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Sanger 1/48 Stirling Mk.I BF372 - Ron Middleton VC - Finished at last!


woody37

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You are certainly getting the hang of this vacform malarkey, Neil, as the tail feathers look like a good quality injection-moulding now. The sign of true success when it comes to kits like these.

 

I’m really looking to seeing the fuselage come together now. 

 

In fact, you’re inspiring me to dig out my long stalled 1/32 scale project!

 

Tom

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Be great to see that beast back in the WIP section Tom, go on, you know you want too!

 

spent the day fitting clear panels, one side is done now. Trying to work with the flimsy fuselage is difficult but should be ok once everything is together

 

cheers

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Impressive stuff Neil. 👍

You have done a great job on those wings too considering the state of the originals, and a nice snug fit against the fuselage sides.

Keep up the good work Matey.

 

Chris.

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8 hours ago, stringbag said:

Impressive stuff Neil. 👍

You have done a great job on those wings too considering the state of the originals, and a nice snug fit against the fuselage sides.

Keep up the good work Matey.

 

Chris.

Cheers mate, I was tempted to scratch build the wings after our conversation but having gone so far with them, it made sense to see how they would look. The roots on all surfaces are filleted so any gaps will be hidden under a bead of miliput which is fortunate :)

 

i need to bring your drawings back back at some point so a good excuse for a catch up. I’m off next week and the week after if you’re around for a brew?

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Sounds good to me Neil.

Are the wings going to be detachable when you have finished or will they be permanently attached? The brass sleeve and steel spar would make that a possibility if you can get the joint to your usual high standard.

Looking forward to seeing the beast assembled whichever way you decide.

 

Chris.

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On 8/13/2018 at 7:23 PM, stringbag said:

Sounds good to me Neil.

Are the wings going to be detachable when you have finished or will they be permanently attached? The brass sleeve and steel spar would make that a possibility if you can get the joint to your usual high standard.

Looking forward to seeing the beast assembled whichever way you decide.

 

Chris.

Hi Chris,

 

no the wings rings will be fitted on. Apart from the gaps that are too obvious, the roots are filleted so I’ll be doing that with miliput on all the flying surfaces.

 

cheers

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Been plodding on this week with the windows. Such a faff of a job, but getting there now. No matter how much I tried to polish the windows, they never seemed to get there but they will have to do.

 

Here's the CD case strips of plastic fitted and the window masks in place...

 

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And here with some primer on and some of the gaps filled and sanded. There are a few additional windows that will be painted gloss nato black rather than being clear due to their locations. I tried this on the Airfix Lanc for the escape hatch windows along the top of the fuselage and they looked good so I'll use the same method of cheating here!

 

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Next job is to open up the mid upper aperture then it's finally on to the cockpit detailing which part from the complex seats, I'm rather looking forwards to.

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On 12/08/2018 at 23:09, woody37 said:

It's not often you get a full day at the bench, but today is one of them! Cut the slots for the tail plane spar earlier and checked everything for alignment. Not too bad so far..

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's looking great and I love the way that you're doing the glazing. I hope to  go down that route when I build mine.  Have you tried  scrapind down a rebate onto the clear  stuff to perhaps h give a bit more control  of the  depth it'll sit. Not that I've tried that myself yet, but to me it seemed the way to go. I've found too that treating cd case material like glass, scoring and then  snapping it over an edge  worked best for me.

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4 minutes ago, matti64 said:

It's looking great and I love the way that you're doing the glazing. I hope to  go down that route when I build mine.  Have you tried  scrapind down a rebate onto the clear  stuff to perhaps h give a bit more control  of the  depth it'll sit. Not that I've tried that myself yet, but to me it seemed the way to go. I've found too that treating cd case material like glass, scoring and then  snapping it over an edge  worked best for me.

 Hi Matti,

 

Yes, that's pretty much what I did, I scraped them until they fitted at the dry fitting stage but glue and the flexibility of the kit fuselage created lots of problems. Despite strengthening, just handling (let alone sanding!)  the parts causes flex that opens the seams up again on the front end so I need to be careful.

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On ‎8‎/‎22‎/‎2018 at 5:07 PM, Navy Bird said:

Excellent work! I love the idea of using clear CD cases, mind if I steal purloin borrow that technique? I'll give it back.   :)

 

Cheers,

Bill

Hi Bill,

 

Feel free to steal the idea, I did from someone else!

 

I've been cracking on today, got the mid upper aperture cut out and made a start on the cockpit detail following on from the great start that @Mike made before passing the baton over. The nose fuselage and the clear insert on the left hand side aren't getting on, so I'm going to leave the tidying up until the fuselage is stitched up. The cockpit will only be an approximation and won't be hyper detailed, just enough to look the part. I'm using some of the resin that @corsaircorp kindly donated and the usual plasticard. I've got to squeeze a Blenheim in after this for the Telford show so there has to be some compromises. Since taking the photo's, I've corrected the shape of the navigators table, it's now rectangular. Here's the progress...

 

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Really great job on the internals too !

Glad that the parts can help, And glader to see that really good use of it !

Congratulations !

Sincerely.

CC

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Looks great Woody, I have thought about doing the clear like this before but never bothered/got round to it. Not thought of CD cases though... a good idea! 

 

Going to be a show stopper when done. 

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Before  I stitch the fuselage up, I need to make sure the clear bits all line up at the front. @Mike did some moulds to improve the turret and cockpit which has saved me quite a bit of time, but I'm going to redo the canopy without frames and add them using solar trim after forming. I'm also modifying the turret former. Due to the shape, it needs to be done in 2 parts, so I'm moving the join further back to ensure any glue joins aren't visible. The fuselage needs some refinement to give a snug fit to the turret whilst allowing it to be added after assembly so that's another job for this afternoon. I've previously crash moulded clear parts, but find you need the dexterity of an octopus to do a good job so yesterdays goal was to knock up a vac forming box which I'll have a go at forming a couple of canopies later as we need two for the Telford display. 

 

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Back to the build, here's where I'm working on. The front turret fairing needs some work and obviously, there's more to do on the interior but it's progressing. Bare in mind that this is a former so the turret will fill the hole better. I need to get that formed before I start measuring up.

 

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A bit more done on the cockpit...

 

44277884871_17429dcdbb_o_d.jpg

 

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This is looking great, one of my favourite subjects, I get all nostalgic when I see an old Airfix boxing of it, but alas my sausage fingers could never handle it now so 1/48 would be my go to scale, looking forward to more.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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1 hour ago, spitfire said:

This is looking great, one of my favourite subjects, I get all nostalgic when I see an old Airfix boxing of it, but alas my sausage fingers could never handle it now so 1/48 would be my go to scale, looking forward to more.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

I'm hoping that this build causes the release of one so lets keep our fingers crossed Dennis! It worked when I did a Blenheim lol!!

 

Been experimenting with the new vac forming rig today and on the whole successful. I used WD40 as a release agent following the first attempt getting stuck. I've used .5mm and .75mm PETG sheet but I've ordered some 1mm which I think will be more suitable for these bigger parts. The missus just shook her head when she seen the toaster being taken into the garage 😂. It works a treat for getting the plastic up to temp. I've been dreading trying to form these parts, it was one of those tasks that I was concerned would de-rail the project but having had a tinker today, I'm more confident now :)

 

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Hi Neil

 

great work as always.

 

Hope you don't mind my being a pedant, but for Middletons Stirling there shouldn't be a radio fitted above the Nav's desk as this was only found on some Mk Ivs and Mk Vs. Also the glycol tank on the stbd side of the cockit should be mounted on a platform/step not diurectly on the floor as it is now

 

cheers

 

John

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Lots of good work going on there Neil. I like the vac box, you might want to consider filling the void beneath the plattern with a block of styrafoam, to reduce the volume of air and get instant suck from your vacuum sorce. Leave a gap of 10mm all round. It will help!

 

Colin

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19 hours ago, stringbag said:

Great results Neil.  I'll bet it took you longer to work out how the vacuum cleaner worked that it did to make the box :tease:

Can see you having fun with the rear upper turret. 

Cheeky bugger, I'm the expert in our house when it comes to cleaning I'll have you know!!!

19 hours ago, 12jaguar said:

Hi Neil

 

great work as always.

 

Hope you don't mind my being a pedant, but for Middletons Stirling there shouldn't be a radio fitted above the Nav's desk as this was only found on some Mk Ivs and Mk Vs. Also the glycol tank on the stbd side of the cockit should be mounted on a platform/step not diurectly on the floor as it is now

 

cheers

 

John

Thanks John, I was referring to photo's in the Aeroplane magazine and it doesn't tell you which version so I'll remove that. Gutted as it was one of my better scratch built parts!

The glycol tank looks to be fitted to the floor going off that photo, so do you have a better shot to see if I can change it? EDIT - found something :)

 

 

As much as I'd like this to be a perfect build, it's my trade mark to have some errors 😂

 

6 hours ago, heloman1 said:

Lots of good work going on there Neil. I like the vac box, you might want to consider filling the void beneath the plattern with a block of styrafoam, to reduce the volume of air and get instant suck from your vacuum sorce. Leave a gap of 10mm all round. It will help!

 

Colin

Hi Col,

 

I was considering that, but it works fine so far so if I start getting issues, I'll reduce the air volume. I was wondering what you use, you've given me the answer :)

 

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4 hours ago, woody37 said:

Cheeky bugger, I'm the expert in our house when it comes to cleaning I'll have you know!!!

Thanks John, I was referring to photo's in the Aeroplane magazine and it doesn't tell you which version so I'll remove that. Gutted as it was one of my better scratch built parts!

The glycol tank looks to be fitted to the floor going off that photo, so do you have a better shot to0p see if I can change it?

 

As much as I'd like this to be a perfect build, it's my trade mark to have some errors 😂

 

Hi Col,

 

I was considering that, but it works fine so far so if I start getting issues, I'll reduce the air volume. I was wondering what you use, you've given me the answer :)

 

Hopefully you have some informative emails Neil :)

 

John

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That interior looks magnificent Neil as do those pukka transparencies. :thumbsup:

Do you mind me asking where you source your PETG from? I've been looking for some reliably high quality stuff for vacforming.

Tony

 

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