Turning Japanese ++ FINISHED ++

[CliffB]

Morning all.

I'll be entering with this little beauty 

 

 

 

The kit provides seven decal options, six of which are illustrated on the back of the box, plus there's an OD overall Japanese army machine.

 

 

I'll definitely be building one of the Japanese aircraft, but I'm not sure which one yet.  It'll be at least a month before I start, so my final decision may be influenced by what others are building.

 

Parts wise, the only options (I think), are small or large sponsons.  I'm looking forward to learning more about the differences between the various 'Vertols', at which point I'll probably appreciate what other structural changes may be necessary for the various decal options 

 

Cheers

Cliff

[modelling minion]

What a nice looking little kit Cliff.

I've never actually seen one of these in the flesh so I'm really interested to see how it goes together. It certainly comes with a lot of options, a good excuse (if one was needed) to add some more to the stash!

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Hello Cliff if you're looking for votes my  would be the Upper right Japanese option, the Blue/White #. It just looks right to my eyes.  

 

Dennis

[CliffB]

3 hours ago, modelling minion said:

What a nice looking little kit Cliff.

I've never actually seen one of these in the flesh so I'm really interested to see how it goes together. It certainly comes with a lot of options, a good excuse (if one was needed) to add some more to the stash!

Thanks Craig.  These kits are quite sought after because, unlike most of the other 1/100 scale Tamiya kits, they were not later re-released by others (like Revell).  Over the last couple of years I picked up three via EBay, so I'm set up to do the three Japanese options .  Better still, one of my kits comes with English language instructions - the other two being 100% Japanese!

1 hour ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Hello Cliff if you're looking for votes my  would be the Upper right Japanese option, the Blue/White #. It just looks right to my eyes.  

 

Dennis

Thanks Dennis. That's my favourite too (at the moment ).

[modelling minion]

23 minutes ago, CliffB said:

Thanks Craig.  These kits are quite sought after because, unlike most of the other 1/100 scale Tamiya kits, they were not later re-released by others (like Revell).  Over the last couple of years I picked up three via EBay, so I'm set up to do the three Japanese options .  Better still, one of my kits comes with English language instructions - the other two being 100% Japanese!

Thanks Dennis. That's my favourite too (at the moment ).

Can't beat having instructions in the language you actually speak! Mind you it does take the fun and guess work out of the build.

I can't fault your choices as the Japanese KV-107's have great colour schemes and to have one each from the JASDF, JGSDF and JMSDF would be great, one thing to bear in mind though is that if you go with the JMSDF option which is yours and Dennis' favourite that colours are actually grey and white and not blue as the instructions do make it look like.

Oh, and will you be building all 3 for the GB  ?

[stevej60]

Another great choice Cliff,never seen this one before,

[CliffB]

On 2/26/2019 at 7:49 PM, modelling minion said:

Can't beat having instructions in the language you actually speak! Mind you it does take the fun and guess work out of the build.

I can't fault your choices as the Japanese KV-107's have great colour schemes and to have one each from the JASDF, JGSDF and JMSDF would be great, one thing to bear in mind though is that if you go with the JMSDF option which is yours and Dennis' favourite that colours are actually grey and white and not blue as the instructions do make it look like.

Oh, and will you be building all 3 for the GB  ?

 

9 hours ago, stevej60 said:

Another great choice Cliff,never seen this one before,

 

Thank you guys .

 

In the instructions, the JMSDF colour is quoted as being Seaplane Grey, with the recipe "blue and black mixed with a little of white".  So that's that sorted then!  Looking on the net, it's the usual problem of there being a plethora of colour pictures, no two of which look the same.  Some look blueish, some look greyish and some look blackish.  Just like trying to sort out Eiko blues in the Starfighter GB 

If it comes to it, I'd probably go with a commercially available Seaplane Grey.

 

I would really love to do a triple build for this GB but, as I'm sure many are finding, there are just too many other great GBs this year and not enough time.  In one sense, it's a nice problem to have I suppose.

 

In a final twist, I've just noticed that one of my set of Japanese instructions is actually for the civilian boxing. Just for interest, here are the decal options for that one.

 

 

Cheers

 

Cliff

[modelling minion]

I know what you mean about what shade the grey is from colour pictures, best just to pick a picture and go with it as the grey seems to fade to varying shades.

I like the look of the civil ones on those instructions Cliff, do any of your kits come with the parts to do them or do you just have the instructions?

And I know what you mean about there being too many GB's to be able to do everything that you want to in all of them, or even to be able to take part in all of them.

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

You just have to go with the classic PAN AM. 😉

 

Heres a link with photo’s. http://www.panam-world.org/pan-am-worldwide-preview/

Direct service from the roof of the Pan-Am building in downtown Manhattan to JFK.  

Edited February 28, 2019 by Corsairfoxfouruncle

[CliffB]

1 hour ago, modelling minion said:

I like the look of the civil ones on those instructions Cliff, do any of your kits come with the parts to do them or do you just have the instructions?

 

No parts unfortunately, just the instructions.  I think my kit is a classic secondhand eBay 'bitsa'.  Thankfully though, it seems to contain all the correct (military) parts.

[CliffB]

11 minutes ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

You just have to go with the classic PAN AM. 😉

 

Heres a link with photo’s. http://www.panam-world.org/pan-am-worldwide-preview/

Direct service from the roof of the Pan-Am building in downtown Manhattan to JFK.  

 

Hi Dennis, yes it is a classic.  Having said that, I do also have a soft spot for New York Airways, ever since I built one of their S-61Ls.

 

 

This was also used for a Pan-Am building service, until one day in 1977 when it all went horribly wrong  

[modelling minion]

Very nice S-61 Cliff, it really does need a CH-46 to sit next to it  .

[Dermo245]

Cool and look forward to this one.

Going for OD overall so?!!

[Nigel Heath]

I do love a Japanese scheme, good luck with it.

[wimbledon99]

Such great schemes in this GB. Yet another I’m going to enjoy watching

[CliffB]

On 3/21/2019 at 10:37 PM, wimbledon99 said:

Such great schemes in this GB. Yet another I’m going to enjoy watching

You're absolutely right about the schemes in this GB.  I just need to get this one started!

[modelling minion]

Any time you like Cliff, we're all sat patiently (for now!) waiting for you to start what will no doubt be another of your great builds.

[CliffB]

It's almost only a month to go now until the end of the GB, so perhaps I should make a start!

 

On first impressions, the kit is really neat - crisply moulded and the pieces fit together OK. 

 

It's a Tamiya kit of course, but it's also a 1960s kit, so not everything's perfect.  For example, there are a few sink marks that will need filling and also some 'see through' holes (most noticeably the exhausts), which will need backing.

 

 

As a multi-option kit, one has to read the instructions very closely in order to work out which antenna need to be removed and which locating holes need to be opened up or filled (depending on version).  I'm going for the Japanese naval version, so have done the necessary.

 

I have three of these kits in my stash, all of which I bought secondhand. Two are unstarted, but one has had all the pieces removed from the sprues.  I decided to build the latter and, surprise surprise, have found that a few pieces are missing.

• one set of spotlights (thankfully not applicable to my version)
• one control column (which I've replaced using a concoction of 30A fuse wire and plastic rod)
• two wheels (luckily I've found some good matches left over from a 1/200 Hasegawa MD-80 airliner kit)

 

 

 

The other thing that the previous owner did, was to separate the two halves of the rear cargo door/ramp.  These come moulded together, but with instructions that they can be separated along a score line, if you want to display the doors open (in fact the two parts can then be assembled as 'working' features if you want).  I'm building my model with the doors closed, so have had to reassemble the two parts in-situ.

 

 

So far, so good and very enjoyable.

 

Cheers

Cliff

 

 

 

 

[wimbledon99]

Nice to see this one started now. Good luck with the build, Cliff!!

[modelling minion]

Great to see your build underway Cliff, about bloody time!  

Good job on replacing the missing control column it looks excellent and I'm pleased to see that you've found some replacement wheels that look similar to the kit ones.

Good luck with the rest of the build, it looks like an interesting kit.

[Nigel Heath]

Quote

 

It's almost only a month to go now until the end of the GB, so perhaps I should make a start!

 

It's comforting to know that someone in this GB is actually less advanced than me, no doubt you will be overtaking me soon. The replacement control column is impressive.

 

[CliffB]

17 hours ago, wimbledon99 said:

Nice to see this one started now. Good luck with the build, Cliff!!

 

15 hours ago, modelling minion said:

Great to see your build underway Cliff, about bloody time!  

 

I know, I know, and I've just remembered that the C-47 GB finishes soon too! 

 

12 hours ago, Nigel Heath said:

 

It's comforting to know that someone in this GB is actually less advanced than me, no doubt you will be overtaking me soon. 

 

I'm glad to be of service Nigel.  May I suggest that you build straight OOB in future !

 

Cheers

Cliff

[spruecutter]

Love your model of the S-61L, sobering story in the NYT. The reporter seemed to go to town on the gruesome details! Good luck with your build. 

 

Richard

[CliffB]

On 4/27/2019 at 7:49 AM, spruecutter said:

Love your model of the S-61L, sobering story in the NYT. The reporter seemed to go to town on the gruesome details! Good luck with your build. 

 

Richard

Thanks Richard.  You're right about the journalism - I don't know if this was an American thing, or whether you'd have seen similar in the UK back then?

 

With my C-47 now safely tucked up in the display case, I note that my next GB deadline is this one!

 

So hands up who remembers IPs printed on kit instructions?

 

 

I certainly do (from when I was a lad), but I can't remember what type of glue I used.  Presumably nice gloopy polystyrene cement from a tube.  Today though I used double-sided sticky tape and unfortunately the IP had to be a photocopy (as I'm missing an instruction sheet from another of these kits in my stash), so some of the finesse was lost in translation.

 

 

Nothing much is visible though when everything's closed up and you'll see even less when the green sunstrip is in place 

 

 

All the parts are primed now and I've assembled things as much as I can.  It really is a sweet little kit ....

 

 

For the first time ever, I've decided to paint and decal the fuselage halves before I stick them together.  I'm doing this because I don't fancy masking the bubble windows - particularly as I'll be adding sunstrips to them too, using Tamiya clear colour.  I've learnt from bitter experience that these paints don't like being masked over!

 

It should be fun.

 

Cheers

Cliff

[modelling minion]

Great to see your build back on the bench Cliff.

I to remember the printed instrument panels ( a very dim and distant memory at that) and that they were only in a few manufacturers kits.

Interested to see how the painting and decaling before assembling goes, totally understand your reasoning behind it and hope that it goes well for you.