Another Airfix Bomber Command Wimpy Mk.1C

[general melchett]

 

Hi all, hope you don't mind me posting yet another Wimpy. This one was finished using the kit decals for R-Robert, the aircraft flown by the incredibly courageous sergeant pilot James Allen Ward whose exploits earned him a well deserved VC. Unfortunately, these decals weren't available at the time I received the original test shot from Airfix but fortunately, that allowed me to model one of the 311 Czech sqn aircraft instead. It's a fantastic kit and worthy of several builds which is just as well as we can't have too many of 'em adorning our Bomber Command SIG table. This kit was provided by Simon (Owen) of Airfix to be built for display on the Airfix stand at the recent Telford show a few weeks ago. It seemed to go down well which is gratifying as hopefully, decent sales of the model will prompt them to produce more BC related subjects...Manchester, Hampden or Lincoln anyone?

 

The model was first black-based using Mr.Surfacer 1500 Black primer thinned with Mr.Levelling Thinner (1/3 ratio), then marbled and painted using MRP's excellent lacquer acrylics, fired through a Mr.Hobby PS-770 to get the finer details. All weathering was applied using Abteilung502 oils, AMMO MIGs pigments and a few AK washes for oil, grime and fuel stains. The aerial wires were added courtesy of Uschi Van der Rosten's 'fine' rigging line, (actually hard to see in many of the photos!) 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

All in all a lot of fun and a nice reprieve from bending and smashing vac and resin parts into shape...but more of that later

 

Thanks for looking and cheers 

 

Melchie VC (Violent Conduct)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A couple of images of the two Wimpys together...hopefully, there will be more variants in the future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 28, 2018 by general melchett

[DaveyGair]

Always gratifying to inspect a 'Melchie Model', wonder why I ever bother 🙄

 

 

 

Davey.

[ColinChipmunkfan]

Great looking models -as ever- I should do my patriotic duty and go and buy one!

[fubar57]

Very nice

[tonyot]

Wow that is superb Andy,..... well up to your usual high standards and a fitting tribute to the actions of a very, very brave man indeed. I have to agree,..... this Wimpey kit is a superb model too,

All the best mate,

                            Tony

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Beautiful pair of Wimpy’s

Edited November 27, 2018 by Corsairfoxfouruncle

[Tempestwulf]

This is one thankful Kiwi Melchie. Fantastic Wimpy & a real history behind it.

 

Hope Airfix release a Manchester on day, it would be a dream come true to have a mainstream company like Airfix put one out there. I imagine it's sell just as well as the Wimpy or Lancaster.

[Abandoned Project]

A very fine bomber sir.

[woody37]

Gorgeous mate, love the subtle weathering and choice of scheme

 

[Baldy]

Very nice looking Wimpy. Lovely paintwork and weathering. Not quite sure abut the "rusty" exhausts though? The new Airfix kit looks really nice.

 

Cheers

 

Malcolm

[Watcher]

My Wimpy is on hold at the moment because I haven't worked out how to deal with the waist gun windows. Appalling fit of the supplied fillets so I'm trying to think how to fill the significant gaps and then reinstate the ribbing.  Any advice gratefully received.

[RMCS]

Fantastic 

[FAAMAN]

Superb Wimpeys Sir

Love to know how you carried out the amazing finish you have ended up with, SUPERB

Not able to go out and get one as I've not seen it here in Great Oz

[Courageous]

What they all said Melchers.

 

Stuart

[sprue]

10 hours ago, Watcher said:

My Wimpy is on hold at the moment because I haven't worked out how to deal with the waist gun windows. Appalling fit of the supplied fillets so I'm trying to think how to fill the significant gaps and then reinstate the ribbing.  Any advice gratefully received.

Re the waist gun positions, i found the blanking plates E46 and E47 best fitted on the opposite fuselage sides shown in the instructions. Perhaps the instructions mislabeled them?

[general melchett]

Wow, thanks guys, all comments greatly appreciated. 

 

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Always gratifying to inspect a 'Melchie Model', wonder why I ever bother 

You must bother Davey...if possible, get inspired and do your thing, you'll surprise yourself...I did and still do, especially after returning from SMW, there's some truly amazing stuff out there, 

 

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I should do my patriotic duty and go and buy one!

For King and Country, you know it makes sense, stride down to your local model shop, swagger stick and wedge in hand and demand one right away... in fact every WWII bomber fan should buy at least one...or more.

 

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a fitting tribute to the actions of a very, very brave man indeed.

Cheers Tony, so true, amazing bravery, but I'm sure if you were able to ask them how they had the courage they would tell you it was just 'anyone would do the same' and that may well be true...however they actually did do it, true heroes, to a man! Sorry, I missed you at Telford, but as usual, I was all over the shop...only just catching up!

 

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Hope Airfix release a Manchester on day, it would be a dream come true to have a mainstream company like Airfix put one out there. I imagine it's sell just as well as the Wimpy or Lancaster.

Well, you just never know...I agree a Manchester would sell well as would a Hampden and Lincoln. Personally, I'd love to see these two in 1/48th, along with an upscaled Wimpy.

 

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My Wimpy is on hold at the moment because I haven't worked out how to deal with the waist gun windows. Appalling fit of the supplied fillets so I'm trying to think how to fill the significant gaps and then reinstate the ribbing.  Any advice gratefully received.

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Re the waist gun positions, i found the blanking plates E46 and E47 best fitted on the opposite fuselage sides shown in the instructions. Perhaps the instructions mislabeled them?

Interesting, I didn't find the waist gunner plates too bad really and never even thought of swopping them over, good find though. I just added a bit of 0.5mm backing card underneath them so that they stood slightly proud, filled using Perfect Plastic and then sanded to shape using a slightly concave sanding block and 800 grit Micro Mesh until blended. Or you could go for a later Mk1C, add the waist glazing and paint over the long windows, (need new decals but they are out there).

 

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Love to know how you carried out the amazing finish you have ended up with, SUPERB 

Not able to go out and get one as I've not seen it here in Great Oz 

Thanks FAAMAN, sorry to hear you can't get hold of one out there in the land of plenty just yet, hopefully that will be addressed soon.

 

As for the finish, well, bit long winded but basically the first thing to do was spray certain areas such as the wing leading edges, fin leading edge, turrets and engine nacelles with MRP Super Silver in preparation for the chipping process. MIG's chipping fluid was then applied over this prior to the painting being applied, after which the paint was slowly chipped away via brush and cocktail stick, using photos as reference. The painting itself is really a combination of black-basing, (basically priming in black) followed by marbling using a combination of the base colours, Dark Earth and Dark Green, along with a mix of heavily thinned light green, red/brown, olive drab and light earth, (all from the MRP range, I can't praise these paints highly enough). This is where a top quality airbrush like an Iwata Micron or Mr.Hobby PS-770 (basically one and the same) come into their own as you can create really tight patterns to add a lot more definition. The colours are then unified by adding a blend coat of the top colours, in this case, Dark Earth and Dark Green allowing enough of the marbling to show through to add tone and depth to the surface colour. I also like to use variations of the base colour to produce lighter and darker panel shades rather than the dreaded 'panel line' washes which I really dislike...a lot! Over this, a light mist of thinned Smoke is added to age the paintwork and modulate the tones a little. Once dry the surfaces were glossed using Mr.Color GX-100 Super Clear III to prep for decalling. Talking of which I cut out all the large fuselage codes individually via scalpel to minimise the chance of silvering. Following all this, the model was given a few light coats of MRP's Semi-Matt coat clear to seal everything in and provide a more realistic finish than a dead looking overall matt coat. The underside was treated much the same way with the lighter colours, mainly greys and browns being marbled over the black base, built up slowly using lightly applied coats at low psi, helpfully the MRP paints are pre-thinned, much like Alclad and as easy to apply). After all this palaver, the weathering was applied using Abteilung oils and Matt Effect Thinners along with MIG and AK pastel powders used for the exhaust staining and enamel 'oil leaks' fluids around the nacelles. Sorry for the long-winded explanation but it's a fairly complicated procedure I suppose, probably better described in photos, (actually I pretty well covered it in the AMW article when I built the first one)...hope it helps.

 

And if you lived through all that, give yourselves a gold star!

 

Cheers all 

 

Melchie

 

 

 

[Dan_RAFBC]

Spectacular pair of Wimpy’s 👍🏻

[Mark Joyce]

Outstanding build!  It's amazing that you can paint the camo freehand.  I recently finished the Italeri Stirling and had to mask everything.  There's no way I could freehand paint anything on that beast without causing all sorts of problems!

 

I am really drawn to this kit, but have the Trumpeter in my stash and can't really justify getting it...at least not yet.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark

[general melchett]

Thanks chaps, 

 

Mark, a decent airbrush does make life a great deal easier. I use both an Iwata CM-C Plus V2 Custom Micron and a Mr.Airbrush PS-770, which basically have the same spray heads, (coming out of the same Creos factory) and atomise paint perfectly, making jobs like this very straightforward. I appreciate not everyone can afford to just go out and buy these expensive tools but they repay themselves back in the quality of the finish they deliver. The PS-770 is almost half the cost of the Micron too making it a real bargain in my eyes, and choose it over any of the others I have, bar the Micron, including an Iwata HP-C Plus, H&S Infinity CM Plus and Paasche TG-3F Talon. These high detail brushes (0.18 needles) allow you to paint fine camo demarcation lines freehand, up close with ease, then move back, adjust the pressure and spray the infill, simple as that. 

 

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I am really drawn to this kit, but have the Trumpeter in my stash and can't really justify getting it...at least not yet.

 

Try and get hold of one if you can, it goes together well, has lots of detail and options and really looks the part......and the geodetic lattice framework on the flying surfaces is superb.

 

 

[FAAMAN]

Thanks for the great step by step Sah!!! 😎

I did not realise you were the chap responsible for the AMW build (nor did I recognise the model ) from the mag in your post here. As I said superb work, one day I may get to your level

It always seems to take a "while" before any Airfix (or Revell for that matter) new release model to turn up at my LMS, if ever

[Uncle Pete]

A couple of beauties there, Mon General, and you can't have too many Wimpys.  My not-quite-L-enough LHS has a couple of the new Airfix one on their shelves.  Maybe it's time for another trip to Hounslow and flash the plastic for some plastic.  A few other items may "accidentally" fall into my shopping basket while I'm in there causing me to say to the missus, "They followed me home... Can I keep them?"

[general melchett]

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I did not realise you were the chap responsible for the AMW build (nor did I recognise the model  )

Guilty as charged M'lud... Well, I sincerely hope that they wing their way down-under pretty soon. Frightful state of affairs, I shall be having words with my MP, (if I can drag him out of the local boozer) and bring the matter up at the next town hall meeting! 

 

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A few other items may "accidentally" fall into my shopping basket while I'm in there causing me to say to the missus, "They followed me home... Can I keep them?"

I used to try exactly the same thing with my local's single malt....sadly the memsahib rumbled the ploy pretty quickly and thoughtfully suggested donating them to worthy causes, ie those less fortunate at yuletide...this usually meant Her younger male siblings.  

[John R]

23 hours ago, general melchett said:

For King and Country, you know it makes sense, stride down to your local model shop, swagger stick and wedge in hand and demand one right away... in fact every WWII bomber fan should buy at least one...or more.

A local model shop??? Didn't they go the way of the Dinosaurs or do they still have them 'up North'?

John

[general melchett]

Hi John

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Didn't they go the way of the Dinosaurs or do they still have them 'up North'?

Yes, while most are now buried under sedimentary layers we actually have a pretty good bonefide model shop oop here in't, (sorry, that's too far norf) heart of Bomber County. This is something of a miracle as I'm sure Poundland/Primark/Lidl/any card or 'charity' shop would love to acquire the site to sell yet more 'cheap stuff' (I'm being polite here) to the huddled masses. Many have come and gone but this one's hanging on for dear life...

[Uncle Pete]

44 minutes ago, general melchett said:

this one's hanging on for dear life

I don't know how the bloke in Hounslow stays open... Seems the only biz he gets is when the president of my RC flying club buys prizes for the monthly raffle.