+++ FINISHED! +++ Airfix Tiger Moth 1/72 (RAF Flight Training School, 1940)

[jrlx]

Chris, Rob, Ian,

 

Thank you very much for your kind words regarding the build and the best wishes for my future exam Really much appreciated.

 

The fit tolerances around the cockpit and also for the bottom wing are really tight. As  I said, I had to sand and file a lot to manage to close the fuselage and glue the wing in place. It seems that even the thin layers of primer and paint contributed to the fit problems.

 

The next steps will be taking care of the seams and applying some external PE bits.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

[Courageous]

Nice to you back on the build Jamie. The cockpits look fantastic with that detailed work. Keep the momentum going.

 

Stuart

[jrlx]

Thanks Stuart! Much appreciated!

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

 

 

[jrlx]

Hi again,

 

I finally got time to post the latest work done on this build, though it was done mid-March and I haven't done any more work since.

 

So, first I finished preparing the small parts for painting. One of the inter-wing struts had a pitot tube, which is poorly represented in plastic and must be replaced by a PE part (No.20 in the PE fret):

IMAG6164

 

The PE part bent to shape:

IMAG6165

 

The plastic stub was cut off and the PE part glued in place:

IMAG6166

 

Finally, here are all struts and small parts ready for painting:

IMAG6167

 

Next, I noticed that the cockpit interior would be visible through the underside opening on the nose piece, through which the exhausts pass:

IMAG6163

 

A picture of the real thing (from the walkarounds here in BM) shows that there was a bulkhead separating the cockpit from the engine, painted interior green:

http://www.britmodeller.com/walkarounds/aircraft/tigermoth/G-ANKT/k2585%2016.jpg

 

So, I decided to make a bulkhead from plasticard. I started by drawing the external profile of the nose cover on paper:

IMAG6168

 

The paper profile was cut off with scissors and adjusted to fit the front opening of the fuselage:

IMAG6169

 

This was used as a template to make the bulkhead from plasticard, which is here shown in a test fit:

IMAG6170

 

It must be painted interior green and glued in place.

 

Next, I took care of the tail fin. I read in my references that the rudder always turned left when the aircraft was unattended on the ground. So, I decided to cut the rudder off the fin and put it in the correct position for added realism. I started with the tail fin part:

IMAG6171

 

and cut off the rudder using a micro-saw:

IMAG6172

 

I also removed the small stubs representing the control horns of the rudder, as they will be replaced by PE parts. Before cutting them off I marked their position with small cuts on the inner edge of the rudder:

IMAG6175

 

Here's the rudder ready for application of the PE parts:

IMAG6176

 

The control horns of the tail plane will also be replaced by PE parts and must be removed. Here I had already removed one:

IMAG6173

 

To allow the installation of the PE control horns, small 0,3mm holes were drilled on the tail plane:

IMAG6174

 

That's as far as I managed to progress recently. I haven't managed to do any additional work, as my German course takes precedence.

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

 

 

[CedB]

Nice work Jaime  

I hope the German course is going well.

[jrlx]

15 hours ago, CedB said:

Nice work Jaime  

I hope the German course is going well.

Thank you Ced! The German course is in its last level and semester. I managed to pass in the C1 level exam in February and am now in the C2 level. The last exam is in late June. It doesn't get any easier and we're now using the language at a very sophisticated level.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

[Terry1954]

Just picked up on this thread. I'm very impressed at the level of detail you are achieving with this one Jamie. I have a couple of these in the stash, and if I can get even close to the standard of build of yours, I will be very pleased! I also saw your RN Phantom through one of the links in the thread and loved it!

 

Some of my builds have taken several years, so I was heartened to see that others can do the same!

 

Looking forward to seeing this progress.

 

Terry

[jrlx]

15 hours ago, Terry1954 said:

Just picked up on this thread. I'm very impressed at the level of detail you are achieving with this one Jamie. I have a couple of these in the stash, and if I can get even close to the standard of build of yours, I will be very pleased! I also saw your RN Phantom through one of the links in the thread and loved it!

 

Some of my builds have taken several years, so I was heartened to see that others can do the same!

 

Looking forward to seeing this progress.

 

Terry

Hi Terry, thank you very much for your very kind words and interest! The level of detail you mention is the result of using Eduard's PE set for this kit. I must confess I'm a bit obsessed with super-detailing, so I always throw PE, resin or whatever available after-market bits at a kit. The resulting added complication is also one of the main reasons for my builds taking so long... 🙄

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

[jrlx]

Hi again,

 

I've been away from the bench for quite a while due to my German course. I'm in the last semester of the course and intended to do the C2 certification exam. However, it turns out that at least another semester is needed before I'm fluent enough to try to do the exam. So, though I still have two more weeks before finishing the semester, I've returned to the bench and did some modelling last week-end. Here is a short progress report.

 

I glued the tail plane to the fuselage:

IMAG6215

 

and the tail fin without rudder to the tail plane:

IMAG6219

 

The fin doesn't sit completely on the tail plane (that's not a model error, as can be seen in pictures of real TMoths) but some filler is needed in the joins of the tail plane to the fuselage.

 

I also primed some parts that needed metalic paints, as well as the scratch built bulkhead which separates the cockpit from the engine compartment:

IMAG6216

 

The metallic paints and interior green where used on these parts:

IMAG6217

 

I hope to start treating the seams in the next few days.

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

 

 

[CedB]

Nice progress Jaime  

Sorry to hear that the German course will be keeping you away from the bench for another semester. Hopefully it will make you even more fluent!

[jrlx]

7 minutes ago, CedB said:

Nice progress Jaime  

Sorry to hear that the German course will be keeping you away from the bench for another semester. Hopefully it will make you even more fluent!

Thanks Ced! You're kind as always!

 

My German fluency is debatable... I can read and write relatively well (but a Dictionary always comes handy ), listening is more difficult but my weakest point is speaking, as I only speak in classes (3h per week in total). Anyway, I must better all these competencies and must also read faster, otherwise I won't be able to pass the exam, even with an additional semester.

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

 

[Space Ranger]

For Jaime (and anyone else who has ever attempted to learn German):

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Awful_German_Language

 

Complete text of the essay: https://www.cs.utah.edu/~gback/awfgrmlg.html

 

with apologies to my German friends, who probably find English just as perplexing!

[jrlx]

33 minutes ago, Space Ranger said:

For Jaime (and anyone else who has ever attempted to learn German):

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Awful_German_Language

 

Complete text of the essay: https://www.cs.utah.edu/~gback/awfgrmlg.html

 

with apologies to my German friends, who probably find English just as perplexing!

I've read it in German this semester. Quite funny

 

 

[FalkeEins]

 

Jaime, just found this and I can see up to your usual very high standard! I just happen to be building the same kit at the moment ..but mine seems to be quite a bit smaller than yours  (real human fingers in the shot..) ...I can't imagine using any etch on it, that's for sure!

 

 

I hadn't noticed until you mentioned it, but a pic of my local Moth ACDC on the field at Postling Farm, Kent -  rudder offset to the left. Pic also shows the two small struts to the rear of the gear assembly that aren’t in the kit...

 

 

 

..and a tip to improve your spoken German ..watch lots of youtube videos especially the "Easy German" channel with graded 'street' interviews and exercises. There are hundreds of them dealing with any subject...recommended ......"..nicht weil Deutsch einfach ist, sondern weil wir es euch einfach machen moechten, Deutsch zu lernen .."

 

 

[jrlx]

Hi Falke, ( @FalkeEins )

 

Thanks a lot for your interest and kind words!

 

I've finished the semester two weeks ago and now I'm limited to read and listen/watch German material. I've just finished watching season 2 of the German series "Dark" in Netflix (rather convoluted story but I'd recommend it). Thanks for the YouTube channel suggestion. I'm already following that channel but unfortunately haven't seen any clips yet. I'll follow your suggestion more seriously, as the everyday spoken German gets a bit lost in a formal language course. More recently I've been listening almost daily to SWR2 Wissen podcasts, which are always extremely interesting.

 

Regarding the Tiger Moth, I've been progressing with the build more or less steadily. I've finished painting but I still have to unmask and touch up any painting problems that turn up. I've also added some more detail by applying stretchers for the rigging and control horns for the control cables. All come from the "Stretchers and control horns" Eduard set. I tried to use the ones most similar to the real thing.

 

The additional undercarriage struts you mention come in the Eduard Tiger Moth PE set. But this set doesn't include all the control horns needed: it lacks the ones for the underside of the elevators and the ones to be installed on the sides of the fuselage, just above the bottom wing, which control the rudder cables. There's also no detail in the kit for the control mechanism and cables for the ailerons, which were installed on the underside of the plane, between the bottom wings.

 

Anyway, I have to update the thread, which will take some time.

 

Thanks again,

 

Jaime

 

[AdrianMF]

Nice work! Hope "alles ist gut" on the German course! You can tell I won't be passing any German exams any time soon.

 

Regards,

Adrian

 

[edit "alles sind"??]

[jrlx]

42 minutes ago, AdrianMF said:

Nice work! Hope "alles ist gut" on the German course! You can tell I won't be passing any German exams any time soon.

 

Regards,

Adrian

 

[edit "alles sind"??]

Thanks Adrian! I think it should be something like: "Ich hoffe, dass alles gut ist"

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

 

[jrlx]

Hi again,

 

The build has progressed a bit more since my last post and the decals are already on, as well as the sealing Aqua Gloss coat, in preparation for weathering. However I haven't had the time for updating the WIP thread, which I'll try to do now.

 

So, after the last reported work, I went ahead with the following:

 

First, I glued the tail fin minus rudder in place:

IMAG6219

Next, I applied Perfect Plastic Putty to the seams and sink areas on the fuselage:

IMAG6225

 

IMAG6226

 

PPP was left to dry for one day and the excess was removed by sanding and filing:

IMAG6229

 

IMAG6230

 

The bulkhead between the front cockpit and the engine compartment was glued in place:

IMAG6231

 

Now it was time for some extensive PE fun. First, the PE parts around the inner struts under the top wing:

IMAG6228

 

Next, the PE parts on the underside of the aircraft:

IMAG6232

 

This was followed by applying the control horns to the rudder:

IMAG6233

 

and the control horns to the top of the tail plane control surfaces:

IMAG6234

 

However, the Eduard PE set has no control horns for the underside of the tail plane. So, I used PE parts n. 25 from Eduard's set ref. 72438 "Wire stretchers and control horns":

IMAG6235

 

The Tiger Moth PE set also doesn't have any wire stretchers for the inter-wing rigging. For these I looked at pictures in my references and also in the following link, which has very good detail pictures:

From this research, I opted for some parts from the already mentioned Eduard set ref. 72438 which I think better resemble the stretchers used in the Tiger Moth.

 

So, for the stretchers around the outer struts, I chose parts n. 32:

IMAG6236

 

Initially I glued them too far from the strut glueing points:

IMAG6237

 

After better analysis of the detail pictures, I had to remove them and glue them right next to the holes:

IMAG6243

 

For the stretchers near the lower wing roots and around the inner struts on the underside of the top wing, I chose parts n. 38. First, I had to drill small holes with a 0.3 mm drill:

IMAG6238

 

After glueing the PE parts, this was the result:

IMAG6239

 

IMAG6240

 

That's already quite a bit for one post, so I'll proceed with more work in the next post.

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

 

 

 

 

[John Masters]

On 8/1/2015 at 6:30 AM, jrlx said:

The aircraft will be rigged, of course

Nice looking kit.  If you need info or tips on rigging, I do it all the time .  I would stay away from elastic.  Try .005 monofilament, CA, and hemostats.  very much like tying flies.

 

 

[jrlx]

More work, starting from one month ago till last week-end.

 

I masked the interior of the nose piece and the front of the fuselage, in preparation for priming, using masking tape and blue tak:

IMAG6241

 

The cockpit was also masked:

IMAG6244

 

Then, I primed all parts and sub-assemblies with Alclad Grey Primer and Microfiller:

IMAG6249

 

The primer was sanded in order to improve the surface finish and a second coat of primer was applied.

 

Then I noticed that I still had some work to do related to the control cabling. First, I had to apply PE parts to the leading edge of the tail plane, through which the top control cables for the tail plane control surfaces will pass:

IMAG6251

 

These control cables enter the fuselage on the sides near the tail. I drilled the necessary holes with a 0.3 mm drill:

IMAG6254

 

The control mechanism and cabling for the ailerons below the fuselage also implied some additional drilling on the under wing:

IMAG6252

 

and the scratch building of a small piece to reproduce the control mechanism for the cabling. This will be cut to size latter:

IMAG6253

 

and an additional hole for installing this part:

IMAG6255

 

The painting phase could now start. I sketched the camouflage demarcation lines on the aircraft with a pencil. This was only approximate, as I would later use precisely cut masks:

IMAG6256

 

Top camouflage Dark Earth and lower wing top colour Green Brown/Khaki were applied (Gunze H72 and H402, respectively):

IMAG6257

 

For masking I enlarged the colour scheme on the box back to model-size. Then applied masking tape on the enlarged scheme and cut the tape according to the camouflage contours. The resulting masks were applied to the model.

 

Here is the masking of the lower wing:

IMAG6258

 

The lower wing dark colour was H405 Olive Green:

IMAG6259

 

Next, I protected the lower wing and applied masking to the top wing, in preparation for painting the last top camouflage colour:

IMAG6260

 

The last top camouflage colour was H330 Dark Green:

IMAG6262

 

Before applying the yellow to the undersides and other yellow parts, I painted these areas and parts with matt white:

IMAG6263

 

IMAG6264

 

IMAG6265

 

As can be seen in the previous picture, before priming with white I also painted the tires with H77 Tire Black and the propeller with H12 Matt Black.

 

Then I painted the yellow areas with H34 Cream Yellow. As this is a gloss colour, I left the paint to dry for several days. After removing the masking, this was the result:

IMAG6266

 

IMAG6267

 

IMAG6268

 

IMAG6269

 

IMAG6269

 

There were a few blemishes and painting problems I had to rectify, but nothing too serious. After that, I applied the first phase of weathering: dry brushing on the wing ribbing with a lighter tone of the camouflage colours. I used the Khaki on the Dark Earth, Olive Green on the Dark Green and lighter versions of the Khaki and Olive Green, by mixing these colours with white, for the lower wing colours. The results are shown below:

 

IMAG6271

 

IMAG6272

 

IMAG6273

 

That's all for this post. Thanks for looking.

 

Jaime

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[jrlx]

1 hour ago, John D.C. Masters said:

Nice looking kit.  If you need info or tips on rigging, I do it all the time .  I would stay away from elastic.  Try .005 monofilament, CA, and hemostats.  very much like tying flies.

 

 

Thanks John. I intend to rigg it with Uschi's fine rigging line and CA. Elastic fishing line is too thick for the scale. By the way, is there any other reason for not recommending elastic fishing line?

 

Cheers

 

Jaime

 

[Courageous]

Love the use of the PE rigging fixings.

Altogether looking very nice.

For rigging, I have used both mono-filament fishing line and Uschi line (which is elastic). horses for courses but I too would like to know about 'staying away from elastic'?

 

Stuart

 

[John Masters]

3 hours ago, jrlx said:

any other reason

I find I am always at the mercy of the elasticity.  With the mono I have complete control over the tautness of the line when I stretch it on the rig with the hemostats.

 

Like this...

 

[CedB]

More incredibly detailed work Jaime - she's looking marvellous!  

[rob85]

2 hours ago, John D.C. Masters said:

I find I am always at the mercy of the elasticity.  With the mono I have complete control over the tautness of the line when I stretch it on the rig with the hemostats.

 

Like this...

 

How many trips to the hospital have you had! Cunning work though.

 

jaime, nice to see you at this and it’s come along loads! Looks fantastic 

 

Rob