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1/72 B-17G Airfix, Released. New boxing Fortress MK.III also released. New B-17G boxing for 2021


sofiane1718

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12 minutes ago, Rakovica said:

Not impressed with the boxart at all, to be honest. The Cheyenne tail turret is a way too short, while the bombs dropping down the stream are totally unrealistic. Seems to me that the Airfix artist often tries to put too much action in one place, for no reason.

 

That chequered nosed 190 seems out of place timing wise with that B-17, but since Airfix have been using the box art to make connections between releases of kits (a 262 appears on the earlier boxing of the B-17, linking those kits in a kind of narrative) maybe there's a new, early 190 (A-5 or A-6) from Airfix in the cards?

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7 hours ago, Rakovica said:

Not impressed with the boxart at all, to be honest. The Cheyenne tail turret is a way too short, while the bombs dropping down the stream are totally unrealistic. Seems to me that the Airfix artist often tries to put too much action in one place, for no reason.

 

That tail looks horrible, some boxart's are done using the kit CAD model, I guess that didn't happen here. I suspect the same 3D model was used for their previous boxart, but the tailplane is obscuring the top of the turret so it's not obvious. 

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4 hours ago, Rakovica said:

Not impressed with the boxart at all, to be honest. The Cheyenne tail turret is a way too short, while the bombs dropping down the stream are totally unrealistic. Seems to me that the Airfix artist often tries to put too much action in one place, for no reason.

Never mind the box art, feel the plastic!

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1 hour ago, Christer A said:

Is there any chance of getting the Milk Run decals seperately?

I'm not aware of any kit company that sell their decals separate to the rest of the kit. Your best bet is to find someone buying this boxing that isn't doing to that scheme.

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12 hours ago, Christer A said:

Is there any chance of getting the Milk Run decals seperately?

You could always ask for a set here on the forum after the kit has been released - I am sure someone will be happy for you to have these decals

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8 minutes ago, elger said:

 

there is one; 3d printed, no clear glass. I have one, looks pretty nice but haven't tried the fit

 

https://www.shapeways.com/product/QBWQN9W29/1-72-b-17g-early-tail-gun-for-airfix

It might be worth them doing a replacement Cheyenne too, seeing as Airfix have such trouble producing them to the correct size. You may remember my thread about the undersized kit parts for the turret. The replacements were only marginally better. I know that others have also had issues with these parts, whilst some have parts which are the correct size.

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For some reason, I decided to offer up my Airfix B-17 to the Al Granger plans from the Aerodata International book. Anyone know how good the Granger plans are, because if they're good, then the Airfix B-17 seems to be 4mm to shallow in the fuselage. Couldn't find my Hasegawa Fort to compare that. 

 

51281365236_6f4c88ba0e_b.jpg

 

Just curious

Steve

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You might compare it to an official Boeing scale drawing, which you can download here:

 

http://aviationarchives.blogspot.com/2016/04/boeing-b-17g-model-drawing.html

 

This might also be helpful:

 

http://aviationarchives.blogspot.com/2019/07/air-age-technical-library-boeing-b-17.html

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22 hours ago, fightersweep said:

For some reason, I decided to offer up my Airfix B-17 to the Al Granger plans from the Aerodata International book. Anyone know how good the Granger plans are, because if they're good, then the Airfix B-17 seems to be 4mm to shallow in the fuselage. Couldn't find my Hasegawa Fort to compare that. 

 

 

Just curious

Steve

 

Don't have the Hasegawa kit but Airfix is exactly as tall as Academy, fwiw.

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@Space Ranger Thank you Sir! That looks like a really helpful resource. I will make sure to check that out.

 

@elger Thanks! Interesting to know that the Academy B-17 is the same depth in the fuselage. I've seen some really nice builds of the Airfix B-17, but I often felt that the nose area looks a bit slim. Probably just camera angles etc, so I thought I'd check. I know the Granger plans are usually quite well regarded so it got me wondering who's got it right.

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37 minutes ago, fightersweep said:

Granger plans are usually quite well regarded so it got me wondering who's got it right.

As a former engineering draftsman, I’ve long been an admirer of Granger’s work myself, but now I’m wondering about his accuracy. Wylam’s drawings have similar issues.

 

I have other drawings that may be helpful, but I need to upload them to Flickr first. Stay tuned!

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Next, for those who want to get right down to the real nitty gritty, are these dimensioned fuselage center line profile drawings. Note that these are for the B-17E. I have not scaled them, so you may have to some jiggling of them to get them to 1/72 scale:

 

CL profile Fwd

 

CL profile aft

 

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As a bonus, here is a detailed nose profile. If my math is correct, it has been scaled to 1/72 at 300 dpi, but the forum software insists of resizing it to 72 dpi. So after downloading it, rescale it to 24%.

 

 

B-17 Nose Profile 1-72

 

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Wasn't the Airfix B-17 LIDAR (or whatever it's called) scanned? Therefore, I would have thought, it's pretty much spot in...

 

Tom

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7 hours ago, Space Ranger said:

As a bonus, here is a detailed nose profile. If my math is correct, it has been scaled to 1/72 at 300 dpi, but the forum software insists of resizing it to 72 dpi. So after downloading it, rescale it to 24%.

 

 

B-17 Nose Profile 1-72

 

 

Someone with the relevant software might also be able to compare these to the Granger drawings and see how correct they are.

 

 

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