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Republic Seabee - 1/72nd Mach 2 injected plastic kit


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10 hours ago, Moa said:

only have a few precious ones from other sources

Earlier in the year I done my own vac canopies for my Sea Fox and I was advised by BMers to use this stuff and worked great but then I am a beginner, might be worth a look.

Nice work in the cockpit.

 

Stuart

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8 hours ago, Courageous said:

Earlier in the year I done my own vac canopies for my Sea Fox and I was advised by BMers to use this stuff and worked great but then I am a beginner, might be worth a look.

Nice work in the cockpit.

 

Stuart

Thanks for the tip, Stuart.

What do you use to vac parts, a Mattel or other device?
I tried in the past a couple of clear sheets, but many would snap off the Mattel frame (even when tightly clamped) since they are not perforated like the original ones.

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1 hour ago, Moa said:

Thanks for the tip, Stuart.

What do you use to vac parts, a Mattel or other device?
I tried in the past a couple of clear sheets, but many would snap off the Mattel frame (even when tightly clamped) since they are not perforated like the original ones.

It's tedious, Moa, but if you have a sheet of the original Mattel vacuform plastic, you can clamp it to a same-sized sheet of whatever plastic you intend to use. and using the original sheet as a template, drill holes in the new sheet with a pin vise. When I ran out of original Mattel plastic, that is what I did until I bought a killer vacform unit used by dentists/labs to make retainers- it gets so much hotter, has tremendous vacuum, and you just clamp a sheet of plastic into a square metal frame while it is heating. If you do a lot of vacforming, which I don't, it might be worth looking into- as a  used one would be fairly  reasonable- I got mine through my dentist and saved a lot of money. Mine is called The Machine, distributed by the  supply house I have attached a link to below.  I hope this helps....think how quickly you could crank out copies of your 1/72 toilets for your civil projects- I'm just sayin'!

Mike

 

https://www.henryschein.com/us-en/Search.aspx?searchkeyWord=the+machine

 

https://www.henryschein.com/us-en/shopping/ProductBrowser.aspx?categoryname=T%26S+Dental+%26+Plastics&browsingmode=m&Reset=4294402007&N=4294402007&cdivId=international_d

Edited by 72modeler
corrected spelling
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5 minutes ago, Courageous said:

I have one of these

Wow! Very similar to the one that I have, Stuart! I still have  my trusty old Mattel 'thingmaker', though! I use it to vacform over the ridged plastic base to make corrugated sheets to use for cockpit and wheel bay detailing- works and looks great to make wheel bay roofs!

Mike

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1 hour ago, Courageous said:

I have one of these

 

1 hour ago, 72modeler said:

think how quickly you could crank out copies of your 1/72 toilets for your civil projects-

Thanks Mike and Stuart.

It may be a solution at one point.

Still, I do have a perfectly working Mattel that I know how to use, and not having good perforated sheet supplies is a bummer.

I posted somewhere else at BM that I tried many of those aftermarket sheets offered online, none really worked well. Most didn't work at all and were returned for refunds.

A person in the US named Mike Dammen used to sell good ones (a tad thicker than the originals) many years ago, but not anymore.

I have seen this same cry many times in many forums, since there seems to be a considerable number of Mattel owners, yet no manufacturer came out with a reliable, perforated, suitably-performing product.

 

I was discussing with @John Aero some time ago how supplies, materials and tools that used to be conveniently available in the market are no more, and you have to move on and re-invent the wheel, once again.

I posted somewhere else how much I miss the very complete P.E. sets that Fotocut had in every scale of many useful gizmos. Now you can get the P.E. bolt for a connector of the reverse link on the right side to the left of your granny for a Spitfire, but no good, affordable, generic sets. MV lenses come to mind, sometimes not very easy to get.

 

At the same time that certain good and useful products vanish or fade into oblivion, other things are being created that remove skills from the manual realm and place them somewhere else, as in the case of 3D printers and plotters, which require a not small knowledge of specific software.

 

Any activity requires its paraphernalia, but I don't feel very happy having to have a Dr. Mabuse laboratory, Dr. Caligari's Cabinet or lightning-catching Frankenstein facilities to make model airplanes. I am, after all, a humble Shaolin modeling monk.

 

Cheers, off to repair the outside holidays lighting (speaking of technological bummers)

 

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58 minutes ago, Moa said:

none really worked well. Most didn't work at all and were returned for refunds.

Moa,

 

Take a sheet of original Mattel vacform plastic, if you have one, to a local plastic supply company where you live. Somebody there can tell you what type of plastic it is and if it is still available. IIRC, I did this back when I was using my Mattel vacform, and was told that the plastic Mattel used had a pretty low melting point so it could be used in their vacformer, which was a pretty low-powered device, both in vacuum and temperature of the heating unit. That's why I switched to the machine used by dental offices/labs. They could handle the polycarbonate or PET plastics, which have a higher melting point, but are crystal clear and can be had in greater thicknesses, which have a much better gluing surface, yet are still thinner than injected clear parts. Most of the time, they gave me leftover pieces for nothing or a pile of assorted thicknesess and types for a pittance, as the standard sheets come in a roll or a big section like plywood. The polycarbonate also works great for plunge molds, but you have to get it pretty hot, which is why the dental units are so much better.

Mike

Edited by 72modeler
corrected spelling
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The horizontal tail halves have tabs, but when you insert them as the are they form a broad arrow (exaggerated below):

IMG_7372+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

... so the tabs were cut, the roots sanded at the right angle, their location in the fin filled with styrene, and then they were pinned in position.

The wing is just dry-fitted to check alignment:

IMG_7373+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

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On 04/12/2019 at 21:56, Moa said:

I know, you are of course right.

Lasers, blasters, and light sabers should not be used lightly in model-building.

But a modeling monk has to do with what it's provided. 

I would have thought a monk, modelling or otherwise, would be a responsible adult?

 

Martian 👽

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The sections of the canopy corresponding to left door and mooring hatch are very carefully cut off.
The engine cover replacement vacuformed part is also divided in its components.
The excised clear parts will later be attached to the removed kit plastic parts, and some little framing is going to be added to the clear parts and on the seating edge of the canopy to keep things a bit more rigid and aligned.

(The canopy is just posed, not glued yet).
What can I say: Pheeeeew!!

IMG_7374+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

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6 hours ago, Moa said:

Dear Martian

I am a very young monk, only 300 years old.

 

That explains it then.

 

Enlightened of Mars 👽

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Nice work. I have my home brewed vacuum box for molding. Half the fun is when the process works well. I have looked at both the Mattel and the dental machines but they are expensive. ( my rig cost about a tenner overall, a 6 x 4 photo frame, a box off eBay, some metal mini bulldog clips and the nozzle from an old vacuum cleaner, I use the grill to heat and the vacuum cleaner to , well vacuum) 

Edited by Marklo
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Now comes the time when a color scheme has to be chosen.

With more than 1.000 built, and the successive changes of ownership and repaints, there is plenty to chose from, and fortunately there are a large number of color photos of Seabees online.

However, as a first step, we need to weed out, for the purpose of this build, the ones that have droop wingtips, end-plate wingtips, and different engine installations, which results in a severe limitation of the available options.

I have also discarded plain all-silver ones, that although classy and sober in reality, offer little interest as models (especially since I already have a number of silver models).

Also discarded are those color schemes that look too vulgar, the ones with color combinations that hurt the eye, and those that have the stiffeners on the hull painted another color (since the kit's representation of them is quite poor and will hinder painting).

Therefore little remains, which is, in way, a comfort.

The final choice will be made soon.

 

 

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34 minutes ago, Blue Monday said:

I bought this kit at a model show in October. It is sobering to see what work is required to turn it into a decent replica. Keep up the great work on this.

 

BM.

Hi BM

I believe there is no need to go far, with a good polish the original transparency will do for a simple interior as the kit provides (no open doors), you may keep the original landing gear, and that will cut the building time in half.

Replacing that awful prop is the only mandatory thing, though, and dealing with the arrow created at the hinge line on the horizontal stabilizer (to remedy that you have to modify the stab roots).

Engraving the missing hinge lines is a breeze.

No need to go for the engine either.

The rest you may well leave alone and you will still have an attractive and unusual model provided a decent paint and decaling job is done.

I have seen (and built) much worse.

Give it some love and build it, it's fun.

Cheers

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3 hours ago, Smudge said:

Looking forward to seeing which colour scheme you go with.

Decision has been made.

I will represent any of the three identical Seabees owned by the Fish and Wildlife Service, in contrasting black and orange (thanks Mr. Christos Psarras!):

(Link to Seabee website)

http://www.seabee.info/rc3_758.htm

like their bigger cousin this Grumman amphibian:

(Link to photo on flickr)

https://live.staticflickr.com/1812/29198082097_98ae0721b2_h.jpg

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The plane I selected had a distinctive Hartzell propeller, with a sort of inverted scimitar blade ("Hartzite") with a sort of unusual hub, therefore I discarded the prop I had recently made, and built another using the kit's prop blades, with a new hub and details, following photos on the Net:

IMG_7389+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

IMG_7390+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

IMG_7391+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

IMG_7392+%25281280x960%2529.jpg

 

Another difference is that the Fish and Wildlife plane did not have wing float braces, a feature otherwise present in most Seabees.

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