opus999

I'm planning my next build, which is going to be the Airfix 1/72 Fiat G.50. This is my first Italian build -- I've been a WWII aircraft fan my whole life but am woefully uninformed about Italian aircraft of the time. The painting instructions show the subject to be green mottles on tan (352a squadron, 20 Gruppo, N. Africa 1941). I did some research over the last few days and almost all of the pictures of G.50's from 352 squadron I could find were green and red-brown "stripes" over tan. I found one black and white photo of a mottled 352 sq. G.50, which I assume is green over tan. My question is: which is right? or are both right? It's possible that camo schemes changed over time. Or maybe Airfix had it wrong? One page I found (https://micheleraus.blogspot.com/2011/07/) was a modeller who made a "striped" G.50 of 352 squadron which he says is from Martuba Libya, 1941. He includes a picture of a "Striped" aircraft -- 352-4. So it seems like, if he did his homework correctly, this would be the scheme that the Airfix kit should be. If anyone has some hard evidence for a green mottle over tan scheme, I'd be interested to see it... otherwise I'm leaning toward the "Striped" scheme. Thanks everyone!

Yeah, it's a puzzler... I also notice that in the photos of the museum piece, the medium gray and light gray seem to be swapped when compared to the operational photos I found. It's weird, but at least I match one set of photos!

I set out to fix the landing gear on Monday night. When I was stripping the paint and disassembling it, I managed to break the wheel off. So these photos show the good gear and the bad gear side by side to show the extent of the damage: I've been thinking of several schemes to fix it, but most were unworkable because of the small size of the broken part. In the end, I cut a flat spot in the bottom of the gear, ...and then put another flat on a piece of styrene the correct diameter: ...and glued them together with Tamiya thin In the above pictures I'd trimmed the styrene to fit in the wheel and painted it already. It is strong enough because I was able to get it on it's feet last night: Also last night I ran brake cables using 0.2 mm lead wire: I also did a whole lot of little detail painting, but nothing worth taking pictures. On Monday night I also experimented with UV resin, which is new to me. The experiments didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped, but the good news is I was able to make a couple really tiny sensors for the nose and the wing tips. I forgot to take pictures, so I'll have to remember to do that. I'm so close to the end I can taste it! Realistically I won't be able to declare victory until tomorrow night, but tonight there will be some antenna making and gluing-on-of-various-doors.

Not too much of an update tonight since I was out of town this weekend. Over last week I used oil paints to create dirt and grime all over the aircraft Wednesday night, the metal parts were masked off and the whole thing was dull coated. Tonight I got back home and started painting the tires. Clearly I am not finished yet. I also used weathering pastels to create exhaust streaks, but I didn't go too dark. Maybe they should be a little darker. I don't know. also added some exhaust from the vertical lift engines Since dull coat was all finished, I took all the masking off Wow those turbine intakes are comically tiny! There's also some junk in the canopy, so I may need to take it off to clean. ...and the masking came of the pylons as well I was going to add some grime around the wing hinge, but forgot. So, I may do that tomorrow. There is still a lot left to do! I need to work on the landing gears and then see about making all the little antennas that didn't come with the kit!

I'm still trying to wrap up the Yak...🤪

Cheers for that! I've seen a photo of that airframe at the museum before, but not these. They will be helpful because I'm trying to figure out all the little antennas that are on the aircraft. It's interesting that the colors of this museum example are different than the operational ones I found pictures of (like here: https://russianplanes.net/id24849). The Begemot decal instructions said this example got the 4 color camo, and then it was repainted just before being put on display, so that might explain why the colors are different.

Nice work on the fairing. I've really liked the look of the Mk. XIV for a long time, and now I've got a bunch of builds to watch! yay! Maybe I ought to join in the fun too...

I spent a couple hours "finishing" off the decals. No pictures to show, really because the remainder of the decals were stencils. I say "finishing" because I'm not really finished. I had forgotten to gloss coat the rocket pods and the various bay doors so I did that and will complete those decals tomorrow, probably. I also plan to put a protective gloss coat on the whole aircraft tomorrow, so Tuesday will be oil wash and weathering. It would be nice to finish before Thursday because next weekend is all accounted for, but we'll see...

Liquid Gravity... I've heard of it. I should look into that. It seems an easier solution than cutting weights into small pieces and then drowning them in epoxy. I've had a couple models in my life where I had just a hair too little nose weight. I found if I sanded the main wheels a little flat on the bottom, that would keep it on its nose. So that's an option if need be.

Those lading gears look very realistic! The brake line additions are great. I wish I could get wash to behave as well as that on my builds!

Interesting research so far! I'm keen to see how it progresses. Nice work on the body too, the resin aftermarket looks great.

I didn't have any time to post this week, but did have a little time to work on this. Monday and Tuesday I penciled in the panel lines using a schematic I have that matches well with close-up walkaround photos. I found the pencil worked fine on just the Mr. Color paint, which meant I didn't have to spray a dull coat on. That made me happy since I don't want to put more overcoats on than necessary. The drawback to drawing directly on the Mr. Color is that it comes off much easier. If you aren't familiar with how I use a pencil for panel lines, I draw the panel line on with no care taken to how dark it is. Then, I go over it very carefully and very lightly with the eraser to dial it back to where I feel it is believable. I've found this is faster and more controllable than trying to lightly draw them on and not mess with the eraser afterwards. Well, with the Mr. Color, I had to recalibrate how lightly I went over it with the eraser because it didn't take much to completely remove them. Still, I'm pretty happy with how they turned out: Next up on Wednesday night was all the masking for the metal parts. A half-hour of masking, 2 minutes of painting. Well, the exhaust area took a little more, so maybe 10 minutes of painting. In the photo above, you can see where I masked the plate for the IFF antennas on the nose and the antenna just forward of the tail fin. And below, of course, is the exhaust area I used Mr. Color super stainless for all the metal parts, because it seemed to best match the walkaround photos I've seen. On the exhaust area I used Alclad Burnt metal, with Alclad jet exhaust on top of it: I thought I was free to start decals on Thursday night, but realized I forgot the metal at the opening of the intakes. Plus I had to fix the off-center dielectric panel on the nose. Here's a shot of the masking (after I painted and remembered I hadn't taken a picture! ) I also hand painted the white panels on the tail, which my reference says are RSIU short wave ground control system aerials. I had to hand paint them because I didn't have the ability to mask them. I had left the panel lines for those, but even so, they were difficult to paint and didn't come out well. Normally I paint these kinds of features with enamel over the aqua gloss and then use a toothpick to clean it up. In this case all I had was Mr. Color Lacquer and it softens up the aqua gloss, so cleaning up with a toothpick can make an even bigger mess if you're not careful. In the end they turned out just OK. They look fine from arm's length so I guess I'm satisfied. You'll notice I didn't zoom up too far on those... I also hand painted the little white nubbins on the back of the aircraft (my references says they are rear radar warning antennae (sides) and an IFF aerial (bottom): Friday we took the kids to a water park down in Oregon (aside: for living in a an area that collectively has almost 200,000 people, it amazes me that I have to travel an hour to a town of 17,000 people to go to a water park with water slides. In all fairness there are water slides here in the Tri-Cities, but they belong to fitness clubs that you have to be a member of to use ). So, that evening, there wasn't much motivation to hit the bench. Saturday i put on decals and got about 2/3 of them on. There are a lot of stencils (over 100). I debated whether to put them on, but my reference photos are inconclusive, so I opted for detail. Getting close now! I think I can finish the decals today. Then it's weathering which will be on the light side, only because I'm not sure how often the aircraft was used after being turned over to Ukraine. I need to work on the landing gears. I broke one when I was removing the paint. It is broken right where it connects to the wheel, so I need to think about how to fix it. I also plan to run hydraulic lines on them. After that, it will be down to details.

That is fabulous! The lighting really makes it look both incredible and realistic. The diorama you set up is really great... the Tusken Raider and Bantha are a nice touch.

Not my usual scale, but I think this is a terrific looking aircraft, so I'll follow along if I may. Cockpit looks great!

Just found this... I have the 1/72 version of the Academy Mk. XIV. I've wanted to build one for a long time. I think the 1/72 version has the same issues as the 1/48. In the end I had someone here at BM recommend the Sword kit. I was going to excess the Academy, but I can't let plastic go to waste, even if it is inaccurate, so I chose some spare decals and at some point plan to just build it and put it in the back of the cabinet. I'll have a look at some of the notes there are about correcting it -- maybe I'll try some of that. Ironically, the kit had a sheet of paper in it bragging about how accurate the model is and how they used laser scanning of a real Mk. XIV to get the kit exactly right. My lady doth protest too much?? I'm excited to see yours come together.

The P-39 will be interesting! I bought this kit more than a couple years ago. Every time I think about building it, I remember all the reviews I read about how hard it was to keep it from tail sitting, and I put it back. I'm a bit intimidated by trying to cram all the weight in. The Dominican Republic camo is fascinating. Can't wait to see that wrap up!

Very clever there with the switch and battery access!

Let me get out my hole punch, this should only take a second...

Good idea! Thanks for that. I'm happy to hear that, i filled panel lines on my last 2 builds with CA and am very tired of sanding, to say the least.

Thanks Mark, I really like it too... aside from my confusion and frustration with the pattern.

Oh... interesting! I hadn't considered that. Thanks Dennis!

The paintwork looks terrific... its really getting there!

Wow, that is beautiful! The rigging really adds to the realism. I was intrigued by your mention of PE rigging; is it just long sheets of PE "threads" specially built for this kit? As always, a wonderfully realistic build... and a fun thread to follow!

WOW!!! This is going to be fantastic! The videos are a nice touch -- they really help visualize the final product.

I don't mean to cause any thread drift, but I recently bought some clear resin and a curing lamp with the idea that it would make filling "oops"s and panel lines (*cough* Airfix *cough*) easier than my current, tedious, method of CA and sanding. Now I am reading about shrinkage and cracking and dissolving... Which is causing me to wonder if these are things I need to worry about if using the resin for my intended purpose? Given my experience with other materials, I suspect a lot of this comes down to a combination of resin thickness and cure time (which I think has been explicitly stated above). So I guess my questions are: Should I expect difficulties with shrinkage and cracking with panel line filling, what cure times should I use, and Is there such a thing as too much curing? Back to our regularly scheduled program. Thanks for the detailed posts Johnny, they're fascinating even for a non-3D print guy like me!