Italeri Sunderland Mk II - RAAF 10 Squadron

[Ed Russell]

There is already an excellent Italeri Sunderland build thread here so perhaps mine is superfluous but I suppose people might like to see another one. I’ll try not to repeat stuff already covered and I’ll emphasize the differences.

http://www.britmodel...=234927927&st=0

Mark I Sunderlands were mostly replaced by Mark III’s before their undersurfaces were repainted white. However some Mk II’s lasted long enough to have this scheme, so my plan is to make this kit as a Mk II. The main differences were a change of engine from Pegasus XII to XVIII, the addition of radar in the form of the ASV Mk II which involved an additional crew position and a series of aerials on the fuselage and under the wings, some minor changes in porthole window layout, flame-damping exhausts and in the later Mk II’s (after W3990 we think) the Botha-style dorsal turret. Even before the release of the Italeri kit I was looking at Mk II’s - just for something different.

http://www.britmodel...topic=234924173

There are a couple of pathways to a Mk II without doing any conversion work. But I was prepared to put in more work than this one, while admiring its panache.

Here's the link to the above one - http://www.flickr.co...in/photostream/

I didn't want to do as much work as this 1/32 monster would take ...

http://paperwings.or...short/index.htm

I agree with Neil (woody37) that the Italeri kit is pretty good and the main thing to improve is the surface treatment. They obviously didn’t study the excellent little booklet that comes with the kit.

I am thinking I shouldn't need any aftermarket parts apart from these.

I put a couple of pictures in his thread of my ideas for improving the panel lines by filling about two-thirds to three quarters of their width and depth with stretched sprue. Basically, I heat stretched very thick sprue from an old Revell ship kit to the maximum length I could manage, about 2 metres, and used appropriate thickesses to work along the lines, following the sprue with Tamiya Extra Thin Cement. Once dry the panel lines were run over with a fine sanding stick and the whole part sprayed with thin coats of white Tamiya Primer from a can.

This seems to have worked well enough in my test run so I have gone ahead and filled every airframe panel line. I haven’t done the floats and struts yet but even they need it.

After the panel lines I put the wings aside, put all the clear parts in Future for a few days and started on the interior.

I wouldn’t say most work on interiors is wasted but my feeling is that Italeri have supplied more than will be visible, even after opening the doors they supply. I did the interior pretty much as supplied except for cutting away the moulded curtain and adding the ASV station just aft of the pilot. The curtains were made from wine bottle foil and are depicted furled up to at least give a chance of seeing that bit. I think the code might overlap the door so I have added a hinge to it - it only has to work once!

More coming as I do it but this is a slow build from a slow worker..............

Edited December 23, 2012 by Ed Russell

[Alpha Delta 210]

Fantastic work so far. The panel line filling looks very effective. How long did that take to achieve?

[LDSModeller]

All right, I've died and gone to Heaven!!!! Either that or Christmas has come very very early

Two Sunderland WIP posts in a few weeks

Hi Ed, looking really good, can't wait to see more (hint hint)

Regards

Alan

[seadog]

Filling the panel lines looks like it was a very major task, but worth it!

[woody37]

That Lego one is a great way of getting reduced panel lines Ed !!!!!!

As much as I enjoyed building mine, I'm equally looking forwards to sitting back and watching you build yours. From your progress so far, I know it's going to be a great build

Neil

[Dave Swindell]

That Lego one is a great way of getting reduced panel lines Ed !!!!!!

Neil

Yeh, but look at all them rivets!

[venomvixen]

Your actually making a model?

[Ed Russell]

Fantastic work so far. The panel line filling looks very effective. How long did that take to achieve?

There's probably about half to three quarters of an hour of line filling, another half hour of sanding, about 5 minutes painting and about 15 minutes polishing in each of the six major panels. This method is quite tedious but I think it does have several advantages in that it avoids the pillow effect of just loading on more and more primer and it does leave something there to break up the expanse. It's probably no more tedious than spraying multiple coats of primer and carefully removing them by sanding between each.

Your actually making a model?

PM sent, cheekyface........

[Ed Russell]

Continuing on with the interior, although I think much of it is hidden. I have only added things where I think they will be visible (and because Alan (LDS Modeller) told me about the curtains and radar station).

I looked with interest at gunpowder17's Tippex adventure and remembered I had used this technique before. I used it for the tailplanes (Yeah, it's sad when every panel line needs filled, but it's true. Even the float struts have panel lines)

So, we have yellow "Liquid Paper" correction fluid on tailplanes and green Citadel Liquid Green Stuff on the floats.

This is a water based fine filler from the Games Workshop people.

http://www.games-wor...questid=2517137

Once the parts had dried, they were cleaned up with successive grades of very fine abrasive paper

They give approximately equal results but the green stuff is easier to work with and gives a cleaner result. I did a test piece and it's easier to scribe also.

I continue to like the Italeri engineering but a few parts needed some extra clamping and may need a very small amout of filler.

Edited December 9, 2012 by Ed Russell

[woody37]

It'll be worth the effort Ed

[LDSModeller]

Looking really good Ed, those panel lines and rivets look much beter after

you have filled and sanded them. I'll have to remember the green filler, I believe we

have the Games Workshop stuff here in NZ.

Regards

Alan

[perdu]

This is looking better by the posting (natch!)

I love the liquid filler treatment, so next I have to get that in...

I use tippex but I'm not happy with how long it takes to become workable, getting impatient in my old age

I think you are right restricting the detail inside where it's hidden, but admit it, with all the info about...

Tempting innit

b

[Ed Russell]

The portholes are attached with watchmakers cement. The bomb compartment ones are just Krystal Kleer, which I will also use for the dorsal ones.

It doesn't look like much progress but I have cleaned up most of the small parts. More soon

[Ed Russell]

Here are the cleaned up and painted bits in my spray booth. The thing at middle rear is a paint cup and the exhausts haven't been assembled yet

So we put together the interior bits

and close up the fuselage.

The fit is very good but the plastic is a little strange. I usually use Revell Contacta cement but it didn't do much of a job here - I have found bits coming off even though I washed the original plastic and made sure I clean paint off joints. However with ordinary Tamiya cement it seems to be okay.

Now how much can you see inside without an endoscope? At least the radar station and the curtains are visible

but the anchor has disappeared!

No, you can see one fluke next to the winch!

Edited December 15, 2012 by Ed Russell

[LDSModeller]

Hi Ed

Your build is coming along really well

I really like the endoscope photo's, that has to give you a real

sense of satisfaction. (apart from the AWOL anchor)

Thanks for sharing, look forward to more

Regards

Alan

[adrianm2]

It`s got just the right amount of detail.

Beautiful build so far.

Adrian

[Ed Russell]

As you can see. the flying surfaces are on

and the next thing is the engine nacelles - the hedgehog exhausts are a tricky fit

and i had a few goes with blue-tack and such like but they were all different. In the end, a jig was required

It will take a while to do the details, such as the depth-charges. We are looking at a mid- to late- war Sunderland so these would have been used as well as bombs

Thanks for looking (and thanks for the encouraging comments, guys)

[LDSModeller]

Hi Ed

That's looking really good!! :thumbsup:

The work you have done on the panel lines has come out really well.

I've just noticed that the main fuel tanks should be slightly closer to the fuselage than

what Italeri have molded - at the end of the day no major, their Sunderland still spruces up nicely

The hedgehog exhausts look good too. I was doing some of my build today, and happened to look

at the Airfix one's - sadly lacking Stll nothing that can't be overcome through sheer detrmination,

No 8 Wire and Kiwi ingenuity (that part I have yet to figure out )

Are you planning on mounting 450 lber's on your model? Even one of those would surely ruin some

submarine crews day.

Look forward to more, thanks for sharing

Regards

Alan

Edited December 18, 2012 by LDSModeller

[Ed Russell]

I was kind of thinking of having the Sunderland on a ramp with some armourers removing a hung-up 450 ilb DC.... I found this in my junk box and it might go on the ramp too

I'm sure it had some instructions on where to put the photoetch but I can't find them at the moment. One ladder is inside the plane and the other might end up on a workstand....

Another accessory I used was this......

Moving on, here are the exhausts

Just for comparison, here are the Airfix ones, which, for a brief moment, I thought I might use.....

My next Airfix Sunderland will have aftermarket ones as these are not quite good enough!

Italeri forgot the wing leading edge vent (as did I) so I had to butcher a hole for it.

The grille is seen above in the picture of the exhausts - it's just a disc punched out from an electron microscope grid (whaddaya mean, ya haven't got one in the junk box - never mind, Jays and others do nice grilles this size)

It's mounted in the tube also seen in the 'red' pic and faired into the wing root.

The lenses go in the light cavities. This is one area the engineering lets you down the covers are too long and not deep enough for the recesses. Shims and sanding.

It's interesting that, understandably, real ones never look very clear so don't stress too much. I'll certainly fil. sand and polish this a bit more though.

So here we are with engines on and starting to look like maybe half-way?

Next, another jig for the float struts

Where would we be without Lego?

Edit - Italeri do supply the grid for the vent on their photoetch sheet!

Edited February 7, 2013 by Ed Russell

[Alpha Delta 210]

Great progress and I love your jig!

[Ed Russell]

There are 3 dozen or so portholes to mask.... more by luck than judgement, the Waldron punch set has a pretty close size. I have found the best way to punch discs of masking tape (I used Shuretape here) is to attach it to some medium thickness acetate sheet - an old-style shirt box is ideal.

It is then relatively easy, if tedious, to separate the tape disc from the clear disc - the surplus clear discs can then be used for the upper portholes once painting is completed.

One side done

[tonyot]

This is coming along really well Ed, I`m at the painting stages with mine but it has become stalled at the moment due to other things so yours has helped to get me back onto it.

Obviously a 10 Sqn RAAF Sunderland was a `no brainer' for you but they were Sunderland pioneers in a lot of ways and as well as working over the North Atantic they also proved very important in the Mediterranean too, especially as a transport link between Gibraltar and Malta! I`ve bought a second model to represent an Aussie 10 Sqn machine and I`d like to track down the book that you are using as reference. I`d like to make the aircraft on the cover with the large A Type roundels on top of the wings and the tall fin stripe,

All the best mate and Merry Christmas,

Tony O

PS- Ed, don`t forget that the Mk.II had the later style tail turret which was introduced onto later production Mk.I`s and used through to the Mk.V. The kit tail turret is the earlier style used on early to mid production Mk.I`s only. I`m pretty sure that Falcon include this later turret in one of their WW2 RAF sets.

Edited December 25, 2012 by tonyot

[woody37]

Great work Ed, can't wait to see the paint on

Neil

[Shalako]

Merry Christmas Ed,

Now, you certainly have gone that extra mile with this build mate!!

Cracking work so far. Can't wait to see the next steps of your build.

Cheers

Sernak

[gruffy]

As you can see. the flying surfaces are on

and the next thing is the engine nacelles - the hedgehog exhausts are a tricky fit

and i had a few goes with blue-tack and such like but they were all different. In the end, a jig was required

It will take a while to do the details, such as the depth-charges. We are looking at a mid- to late- war Sunderland so these would have been used as well as bombs

Thanks for looking (and thanks for the encouraging comments, guys)

Excellent build ! What's the book in the last pic called your using?

Edited December 26, 2012 by gruffy