1/144 Airfix 727 Alitalia

[Val]

Hi guys,

Another one has made its way onto the bench...

This is going to be a long term project. Basically I can foresee this being a project which I'm going to do a bit, then wait a while for drying times, do a bit more, wait a while, do a bit more...

It's also going to be my first ever airliner, so will be interesting to see what happens. Help, C&C is more than welcome



I'm going to do the Alitalia version, and then the plan is to use Halfords White acrylic spray for the gloss white, Xtracolor enamels for the wing grey and Metalizers for the metal areas. I hear that acrylics over enamels is a no-no, but from what I've learned is it's because of the enamel paint outgassing and reacting with the acrylic top coat, but it's ok to do so if the enamel has totally cured. I've experimented with Tamiya over Xtracolor, and this seems to be ok if the Xtracolor is given time to totally go off, and I mean 4-6 weeks plus!! If I'm wrong, please let me know Worst case scenario, sand the wings clean and start again.

I've filled the windows with milliput, I'm yet to sand down though; there are no pictures as I was covered in liquid milliput and leaving white finger printers everywhere! I'll sand off the panel lines on the fuselage and won't rescribe these. I will probably try and rescribe the wings though, as the panel lines seem to make good guides for painting and the wings seem to get a bit dirtier and therefore panel lines more visible.



Basically this is all that's really happened bar the milliput... More to follow (one day, you know what my builds are like!! Sssslllloooowwwww!!)

Oh, and I've also got a couple of AM bits for her:



The wheels seemed a bit crude OOB so replacing them, and I've heard the metal landing gear is a worth while addition to this kit as the way the kit gear fit makes them quite week OOB.

Well, speak to you all soon

Val

[Jessica]

By coincidence, I'm doing this one in Air Canada right out of the box over at some other modeling website. Watch out for less than stellar fit. The right fin half is larger than the left on my kit and the rear airstairs' fit is incredibly poor. You either need to rebuild the entire thing, or glue it closed and putty right over.

Looking forward to seeing how the Alitalia scheme turns out. I must admit that I'm somewhat tempted to get another one just to do it.

[Val]

By coincidence, I'm doing this one in Air Canada right out of the box over at some other modeling website. Watch out for less than stellar fit. The right fin half is larger than the left on my kit and the rear airstairs' fit is incredibly poor. You either need to rebuild the entire thing, or glue it closed and putty right over.

Looking forward to seeing how the Alitalia scheme turns out. I must admit that I'm somewhat tempted to get another one just to do it.

Ahh cool, thanks. Yes, I'd guessed the fit wasn't going to be great... I look forward to the miss-matching fins!! I'll get the putty out

Cool, the Alitalia scheme i love. I love the Iberian livery in the other boxing as well.

[MikeW]

Looking forward to this one.

The main wheels on the 727 do 'lean' toward the rear at quite a rakish angle, but I've not had trouble with them supporting the build afterwards. On the Minicraft kit, they go straight down in the conventional way, but it loses something of its' 727ness that way.

I think the Airfix 737 and 727 constitute a sizable part of my builds - they are fun.

Cheers,

Mike

[Graeme H]

Do love the 727

[Alex1978]

Looking forward to your Alitalia 727.

The kit has its faults but it can turn into a nice replica of that elegant airliner.

I have quite a number of these kits in my stash as well as the Revell 727-100 waiting to be built.

Good luck with your project

Alex

[Jessica]

One other note that I forgot. For reasons best known to himself, when the designer designed the kit, he put the potato chip fences on the trailing edges rather than the leading edges where they belong. See this photo for a perfect shot of the fence in its natural habitat.

Here on my model:

The incorrect fence on the trailing edge where it will do no good at all

A quick little saw cut and a square of ten thou card later...

And once the glue has set, a little trimming and sanding brings it to its final shape

I trimmed off the incorrect fence at the same time. Total modelling time for both wings is about 5 minutes, time well spent.

[Hepster]

Proper modelling! I built one of these a few years back, and used aftermarket decals with windows, so that I could fill in the kit ones.

If I recall, the kit instructions suggest solid decal that you punch out window holes from with the jig provided...erm. Some modellers then fill in the holes with Crystal Clear (random spelling).

What's the plan?

[Val]

One other note that I forgot. For reasons best known to himself, when the designer designed the kit, he put the potato chip fences on the trailing edges rather than the leading edges where they belong. See this photo for a perfect shot of the fence in its natural habitat.

Here on my model:

The incorrect fence on the trailing edge where it will do no good at all

A quick little saw cut and a square of ten thou card later...

And once the glue has set, a little trimming and sanding brings it to its final shape

I trimmed off the incorrect fence at the same time. Total modelling time for both wings is about 5 minutes, time well spent.

Ahhh, that's right, now I remember hearing about the wing fences! Thanks for the heads up and guide. That's brilliant, I would have forgotten to correct them without that

Proper modelling! I built one of these a few years back, and used aftermarket decals with windows, so that I could fill in the kit ones.

If I recall, the kit instructions suggest solid decal that you punch out window holes from with the jig provided...erm. Some modellers then fill in the holes with Crystal Clear (random spelling).

What's the plan?

The windows are all filled. I used the milliput sausage technique which I also leaned from Jessica on another thread I've sanded them back roughly as I'm sanding the fuselage panel lines off anyway. I'll give them a quick coat of primer to see how they look soon, pics to follow. This boxing of the kit comes with decals for the cabin windows so I will be using them. There is also decals for the cockpit windows, but I am going to use the clear plastic cockpit windows if I can. If that fit is too horrendous for me to deal with, I'll fill and decals them as well I've got the Airfix 737-200 as well; I plan to Krystal Klear in the cabin windows on that one. Stay tuned for that!!

Thanks guys,

Val

[Val]

Ok, so I glued a few things together last night...

Obviously laundry was an issue today!

The fuselage with the windows filled:





Aaaand the fit issues (as expected), the miss-matching tail fins:



And the rear door (I'm assuming this is a bad fit, and not the kind of tolerances we had on these aircraft!!):



And the wings, a bit of filling needed in places:





The other bits:



I've given the fuselage a bit of a sanding and got rid of most of the panel lines:



Next step is to get the filler out, fill, sand and probably fill again, prime to see where we're at, and then some more filling and sanding I should imagine!!

The wings will be rescribed probably, although stand by for a mind change... and to see how the windows fit...

Cheers,

Val

[Jessica]

The windscreen on mine had absolutely abysmal fit. Since I'm using decals I didn't let that concern me and simply slathered the putty over it. You may be able to keep it clear if you first dip it in Future and they use gap filling superglue to fill the gaping holes.

[Val]

The windscreen on mine had absolutely abysmal fit. Since I'm using decals I didn't let that concern me and simply slathered the putty over it. You may be able to keep it clear if you first dip it in Future and they use gap filling superglue to fill the gaping holes.

Ahh, that's a shame but ultimately predictable I guess... I'll try that, but I may just end up super-gluing the glass in place and filler over it...

Thanks,

Val

[Gimme Shelter]

Hi - thanks for keeping the old Airfix classic Sky Kings alive. It is nice to see another in production which makes me wonder why when I was younger did these old kits always seem to assemble better and more convincingly. I built the old Airfix 737 last year and had similar challenges to those which you mention in your build, but this just adds to the fun and challenge of modelling doesn't it.

Good luck overcoming all those old Airfix fit issues - I may have missed it but are you going to treat yourself to a set of resin replacement engines? I gave up on clear plastic windows and flight deck glazing years ago and settled instead for decals so good luck with your flight deck along with the remainder of the Italian Job.

[Val]

Hi - thanks for keeping the old Airfix classic Sky Kings alive. It is nice to see another in production which makes me wonder why when I was younger did these old kits always seem to assemble better and more convincingly. I built the old Airfix 737 last year and had similar challenges to those which you mention in your build, but this just adds to the fun and challenge of modelling doesn't it.

Good luck overcoming all those old Airfix fit issues - I may have missed it but are you going to treat yourself to a set of resin replacement engines? I gave up on clear plastic windows and flight deck glazing years ago and settled instead for decals so good luck with your flight deck along with the remainder of the Italian Job.

You're absolutely right about the fun of it, I'm enjoying the challenge and learning a lot about modelling. I've rescribed one wing; the top went well, the bottom not so...! I've also filled and sanded down the rear door, but will need another coat or two...

Initially I've not planned on resin engines, but if I can't get the engines seamless without flat spots then I will... After a bit of dry fitting, I've noticed there's going to be some gaps where the wing fits the fuselage, predictably, and the window fit is so bad I'm planning on filling it somehow... Would have been easier if I'd listened to everyone and filled before hand... Now, where did I put that milliput?!

[Val]

So, first round of filling and sanding....

And here's the wonderful fit around the glazing...



So, what I've done is glued it in place with copious amounts of Extra Thin Cement which will then be filled over and sanded down. I'm going with decals on the cockpit as well as fuselage! After that, I will prime the fuselage. Not because I think it's ready for painting, but so I can see what needs to be refilled and sanded.

I've also rescribed a wing:



More to follow

Cheers,

Val

[Alex1978]

Looking good so far.I stay tuned for more updates

I build one of them OOB as a kid and the outcome was not the best.

I have quite a few of them in my stash again now,so its interesting to follow this WIP.

[HOUSTON]

Val,

Nice work so far..

it is quite a lovely change to watch a Boeing being built than wading

thru another jet this morning..Good, splendid workmanship

Good luck

[snapper_city]

Looking good.

[Val]

Update: Lots of sanding and filling!

[MikeW]

Very neat job on the cabin windows. Looking forward to seeing this one.

[modelglue]

Very nice Val, looking forward to the conclusion!

[Val]

Thank you all for the interest and encouragement

The sand-and-fill-athon continues... I spray some Tamiya Flat Black neat over all areas of the fuselage with filler on, and then "primed" it with a 50/50 paint/thinners mix of Tamiya IJN Grey (a colour I have an inexplicable amount of considering I've not done a single Japanese aircraft yet!), to see what needs to be refilled and sanded.



(please excuse the state of my desk)



The cabin windows were much better on one side than the other; one side seemed to be nearly all fine except a few deep divots whilst the other side every window had sunk back but only slightly... After sanding the paint layers back off over the filled areas and joins, the remaining colours give a clue to the required level of work. If there's still green paint on top of the filler, it's a bit of a trench. If it's black, it's not too bad, and if I'm at white filler, then it's basically perfect. A layer of Mr Surfacer 500 was applied over the windows and any slight seams, and Mr Dissolved Putty (love that stuff) over any window showing as green still.



Perfect Plastic Putty (love that stuff too) took care of the rear door nicely as well, just slight marks left in the corners, so covered the area in Mr Surfacer just to be safe.



A touch of Mr Surfacer the seam up front too, but nothing much to worry about. The cockpit window filled nicely over the top of the glazing, just a tiny line on one side and that was probably being fussy.

Also, engines are together. Not a great fit, but nothing a sanding stick hasn't sorted. I was hoping the engines fit would be good enough to fit them after painting. A dry fit has suggested otherwise! So hopefully the fuselage is basically all filled now, the engines will go on next and then we'll worry about the wings. A hint of light at the end of the tunnel!

Val

[Flying Badger]

Hi

Looking good so far.

A note on the drying time of enamels.... there is a way to speed everything up and it doesn't involve anything fancy....... If you stick the model in the oven at c50-60 degrees C for a few hours after the enamel paint has already gone hard to the touch then you can get it to off-gas and set hard much faster.

The plastic in models softens over 60 degrees and begins to warp up around 70 degrees so don't let the oven get too hot, but around 50degrees and it should be fine.

This is a common trick for those who live in very cold or wet places where spray paints outdoors isn't an option as the moisture and slow drying times makes them a pain in the bottom.

You need to make sure it is sat on suitable supports - I tend to use cocktail sticks in a big block of balsa and inserted in the place of the undercarriage mounts as this provides a nice stable support with minimal contact with the model and it's paint.

Give it a go!

[Val]

....who live in very cold or wet places ....

Basically Britain!! :D

Thanks mate, I shall give that a go when I get to that point.

[Jessica]

The wings will definitely need shimming. I'm considering some stretched sprue to fill the yawning chasms on mine.