crookedmouth Posted January 27, 2010 Posted January 27, 2010 (edited) OK - I'd like to enter this one. It'll be my first ever WW1 aircraft. I've also taken delivery this day of Pheon Models' excellent "SE5a Aces In France" decal set and am considering doing Major Caldwell's checker tailed D6864, although I'm far from decided. However, there's a rider. I have to admit that my enthusiasm got the better of me and it's a bit more started than "no major sub-assemblies". Is it acceptable? Edited January 31, 2010 by crookedmouth
ollieholmes Posted January 28, 2010 Posted January 28, 2010 We are happy to allow this one in so good luck.
crookedmouth Posted January 31, 2010 Author Posted January 31, 2010 Made some progress this weekend. The kit flew together and even without locating pins, it built beautifully with little seaminess. To make the painting easier, I intend leaving the top wing off till the paint job is mostly done. Actually, to be truthful, I'm scared pooless about fitting the wing and also about rigging it so I'm putting it off a bit.
crookedmouth Posted February 5, 2010 Author Posted February 5, 2010 Progress made here A coat on the upper and lower surfaces. The box sez WWI RFC Green or some such nonexistent colour for the top and raw linen for the lower. Well, having neither of those< i mixed my own. On top is a 50/50 of Humbrol 155 (olive drab) and Revell 32117 (africa brown) with a dash of white to lift it up a little. I then brushed over heavily with the same again but lightened with a bit more white to accentuate the ribbing. It actually looks OK to me. Underneath, and trying to emulate the colour in this thread was white, tinted with Revell's african brown, again washed out with a lightened topcoat of the same. Looks like the tailplane needs another coat on the bottom. Still trying to put off building the top wing!
magpie Posted February 8, 2010 Posted February 8, 2010 looking good so far. I use Citidel bleached bone from Games Workshop for clear doped linen undersides it's acrylic and needs to be thinned quite a lot but brushes on well. The colour you've used looks very similar. Be brave and get the top wing on. Ed
crookedmouth Posted February 9, 2010 Author Posted February 9, 2010 looking good so far. I use Citidel bleached bone from Games Workshop for clear doped linen undersides it's acrylic and needs to be thinned quite a lot but brushes on well. The colour you've used looks very similar. Be brave and get the top wing on.Ed Thanks - how does the green look? I think the reproduction in the photo is quite true to the actual model, but does it look suitably WWI green? Not that I'll be changing it now!
magpie Posted February 9, 2010 Posted February 9, 2010 Thanks - how does the green look? I think the reproduction in the photo is quite true to the actual model, but does it look suitably WWI green? Not that I'll be changing it now! Looks fine and I like the way you've highlighted the ribs and stringer detail. RFC green had a lot of variation but is generally accepted to have been a greenish shade at the start of the war and browner at the end. Personally I do a different mix for each model anyway as I don't want them all looking the same.
crookedmouth Posted February 13, 2010 Author Posted February 13, 2010 (edited) Well here we go with the next installment and I've made plenty of progress. Got the top wing on after lots of prevaricating and hesitation and it wasn't quite as bad as I'd expected (although still fairly nerve wracking). I didn't use a jig of any sort - I used modelling glue to fix the interplane struts and the front fuselage struts to the top wing and left it to go off a bit - just enough that the whole deal was stable but still flexible. I then CA'd the struts to the lower wing and fuselage - the idea being that this meant that I had enough flexibility in the top wing to set it straight but the CA would dry quickly enough that I would have to sit there like an idiot for a day holding it all together waiting for it to go off. It all worked surprisingly well - trying to get the six struts to locate on the lower wing & fuselage, while not knocking them off or spreading CA all over the shop was a trial, but once these were in in place, they pretty much set the forward/aft position of the upper wing automatically and I only had to make sure it wasn't skewed off to port/stbd. Once all that was done, I fixed the rear fuselage struts in place. I also made a start on some rigging. I'll be using stretched sprue for this and the method I used was posted by someone on one of these forums a while back. It's the "set it alight and poke it onto a bit of paper and pull" method and with a bit of practise I managed to get some pretty decent wires. The trick seems to be to keep pulling at a steady but not-too-fast-not too-slow rate. At first the sprue pulls out as several parallel hair thin fibres, but eventually as it cools, the fibres meld to come off the melty sprue tip in a single strand. I can't be certain that they scale rightly or that I'll even be able to do consistent diameters, but for my first attempt at this sort of thing, I'm not going to sweat it. The kit comes with decals for the control pulleys in the triangular windows in the wings, but I decided to paint them in by hand. I think it looks nicer than the decals. All in all, I have a good feeling about this at the moment (cue disaster!). Edited February 13, 2010 by crookedmouth
Rowan Broadbent Posted February 13, 2010 Posted February 13, 2010 CM, That's coming on a treat! Might I make one quick observation? before you go further with the rigging (which looks great, BTW); I'd suggest that you get the gloss coat, decals and any finishing matt/semi matt finish coat on pronto, as if you wait until all the wires are in place the necessary handling might well dislodge them - stretched sprue is not very forgiving of lateral stress, plus if you are going to apply the gloss and finish coats with an air brush, you will get some thickening and possible beading of the varnish on the wires. I find it easier to do all the decal and varnish work before fitting the top wing. Just a thought!
crookedmouth Posted February 14, 2010 Author Posted February 14, 2010 Rowan - thanks for the advice - I'll certainly bear that in mind. However, I've just spotted the big mistake - the front flying wires should be attached to the undercarriage struts, not the wing/fuselage join! Pooh! so I'll have to start again.
magpie Posted February 14, 2010 Posted February 14, 2010 Rowan - thanks for the advice - I'll certainly bear that in mind. However, I've just spotted the big mistake - the front flying wires should be attached to the undercarriage struts, not the wing/fuselage join! Pooh! so I'll have to start again. For your first go at a WW1 aeoroplane you are doing really well. Nice look to the exhausts. Don't worry about the rigging just yet. Should be the last thing to do after painting and decalling.
crookedmouth Posted February 22, 2010 Author Posted February 22, 2010 Well, here we are. I'm embarrassed to find that, not only did I finish the first model of the GB but also the second. Either I'm way too fast or you're all way too slow! I can guess which! The rigging is my least favourite aspect of this build. I realise now that I could have done a much better job - the first few wires went in fine, nice and taut, but after that I seemed to lose the will to do it well enough. Consequently the aft mainplane wires are horribly saggy - more so than is apparent from the pictures. I lost my nerve and didn't rig the tailplane or any of the control wires either. The decals went on beautifully - thanks to Rowan for those - but I'm not sure I've done them justice. In the end, I decided not to do the checkertail plane but did "C1117 Capt Ira Jones 74 Sqn". Dunno why - I suppose that I just liked the big "T"! Despite the rigging nightmare, I think I'd like to try another bipe sometime soon. I suspect that I'll try the fishing line rigging and drilled installation method next. All said and done, I'm dead happy with this. It won't win any prizes but in many ways it's the best model I've done to date. Thanks a lot for watching and for your encouraging messages and best of luck with your builds.
T-Tango Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Lovely build mate, well done, I hope my 1/32 turns out as good.
The Velociweiler Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Bl**dy hell, that looks fantastic....!!
OzH Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Looks good, like it alot May have to try one of these...
blimp Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 i wish i was that good the fist time it tried it ! srly , brilliant effort . - here's a tip from an old bodger , soggy wires ? - light a match . extinguish it , and hold it NEAR the offender . it will 'snap' taut again . simples . err , dosn't work to well if they're painted though , sorry . don't give up , you've got real talent there . you might even get to enjoy it
magpie Posted February 23, 2010 Posted February 23, 2010 Very very nice Se5a turned out really well. We all get a few saggy wires I use a heated pin held in a pair of pliers. I heat the pin over a gas flame on the kitchen cooker till it glows red hot then quickly get it close to the saggy wire. Not too close or it will burn and part. Get it just right and it snaps tight like magic.
crookedmouth Posted February 23, 2010 Author Posted February 23, 2010 Heating the wires? Does that work on sprue? Eek! I don't know if I've got the guts!
blimp Posted February 23, 2010 Posted February 23, 2010 i love sprue me , for one thing it's FREE ! there's a choice of colours and it can be made as thick or thin as needed . other stuff like fishing line , lycra thread , 'shirring' elastic etc. are often used as well . - for those of the 1/48th persausion , Aeroclubs rigging material is highly popular , (use with CA) it's stretchiness keeps it in tension and can even survive the odd knock
crookedmouth Posted February 23, 2010 Author Posted February 23, 2010 One thing that occurs to me about rigging a bipe by drilling holes for the wires is surely that it has to be done first, in which case all those wires are going to make the painting and decalling very difficult? I'm keen to see how the other GBers deal with this step. I'm hoping to pick up some tips.
blimp Posted February 23, 2010 Posted February 23, 2010 a lot of 'bipers paint them first , drill (carefully) rig and then trim off the excess , touching up/filling as needed . often the exits are covered by roundels anyway , handy that
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