1:72 Italeri H-21 Flying Banana

[hendie]

Banana Build - Day 14

.... I like the little feller and will keep it:

If you look at this in the right light, it makes me think of some deranged offspring from an illicit and clandestine relationship between one of those Rapa Nui Maoi monoliths and Beaker from the Muppet's!

*edited* to correct my incorrectly defined indefinite articles

Edited December 8, 2013 by hendie

[HL-10]

Some very impressive work there Nigel, can't wait to see it finished.

[Nigel Heath]

Well I finished the majority of my dishes by 8.30pm this evening. It was an absolute doddle really so I have plenty of time left this evening to get some building done.

My gosh, that Jessica certainly is a demanding lady. I am not sure my stamina levels will be able to satisfy her imploring’s but my aim is always to leave a lady fully satisfied so here goes.

I had a look at the panel lines realizing I will have to face up to the rescribing task soon. I can just about get the lines to line up on the tail area:

If I do this:

There is clearly a case for passing a razor saw through that bar to get things aligned properly.

I am still fairly focused on the front undercarriage and snipped off the front wheel to do a fit check:

There is quite a pronounced seam on the wheel:

I find the best way to clean up wheels is to use these abrasive foam pads:

I cleaned up the seam and added a flat to the tyre:

Paying careful attention to my reference material:

OK, that museum example is probably a bit too deflated but I did try to compensate.

While on this photo, any idea why the front window has a hole in it? All the kit windows have little circular depressions in the middle of them and I think I have seen photos where there appears to be a black dot in the middle of the window. I would like to know what its all about.

Edited December 10, 2013 by Nigel Heath

[georgeusa]

I would assume it is a gun port. Funny thing they found in the field, if there is no suppressing fire from the coptor, the bad guys you are transporting the good guys to get a might testy and try to persuade you to remain in the helicopter. H-21 when they first arrived in Nam had no provisions for weapons mounting. In other words, very large, green, practice targets

On the issue of the bendy brace, I also think the best remedy would be a razor saw cut or two strategically placed to line up the panel lines.

By the way, you will be proud of me, got off of my lazy rear, fought my fears and used my airbrush.

[Nigel Heath]

Banana Build - Day 17

Before dinner I got a little modelling done, there are some tiny ejector pin marks on the front under carriage which I have now filled:

Edited December 16, 2013 by Mike

[Nigel Heath]

I think I am about to take the momentous step of gluing together two pieces of plastic from the kit. This clearly needs to be recorded, here is what the anti-rotation jack on the front under carriage looks like:

And here is my version:

And the filled ejector pin holes:

Edited December 11, 2013 by Nigel Heath

[Nigel Heath]

I have to disagree I'm afraid, I don't know what trimmed pepper seeds are.

I now know that the little rectangles along the spine are access ports to oil the rotor shaft bearings:

I will have to make sure the visible part of the shaft lines up with them properly. The elongated rectangle above the big vent holes could be where access is gained to the oil header tank.

Edited December 12, 2013 by Nigel Heath

[Nigel Heath]

Funny you should say that KT, they were waiting for me when I got home:

They look superb KT, I have no idea why you thought they might not be detailed enough. Thanks very much.

I only need one really so if Billydick wants one for his build I can pass the spare on. (PM me BD).

I actually reaped a bumper harvest from the postie this morning as this lot arrived as well:

Still no PE of course but I wasn't expecting that, I guess its all still a few days away.

[Nigel Heath]

Banana Build - Day 18

Now I had more strips for the ribs I did a bit more work in the engine bay, there were some ejector pin bumps and the redundant false bulkhead back up strips that needed sanding off. I have finished the lower fuselage half the upper one is still to be done:

Now I had the actual engine in my hand I was quite happy to razor saw off the fantasy offering from the kit:

Here is how it looked after clean up from the back:

I had a pootle round my spares box for parts for the ducting to go around the engine:

That conical part looks promising - the hilt off a lance IIRC. OK I did have another radial engine but not in 1/72 scale.

I snipped off the main engine parts and established they nicely fitted onto a piece of 1.5mm diameter rod. The drive shaft from KT was of a similar order - 1.42mm:

I was interested to see if this drave shaft, with its nice coupling (equating to reality and now added to my drawing) was long enough for the job so I set this up:

Looks like it is to me. The plastic rod the engine is threaded onto is actually very slightly tapered, this is where it came to rest on the rod. This set up also illustrates what complete nonsense the kit engine is, no wonder its not visible in any of the photos.

The night is still young, who knows what wonders are to follow?

Edited December 16, 2013 by Mike

[Nigel Heath]

This is more like it, actually sticking bits of plastic together.

I assembled the two main halves of the engine:

I removed the rest of the engine parts from the sprue:

I further assembled these parts:

The ignition harness does not fit anywhere and will be consigned to the spares box.

The final parts of the engine were the exhaust manifolds glued on like this:

I am sorry KT, but unless anyone comes equiped with an endoscope I don't think much of your engine will be visible on the finished build but it has helped me a lot to get things aligned and in order.

[Nigel Heath]

I have been doing a little thinking about the mesh for the engine intake grills. Each grill is divided into three sections and each of these is 5.5mm wide on my model. Using that very useful interior shot I can see there are about seven to eight diamond shaped apertures in the mesh within this dimension. This means that I need to look for metal wire diamond mesh with a dimension of about 0.7mm on the long axis of the diamond. I wonder if such stuff exists?

[Norman]

Hey Nigel

I am a 1/48 scale modeller......

And have been sufficiently enthused from your entertaining and well illustrated thread as to purchase the Special Hobby 1/48 kit

Great subject....see what you've done !!!??

Rock on

Cheers

P.S. What other site on the net gives this standard of modelling entertainment ?

[Nigel Heath]

That is excellent news Norm, I look forward to seeing the build thread. I will go and have a look at that kit, it sounds interesting.

It looks lovely actually, I like the white metal rotor heads and the PE engine intake grills look excellent - I think I would be quite happy to use those.

Edited December 13, 2013 by Nigel Heath

[John_W]

I have been doing a little thinking about the mesh for the engine intake grills. Each grill is divided into three sections and each of these is 5.5mm wide on my model. Using that very useful interior shot I can see there are about seven to eight diamond shaped apertures in the mesh within this dimension. This means that I need to look for metal wire diamond mesh with a dimension of about 0.7mm on the long axis of the diamond. I wonder if such stuff exists?

In all seriousness, could you make it yourself?

If not, someone on here probably could...

[Billydick]

Nigel is an inspiration ! Keep up the good work (in the relevant places I guess).

Billy D.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Would this mesh be any good: http://www.meshdirect.co.uk/Woven-Stainless-Wire-Cloth-24-mesh-0.7-mm-aperture.html It appears you can buy samples from this seller, so you won't need to shell out for the full metre wide roll!

[John_W]

White Ensign Models

https://www.whiteensignmodels.com/p/Alliance+Modelworks+Diamond+Mesh+Medium+07mm+Spacing+TW016/16328/#.UqsdGv1FDIU

[Nigel Heath]

In all seriousness, could you make it yourself?

If not, someone on here probably could...

The thought had occurred to me and this could be my ultimate fall-back position if the PE is not up to scratch. Having seen what is available I don't think this will be necessary - there is mesh of just about every description out there. We live in amazing times.

Would this mesh be any good: http://www.meshdirec...m-aperture.html It appears you can buy samples from this seller, so you won't need to shell out for the full metre wide roll!

Thanks for that KT but I think I have found something even better already. Its square woven mesh that has 0.567mm wide squares, with 280 micron diameter wires (20mm @ 1/72) - still a touch overscale of course but it could be OK, The seller has confirmed that a small piece can be squashed to give a diamond pattern and the squares can be made into 0.7mm long diamonds - result!!

White Ensign Models

https://www.whiteens...8/#.UqsdGv1FDIU

John, I like that a lot - I might get both and see which looks better. You never know, the Eduard PE might be all right.

Edited December 13, 2013 by Nigel Heath

[IGKent]

Nigel, what's good in this mesh? What is it's advantage?

[Nigel Heath]

The kit mesh is clunky, over scale and has a square pattern. On the real machine it is fine and has a diamond pattern. The PE from Eduard may be fine I am just making a backup plan.

[Nigel Heath]

Banana Build - Day 19 - THE RELAUNCH

Those of you who follow this thread closely will be well aware that it has come in for some criticism of late for being light on modelling content and far too concerned with non-modelling issues. The moderators and Big Mike in particular have had a word in my shell like to this effect. I have to say I am in full agreement with this stance. I was coming round to the same conclusion myself in my own, slow way.

Going forward this thread will be a model of restraint and good taste, almost entirely dedicated to the building of this particular kit. I have been selfishly treating a modelling forum as my own personal playground, quite a few others seem to have enjoyed joining in the games but for a modeller solely interesting the construction of this kit this must have been understandably frustrating.

I am still allowed to post non-modelling stuff in "Chat" and propose that I will do this under "Nigel's Nosh" which I will rename "Nigel's Antics" or some such. Those that are interested can join me there.

I might scale back the daily updates to only posting once or twice a week as well. It is difficult to progress things on week nights and it must be annoying to see posts appear where little progress has actually been made. (Sorry hendie).

Having got that lot of my chest; on with the build.

To fit within the confines of the fuselage the engine support cradle had to be trimmed thus:

To fit it I had to create some sort of support structure. I found this part in the spares box with just the right sort of curvature to match the fuselage:

I have no idea what its off, its origins are lost in the mists of time.

Sawn in half, squared up, sanded and drilled with the necessary 1.0mm hole I had this:

There seems to be a part missing to connect the cradle to the engine so I made this out of 1.5mm plastic rod:

After a bit more cleaning up of the cradle I joined it to the engine like this:

I really do like sticking bits of plastic together.

Rigged up like this, I could glue in the support structure:

Note that the exhaust outlet is in just the right sort of area.

With a bit more gluing, I now have this:

I can now fit more ribs around this.

I have also come to the conclusion that the fabrication of ducting around the engine is unnecessary. The appearance of the engine as it is looks about right to me and it would be a shame to hide any of that lovely detail.

Edited December 13, 2013 by Nigel Heath

[Nigel Heath]

With much jiggery and pokery I got the engine location structure mounted and glued to the other side of the fuselage:

Here is how it looks through the open intake grills, with the best will in the world and very see through mesh this is never going to be be most visible engine ever:

Still worth a bit of effort though.

Note that the bar above the aperture has split following all the manipulation.

[IGKent]

Excellent work!

[Nigel Heath]

Thanks Igor!

[Nigel Heath]

Banana Build - Day 20

The first job of today was to trim the main drive shaft:

This is about as much of the engine that can be seen through the big vent holes:

Not a lot, but still something.

I have now finished off the engine bay ribbing

Here is the engine and drive shaft temporarily fixed in position:

I am quite pleased with that. I am not sure what colour the engine and the shaft should be. The instructions suggest matt gun metal for the engine which seems reasonable but I would have thought the drive shaft would be painted. Maybe red oxide primer?