Chaotic Mike

It's in RFI...

I think I'll call this finished. A very pretty little aeroplane. The WIP is here. This is the second Lukgraph kit I have built (the first is their Dragon Rapide) and they are poster boys for modern mixed media (resin, 3D print, PE) kits. This one has no vices, it went together beautifully. It is rigged with EZ line in the main, but the control cables around the elevator and rudder are thin wire. I had a go at putting paint onto the EZ line to make it steel rather than black, but it wasn't taking and I didn't want to get into a world of overspray, mask, touch up, re-touch up, etc. Basic silver is Tamiya Titanium Silver, the metal panels are Vallejo metallics, which do a very good job of looking like anodised aluminium, particularly after a light PVA varnish clear coat. The yellow is Humbrol trainer yellow, other paints are mainly Tamiya acrylics. On with the show. A general overview: Everything yellow, and the national insignia, is sprayed on. The only decals are the serial number and squadron crest on the tail, and the '561' on the yellow band. Probably what you wouldn't want to see if you were an enemy of the nation, looking over your shoulder (mind you, the engine appears to be stopped... 🙂 ): Port profile, capturing the elegant lines. Note the windscreen... It's a total pig! Plan view, looking down into the cockpit where a significant amount of detail provided by Lukgraph remains invisible: Told you... The oddly sized exhausts are because I made frequent breaks of the port one, and during reassembly bits got misplaced. Why did it get broken? Because I thought I'd try to be clever and use wire to reinforce it (it comes in 2 pieces). As I drilled, bits got fractured and I didn't get them all. I had learnt my lesson on the starboard side... just glue a butt joint. Also spot where I need to touch up one of the pilot's overhead grab-handles, but probably won't. Don't look up... Don't tell me the radiator core should be darker... I'm not going to repaint it now and I have carefully placed it for display so that no-one can ever know. Coming back the other way. I'm turning a blind eye to the slightly lumpy joins between the centre section and outer upper panels on the grounds that once again, careful display positioning (inside a filing cabinet inside a windowless room with the lights off) keep my sins hidden... Just another general view with different lighting... Finally, on the topic of display, I am gradually building up a collection of large scale Hawker single seaters. Next off the blocks is either a Special Hobby Tempest II to sit next to the V, or... (gulp) a Fisher Model Pattern Sea Fury, imported at ludicrous expense from New Zealand... Th-th-th-th-that's all, folks!

Ye Gods the windshield is difficult. And that's all I'm saying on the subject!

Another week has passed... what will tonight's exciting instalment cover? Mainly, tiny things and paint work... There is a doofer (technical term) that attaches to one of the interplane struts. I think it is likely a pitot tube for airspeed. Anyway, here it is on the PE sheet, part 19... I don't like the 2D nature of PE for parts like this. I spent half an hour or so trying to carve a small bit of polystyrene that I could then drill to place brass tubing into, but that wasn't really working. Then I remembered I bought one of my offspring a 3D printer for his last birthday. So... time to learn Tinkercad? Everything that isn't red is a support structure because it was too tiny to print just by itself. And the result? I will clip the various wires to being a lot shorter before installation - having looked at a picture of the real thing this is a lot better than the PE version. Whilst I was thinking tiny (and I realise that next to @Putty Animal's activity, I have the appearance of Gulliver in Lilliput), I looked at the PE gun sight and again decided I could do better: Note cunning recycling of the bit I could never have made myself. These parts look a bit rough at this magnification but they have subsequently had the solder smoothed down a bit. There are 2 hooks that go on the upper wing, that are supplied as resin. Here they are in copper, instead: This is the point at which insanity started to reveal itself. There are a couple of tiny PE 'T'-shapes that go onto the trailing edge directly above the cockpit. Well, 'somehow' I managed to displace one after installing it. So I thought I should make a replacement. Cue muttering as I organised 2 bits of copper wire in an improvised jig that enabled me to make a largish (1 cm wide?) T shape that I subsequently trimmed down: Again, the slightly lumpy soldering was subsequently filed and polished. Meanwhile, eager followers might remember that I had masked off the yellow diamonds on the upper wing. I decided that today would be the day that I removed the tape, and would spray on some appropriately sized roundels. Here is the result, I feel pretty good about how these have turned out - there is a tiny amount of touch up, but this is definitely more right than it is wrong. Until someone pops up to burst my bubble. Note the 2 tiny T-shapes, one in 2D PE, one in 3D copper, and the little hook like objects in the second picture: That little bullet shaped fairing did, of course, require me to spend a few minutes on my knees in the construction shed once it had pinged itself off its 3D printing block. Next week is going to be all about getting a nice finish on the metal panels that cover the front of the beastie.

Back after a few weeks of desultory bench time, but not updating the build log. Bad Mike. Anyway, quite a lot of progress since I last posted. First up, I put the tail feathers on: Being a resin kit, (albeit a really well engineered resin kit) it benefits from being reinforced with copper, brass, steel... anything I have to hand, really! If you look carefully you can see a couple of brass rods that went into the fin and fuselage for stability. Nothing short of a lump hammer is going to knock that fin off! I set it so that you can see air between the fin and the fuselage, just like the original. The undercarriage was a real pig. Again, much drilling of 0.5mm holes to set wire in so that there was some sort of stability while I dropped on small quantities of Rocket extra-thin, which is my go-to CA when I'm in a hurry and I want to be sure that a good bond will result. You can see a few ends protruding on the axle cross bar, but they are easily ground down with a needle file: And on to the part that has been giving me the most cause for concern, which is mounting the upper wing. Once again, out with the micro drills. I have a Dremel with a flexible drive shaft, and I uncovered a collet that was capable of gripping my tiniest drill bit. This was immensely helpful, because I have been slowly working my way through a quantity of extremely brittle PCB drill, leaving many fragments behind, inaccessibly and irremovable. I was able to use a high speed steel drill bit instead, which is considerably more forgiving when you put a fraction of sideways pressure on the bit. That meant I could bang out 16 holes in more or less the right place across the ends of the N struts and the two sets of wings. You can see an example below: This meant I could dry-run getting the upper wing on. It went well: I'm using Tamiya Titanium silver to represent the doped linen parts of the airframe - it has a very fine grain and makes a very good substitute for the RAF's inter-war silver, IMHO. Careful scrutiny of the upper wing shows where I painted the wing yellow before masking off the set of diamonds and lines that will ( I hope) reappear in glorious fidelity after I finish the silver and the national insignia. I cut the masks myself after drawing them up in Inkscape and printing them onto A4. I then laid Tamiya tape over the paper, cut with a new blade and transferred the masks onto the airframe. This, I suppose, is why people invest in fancy Olfa cutters and bespoke masking material! A few picks of the dry mounted wing - no cabane struts: Whilst I was feeling machine-tool orientated, I put a mini-lathe that I acquired off eBay for a song to use. First job was to use it to paint the wheels, which have a tiny bead of silver between the yellow axle covers and the tyre: I was very pleased with how that turned out. Then I looked at the decal sheet, which of course provides yellow circles of exactly the correct diameter. However, since I had decided to paint the other yellow areas, I can be sure it will match nicely... 🙂 Finally, the upper wings have little nubbins moulded on to represent the formation lights. I thought I could do better, and turned a little off-cut spare clear sprue: I think that will look better drilled out, with a blob of red (or green...) inserted. So, a couple of weeks work, but I'm really enjoying this. Until the next thrilling instalment... Mike

Hello, I am doing one of these, if I get a quarter of the way to your results I'll be happy! Can I ask how you rigged it? Mike

A couple of weeks later and what progress have I made? Well... not a massive amount! Three views of the cockpit framework, prior to it being installed. In the second picture above, I appear to have assembled the starboard gun out of focus, but I'm sure it won't notice IRL! 🙂 In the last picture, you can also see where I broke a bit of the framework - this printed resin is excellent to sand and (gently) file, but it is very brittle so you have to be very careful when drilling or sawing. However, the next picture will show you why I'm not going to be losing sleep over it. In the earlier pics you can also see sundry PE levers and wheels being attached. After a lot of muttering because the CA I'm using has no tack (so bits kept falling off) I resorted to drilling tiny holes and using wire to make mounting pins - at which point the swearing was replaced with a new variation targeting the difficulty in drilling onto a tightly convex surface with a teeny-weeny radius. I got there in the end, though. Right. Why am I not massively fussed about things like broken framing low down? Here's a test fit of the cockpit going into the fuselage: Observe the very small hole through which the internals can be seen... When I have it zipped up (which won't be long now, there's nothing else to go inside) I'll post a view looking through the aperture, to reiterate the futility of much of our efforts! Laters, taters... Mike

Just glorious. Proper modelling.

I'm also thinking of reverting 45 years and using stretched polystyrene rod. I will experiment by stretching something that is rectangular in section to see what it will extrude to.

Sounds intriguing!

Hello CC, welcome to the slow-moving resin-fest that will be this here Nimrod. I hope you don't get too lonely! 🙂 This week, I have mostly been working, but I got some shed time this weekend. This is just preparing the interior, of which virtually nothing will be seen through the tiny cockpit aperture. Nevertheless, Lukgraph cast them, so I'm going to paint them! What you can see is a bit of aluminium around the cockpit surround, brick red representing the doped finish for the fabric areas, and interior green over the backsides of the panels that will comprise the cowling. As this is difficult to determine from references supplied, I am going with this! As I say, all-but invisible when assembled. The two halves can stand a bit of clean up on the mating faces to remove whatever is the resin equivalent of sprue gates. A little bit of detailing going on. The control column, which is beautifully 3D printed. I used fine wire rather than the supplied photo-etch to represent the gun actuators, as I prefer the more 3D look. But, as I said previously, I reckon this will be nigh-on invisible after assembly. That's a lot of screen real-estate for not much payload! Must crop harder! Next up is the instrument panel: This is massively magnified. The chipping around the dials is because this mounts behind a framework in the cockpit cage, and every time I have placed it behind the framework for test fitting, it has chipped a little more from the panel. Nothing that can't be touched up before the inevitable consignment to oblivion, though! Speaking of the cockpit framework, here is its current state: Not a lot to see here except that there will be a fair amount of touch-up in my immediate future. I'm still blown away by the rigidity and delicacy of the framework, though. It fits beautifully snugly against the relevant sockets in the fuselage halves. Finally the seat, awaiting a bit of grime, and some belts. It's actually a dark aluminium colour, a bit paler than the picture would have you believe. That's all, folks...

I didn't find the plastic too bad... 😁

Reverting back to my theme of Hawker single seat fighters, and lulled into a false sense of security by the ease with which I despatched the Special Hobby Whirlwind, I have taken the aforementioned biplane from the stash. Mixed media resin and 3D printing, and spare wings. And rigging. This will take longer, I think. Just a couple of early pictures showing the quality of what is in the box. The 3D printing process leaves tiny striations behind, but the resin is very easily sanded. Here is a WIP... I have some Ez-line on standby for the rigging, but I think it is too 1-dimensional. Anyone know of a workable alternative that would show the flatness of the real wires? Mike

Thank you!

I did spend a little time scraping down the mating surfaces of the wings and elevators from the inside, to make the trailing edges sharper. Similarly I filed the exhaust shroud leading edges from the inside with a half-round file to make them look better - a bit less agricultural!

Thank you all. Regarding the photos, I've stopped using my posh Panasonic micro 4/3 system camera, and started using my 3 year old phone's built in one, I'm sure there's a message there somewhere!

Another racing-quick build for me, about 6 weeks flash to bang. Special Hobby's Whirlwind, like the real thing, is a thing of beauty and joy forever, with the possible exception of the undercarriage which is closer to being an invention of Satan. Fit is superb, there were no vices to this kit (apart from the undercarriage... did I mention that?) and the quality of the interior out of the box contains pretty much all you would want to find. So I immediately added in a Yahu instrument panel and groovy 3D seatbelt decals from a company I can't remember! On with the show: A general overview: Front view, showing the extraordinary attention to detail that resulted in a frontal area apparently less than a Hurricane: Another 3/4 view: Bubble canopy is of exemplary quality: Aforementioned Yahu IP. Note also tactical use of EZ-Line. Another view of the pit. In real life, the radio mast doesn't seem quite so wonky. Drilling a hole through it to enable the EZ-line to have something to adhere to was 'challenging'. More pit goodness. If you look *really really* closely you can see a pneumatic line I added to the control column for the cannon trigger. The underside. The instructions would have you paint the starboard stabiliser black, but I didn't believe them, so I didn't! Tail wheel bay: An undercarriage bay. You know what? Tricky... In a rare attempt at figure painting, a resin bloke I acquired from somewhere (possibly he came along with my SH Tempest V, although I really can't remember), Flight Sergeant Hampton Wick, is fighting his way into the cramped cockpit: Meanwhile Leading Aircraftsman 'Nobby' Nobbs considers whether or not to remove his hand before Sgt Wick turns the engine over: And there you have it! I think I will take a short break before re-visiting my current theme of 1/32 Sydney Camm objects: I have the choice of a Lukgraph Nimrod, a Special Hobby Tempest II, or, the piece de la résistance, a Fisher Pattern Sea Fury that has travelled from America, to New Zealand, and now to me. Decisions, decisions...

The camouflage is superb!

Reviving a necrothread, did anything ever come out of this? I appear to be building a collection of 1/32 Hawkers, and there seems to be a gap in the market... Mike

Hi Andy, Done the undercarriage yet? 😁 I have finished major construction and painting (just waiting for decals to bed down before I matt coat the airframe) and am looking at the undercarriage with a great deal of trepidation! Could they have made it any more complicated? (I think I will share the blame equally between Teddy Petter and Special Hobby...)

Well, that's weird! Mine are Cartograf. I've used the HGW peel-off-the-film decals in the past, they were very effective for stencils. I can't comment on anything bigger, because I spray insignia, usually.

I'm almost at the same stage, just about to paint the undersides. I'm confused by the references to removing the decal carrier film... I didn't think these were that sort (at least, the OOTB sheet from Cartograph). Have I not been paying attention, and you're using some aftermarket? Looking very tidy, by the way! Mike

My aunt used to be his PR lady, and her sister was married to Brian Eno. This inormation has helped my alternative career in music not one jot...

I imagine those aren't cheap. I got the table from eBay (£150?) then had the perspex box fabricated, and that was several hundred, if I recall correctly. However, it makes a nice presence in the living room. God, my wife is accommodating!

You mean like this? Mike