nimrod54

Thanks Loren. I have been steadily plugging away at these three over the last couple of weeks and have made fairly good progress. The majority of the decals are on and I have just started adding the undercarriage to the -18E, the pylons are painted but the missiles and bombs etc need some paint and decals have then to be added to both pylons and the dangly bits that require them. Sadly, I won't get all of that done before tonights deadline, but work will continue and I am not committing to anything else until I have finished this trio along with the pair of A4's, yet to be started, that I said I would build for this GB. Here are a few pics taken a short time ago of the progress made so far. First the F/A-18D by John L, on Flickr Next up the EA-18G by John L, on Flickr And bringing up the rear, one of the F/A-18E, minus the undercarriage legs at this stage. by John L, on Flickr To those still tagging along, thanks for dropping in. Cheers for now John

Thanks for your comments Peter.

Thanks guys, having finished a Blitzbuild in the same week is a bonus for me. It's a nice little kit that goes together really well and there is also a small etch set available to improve the dive brake detail - but not for a Blitzbuild. I added the spinner on Friday and took some more photos of the finished model this afternoon, so finally here is the end result. Douglas SBD-3 Dauntless CX-6 USSEnterprise, VB-6 during Wake Island Raid, 24 February 1942 Brengun 1/144 by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr Off to see if I can blitz some Hornets now. John

A few days later than expected, but here is the model almost complete. In the end I stripped the paint from the canopy and masked up the frames then repainted those, for @Tim Taylor here are a couple of photos showing the vertical frames masked up, and the result after unmasking having brushed on the top colour. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr I finished adding most of the remaining parts last night and the aerial wire this morning. I almost missed the small spinner which was still on the sprue, I had to quickly paint it up and have left it to dry. I'll add that later and take some final photos, but here are some of how it looks so far. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr John

Tim, In this scale and for this tyoe of canopy, I would generally mask the frames off with 1mm tape one row at a time (horizontally then vertically) and paint that row before proceeding to the next. But in order to speed things up, tonight I decided to paint them freehand, needless to say I am not happy with the end result. I'll see if I can rescue it tomorrow. John It has gone well matey just running out of time. As a former Production Planner you would think that I would be better at managing my time. John

After a couple of hours spent hand painting the canopy frames and adding the decals I have decided to call it a day for today on this one. I'll wrap it up tomorrow and post the finished photos in this thread. The decals need to bed in then I can add a clear coat to seal them in before adding the rest of the details and I may revisit the canopy framing. Here are a couple of photos of progress so far. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr Cheers for now. John

Thanks for the comments guys, I stopped for something to eat a short while ago. This how things stood before starting today. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr And after around one hour I had filled and tidied the joins, glued the canopy in place and added the port and starboard tailplanes. by John L, on Flickr After a break for some lunch I spent the rest of the afternoon painting and this is how it looks now. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr Things should be dry enough for me to unmask later, then I can paint the canopy and start on the decals. Cheers John

I finally made a start early this afternoon. After cleaning up and painting the few cockpit details I glued those into the starboard fuselage half and then assembled the fuselage and wings. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr And after around 51/2 hours work that's how I left things when I had to break for our evening meal. That should give the model time to set up and I may have a shorter session later to clean up the joins and carry out the filling around the the wing root and fin. by John L, on Flickr More later. John

Cheers matey. I have to decide when to make a start now. 🕛

Ooo! This looks egg-citing. I look forward to seeing the chick progress H.

Nice to hear from you Jean, I hope that everything is well with all of you down there in Zim. I am gradually recovering from a course of chemotherapy and that is why there has been less activity from me here on Britmodeller lately. Good news from my last CT scan though, it shows that the tumour is continuing to shrink and a lymph node discovered at the initial screening has been resolved. Caron has been a rock through the treatment and the Black Beauty still thinks that she is a puppy and seems to have boundless amounts of energy, As I have said before, the eyesight is greatly assisted by my special glasses, they are useful for these smaller scale models. by John L, on Flickr There are no plans to drop down to 1/720 scale just yet - I think that I would need to change my prescription for that. Cheers for now. John Thanks chaps. I hope that I can get this finished this time around, I don't want to rush things though. John

My record hasn't been that great for past BIitzbuilds with many of them, having failed to make the deadline, being candidates for the year end KUTA. This time I thought that I would try to improve my chances with this little kit of the Douglas Dauntless SBD-3. 🤞 Here are the box and contents pics. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr See y'all over the weekend. John

I have made some more progress on the swarm since the last update and have brought both the 18E and 18D up to a similar stage as the 'F' variant. I have started painting up the intakes for them and once these are fixed in place they should be about ready for some primer and paint. by John L, on Flickr John

I haven't had a lot of enthusiasm for modelling of late and still have a couple of incomplete builds hanging around from the Baby Boomers GB, so questioned the sense in starting more models that may end up being unfinished. That said, perhaps a series of quick builds could be the very thing that is required to kickstart the modelling mojo. First kit out of the trap for this trio was the F-18G and after priming the cockpit parts yesterday I set about some detail painting. by John L, on Flickr Once the paint was dry I assembled the front and rear cockpit tubs, added the decals and glued the assemblies into the lower fuselage section. by John L, on Flickr After painting the undercarriage bays white I glued the upper and lower fuselage sections together and added the seats. Some filler will be need to neaten up the join, paticularly where the join line runs diagonally across panel sections. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr I then decided to break out the F-18E and removed the parts that I would need to get that kit to the same stage of assembly. I primed the areas that would need further detailing and that is where I left things for today. by John L, on Flickr John.

Great job H, and good to see the tradition of naming the pilot is being maintained. 😃