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Handley Page HP42/45, Contrail vacuformed 1/72


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16 minutes ago, Courageous said:

Very interesting. Love the production line seats, done enough to cater for either version. 

Can't wait to see this 'clear strip' in action.

 

Stuart

To be able to make copies in resin from a master is a craft that I do not posses, nor an activity I want to get involved with, but some times it would be sooooo useful, Stuart.

Sigh...

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3 hours ago, Moa said:

I may have conveyed the wrong plan: The clear strip is not going to be clear all the way, but just as usual through the windows, the rest is going to be painted normally, it is just a device to simplify construction and masking.

The function is to eliminate the imperfect frames on the kit, and to remove the need of making individual windows, or use the kit's "capsule" as explained. So the final impression is going to be that of a normal model, not like one of those semi-transparent or cut-away travel agency models.

 

No, you did convey the correct idea although a cut away model would look pretty cool as well.

 

Martian 👽

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11 hours ago, kev67 said:

This should be good when finished, always love a vac form, I always thought about trying to acquire one of these beasts and having a go and building one, but I hate rigging model aircraft

Hi Kev

This one in fact has less rigging than most, the wings being secured by a Warren truss arrangement and a only a couple of cross wires at the end. There are of course control cables and tailplane rigging and such, but all things considered, this is an "easy" one (in that regard, that is 😉

If you catch one, give it a go!

The world needs more HP42/45s! They were eight of them!

Cheers

 

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Some parts are separated from the backing sheet. Notice the small parts still on a scrap, those are the two odd seats that are located back to back to the cockpit bulkhead, and where smaller. Needless to say they need to be replaced (only for the "high density" configuration, though):

IMG_2483+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

I will put this aside for a little while now, as this was a first foray just to make the Martian stop screaming and releasing the green goo, and I will turn my attention to the other seven models in progress.

Cheers

 

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1 hour ago, Moa said:

I will put this aside for a little while now, as this was a first foray just to make the Martian stop screaming and releasing the green goo, and I will turn my attention to the other seven models in progress.

You mean you haven't finished it yet! 😱 😱

 

Queasy of Mars 👽

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The airplane looks pretty big! I'll be watching this build with great interest!

HP 42 was featured in "Kiki's Delivery Service" anime by Hayao Miyazaki!

 

Edited by GrzeM
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A hair was embedded in the plastic, most likely a woolly mammoth hair, given the age of the kit:

IMG_2487+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

The molded items are coarse and their mold halves mismatched, They are sanded equal here:

IMG_2488+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

The tail components are liberated. Absolutely unnecessarily thick, which will make their thinning a sanding nightmare. Why the manufacturer put this parts on the very thick sheet and not with the thinner "capsule" parts will remain as another kit industry mystery that not even Poirot could solve:

IMG_2489+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

 

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I saw Moa & HP-42 & 1/72  and without even reading the thread instantly followed, then went back and read it.

I can't add anything that others haven't said but this is so good I'm really excited about each and every little bit of progress.

I went home to my parents house at the weekend and rummaged amongst the stash of my models they have patiently stored in their house whilst I disappeared off with my life.

I came back with a handful including this

 

20190226-123948.jpg

 

20190226-123754.jpg

 

This was before I saw this WiP!

 

Hopefully you've watched this -

 

 

 

Jeff

Edited by pinky coffeeboat
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6 hours ago, pinky coffeeboat said:

I saw Moa & HP-42 & 1/72  and without even reading the thread instantly followed, then went back and read it.

I can't add anything that others haven't said but this is so good I'm really excited about each and every little bit of progress.

I went home to my parents house at the weekend and rummaged amongst the stash of my models they have patiently stored in their house whilst I disappeared off with my life.

I came back with a handful including this

 

 

This was before I saw this WiP!

 

Hopefully you've watched this -

 

 

 

Jeff

Jeff, you found the little brother! It should make for a very nice build.

That movie clip is wonderful (although the imperial touch makes it a bit , ahem, not very PC 😉 , I haven't seen it before, thanks for posting it!

Cheers

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5 hours ago, Courageous said:

Plastic reduction of those wings and fuselage will be interesting. 

 

Stuart

Never mind, I hired the services of Sweeney Todd.

You think that in Antarctica is snow? Há!, it's styrene dust, left by generations upon generations of my modeling monk brothers, as they sand their way through kits like this one.

I have built Dujin and Merlin kits. Nothing scares me. I have developed muscles of steel sanding vacformed kits. My modeling pals, The Ornithopters, call me The Charles Atlas of Sanding (and many other names I shall not reproduce here).

Easy for others, like Martian Hale, with many tentacles. But one must do with what evolution has given us. Like moronic presidents.

 

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The remainder of the parts is freed.
It is of note that through a molding trick, the slats and top wing wing leading edges curve down and in, in what is called an undercut, not easy to achieve on a single mold, but if you do it only in one way, you can pull the molded sheet first a bit to one side liberating the undercut and then up. Clever.
I did not bother with the capsule since at this point I don't think I will use it:

IMG_2515+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

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Instead of providing a cohesive body of notes regarding the many aspects of the build in one place (historical, technical, sociological, psychological, political, culinary and the like), I decided to just sprinkle them here and there, which is immensely more fun and utterly impractical.

So here we start:

-The tail fins do not conform to the upper stab intrados (under surface, being the extrados the upper surface) as the kit and many models present it, but are slightly separated and pinned, the upper stab being at a much lower incidence.

-Early Hannibal shows additional diagonal strut at the wing tip (later replaced by cross wires), and small stab trim.

-Extra cargo door missing on the kit on the aft right fuselage after corrugations (but not on Horsa or Hanno).

-Loading hatch right mid-fuselage under the lower wing, absent on the kit.

-Two finned oil coolers on diagonal struts upper engines (among the myriad of gizmos that bristle all over the surface of the planes).

-Photos show the same plane with and without nose light (Hengist), and others show superimposed two two-blade props and four blade ones alternatively (some of the rest).

-The lower wings have a corrugated area at their roots. Those are not to be butt-joined without alteration to the fuselage, but have to be altered to partially conform to the fuselage contour as shown in photos.

All built models I have seen have it just butt-joined without alteration, which is inaccurate and also slightly alters the span, augmenting it:

2664858-gettyimages.jpg

 

3376434-m.jpg

 

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For those curious about the marred decals:

Surmising (perhaps erroneously) that the protective paper was covered in some kind of wax, and the melting/degrading of that wax was what caused it to stick to the decals, I tried on discarded (the military bits) pieces different solvents (xylol, Simple Green cleaner, acetone, thinner, boiling water). None worked and some diluted the ink on decals below. The paper will pull free from the areas where there are no images, but adhered firmly to the ink, showing perhaps that it is a reaction with their ink. In fact it looks exactly as if the protective paper was put on while the ink was still fresh, the fibers embedded on the color.

 

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1 hour ago, Moa said:

 

The lower wings have a corrugated area at their roots. Those are not to be butt-joined without alteration to the fuselage, but have to be altered to partially conform to the fuselage contour as shown in photos.

 

Well spotted. I've never noticed that before (even though I've had the kit since it was bought for me as a Christmas present when a teenager in 1981).

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A quick rummaging through the spares produced suitable cockpit seats, some potential pantry and radio elements, possibly a support for the instrument panel, and a couple extra parts to remind myself of things needed (oil coolers, wind-driven generators, slat supports, toilets, bar, for example).

No weekender, this one 😧

IMG_2518+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

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The history of the several HP42/45 is fascinating, as it is the aura of glamor and a pinch of adventure that surrounds it.

But which one to build?

As you know, 8 airframes were built, of which 4 were destined to serve the European region and another 4 to for the Africa, Middle East and India routes. But there was some shifting in that picture.

Before I start any build, and much more so if the type is interesting, I immerse myself in the research stage. I gathered a significant number of files on the HP42 (let's call it that generically) and what you discover looking at photos is interesting.

Rumor has it that the Eastern machines used 2 two-blade props, whilst the Western ones had a normal four blade ones. Photos show that the case was that:

Hanno, Hadrian, Hannibal and Horsa: used 2 two-blades props only

Horatius and Helena: 4-blade props only

Hengist and Heracles: used both types of props.

 

Heracles had for a time two smaller "Imperial Airways" legends on nose and to the right of the passenger door, instead of the larger legends in the areas of the fore and aft cabins.

The position of the Air Mail motif varied too, and so did the large number of probes, vents, antennas, flares, oil coolers and the like, that change from plane to plane and from one period to the next in the life of the planes.

Heracles, Hengist and Horatius also had on the nose at a time a circular motif with a lion, at some point a symbol used by Imperial Airways.

 

As you can see, as you advance in the research more details are revealed, so again instead of presenting a list with all the details for all the planes (which , by the way, will occupy three yards of posting real estate), I give it to you in this most impractical piecemeal fashion for your amusement and entertainment.

 

 

 

 

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