KV-107 JGSDF Okinawa rescue scheme

[PlaStix]

While I've got some time between projects I'm going to try and catch up with everyone's builds! Your's is looking very good so far! I don't think I have ever built a helicopter but, with looking at all the cracking builds in your GB, I might have to have a go at some point!

Looking forward to seeing more progress.

Kind regards,

Stix 

Edited March 25, 2019 by PlaStix

[spruecutter]

Nice work, Craig - I see you are keeping up the pace. By the way, is the kit you are using the one I got for you when I did my work placement in Tokyo a few years back?

 

Cheers

 

Richard

[modelling minion]

3 hours ago, PlaStix said:

While I've got some time between projects I'm going to try and catch up with everyone's builds! Your's is looking very good so far! I don't think I have ever build a helicopter but, with looking at all the cracking builds in your GB, I might have to have a go at some point!

Looking forward to seeing more progress.

Kind regards,

Stix 

Cheers Stix, you are more than welcome to get yourself a CH-46/KV-107 and join in  .

I think a helicopter in one of your dioramas would look great.

1 hour ago, spruecutter said:

Nice work, Craig - I see you are keeping up the pace. By the way, is the kit you are using the one I got for you when I did my work placement in Tokyo a few years back?

 

Cheers

 

Richard

Thanks Richard, well spotted sir it is indeed the kit you brought back from Tokyo, about time you had another placement over there!

[PlaStix]

7 minutes ago, modelling minion said:

 you are more than welcome to get yourself a CH-46/KV-107 and join in

Hi Craig. Not this time around, I'm afraid. I'm now co-hosting the Patton STGB plus building a Super Pershing in said GB and it's not long then until the Tiger STGB which I'm also co-hosting. 

Kind regards,

Stix

 

[modelling minion]

13 minutes ago, PlaStix said:

Hi Craig. Not this time around, I'm afraid. I'm now co-hosting the Patton STGB plus building a Super Pershing in said GB and it's not long then until the Tiger STGB which I'm also co-hosting. 

Kind regards,

Stix

 

There's just not enough time in the day is there? Not helped by there being too many GB's/STGB's that I am interested in or have signed up for turning up at around the same time.

[modelling minion]

A fair bit of progress since the last pictures of the build.

I gave the kit a couple of coats of Halford's Appliance White straight from the rattle can as I find this is the best way to get a good solid white coat of paint that doesn't need a week and an entire pot of whichever other paint you choose to use, I also assembled the sponsons that I am using for this build which I have taken from a CH-46 E/F boxing ( I have put the enlarged ones from this kit into the CH-46 boxing and will use them to make a HKP-4 in the future). Of course I added the sponsons after the white which meant that they were grey but thought it would be okay as they are orange and green and thought I could get a similar orange colour from the grey as that on the white, I was wrong so don't fall into the same lazy trap that I did if you plan on doing this scheme and paint the sponsons at the same time as the rest of the airframe! After the white had dried properly (I gave it a couple of days) it was time to mask the areas that would remain white and to apply the orange that forms the wide band along the length of the fuselage, for the orange I have used a Vallejo acrylic paint which seems to have given a pretty good match to pictures I have found online, here are a couple of pics of how she looks now;

 

 

As the sponsons were a different shade to begin with I sprayed them yellow before re-applying orange so they look like they do in the pictures above, masking around them might be interesting as the demarcation line curves round the top of the sponson and follows a panle line which can hopefully be seen in the picture below;

 

I have started on the rotors too, giving them a coat of light grey as the pictures I have found show them to have a light grey upper surface with black under surfaces, which is different to the kit instructions call out of silver upper surfaces withe different coloured leading edges, no pictures of these yet as they are just grey at the minute and I think you can all use your imagination to work out what they look like!

 

That's it for today, as usual all comments and criticisms are gratefully received.

 

Craig.

 

 

Edited March 31, 2019 by modelling minion

[Hewy]

Good choice on the use of rattle can  appliance White, it seems to be the go to paint for airline modellers, and that's a fine bit of masking Craig, terrible things could have happened there, but it's turned out very well, a very eye catching scheme, its looking good

[modelling minion]

15 minutes ago, Hewy said:

Good choice on the use of rattle can  appliance White, it seems to be the go to paint for airline modellers, and that's a fine bit of masking Craig, terrible things could have happened there, but it's turned out very well, a very eye catching scheme, its looking good

Cheers Glynn, funny thing is the orange managed to find a couple of gaps in the masking, despite my best efforts at making sure everything was covered, but fortunately appliance white is that tough that I could just wipe the overspray off with a damp cotton bud, phew!

[Nigel Heath]

This is building up to being a great looking paint job. The masking efforts will be well rewarded with a panel line wash treatment.

[modelling minion]

Thanks Nigel, not sure how much weathering to give this one as they seem to be kept in a very clean condition like the majority of all post war Japanese aircraft but I think she does need a light panel wash at least.

[Smudge]

Those Japanese schemes sure are colourful and bright.

 

Looking good.

 

[wimbledon99]

Now that's a bright heli!! Nice job with the paint, Craig!!

[modelling minion]

Thanks Smudge and Nigel, did a bit more tonight and got the black areas by the exhaust, on the nose and the undersides of the rotors done.

[Jabba]

Rather bright, but in a nice way. Appliance white the only way to go with white.

[Whirly]

Hi Craig,

good progress on this one, she's looking very bright! Glad you are using the correct orange instead of yellow 13538 suggested in the Print Scale instruction sheet.

Also Field green is completely off, what are you going to use for the Gloss Olive Drab? Seems 14087 is quite different from the later matt variant and no off-the-shelf paint is available..

Cheers

Fabio

[modelling minion]

9 minutes ago, Whirly said:

Hi Craig,

good progress on this one, she's looking very bright! Glad you are using the correct orange instead of yellow 13538 suggested in the Print Scale instruction sheet.

Also Field green is completely off, what are you going to use for the Gloss Olive Drab? Seems 14087 is quite different from the later matt variant and no off-the-shelf paint is available..

Cheers

Fabio

 

Thanks Fabio, much appreciated.

Yes you need to be careful with some of Print Scales colour call outs, the orange being a prime example as it is definitely orange and not yellow as they would have you do it. I have not yet decided on which green to use, not sure if a glossed Luftwaffe dark green would give the desired result as in a lot of pictures of these aircraft show a colour which is more of a dark green than an olive green.

[modelling minion]

Finally got around to masking off the orange and white and getting some green applied. After looking at LOTS of pictures I decided to with RLM70 as the nearest shade to the one used by the JGSDF, very good of the Japanese to use left over Luftwaffe paints from WWII, possibly the ultimate in recycling  , anyway here are a couple of pics of how she looks now;

 

 

As you can see it needs to be glossed, which I hope to start either later this evening or tomorrow.

The front rotor has been assembled and mostly painted with just the yellow tips needed and the thin coloured bands on each blade joint;

 

The detailing on the hub is quite nice;

 

But I hope to enhance it a bit with some wire to represent the hydraulic hoses, can't let Nigel do all the detailing on his own can we!

 

Well that's it for today and as usual all comments and criticisms are gratefully received.

 

Craig.

[Nigel Heath]

Very neat and tidy finish on the exterior, a panel line wash will bring it all together for sure. Nice of the Luftwaffe to leave some RLM 70 paint behind for their ally to use on future projects. They were a forward planning bunch.

 

Quote

I hope to enhance it a bit with some wire to represent the hydraulic hoses, can't let Nigel do all the detailing on his own can we!

 

I haven't even really looked at the rotors yet but I would imagine some hydraulic hoses made from some lead wire would be pretty much mandatory. Looking forward to seeing how yours come out.

[Hewy]

This will look superb decaled up, will you use gloss or satin finish Craig? 

[wimbledon99]

Coming along nicely, Craig. The panel lines and decals will really make the colours 'pop'!

[modelling minion]

16 hours ago, Nigel Heath said:

Very neat and tidy finish on the exterior, a panel line wash will bring it all together for sure. Nice of the Luftwaffe to leave some RLM 70 paint behind for their ally to use on future projects. They were a forward planning bunch.

 

 

I haven't even really looked at the rotors yet but I would imagine some hydraulic hoses made from some lead wire would be pretty much mandatory. Looking forward to seeing how yours come out.

Thanks Nigel, I haven't looked much at the rotors myself yet but I'm sure I can make them look a bit better.

11 hours ago, Hewy said:

This will look superb decaled up, will you use gloss or satin finish Craig? 

Thanks Glynn, not too sure about the final finish mate as some pics show quite a glossy finish with others less so.

4 hours ago, wimbledon99 said:

Coming along nicely, Craig. The panel lines and decals will really make the colours 'pop'!

Cheers Nigel, it is certainly moving in the right direction.

[stevej60]

Great paintwork Craig,coming along a treat.

[spruecutter]

She is looking the business, Craig. Good call on the Luftwaffe green. I must remember the Tamiya tape 'Front' reminder when I do the rotors.

[modelling minion]

A bit more progress to report, well quite a bit actually as the decals are done!

I have used the stencils and window surrounds from the Fujimi kit and the main markings from the Print Scale sheet, before I go into the decals more closely here are a couple of shots of how she looks now;

 

 

Now onto the decals themselves, the Fujimi decals are very good with excellent colour density and accuracy and behave themselves very nicely when applying them and the only thing I needed to do to them was to cut out the centre of the window surround decals as they come on the sheet as a solid square of decal film and this will definitely make life interesting if you try and place them over the bubble windows so all I did was to use a sharp scalpel to score the inside of the square before I put the decals into water and when they were ready to place on the model I just lifted off the part I wanted which left the inner square on the decal film and they did not wrinkle up and stick to themselves, which was good. You can see them closer below;

 

As to the Print Scale decals well they are a different matter altogether unfortunately, they behave well enough and conform nicely to the surface but their problem lies in their accuracy or rather the lack of it, and there is also a problem in the colour density of the white decals which is best shown in the picture below;

 

As you can see the white isn't quite white when placed on the dark green background, not an issue with the under fuselage Hinomaru but it shows on the large kanji script and serial number on the fuselage and could probably do with another identical decal being placed on top. The kanji script on the fuselage is not a bad match for the pictures I have but the other decals for the serial numbers etc are either too small (the white serial numbers and the black "IB") or both too small and the wrong font (the black JG-1810 on the white upper fuselage). Strangely the J and G of the black decal are in the right font but the numbers most definitely are not and unfortunately I don't have anything in my stash which is the correct size and style. Another issue with that particular decal is that the numbers are way too close together so I cut the individual numbers out and placed them separately which makes them look better but they are still not right. Another omission from the Print Scale sheet is any form of stenciling at all which is strange as I have another of their sheets for the CH-46 and that has most if not all of the stencils on it, so I used the ones from the kit decal sheet and for the black lines which mark out the footholds I used a thin black line which is on the Print Scale sheet where it underlines the title of the sheet and is just the right size so an unintentional tick for the Print Scale sheet, here are a couple of the lines I mean;

 

As you can see from the pictures she is very glossy, too glossy for a service machine no matter how well looked after, so I will give her a panel wash and a bit of exhaust staining and then add a matt coat to bring down the finish to a more satin look.

 

That's it for today thanks for looking in and as usual all comments and criticisms are gratefully received.

 

Craig.

[Smudge]

Looking very smart.