Whirly

Hobbycraft Boeing Vertol CH-113 Labrador 1/72 Finished in delivery scheme (around 1965) with the aid of Belcher Decals, here the build thread: I know some details are missing and I will add them in due course, but the main goal to me is achieved since I wanted to model this rare paint scheme. Thanks to the hosts and to all that contributed with their threads and encouraging others in this fantastic group build!

Glad to know I'm not the only one I found this decal set challenging! Well, since I really wanted to post the finished model in the gallery but time and will were very limited lately, I hereby state that the model is completed, despite all aerials, pitots, lights I perfectly know are missing, perhaps also some walkways (I have to check my references). So, if you are willing to believe my claim, images will be shortly in the gallery.

And this is the other side completed. I had to source elsewhere a suitable decal for the underside dayglo rectangle which is neither provided nor mentioned in the instructions. Speaking of dayglo, here the contrast between "RESCUE" wording and the painted areas is exacerbated by the camera rendering, but the decal is unfortunately orange and not at all red-orange as it should be.

Thank you Craig! A bit of comment on the decals: God bless Michael Belcher for producing them, I reckon this is the only Canadian firm currently on the market. They went on quite well, just needed liberal applications of setting solution but I think it's also a consequence of the multiple colors used. There are though a few annoying things to be aware of if you care about such things: BD11A is a multiple subjects sheet covering Labradors/Voyageurs, Chinook, Cormorant and Bell 412 as an addition. Nowhere in the instructions you are clearly told which decals on the

Revell black is slowly drying up. Meanwhile I applied transfers on the right side.

Thank you all for the positive comments, they help a lot to keep high the motivation Lack of updates is because I had to redo some areas of white and dayglo after lifting the masks, then I shooted some coal black for the rear engine area plus rotor blades and I ran into troubles. I used for the first time after many years a tin of Revell enamel SM302 (I was fed up of the good old Humbrol 85 new formula behaviour) seems the Revell paint is even worse: after 4 days is still tacky but not uniformously. Really puzzled. Last evening I started applying the decals, very c

Finally some colour! Well.... some paint! This is only the white coat already masked. Ok, now we are talking! And then blue (it is not actually so bright and violet, the hue is shifted by the fluorescent light over my paint shop)

A little step back in the timeline: I refined a little the cockpit parts since they are really very clunky. I added also the perforated side panels for the transparent nose but I failed to notice an important detail that will emerge later... The main transparency required a lot of adjustments with plasticard and filler to obtain a smooth joint. I think most of it was caused by the front fuselage distortions not fully cured.

And now the tank braces. Not only they differ between Voyageur and Labrador being round versus flat, but also the rear attachment point to the fuselage is bulkier with the bigger tanks as can be seen in the photo comparison in my post above. I considered trimming down the parts provided in the Hobbycraft kit but it was a no-no, too fiddly. Best compromise is using a surplus set of the smaller front fairings, which I did not have, so I robbed a pair from one of the Fujimi kits I have for lack of time and I will make resin copies later to replace the missing ones. Locatin

Thank you Craig! Next I had to shorten the sponsons as pointed out by Patrick a few posts above. Initially I didn't think it was so relevant but after comparing photos knowing what to look for the difference became quite evident. Please look at the following montage I did with a Voyageur after SARCUP upgrade and a Labrador which, as far as I know, always kept the original tanks (the image is flipped because I couldn't find anything with the correct angle of the right side). Note also the different fairing for the tank braces on the fuselage, more of that later.

Thank you! I've also solved the problem of blade bending with a much safer procedure: you only need the back of a quite stiff gym mat, a FIMO rolling pin decommisioned by my now-grown-up daughter and a moderate hand pressure. With this method I obtained the mild curvature I needed and also the rebuilt blade survived the treatment!

I do hope! From visual observation only the Pavla ones are certainly off...

Hello, I recently purchased both resin floats from DF HeloSTuff and the hot new LF Models kit to help me complete the current project but I'm not sure I did a good move. Please see below a visual comparison of these two pairs with the old Pavla parts I battled with for a few days: Detailed measures are as follows: PAVLA diam. 9.5mm lenght 57mm LF MODELS diam. 8mm lenght 61mm DF HELO STUFF diam. 7.5mm lenght 54.5mm Now you can see there are wild variations... anyone can gi

Then you can start the Mi-26 to dry them up! Wonderful collection @JagRigger, nice to see them all together.

And here is the finished improvement: I'm quite satisfied by the result