1:48 Heritage Aviation Percival Mew Gull

[Mike]

Ian from Heritage sent me this little poppet for me to do a build article. Firstly, many thanks Ian... you're doing good things & getting better all the time

It arrived this morning at 8.20am with a pile of 7 DVDs, 6 of which were from Play, the other was a VTOS restoration disc I bought the other day... Anyway, I digress.

As soon as I could, I opened up the box for the mandatory peruse of the contents. The box is a sturdy affair, and contains three zip-lock bags - One each for resin parts, white metal parts, and decals. In addition is 2 pages of double-sided A4, which give build instructions, parts list, and even some nice color and black & white reference photos, reproduced by a good quality inkjet printer. Most helpful.

The instructions deal only with the construction of the cockpit, which is the main tricky point of the construction, and where I had the most problems - none of them insoluble. Straight away, I began removing the parts from their hefty pouring stubs with my battery powered Dremel, which was done outside wearing a respirator and goggles. I am becoming quite health conscious about these things now I'm officially old

The horizontal tail had helpfully removed itself before arriving, thankfully with no damage. The rest were roughly removed with a cutting disc, then sanded near their final profile using a small sanding drum. I washed the parts, and took them into the workshop for inspection.

The fuselage is a one-piece moulding, with a seam line running down the top face. Ian informs me that he's about to change the way this part is moulded to remove this seam from the process, so upcoming customers won't have to deal with it. A few passes of a sanding stick, and the seam is gone, simply requiring polishing up. The cockpit was a slightly different proposition, as you have to Dremel out the foot-well, which was left solid to aid in casting. This is where the instructions come in handy. Unfortunately, my copy had a malformed blob on one cockpit sidewall (you can see it in the in-set in picture 2), which after removal meant that some of the sidewall detail was missing. After some careful thought, I decided to remove both sidewall inners, and create some new ones from styrene stock, which would be cut to fit, then slid into place, being secured with CA and a clamp.

I also made a new back wall, as the tiny cockpit is difficult to sand flat because of lack of space. I slotted this in & glued it firmly to the back, fairing it in to the rear fuselage. The floor was provided as a resin piece, and this was cleaned up, thinned at the foot-well end to take account of my haphazard Dremelling, and I glued the joystick & seat to the rear, adding a styrene sheet cushion for some added detail.

Ian provided some extra detail shots of the cockpit, which is today painted aircraft grey/green, with a leather coaming, wooden sills, and a black instrument panel. I painted the cockpit accordingly, resisting the urge to add further detail to the instrument panel. Once complete, I installed one sidewall, then the floor, then the other sidewall, clamping each as it went in. There is so little room that each had to be done in turn, waiting for the CA to cure, as there was no room for anymore clamps.

After all this had set up, I trimmed the interior "shim" walls, added the instrument panel, and roughly painted the sills & coaming for the pictures. I'll probably strip that paint & apply some more detailing. I noticed that there was a throttle quadrant high up on the left sill, so may attempt to reproduce that. I botched the first canopy, and my spare was a little marbled & consequently not very clear. Ian's letting me have some spares on Monday

Here's the cockpit as it stands:

The other parts were given a coat of primer, sanded to remove some imperfections, and then primed again. There's still a little work to do in places, but it's coming together nicely, and I'm thoroughly enjoying building my first resin kit.

Tomorrow I'll try to get all the parts clean, pin-hole free & finished ready for assembly, after which I'll build her up, and begin thinking about painting her. It may only be a tiny kit, but it's a little gem just waiting for someone to put a bit of time & effort into making it. You should all get one...

[ron]

That really a neat subject. totally different. Now you need a 1/48 Dragon Rapide to park beside it

[Mike]

That really a neat subject. totally different. Now you need a 1/48 Dragon Rapide to park beside it

Biplanes fill me with fear & dread

[Grant]

That looks really neat. I like the painting sticks idea. Keep us posted.

cheers

Grant

[Mike]

Here's the latest update...

I attached the horizontal tail, the last few pin-holes were filled, another coat of primer, and she was left overnight. The next day I coated the slot with Milliput, smoothed it out with a wet spatula, and left it overnight to cure. I also applied some Milliput to the coaming, as it needed some fairing in if I'm to paint it leather. I also replaced the nacelle hinges with styrene strip, as I'd manage to obliterate one end of both of them during sanding.

Tonight, I've smoothed out the fillet & added a little more Milliput where I've missed. I've also added a little to one of the spats, as I wasn't happy with the sanding job I'd done, so wanted to even them out. Ian's spare transparencies arrived, but I've held off cutting another one to fit just yet, until I've finished the painting of the leather.

Here's a pic of her almost completely assembled, minus canopy & landing gear of course:

Next job is to prime the whole fuselage, fill any remaining dinks, and then try to fit the canopy!