thommo

Interior done. I can finally button it up. You can hardly see a thing. There is an IP in there with 4 dials using cut-down decals from a 1/48 dial decal sheet but you'd never know. And the wood grain effect is all but invisible. Seat shoulder harness from Tamiya tape, buckles from fine wire. Did not bother with a lap belt.

I've been experimenting with simulating woodgrain. None of these are yellow enough compared to the aircraft in the AWM. The base coat for all is Tamiya Wooddeck Tan & Flat Yellow, some with more yellow, but not enough. Probably the closest is the bottom 2 panels on the left. The bottom one has Humbrol Matt Brown streaked on, the one above is with brown watercolour pencil drawn on. Then both have a dilute mix of Tamiya Clear Orange & Flat Yellow brushed over. Then Future over everything. Another round of experiments will ensue, this time with more flat yellow in the Tamiya Wooddeck Tan - Flat Yellow base colour mix.

Thanks gents. More upgrades today - the start of changing the shape of the top wing cutout (idea borrowed from Ray), added bits for elevator wires & re-did elevator hinges, and as per Ray's build, re-did the props using some spare blades from God-knows-what and making the ends a bit blunter. Also filled the massive ejector pin marks. I'm also going to upgrade the radiator.

Engine painted. Alclad Burnt Iron, Alclad Dark Alum. with a thin overspray of Tamiya dark sand, Nato Black, Tamiya Alum. Geez the digital camera is brutal esp. in Macro Mode. Looks much better with the naked eye, or even with an Optivisor on.

Yup, I found that thread too and have been looking at it religiously!

The kit engine is a blob with a few cylinder like lumps on it, so I've added some basic detail.

Glad I found this thread. Some great tips here for my current 1/72 Airfix Albatros DVa build, esp. re doing wood grain. Seems I need to get me some clear orange! I'll lay down a base of Tamiya Wood Deck Tan, then need to decide if I do the darker wood grain streaking with oils, pencil, or as you did - drybrushing a darker brown. If I have the patience, I'll experiment off the kit. I also note the DVa has 2 extra lengths of rigging on each wing running from the lower interplane strut base to the top of the cabane struts.

Very nice. I love the old Gladiator.

A friend found this for me in an Op Shop for $5. The red box had me hoping it was a new tooling, but it seems not. It is still rough as bags. I'm building it in the same livery as the one in the Australian War Museum in Canberra - a plane that was forced down by Australian pilots in an RE8 in 1917. Sadly, shortly after forcing it down, both pilots were killed by the same armor piercing bullet fired by another German fighter from behind. Their plane circled for hours before it ran out of fuel and came in for a gentle crash landing. As per usual, I started with scratching in the cockpit, making stuff you will never see 🙄. I got some machine guns from a 1/72 B17 kit and am modifying them as the kit guns are total rubbish.

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Thanks gents. I did steal the plasma bolt idea from another modeller, but his model was much larger. Squeezing it into 1/72 was a challenge. The bolt actually looks much more like in the movie in real life than in a video. In the video it comes across as a bright flash but with the naked eye you see the very fine purple bolts.

Video of it in action.

Some pics of the Plasma Bolt in action. Almost finished now. Of course at this late stage the negative wire from the battery broke at one of my dodgy solders, so I had to pull the entire back rock wall off and fix it. Thankfully it was only attached with hot glue so came of in one piece. But there will be a bit of touching up to do. In the last pic you can just see the engine and instrument screen lights.

Thanks gents I think it could be both these things actually. I noticed it seemed a bit thick compared to my other Alclads. I do blast a bit of Alclad airbrush cleaner through before using Alclad, but perhaps that was not enough. Good to know that Mr Color Leveling Thinner is compatible because I actually have some of that stuff. It is a very good thinner. I often use it with my Tamiya paints.

Model parts now attached to the base.

Started on the diorama terrain last night. Packaging foam shaped with a hot knife heated over our gas stove. Consequently, I may have ruined one of the wife's knives 😬...still the tip was busted off it anyway. I was going to make a hot wire cutter, but couldn't be bothered. Various gaps and trenches need to be cut to go over the wiring to make it sit flat on the base. It's a bit tricky as the engines and pod need to be attached to the wiring & base BEFORE the terrain is installed. So I'm aiming to paint most of the terrain off the base, then add it around the model supports (which are 4mm clear plastic tubing from Bunnings, but I'll have to paint it the same colour as the terrain else the wiring inside will be too visible). Then hide gaps with more small bits of terrain & paint those being careful to not overspray onto the model.

Anyone ever had this happen when airbrushing Alclad? I thought there may have been some residue in my airbrush, but it is only my Aluminium Alclad doing this, other colours were fine. Luckily it brushed off the model easily, but I had to abandon using this colour and switch to chrome.

Started painting the pod. There's nothing like a digital camera to reveal where you got a little too much superglue 😧. Can't see it at all with the naked eye, or even with an optivisor.

I'm saving that pic for later! It's bloody noisy too. A big zap & crackle. And it is also the right colour, a type of blue-purple. BTW those power step-up modules are only $10AUS on Ebay. But they do warn not to let it run for more than about a minute or it will overheat & die. I am thinking of also making a static plasma bolt out of fishing line & painting it bright purple and placing it near the electric arc.....but the arc might melt it? I just tested my last LED that will illuminate the screen on the instrument panel & it works. Miracles will never cease. When running a 9V battery, you need a 300 ohm resistor for the LEDs as they are only rated for 3V. Also, even the tiny 2mm LEDs often have to be attacked with the dremel to sand off the ridge such that they will fit through tiny holes. But so far, I've not killed one doing that. Here in Oz we have a franchise called Jaycar where you can get small electrical stuff very cheaply.

Not very long as I'm already discovering every time I test the circuit! Maybe 15-20, 1-2 second zaps of the plasma bolt, then the distance you can zap (which is a max of about 1.8cm) begins to decrease and the engines need to be moved closer together. But once it is finished, the button will hardly ever be pressed.

Alien pilot painted & the majority of the electrics wired up. I'm slowly getting the hang of my $15 battery operated soldering iron (3xAA batteries). You get about 15-30mins of soldering time, then the batteries need replacing. I really should have invested in a decent one but meh. My electrical design skills have improved too - this time everything worked 1st time (well one more LED still to wire in so fingers crossed). Wiring in parallel is the trick. In series, too much voltage drop across the LEDs = they won't all work. That other black tube powers the plasma bolt between the engines......it may end in tears with 9V ramped up to 40,000V, I'm thinking it will need a small metal shroud on each engine to protect the plastic.

Work on the alien pilot. A 1/72 WW2 pilot, with 1/48 scale hands, scratch built head and clothing out of Tamiya two-part epoxy. Legs removed to fit under instrument panel. Tamiya tape harness.

Scratch, scratch, scratch.... I'm also trying to convert a 1/72 WW2 pilot into a podracer creature. Making ears in 1/72 scale is interesting. Think I'll give him 1/48 scale hands though.

Some early progress on the cockpit module. Bits & pieces thrown together from my spares box. Seat & IP scratch built.

More engine progress. The Cricut turned out to be a Godsend. I cut some donut shaped pieces and the exhaust flap segments into styrene sheet which is about 0.5mm thick using the 'Plastic Packaging' setting with higher pressure and the fine point blade. It will make 2 cutting passes which does not go all the way through, but you can then use the exacto blade and just wiggling it to get it out. Those triangular pieces are only about 6mm long, 2.1mm at one end and 1.1mm the other end.