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Back to the Mountains of Madness - Part 1 Complete!


billn53

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On 09/12/2018 at 17:12, billn53 said:

It's cold and rainy all weekend, so I've stayed home and continued experimenting on building the control horns I will need. This evening I explored using styrene strip for the larger control horns beneath the cockpit.

 

Here's my "best effort" thus far for the elevator horn:

 

 

 

    

 

 

I just noticed that the double-ended horn for the elevator is too high up on the fuselage. I placed it where Airfix would have it, but it needs to be lower to match the actual aircraft. Also, where it is now might get in the way of the rudder cable.

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4 hours ago, billn53 said:

Thanks for the advice. I'll order the larger scraper and look into a sharpening tool. 

A proper burnisher is a good thing to use but  if you've got anything like a screwdriver with a hard, pollished surface, that will work. the aim in sharpenning a scraper is to use the burnisher to "pull" a pair of burrs on the  corners of the edge and then to then burnish them down. thiss illustration shows it cabinetscraper_illustration.jpg?itok=whE

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@Matti -- Per your recommendation, I've ordered off a larger gooseneck scraper plus a burnisher tool from Amazon.

 

Today's progress report follows....

 

I have all of the various control horns finished. In addition to those on the nose (which I previously posted), today I focused on the horns for the control surfaces themselves (elevator, rudder, and ailerons). These I made from 0.005" brass shim. Here's an example of the elevator / rudder horns:

 

32377487548_8553eb9f3b_z.jpg   31310760907_9468e80198_z.jpg

 

The control horns for the ailerons are built in a similar fashion, except that I made separate items for the upper and lower horns:

 

32379832588_d6d6509de4_z.jpg 

 

It may not seem like I've accomplished much today, but it took me a good three hours of work (not to mention potential harm to my eyesight)  :tmi:

Edited by billn53
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5 hours ago, billn53 said:

@Matti -- Per your recommendation, I've ordered off a larger gooseneck scraper plus a burnisher tool from Amazon.

 

Today's progress report follows....

 

I have all of the various control horns finished. In addition to those on the nose (which I previously posted), today I focused on the horns for the control surfaces themselves (elevator, rudder, and ailerons). These I made from 0.005" brass shim. Here's an example of the elevator / rudder horns:

 

   

 

The control horns for the ailerons are built in a similar fashion, except that I made separate items for the upper and lower horns:

 

 

 

It may not seem like I've accomplished much today, but it took me a good three hours of work (not to mention potential harm to my eyesight)  :tmi:

The more you do, the quicker they'll get. It's always ironing out the procedure on the first one which seems so  crushing

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12 hours ago, billn53 said:

@Matti -- Per your recommendation, I've ordered off a larger gooseneck scraper plus a burnisher tool from Amazon.

 

Today's progress report follows....

 

I have all of the various control horns finished. In addition to those on the nose (which I previously posted), today I focused on the horns for the control surfaces themselves (elevator, rudder, and ailerons). These I made from 0.005" brass shim. Here's an example of the elevator / rudder horns:

 

   

 

The control horns for the ailerons are built in a similar fashion, except that I made separate items for the upper and lower horns:

 

 

 

It may not seem like I've accomplished much today, but it took me a good three hours of work (not to mention potential harm to my eyesight)  :tmi:

 

Great work, Bill. Your patience and skill outstrips mine for sure! I'm looking forward to seeing this finished :)

 

Martin

 

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It is looking really tidy, that in itself is a great accomplishment with any  corrugated airframe. It will  really look something  when its finished, Cyclopean? Decadent ? Who knows?  but  you'll have amassed  quite an audience  to see you across the finish line

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Thanks Matti! But, finishing the plane only gets me halfway to my goal. Then I'll be able to tackle the rest of my planned diorama. Fortunately, no more business trips for the rest of the year, and my company closes down between Christmas and New Years. So, plenty of time for building 🙂

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My plan, as much as I have one, is to treat the wing as a separate sub-assembly, completing it as much as possible before installing it on the fuselage. Today's progress report focuses on the landing lights in the wing leading edge.

 

This is what I'm trying to model:

 

45361961645_4a661a14d1.jpg 

 

The kit's representation leaves much to be desired. First step was to grind out a dish-shaped cavity for the light:

 

45361638715_dd5ee79806.jpg 

 

I also will replace the kit's lenses with larger, but shallower, lenses made from UV-activated acrylic "glue". I placed appropriately-sized drops of the acrylic on a clean sheet of glass, zapped them with my UV flashlight, and lifted them off with a new razor blade. The resulting lenses look much better than the kit's (shown at the top of the photo below).

 

32402518518_b510eca140_z.jpg   32402517998_b185afb42c_z.jpg 

 

Before adding the lenses, I will install miniature light bulbs in the dishes ground out in step 1. For these, I have some choices. I could use aftermarket lenses (relatively expensive on a per-light basis):

 

44457320110_234db72b23_z.jpg 

 

Alternatively, I could go the budget route, which will require a bit more effort but should end up looking just as nice:

 

44457320050_930bc73468_c.jpg 

 

That's it for right now. More later...

Edited by billn53
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On 12/12/2018 at 02:49, billn53 said:

My plan, as much as I have one, is to treat the wing as a separate sub-assembly, completing it as much as possible before installing it on the fuselage. Today's progress report focuses on the landing lights in the wing leading edge.

 

This is what I'm trying to model:

 

 

 

The kit's representation leaves much to be desired. First step was to grind out a dish-shaped cavity for the light:

 

 

 

I also will replace the kit's lenses with larger, but shallower, lenses made from UV-activated acrylic "glue". I placed appropriately-sized drops of the acrylic on a clean sheet of glass, zapped them with my UV flashlight, and lifted them off with a new razor blade. The resulting lenses look much better than the kit's (shown at the top of the photo below).

 

    

 

Before adding the lenses, I will install miniature light bulbs in the dishes ground out in step 1. For these, I have some choices. I could use aftermarket lenses (relatively expensive on a per-light basis):

 

 

 

Alternatively, I could go the budget route, which will require a bit more effort but should end up looking just as nice:

 

 

 

That's it for right now. More later...

Poundland and Claires Accessories help us out every time.  Poundland did sell, which I only managed to get  a couple of packets of, nail wraps which were  rows of tiny dome headed rivets!

 

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Continuing to work on the wing sub-assembly . . .

 

This evening I finished up what should be the last details for the wing, prior to painting.

 

First, the easy part -- scratching up and installing the "handles" for the wing's luggage doors:

 

45559201704_d763444211_z.jpg  45509320274_7bd7d992b6_z.jpg

 

My patience was tested with replicating the navigation lights on the Tri-motor's rudder and wingtips. Very fiddly work it was, and I spent more time than I would have liked rescuing flyaway parts from the carpet monster. Here is what the nav lights look like on the actual aircraft:

 

46232547242_bc9e10b3ce_z.jpg  46232547232_3edc2e30a8_z.jpg 

 

And my attempt at the same:

 

45559201694_2b56b2bc84_z.jpg  46282722251_277eb0e561_z.jpg 

 

45559201194_55b4e2a97f_z.jpg 

 

After I paint the wing, I will use UV-activated acrylic to create the nav lights' lenses. Speaking of painting, the postman delivered more AK Xtreme Metals paints today, so I should be firing up my airbrush in the very near future!

 

46282722461_24e1c27c2a_b.jpg 

 

There's still much to be done (I've been putting off the engine pods, they will be a bear), but I'm beginning to think I just might get this Tri-motor finished in time for 2019!

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A major milestone achieved today: First paint! Well, only on the wing, but it's still progress.

 

Before I get into the details, I want to say straight out that I'm having doubts about the AK Xtreme Metal paints. I've heard good things about them, but I've never used them before. As you will learn, my first experience isn't 100-percent satisfactory.

 

On with the show!

 

My first task was to prep the wing and rear control surfaces for the metallic layers with a base coat of black. For this, I used AK's "Black Base" from the Xtreme Metal range:

 

46269734672_35db5fcfea_z.jpg

 

45407468895_4e729387e9_b.jpg 

 

First problem -- the paint didn't want to get in to the "valleys" of the corrugated surface:

 

45407468905_9046da0301_c.jpg 

 

Second issue -- The Xtreme Metal paints are pre-thinned for airbrushing. That means, a little bit does NOT go a long way. I used over half of the 30 ml bottle just for the wing! Better order some more... 😞

 

46269734682_bf0d3c6014_z.jpg 

 

After the base coat was completely dry, I proceeded to mask off the leading edge, which I will keep black. I fully expected the corrugations to cause masking problems, so I used my "go to" tape for difficult jobs, Tamiya's masking tape for curves, which is a white vinyl product instead of the traditional paper-based tape. I used the tip of my needle forceps to coax the tape into the corrugations:

 

46269734692_9d31f214b8.jpg

 

Masking tape for curves does NOT want to naturally follow a straight line, and this turned out to be most difficult "straight line" masking job I've ever done. But, eventually, the job was finished:

 

44503492820_8417c6cb81_c.jpg

 

I also masked off the outer leading edge, and a few other minor places, and sprayed them with Xtreme Metal Dark Aluminum. My desire is to duplicate the different shades of metal as seen in this photo:

 

46269788602_72340de499_c.jpg 

 

44503492750_df0283bc50_z.jpg   31381127877_db4e985e07_z.jpg 

 

Which led to the third problem: My paint, in a couple of locations and for no apparent reason, didn't want to level. This resulted in uneven coverage, which can be quite obvious with metallic paints. The biggest problem was with the outer panel on the left wing (compare with the corresponding panel on the right wing, above):

 

31381127857_fb0fd4efde_c.jpg 

 

As I said, there's no apparent rhyme or reason for why this happened in only certain areas. The right wing looks absolutely fine in comparison, and the entire wing was pre-painted with black base. Some things will always remain a mystery, I suppose :shrug:

 

Tomorrow's plan is to finish painting the wing using AK's "Matte Aluminum".  I'll be crossing my fingers that all goes well with that!

 

Edited by billn53
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Sorry to hear about the paint problems :( 

 

4 hours ago, billn53 said:

I proceeded to mask off the leading edge, which I will keep black.

It may just be me, but did you mask off the wrong section of the leading edges? The photo shows the lights and outer edges black - the bits you haven't masked?

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The Tri-motor's wing is now painted, although I will need to do some minor touchups. Some due to problems with the Xtreme Metal paint, others are my own fault.

 

Here's the wing as it now stands after painting with Matte Aluminum:

 

46278563232_a3b7112bc9_b.jpg

 

I'm pleased as punch about how the masking for the black leading edge turned out. I really love Tamiya's masking tape for curves! I'm also happy with the contrast between the matte aluminum wing and the dark aluminum areas like the outer leading edge panel:

 

32456826078_5b0dfd2194_c.jpg

 

I do need to clean and re-do the wing landing lights, as the masking tape pulled up the dark aluminum I painted earlier today. I have no one but myself to blame for that -- I forgot that the Xtreme Metal paints are enamels, and didn't allow enough time for the paint to completely dry before masking.  Compare with the outer wing panel (on the left in the below photo), which I painted yesterday evening.

 

46278563122_a5de1e0f9f_c.jpg

 

Same problem with the access panels on the underside of the wing:

 

32456825838_f3f6e63272_c.jpg 

 

The other areas needing touchup are the result of problems with the paint itself. Just as I experienced with the black base coat, the Xtreme Metal matte aluminum does not like the Tri-motor's corrugated surface.  For some reason, this manifested itself mainly with the rear control surfaces:

 

31389901427_2a54fef1b7_z.jpg   31389900967_09a418dd72.jpg 

 

But, before I take on the task of fixing the above items, I think it wise to let today's paint job dry overnight 😉

Edited by billn53
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It's been a few days since my last post, but I have not been idle. Let me bring everyone up to speed.

 

When I left off last time, I had some touch-up to do for my paint job on the wing and tail surfaces. Here are a couple of tools that I applied to that job:

 

32488373238_ea98dc91cf_z.jpg

 

The yellow pen is a fiberglass-tipped brush that I used to clean out the corrugations on the tail surfaces where the paint failed to adhere. I then re-sprayed with another coat of matte aluminum. I'm happy to report that this was a success. Check the "before" and "after" pics:

 

31389901427_2a54fef1b7.jpg   46360144441_686fb88799.jpg 

 

31389900967_09a418dd72.jpg   46360144351_b01d4fd4f2.jpg

 

The purple-topped bottle from Tamiya is a cocktail of organic solvents sold for cleaning RC cars' polycarbonate bodies. My prior experience is that it does an excellent job of cleaning oil and grease from styrene prior to painting. It also aggressively dissolves most kinds of paint and putty, so it must be used carefully less puttied seams be revealed. For this build, I used it for two tasks.

 

First, I carefully cleaned the area around the landing lights down to bare plastic, then re-painted. This is what I started with:

 

46278563122_a5de1e0f9f.jpg

 

The final result I will reveal a bit later....

 

The second task for my body cleaner was to thoroughly clean the Tri-motor's fuselage before painting the black base and matte aluminum. This, apparently, did the trick, as the paint went on without any problems:

 

45664079424_e54ef8d677_c.jpg 

 

45664079544_127de7ab97_c.jpg 

 

Now, back to the landing light story....

 

After cleaning and re-painting the leading edge panel for the landing lights, I proceeded to finish off the landing lights themselves. I painted each recessed disk area with a Molotow chrome pen, and then used a couple of my beauty shop stick-on fingernail "jewels" to simulate the center bulbs:

 

45637221654_6c72d6634c_z.jpg 

 

Here is an oblique shot, with one of my UV gel lenses dry-fitted in place, to give you an idea of how the landing lights will look when finished:

 

46360144361_55dda16aa0_z.jpg 

 

All in all, I'm pretty happy with how things are shaping up. Next step is to apply a clear coat to the wing and fuselage, apply decals, do some initial weathering, and then assemble the wing to the fuselage. After that comes what may turn out to be the hardest part of this build: the engine pods.

 

Two more days of work this week, then ten days off! Hopefully the next two weeks will see my Tri-motor finished off, and I can get started on the "Mountains of Madness" display base.

Edited by billn53
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Yesterday was the last day of work until after New Years, so I'm free to put in some dedicated time on my build. I'm still working on the wing, but getting closer to the point where I can put it aside and move on to the engine pods. Here's the latest.

 

The Tri-motor's wing is pretty large, and all that matte aluminum is pretty boring. Perusing photos on the net, I found this one that looks interesting. Note the different shades of metal on the wing (I've enhanced the contrast and brightness a tad for clarity):

 

46412271791_835187d2ab_b.jpg 

 

So, I masked off my wing and sprayed panels both lighter and darker than the main wing color. For the lighter panels, I used Xtreme Metal "White Aluminum", and for the darker panels I used their Dark Aluminum, with a couple drops of black added. This is the result:

 

46361915212_54e8b687ce_z.jpg  46361915052_a547c4f4c5_z.jpg 

 

The next task on my list is to add some weathering to the wing. I was afraid of screwing up my beautiful wing, so out came my backup kit to experiment on. I wanted to see how different products might look, including waterbased Flory washes and some enamel-based washes from Tamiya and Mr. Weathering Color.  Here's my testbed with the washes applied, but before the removal process:

 

Flory water-based wash:

46361915202_8e172b0654_c.jpg

 

Mr. Weathering Color (enamel):

46412571231_ff129bc980_c.jpg

 

Tamiya panel-line wash (bottom row):

32540758568_3e1347f837_c.jpg 

 

What I found is that the enamel-based washes were very problematic. They settled in to the valleys of the corrugations and looked like cr*p.  Trying to clean them out with enamel thinner simply removed both the wash, and the Xtreme Metal beneath it (even though I had previously protected it with a clear coat of Future). Take a look:

 

32540758638_589853b2d8_z.jpg

 

That might be appropriate if I were building this:

 

32545191208_a1f5931137_z.jpg 

 

But I'm not, so I needed to find another solution. 

 

The Flory wash responded well to cleanup with a damp cloth, best results being with the Grime and Dark Earth colors. I apologize for not having a pic to show, because I used that wing for further experimentation using oils and powdered pigments. (The oils had the same issues as the enamel-based washes, but the pigments look very promising.) Here's my test wing with Flory wash and various oils & pigments applied, compared to my un-weathered wing:

 

45689527174_3311bd9c67_z.jpg

 

Definitely overdone, but by serendipity I discovered a thin mist of matte aluminum works wonders, the "overdone" effects acting something like a pre-shade.

 

Here's the pigment I found to work best:

 

46368921952_deb613b40a_z.jpg

 

And what it looks like when applied to the wing, with a final mist coat of matte aluminum. You should be able to see a faint streaking effect from the pigments:

 

46368922522_8d2cc1b4cb_z.jpg   32547656398_46b8d68078_z.jpg

 

So, that's my approach for weathering the wing. My next update should reveal if it was a success, or not.

 

-Bill

 

 

Edited by billn53
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3 hours ago, billn53 said:

32547656398_46b8d68078_z.jpg

 

So, that's my approach for weathering the wing.

I think that looks simply superb Bill; some beautifully subtle variations across that whole surface. A great lesson that getting the incredible requires some experimentation and risk-taking at times.

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39 minutes ago, TheBaron said:

... getting the incredible requires some experimentation and risk-taking at times.

I'm not sure "incredible" isn't a great exaggeration (thank you for that), but my spare kit is paying for itself many times over as a mule for experimentation. And to think I once had second thoughts after I hit the "buy now" button... lol!

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Lovely variation on the wing Bill.

Another vote from here for Flory washes - pretty safe stuff, even if you splosh it all over.

I'm with Tony - beautifully subtle :) 

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It's Sunday afternoon and time for another update!

 

The majority of weathering is done, at least until I do my final assembly. Drum roll, please...

 

Wing upper surfaces:

44620461660_d34c803968_z.jpg   46437103101_4d388a68a5_z.jpg

 

Lower surfaces:

44620461710_65a1fecc3a_z.jpg   46437103191_d5f24fa6f8_z.jpg 

 

I didn't forget the control surfaces:

45524515685_8db5555c9a_z.jpg 

 

But the fuselage I left pretty much untouched for now, because photos show the fuselage almost always has a uniform appearance. I also used the metallic polishing powders to highlight some small details on the wing:

 

Fuel fill covers polished with chrome powder:

31497637897_d75b49dbf7_z.jpg 

 

Likewise, the navigation light housings on the wingtips and rudder:

46437102301_4f87856bc5_z.jpg 

 

And, the forward edge of the ailerons, done in polished iron:

45524515835_2ec66afd67_c.jpg 

 

With this stage of weathering complete, it is time to move on to decaling the wing and fuselage. I am indebted to Thorfinn for sending me the artwork he created for his build (see the first post in this topic). I modified his artwork slightly, and added some small items of my own.  Here's a pic I took while checking to ensure I had re-sized everything correctly:

 

32564951218_c84d99f9c6_b.jpg 

 

In Thorfinn's build, the Tri-motor was leased from Ward Aero Services.  Ward is a good, proper Lovecraft name, but I thought "Marsh Air Charters" would be even more appropriate. For readers not familiar with Lovecraft's Cthulu Mythos, here is a short history of Obed Marsh and his shipping company:

 

Captain Obed Marsh owned three ships, the Columbia, the Hetty, and the Sumatra Queen and used them to build a mercantile empire in the Massachusetts town of Innsmouth, beginning in 1820 and lasting over two decades. It was on an early expedition that Marsh procured gold artifacts from Polynesian islanders, who claimed to receive them from a race of fish-people (Deep Ones) in exchange for human sacrifices. Marsh became a student of their legends and folklore during his many visits to trade for more gold. Arriving in 1838, however, he found that the islanders had been slaughtered by their neighbors, and his source of gold was lost. Innsmouth had come to rely upon the gold he brought back from the island, so in the wake of this tragedy, its economy crumbled. Obed then founded the Esoteric Order of Dagon, preaching a new religion that promised success and prosperity in exchange for fealty to the Polynesian gods. All of Innsmouth’s churches were converted or closed. Male and female inhabitants were forced to breed with the Deep Ones, producing hybrid offspring with the appearance of normal humans in early life but, in adulthood, slowly transform into Deep Ones themselves and leave the surface to live in ancient undersea cities for eternity. The plague of 1846 decimated Innsmouth’s population and left the survivors firmly in Marsh’s grip. After Obed's death in 1878, the Marsh family continued its control of Innsmouth until the death of Robert Marsh, presumed to be the end of the line.

 

I also added the "City of Arkham" decal, the list of cities & towns serviced by Marsh Air Charters, and the name "Sumatra Queen" over the passenger door. And, just for fun, I made a couple of small labels that I'll use when I get around to building my diorama:

 

44620932570_fdbaf0c36b.jpg   46386858122_e79d37cdf5.jpg

 

Those Miskatonic University profs are gonna need something to keep them warm while in the Antarctic! :penguin:

 

 

 

 

Edited by billn53
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