Boneychest

I just bought a Sparmax compressor from Air-Craft.net. Being new to the hobby (after a 40 year break), I didn't know the company and didn't want to spend over £200 online without some reliable reviews, so I looked here first. I am delighted with the speed of delivery and communications (not to mention the price). I'll definitely be adding you to my 'favourites' list.

That cockpit detail looks amazing! The fire extinguishers are made of copper (obviously not toothpicks 🤣) - When I was at Marham we got hold of the life expired ones and cut the tops and bottoms off, soldered them back together again (neck to base) to make goblets and polished and planished them.

Time to make a start on the annexes. I forgot to take any photo’s until after the whole structure had been glued up and I was part way through adding the window frames to the inside wall. I’ll try to be a bit more diligent with the camera next time around. I didn’t like the effect - the windows are too deep in the wall, so they got cut out and I made individual frames to be set midway in the wall. The yellow plastic spacers were made to help set the frames squarely in the wall cavity, they worked reasonably well but weren’t easy to keep true while trying to balance the annexe, window frame and glue, so I made a ‘new improved’ set (in orange), which worked much better. The result was more pleasing, but still not accurate; they should probably be closer to the outer face of the wall. You can still see the remaining card edges on the inner wall from where the first set of frames were cut out. I couldn’t find a satisfactory way to join the corners so that the brickwork would go all the way to the corner - other than making a mitre joint, so that’s what I did. Unfortunately, I had gone too deep with the laser cutter and individual bricks started falling off while I was making the 45 deg angles (and kept falling off every edge that I handled). It looks ok from a distance though, and I decided to Carry on and paint it - I can fill the gaps afterwards, and the paint should help to hold it together! That was a few months ago, but when I offered both annexes up to the main hangar wall last week I decided to bin them and start again! It's amazing how bad an 'it'll do' job looks when you come back to it after a break. They don't look so bad in this photo but I've restarted them now, so I'll finish. Will keep hold of these until I'm happy with the replacements. I have redrawn all annexe walls with comb joint corners and the test pieces look ok. Each course of bricks is just 1.25mm high. I hope to cut the ‘real’ parts later this week, then I’m away for half term, so no further progress for a while.

Thanks for the kind comments folks. Sharing - that's why we all post here isn't it. It took me quite some time to pull them all together and hopefully putting the whole lot here will save someone else having to search again, or help them find some related documents (Type J anyone?). I'll be using 0.15mm PVC sheet, sandwiched betaween the window frames already shown in the build so far, and the ones shown below (sitting on the PVC sheet). I haven't decided (tested) yet, how much scuffing or other treatment it needs to give the dirty, windblown effect. I won't be painting them because I'm going for a cold war period finish rather than WWII. It'll have cold war jets. The stash waiting to be built include three Javelins (T3 & FAW9), two Victor K2s, Jaguar T2 and Lightnig F3 (plus a Shack AEW2) - apart from the Javelins, all aircraft that I have worked on. I hope to add Buccaneer S2B, Canberra B2, Harrier GR3 & Tonka GR4 if I see them at the right price.

Next up are the cross braces that fit into the end bays either side of the main doors. These need a gap behind them when added to the structure, so they were made of the same 1.5mm greyboard and with 1.5mm packing strips. Mustn’t forget which way round they go when adding them to the wall! These are very delicate, so I have sprayed them with shellac to stiffen the thin webs - that should also help with sealing the card for painting. I used shellac because it penetrates the card without swelling the fibres.

While the ‘big bits’ were drying, I glued the two layers of Pillars, longitudinal struts etc together using Roket Card Glue. This took longer than I expected and was a bit fiddly - the glue set almost instantly when the two parts were pressed together, so I worked from one end to the other, one pillar at a time, lining everything up as I went along. When the PVA had set on the big bits, the greyboard pillar/strut assembly was glued to the white card using Roket glue again. The MDF extends 3mm below the level of the doors and pillars so that it will sit into a routed groove on the baseboard, when I eventually make it! The final bit for now is gluing on 4mm MDF strips to make up the remaining thickness of the pillars, with slots in the top to hold the rafters up - the two end pillars will be added later and are part of the cross brace assembly.

When the drawings were ready to convert to laser cutter files, I tested the power settings using a 10mm square brick pattern to see how deep and wide the ‘mortar’ was. Happy with the setting, I started cutting all the parts that I had drawn so far - I later decided that the cuts were too deep, as you will see when I post the photos of the first annex build. These are the main parts that make up the hangar walls. I wanted the cross-sectional dimensions to be accurate as well as the general layout, so I bought various materials of different thickness. Each layer is glued onto the one below it in the picture. The white card is split into two halves because I couldn’t get sheets big enough - the seam in the middle doesn’t matter because it’s covered by the centre pillar when all glued up. I coated the whole inner wall of the MDF with PVA and then stuck the two pieces of white card to it, pressed under a fair old weight to try and stop it from bowing as it dried.

There are quite a few drawings available online, but they don't cover everything, so there's quite a bit of calculating and educated guesswork involved. Technical Bulletin 02/02 World War II Hangars - Guide to Hangar Identification. Download here https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20090806140000/http://www.defence-estates.mod.uk/publications/technical_bulletins/2002/tb02_02_drawings/tb_02-02.pdf or here https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20121109120104/http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/D389ED08-80D6-4D86-8342-D80C7E474DB2/0/TB02_02.pdf Health and Safety Warning Notice 01/02 Inspection of Hangar Doors, Door Top Guides. Type C Hangars. Download here https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20091204135447/http://www.defence-estates.mod.uk/publications/health_and_safety/2001/hswn_01-02.pdf or here https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20090430180506/http://www.defence-estates.mod.uk/publications/health_and_safety/2002/hswn_02-08.pdf Links to available construction drawings https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20091204140336/http://www.defence-estates.mod.uk/publications/technical_bulletins/2002/tb02drawings.php DE/H1/100/110 at above address DE/H1/100/111 at above address Technical Bulletin 01/45. Design and Maintenance Guides: Guides to World War II Hangars DMG24-03 Type C Hangar DMG25-O4 Type J/K Hangar. Download here https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20090804215153/http://www.defence-estates.mod.uk/publications/technical_bulletins/2001/tb_01-45.pdf or here https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20120906025631/http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/4F042992-CF74-4C68-987B-D46FAD2BF44B/0/tb0145.pdf I also looked at a lot of photos to try and get dimensions and layout of the annexes - there are so many variations that in the end I just settled for symmetry.

Sorry I've not been around for a while - loads of reasonable excuses, but mainly that I haven't progressed too far with assembling. All work stopped to go into production of facemasks for the NHS when we went into lockdown 1 last year and I never really got back to it. I have spent quite a bit of time redrawing parts - mainly the door gantries, which I think I have got close enough now and redoing the main doors (couldn't find the crew room door for the annex though, might need the NAAFI wagon ;-)). I'll add a few photos in the next few days.

I'm working on a 1934 C type hangar. I couldn't find any on the web so decidied to build one from scratch. It was going to be a 10-bay shed but at 1/72 that's too big (to store/display and for the laser ctter), so now it'll be an 8-bay - I doubt any were built that small but it'll do nicely for any photo's that I want to take with aircraft in and/or outside. This is a brick built one (brickwork laser cut into the material) but I already think a concrete one would have been easier. No idea how long it's likely to take. I have drawn most of it out on 2D CAD and laser cut the parts from MDF, greyboard and white card. All layers visible (except notes and dimentions). This was drawn at full size and then each part was copied and reduced to 1/72 scale in a new drawing. Most of the main hangar parts cut out. I was unsure whether to build up the walls by full length layers or by individual parts/frames of full thickness. In the end I went for the former; still not sure if that was the best way but it's what I've got! Most of the parts for both annexes - one roof not shown, and all window frames still to cut. Window frames and some plastic spacers to help position them centrally in the wall thickness. Next - time to trial fit and start gluing....

Hi, I've been reading through a lot of the WIP posts on here and am in awe of the quality of the workmanship. It's been something like 40 years since I last built a model aircaraft; now I have two Javelin T3s, a Javelin FAW9, two Victor K2s (Airfix & Revell), a Jaguar T4, and a Shackleton AEW all waiting to be started, but first I have a hangar to build. I discovered the site while googling for information about 'C' type hangars and found a couple of threads on here of 1/48 scale blister type hangars, from there I started looking at builds of all the aircraft types that I have in boxes on top of the wardrobe. So my hangar is my first priority and has all been drawn up on CAD, most of the parts have been laser cut and I have started to put it together. I'll add a post once I figure out where it should go - Aircraft (as the two others that I found are) or Dioramas. I'm ex RAF (demobbed 2002) and my main interest is in British Cold War aircraft. Apart from the Javelin (which I loved seeing as a young boy), all the models I want to build are of aircraft that I have worked on at some time. Thank you all for your inspirational posts on here. Tony