ScanmanDan

Progress?; Started work on the cockpit. Mg15 need some work and I know that the MG17 barrel is wrong but boy does it look nice;) I'll get some paint on her tonight. Greased Lightning and Dr.Jellyfingers-- Thanks guys! So heartened that you like the paint work. I'm always looking to improve my painting. Hopefully I'll have a bit more tomorrow. Though I did stop into the shops this morning and get the 1/24 scale Fw-190a... Can't help myself. Dan

Progress; Made a misstook. Should have put the four holes on the bottom of the exhaust shroud... Got a bit muddled. Received a Legends resin pilot and brass MG barrels in the post today so I've got more goodies to play with. Thanks for stopping in. woody37, HOUSTON and phildagreek-- Thanks for those comments guys. Had a lousy day today but was buoyed by the encouragement. Dan

Progress; Dan

Steve-- Thanks. As for paints I'm a bit of a magpie. I love paints and have heaps of different ranges. The basic block is in Lifecolor UA407 Panzer Uniform a lovely dark neutral grey. Over that are washes of Reaper violet shadow and deep blue shadow and P3 Armour wash. Drybrushing is in Vallejo Model Air gray primer and Games Workshop Graveyard Earth. Followed up with a hit of pastels in three colours of the Tamiya weathering set F (Titanium, Light gun metal sand copper.) Topped off with a squirt of Testors Dull Coat from a can. Still needs some more washes in oily colours and another hit of pastels but a good start. All the other colours get much the same. Base coat, shadow and highlight with a wash or two and some pastels. Must be close to thirty different paints so far but I just grab what I think will work. Trying out the new formula Games workshop colours right now.( they might just be okay but I'm going to try and get as many of the old ones as I can especially chain mail!) All the better paints; Lifecolor, Vallerjo, Reaper, and Games Workshop thin beautifully and brush paint nicely so that it's a joy to work with them. Lots of thin coats and trying to keep it all subtle( and I'm not very good at subtle). Oh and I forgot the basics...A nice thin coat of Mr.Surfacer 500 thinned with Tamiya lacquer thinners gives the paint something to bite into. HTH Dan

Progress; Always happy slinging paint Had a bit of an AMS attack and added a thin lip of rolled solder to the radiator and then added an upper lip of styrene with some styrene bolts.... At last the radiator is in primer and I can paint it. Steve-- Thanks mate. Radus stuff is always the bees. Your plans boogle my mind as I'm lucky to finish one kit a year! I'll be on the look out for what you start next. Thanks for dropping in for a look. Dan

Progress; Torn the radiator apart and did some mods. Used Radus etched radiator matrix and it works great. Pity I used too fine a screen on the front because you can hardly see it but it looks great at the back. Lots more to add and I'm beginning to add some paint. I stumbled on to something that helped me out with all these little parts. I like to use those tiny photo etched bolt and screw details but they are the devil to hold onto long enough to add them to the model. I'm sure somebody has tried this before but I got to thinking that if I coated the end of a toothpick with liquid masking and let it dry it would still be tacky enough to pick up the part and let me touch it into a blob of superglue then place it on the model. I was surprised that it worked quite well. I find that the superglue doesn't like the masking fluid and if I hold the part for a few seconds then give it a little twist the part stays put. I do find that I have to recoat the toothpick after a few parts but that only takes a second. I'm sure this isn't new but I hadn't seen it before. Give it a try it's made my life a touch easier. Steve-- You Fw190a rocks! I had a kit in my hands yesterday but knowing my nature I put it back on the shelf as I would have started it straight away. Plentty of time for that once I get the Stuka sorted. Glad you like her. Radleigh-- Thanks , do yourself a favour and get a Stuka. It's a great kit! Dan Dan

Thanks to all for sharing their information and opinions. I'm working on the Stuka right now but I think I might give the 190 a go after that. Thanks Jonathan for those nice photos of your 190. Looks great! Dan

Thanks Christof for the encouragement! You should give the old girl a go. Makes into a cracking big bird with much presents. I've taped the larger airframe bits together to see what it would look like and wow! it's a bigun. Progress; Almost time to break out the paint pots! Mostly adding little grubbins and thinning parts, opening up the exhaust and the like. I've started to hack the radiator apart to replace the screening and add some more detail but I thank I need to get the engine in basic black before I go much farther. I don't know if the Jumos had white numbers on the side like the DB engines. Some of the reference pics I have show something there but I can't make it out. Might get the MDC decals and wing it. looking forward to painting and weathering this beastie. Thanks for looking in. Dan

Just wondering if the old Airfix Fw190a was worth the dollars. After enjoying the Hurricane, Mustang and now the Stuka I was thinking about trying the 190a. I have heard that it wasn't as good as some of the others and wondered why? I'm not too fussed about it being 100 percent accurate jut that it builds well and looks like a 190a. Any thoughts? Is it worth dropping a quick $80 bucks on? On another note why no 1/24 scale Corsair kits? Now there would be a kit and a half. Thanks for helping out an old geezer. Dan

Thanks guys I'm glad you like what I'm up to so far. A bit more progress; Plumbing Hollowed out the intake and messed about with yet more plumbing Started to 'imagineer' the firewall Have started to try and figure out how I'm going to get this all together and hooked up after it's painted. I've got to work out some ideas to add electrics to the engine and I'm sure there must have been some kind of mechanical linkages too. Just how they started these puppies up has got me stumped. I know that a crank was inserted into the left rear bottom of the engine but just what that looked like I don't know. More fun to come as I work it all out. Dan

Another kit I always wanted as a kid but couldn't afford. Started to add some detail to that honking great lump of an engine. Airfix let you leave all the nose panels off so why not go to town? Progress? Not a lot of pics to go on so much of this is spurious but will fill the area nicely. Big thanks to Mr. Metz for some pics and to Kostucha for his great build article ( such a pity gravity to such a nasty dislike.) Lots and lots more to do but I'm just puttering along. This one is not going to get the better of me! Thanks for stopping in for a look. Dan

First for the year. My favourite pic. She just looks tired. Thanks for looking. Dan

Some more progress; Radiator finished. Got her up on her pins and most of the detail painting finished. Roughed out a base. Lots of little details to still apply but I can see the end from here. Thanks for looking. Dan

rogress on weathering the underside; Richard, Woody and James-- Thanks for the encouragement and kind comments. Thanks for looking in. Dan

Progress; Other side serials done. Real bugger getting that K in there without a ton of overspray. Looks as if they had to squeeze it in full size as well. Received HobbyDecal dry transfers on Friday( Love the post!) Started applying them. I have much better luck with dry transfers than waterside decals. A joy to use. Spent much of the morning grinding out the resin wheels I cast to fit the rims. I hadn't thought that the rubber tires in the kit are stretchy and therefore slightly under size, hence the grinding. A bit of paint and they are on their way. Worked on the belly radiator and the main gear struts. Took off all the underside masking and had very little overspray to fix up. Need to mask off so I can spray the wheel wells( Silver or interior green?) Having a ball and nearing completion. Now I have to find a spot to put her as I've just noted that she doesn't fit in my Ikea Deltof cases! Thanks for looking in. Dan

Optus mobile broadband is not my friend tonight....Computers & Internet Bah! Progress; Made some headway on the resin wheels. Cast in resin from half molds I made with Instant Mold. Bit more clean up but should work okay Off to work tomorrow. Hope you like her so far. Joachim--Fear not. The camoflage is very bright and contrasty but I'll be adding washes and oversprays to tone it way down before I'm finished. That said I do like a bit more contrast than some in my paint finishes. Just a matter of personal taste. Dan

Bit more on the markings. I'm working on the masks for the four colour fuselage roundels. Now they will be fun, fun, fun. Here's my latest workbench. I now have an area just to do masking/decaling and clean work. It doubles as a area to take photos.

What can be more fun than painting camo on a windy & rainy summer day in Melboourne Now I just have to keep my mits off it for a day so that it will dry and then I can mask off the upper side roundels and markings. I've ordered the dry transfer stencils for her but they won't be in for a week or so, sigh. Mish--Thanks! Nice to know you like her. Mochealvk-- I paint most of my markings because I can't get decals to work for the life of me... I do like how the painted ones look even if it's a bit of work. The Airfix kit is pretty good for as old as it is. I'm never too fussed about detail as long as it looks the part. the kit builds well but I don't know how well the removable cowls would fit if you put the detailed engine on display. I used a heap of superglue and a bit of brute force to get them to fit closed. Good solid kit and a base for detailing. Smeds--Haven't seem the Trumpeter kit but one of Airfix best big kits along with the Stuka. In fact if you've built the Stuka then the detail and fit are very much the same. Dan

Don-- Thanks! Yep casting is a lot of fun and opens up a lot of possibilities. Progress; I don't like decals much so got out the Tamiya masking tape and the circle cutter. Whipped up some masks and airbrushed the roundels. Didn't do too badly and at least no silvering. Dan

crobinsonh--Thank you for your encouragement. I'm glad you liked it. I've spent much of the day scratching a replacement spinner. My kit was missing one when I opened it. I stuck lots of pie shaped profiles of the spinner onto a round baseplate. Then used two part epoxy putty to fill the gaps, after a rough sand to shape. I covered the lot in a thin layer of superglue and talcum power. Much sanding latter I have this; I've still to add the middle joint and some other details but It's looking a bit like a spinner. Working on other bits too. Didn't like the rubber tires and so i cast a replacement tailwheel in superglue from a open face mould. With luck I'll get to work on the main gear legs tonight.

I just wanted to play around with some paint so I broke out an old Airfix 1/24 Hurricane and put it together in about a week over the Christmas break. The kit went together very easily and primed up quiet nicely not too shabby for a kit that's as old as this one. Bit of pre shade. And then on to the sky undersides. Still a bit contrasty but it should weather down in the end. I've got to wait until the paint cures a bit more before I mask off for the roundels. All paints are Tamiya acrylics thinned with Tamiya lacquer thinners. Thanks for looking. Dan

Progress, Rear ejection seat belts finished; Slow going for me, about six hours with the Eduard PE set. More progress, wings on intakes sorted; Tried something new on this build. I have constant problems with cracking seams while I'm sanding out joints. I usually use super glue to both join major parts and as a filler. I must just be too ham fisted and in the process of sanding invariably crack at least one major joint. I thought if I could somehow reinforce the joints I'd have a better chance to not crack anything. I've been using 5 minute two part epoxy putty with some success on the hawk. Here is a pic of what I'm trying. The putty can be pressed into make a shelf for the wing to rest on. If you wet one part like the wing the parts can be pressed together and the wing then removed leaving the putty still stuck to the fuselage but perfectly shaped to support the wing once it's glued on. I also used putty to beef up the fuselage joint and to fix in the cockpit. So far so good. Here's the belly seam after rough sanding and the first coat of primer. I spent a fair while trimming and sanding the parts until I had a good fit before grabbing the super glue. Lots of dry runs to get the best possible fit, though to be fair Revell have done a pretty good job on this kit. Here's the intake; Still working along. Hope to get the rest of the main parts together soon. Thanks for looking. Dan

My first resin kit. Just had to build one as it is such an unusual subject. Still don't know much about it but had fun building it. Kit; Trolly; Finished; For a first resin kit it went together well and has some nice details. Thanks for taking a look. Dan

I've been fussing around with my second Revell Hawk kit. I've really been inspired by Geedubelyers build and have shamelessly copied many of his modifications. As I wanted to make this one in flight the first order of business was to get a suitable pilot. Revell didn't provide any pilots, a real shame as they make it very easy to build this kit as if it's in flight, and so a Frankenstein like creature was hobbled together out of a Hasegawa Fw190 body and modified Revell X-1 Head and arms. He needed a lot of thinning down and chopping about to get him to fit in the tiny space of the cockpit. I also had to lop off a bit of the bottom of the ejection seat rail to get him to sit down far enough. Following along with Geebudelyer, I opened up the vents on the tail and then backed them with epoxy putty and used a toothpick to press in openings. For the gauges I scribed a line on the back of the glass then filled the line with red paint. Once dry I used a thin strip of white decal to make the gauge and then painted black over the whole back to seal it all in. I used the epoxy putty trick again for the dorsal vents as well. Have glued in the main landing gear covers and all went very well. The kit is going together quite well and I've managed to mount the aircraft on a bit of threaded rod. Such a nice easy kit to work with. Makes a nice change from struggling with older kits. I can't wait until Revell release a second run in grey plastic with different decals. Thanks for taking a look.

Slow going but a little progress. Wheels got finished; Over cooked, and I was trying to be restrained :BANGHEAD2: A little detail painting but I tried real hard to stop myself from doing my usual over board chip and bang it to death finish. The mantra was KISS Keep it SUBTLE stupid. Last of the decals went on and a nice thin even coat of Testers Dull Coat to give a semi flat finish. ] Just a very few additions to make before I make the display base. Might even, gasp, get her done by next weekend. Happy with the way the finish turned out but man am I itching to just add one more chip..... Maybe the next one can be ready for the scrapers torch.