Revell B747 Ed Force One; Run To The Hills!

[nuuumannn]

Well, it's been sitting in my room for a couple of weeks looking dejected after my criticisms of the kit on first glance and I finally decided to make a start on this basket case. Firstly, a note on my skills as a modeller. I don't do this very often; time and circumstance mean that I am busy with other stuff, but I have deliberately made time to build this. Also, I haven't made models consistently for around 15 to 20 years and I don't have an air brush, so I will paint it by hand and rattle can, so don't expect excellence; mediocrity is a skill unexploited in forums like this, I feel.

So, here 'tis. Crank up the volume... "Here is the soul of a maaaan. Here in this place for the taking. Clothed in white, stand in the light; here is the soul of a maaaaaaan...."

As Bruce Dickinson warbled his way through the first bars of If Eternity Should Fail I contemplated my options with this kit. There are many issues that should be tackled properly, accuracy and fit problems that those of you with an eye for perfection would fix, but I'm not one of you. I have made the decision to turn this into a (rather imposing) desk top model with a custom made stand, so accuracy issues won't be top of the list, although some things will be unavoidable and won't be ignored.

The box looks suitably fancy and the photographs on it give useful reference for finish, but there's plenty of stuff on the net on this aircraft anyway, including Iron Maiden's own site.

At first glance, there's lots of flash on the sprues and as I commented when I got this, the sprue thickness is a bit overdone in parts. Boy, I'm glad I'm not tackling the undercarriage. Sink marks, circular mould spots, surface blemishes, excess flash; this kit could have come from the 1950s or 60s.

As I mentioned elsewhere, the first thing I noticed was the nose shape; the 747 has a straight nose from the windscreen to the radome; as you can see here the kits' is not. I'm not sure at this stage whether I will actually alter this or not. I was hoping this would be a OOB assembly, but oh no... So I'm inclined not to tackle this as, where do I stop? There are so many issues I've found so far with accuracy.

Another glaring issue is with parts fit; for example, the holes for the hori stab don't line up with the part. I'll cut the pins off and make new ones with dowel. Also, the hori stab butts up to this bit of it that sticks out. Why didn't the kit manufacturer just butt it up against the fuselage? The hori stab, as on most big jet airliners is variable incidence and there is a flat plate here that's not represented, although I see some detail lines on the decal sheet that are vaguely meant to represent this.

I began with removing parts from the sprues and because of the excessive flash, each one has to be trimmed and sanded individually. The hori stab was glued first, which revealed big gaps in the leading and trailing edges and these were filled with putty and sanded - twice. The next bits were the engine exhaust cores, which were painted black (after the obligatory sanding and trimming of excess unwanted sticky-out bits).

Next I'll be tackling the fuselage and main wings. If you are following this, please be patient as I won't be adding to this every day...

"Reef in a sail at the edge of the world, if eternity should fail. Waiting in line for the ending of time, if eternity should fail...

Edited August 26, 2016 by nuuumannn

[GRIM REAPER]

Really nice! I love 747's, so watching with interest! Just started on the 747-8F myself.

[S5 modeller]

Looking forward to this one.

As to the age of this kit, scalemates gives a bit if an insight to the age here....

https://www.scalemates.com/kits/111418-revell-04219-boeing-747-400

Matt

[invidia]

The wife got me this for my birthday, your going to need a bucket of filler just for the fuselage and fitting the wings. The piece that go's under the fuselage really doesn't fit, put some plastic card 'shelves' in to surport it. It's building up nicely but needs some work.

[MetroRacing]

Excellent I've been waiting for this kit to come out. I forgot actually lol.

Will be following this naturally

Ashley

[nuuumannn]

Hi Guys, thanks for your comments and for looking. Grim reaper, I too, am a fan of the 74'; she's a terrific bird and beats the pants off the 777 and the 744 can still leave an A380 in its wake. Thanks for the info S5 Modeller, I knew it was new in 1993, but even for then, the kit is pretty bad. Despite that, I'm actually enjoying this

[Graeme H]

I like your idea of mediocrity, should be a quick build then

[Jessica]

The wonky nose can be fixed by backfilling with Milliput. Allow it to dry, then sand to the correct contour. You'll go through the plastic in places, but the Milliput will keep everything firmly locked in place.

[nuuumannn]

should be a quick build then

Ahh, but you see, Graeme, I'm slow as well...

Jessica, thanks for the advice, but I'm going to leave it, principally because there are so many inaccuracies on the kit and I am not wanting to put too much effort into correcting them all; this was supposed to be a simple build and all that would just complicate things - I'm at a point where it holds my interest, but if that wasn't the case it'd just sit for ages unmade.

Anyhoo, on with the build. The next step was tackling the main wings - note that I've abandoned following the instructions - these were removed from the sprues, cleaned up and sanded as there was lots of flash in them, particularly around the canoe fairings on the trailing edge. The recessed panel lines aren't entirely accurate, particularly the Kruger flaps, which are set too far aft of the leading edges; their forward edge should be almost at the wing leading edge.

The leading edge landing lights are clear parts, which were covered in flash, see the picture below, they are the 'U' shaped parts to the left of the tree and these were cleaned up and cemented into place before the wings were glued together.

Problem is, and there's no surprise here, they don't fit the holes, which are far too big, so I covered the lot with putty and will use the decal that Revell has kindly provided as an alternative. Lots of putty required to fill the gaps between the two wing halves.

The engine cores have been assembled and engine nacelles have been removed and cleaned up and are ready for putty and paint.

Next I'll be tackling the fuselage halves and cutting out windows; should be fun.

Sing it! "Shadows in the sun, we will not return. Humanity won't save us, at the Speed of Light..." (I'm actually enjoying this, really)

Edited August 28, 2016 by nuuumannn

[Alex1978]

Watching this with interest.Coming along well

Regarding the nose;Depending you care for the panellines,draw them slightly deeper before glueing the halves together.After that you can sand that "hump" flush without using Milliput and the panellines will still be visible after the work.

That was my method when I build Revell's 747-400 in British Airways livery.I also glued in the clear part cockpit window,plastered it with putty and sanded it smooth.Then I used a windowdecal for the cockpit which can be applied in the correct position.The clear part sits way too high and the windowframe decal for the cockpit,being correct in shape won't fit to the clear part because this is completely out of shape.

Small and easy modifications,but it changed the look of the model significantly.The rest of my build was more or less out of the box but I am very pleased with the end result.

[Howlindawg]

An interesting subject - shame about the quality issues with the plastic.

I shall peep through the keyhole and observe.

[celt]

As a mad Iron Maiden fan, really interested how this one turns out. :popcorn:

[bbudde]

Hello I'm In here of course.

For that:

I hope no one betrayed

[Radleigh]

I need to build this one day, I went and see it when it came over but sadly for me it was parked in a less than perfect spot, and I couldn't hang around for it to depart. Looking forward to seeing this progress though!

[bbudde]

One for decaling:

[nuuumannn]

I hope no one betrayed

Can you name the films the clips come from? I see Battle of Britain, Pearl Harbor, The Blue Max, Flyboys, Memphis Belle, possibly Dark Blue World (which used Battle of Britain and Memphis Belle clips)...

I thought this one was a mite better given the subject matter...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoUnq-e--Nc

Or you could go with this one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ve4kcWuQYsU

On with the show in a day or two; I have Baby Bear with me.

Edited August 30, 2016 by nuuumannn

[rom1]

Hi!

nice start. thanks for sharing, it will be usefull ;^)

Romain

[celt]

I would buy this kit for just the decals and make em fit on a better 747. I have heard the Revell kit is not a good one.

[Romeo Alpha Yankee]

I would buy this kit for just the decals and make em fit on a better 747. I have heard the Revell kit is not a good one.

Considering the original issue of this kit was in 1993 it is not bad. Unless you want to chop up a Zvezda or Revell 747-8 kit you won't find another 747-400 kit around. Best to build this one with its vices. To me it looks pretty good without breaking out the micrometer.

[nuuumannn]

To me it looks pretty good without breaking out the micrometer.

You don't need a micrometer to find the errors, they are pretty obvious. 1993 wasn't all that long ago (I was in my 20s then) and I really do think they could have done this better than what they did; it is really at a standard of kit build dating back to the 60s - boy Trojan, you must do it tough...

Anyhoo, More Ed Force One. Despite the issues, I am sinking my teeth into this and it does keep me entertained. Baby Bear has gone home and I've pressed on with the windows. The instruction sheet helpfully colours the windows to be cut out in green and those to be filled in red to match Ed Force One:

But... Of course there are compromises on the plastic. Most of those needed to be cut out are sunk into the inside plastic as seen in the pic below, but not all of them. The windows needing to be removed from the top deck are not sunk, so a bit of forward planning required. I, of course chickened out and decided that these'll stay configured the way they are.

A bit of before and after going on here: the windows were drilled out first, then pruned into shape with a scalpel. I did cock it up a bit and they are too big, but I squirted a bit of putty into the holes and cleaned them up and they now look better, but are still rubbish. Nevermind. I'm falling back on the window decals to give them a bit more definition once the lot is painted. From a distance they look okay, but close up they are quite noticeably askew.

A bit more progress with engine nacelles, exhaust cones and LP fans painted dull aluminium.

Next, the fuse goes together; Big Visual Progress. Diggety diggety. Oh, by the way, big thanks to those of you who have offered your advice and kind words; it's very encouraging.

"The red and the black, people don't want the truth, look in their eyes and you send them away..." (This song sounded awesome at the concerts)

Edited August 31, 2016 by nuuumannn

[UpperDeck]

you won't find another 747-400 kit around.

The Authentic Airliners kit is the 2nd option, it started to be available a little less than 2 month ago, now availability suspended because the fuselage master had to be reworked on, but deliveries should resume in a few days/weeks.

Last option is the Dragon kit which navigates in the same accuracy level as the Revell kit, the AA kit being the definitive reproduction.

Edited August 31, 2016 by UpperDeck

[nuuumannn]

On with the build. I'm heading out of town for a few days, so a bit more done before I go.

The Fuselage! In trial fits it didn't go together well at all; lots of gaps and the pins didn't line up. Some were so badly misaligned that they poked into the fuselage and missed the holes altogether and when they were forced into the holes, there was a step in the fuse halves, so they all went. Aerials and protrusions along the centreline were cut off also, as the gaps and steps between each half will have to be filled in with putty. Because of the thickness of the plastic in places, I made some tabs to align and support these areas. They also close the undercarriage bays and provide a surface on which the doors can sit.

I put the fuse together with the wings for a wee look-see. It's big, alright.

This did highlight the worst areas where there'd be gaps and misalignments between each half, so served its purpose.

A coat of grey undercoat was sprayed into the fuse interior before assembly. The problem with these rattle cans is they spit a little and you get wee lumps coming out. Don't like that.

While I waited for the grey to dry I did some more work on other bits; undercoat was sprayed on the wings and hori stab and more coats on the engine components, adding black to the LP fan centre bodies, then I stuck the fuselage together and bound it with tape.

That's it fer nooo, well, for a few days at least. Thanks for looking.

"I need somebody to save meeee..."

Edited August 31, 2016 by nuuumannn

[AdamLouiseModellers]

She looks amazing 👌. Are you doing her in the Iron Maiden livery or have you bought aftermarket decals? That's what I plan on doing. Not exactly looking forward too it 😂.

[Jessica]

Try soaking your rattle cans in hot water for a bit before spraying. That makes the paint flow a little better, and gives you a bit more pressure.

[nuuumannn]

Excellent advice, Jessica. Will do. Will press on with this soon.

Adamlouisemodellers, I'm using no aftermarket stuff at all; this is an OOB build at its purest; no accessories, using what was supplied in the box. Good luck with it - it requires a lot of work, but it's a bit of fun. Post pics.

Must remember to get some more sandpaper from work tonight...

Edited September 5, 2016 by nuuumannn