It's fast! It's British! It's a Lightning!

[keefr22]

Cracking update G, really neat work as per usual! I like your pitot - being lazy I 'invested' in Master pitots for all my Lightnings - they're lovely things but yours looks just as good!

 

And despite my attempt at 'humour' a few days ago, I have to say that your use of the clamps for a stand when working on the fuselage is brilliant!

 

1 hour ago, giemme said:

And I'm very tempted by the ZM series of Phantoms,

 

I'd love to see what you could do with one of those beauties!

 

Keith

[Cookenbacher]

2 hours ago, giemme said:

so I discarded it and scratch built a new one using the same steel rod as above, flattened with a hammer, reshaped and with a segment of brass pipe superglued on top

Of course you did.

 

Amazing work as always Giorgio!

[Davetur]

Hi Giorgio, excellent progress!

Just one small suggestion, if I may, before you attach wings.

Since the Sword wings have so little surface to stick to, when I did my T. Mk.5, I inserted two metal rods made from paper clip on one wing and drilled corresponding holes in the other.

This allowed me to adjust the dihedral before gluing the wings to the final position, since the paper clip metal can be bent easily.

 

Cheers from Davide

 

 

 

 

Edited April 25, 2020 by Davetur
Wrong picture

[CedB]

More great work Giorgio  

 

Good news on the yoghourt pots too

[giemme]

On 24/04/2020 at 22:44, Spookytooth said:

Outstanding work there G. as per norm.

 

As for space.... that is one thing I am going to be short of.....

 

Simon.

Cheers Simon, thanks   I shouldn't really complain about space, I'm luckier than many others in that respect - it's only the RFI shelves that are quite limited, actually (and confined in my garage, anyway    ) And yes, with that big bird you are building, your house is going to get crowded all at a sudden  

On 24/04/2020 at 23:19, bbudde said:

Ahhhh, crazy things going on here. Stop it. Wait . Oh no!!

Not sure what you are referring to, Benedikt, but just because there are many different crazy things going on here ...      

On 25/04/2020 at 00:04, keefr22 said:

Cracking update G, really neat work as per usual! I like your pitot - being lazy I 'invested' in Master pitots for all my Lightnings - they're lovely things but yours looks just as good!

 

And despite my attempt at 'humour' a few days ago, I have to say that your use of the clamps for a stand when working on the fuselage is brilliant!

 

 

I'd love to see what you could do with one of those beauties!

 

Keith

Thanks Keith!   I came up with the clamps idea because of the peculiar shape of this aircraft - I'd never needed anything like that before   Master's is great stuff, good choice.

 

As for the ZM Phantoms, I'm slightly intimidated by the scale and the level of detailing they seem to have put into their models - I haven't bought any yet, but the right time will come, I know ...  

On 25/04/2020 at 00:34, Cookenbacher said:

Of course you did.

 

Amazing work as always Giorgio!

 Thanks Cookie, much appreciated  

22 hours ago, Davetur said:

Hi Giorgio, excellent progress!

Just one small suggestion, if I may, before you attach wings.

Since the Sword wings have so little surface to stick to, when I did my T. Mk.5, I inserted two metal rods made from paper clip on one wing and drilled corresponding holes in the other.

This allowed me to adjust the dihedral before gluing the wings to the final position, since the paper clip metal can be bent easily.

 

Cheers from Davide

Grazie Davide, that's an excellent advice! I'm afraid it came too late though: last night, after posting my last progress report, I went on and attached the wings and the tail planes ...  

Come to think of that, your idea would have been great for the latters too ...   Your T5 looks great, BTW; is that in 1/72 too?

16 hours ago, CedB said:

More great work Giorgio  

 

Good news on the yoghourt pots too

 Thanks Ced  

 

As I just said, last night I went on and glued the tail planes and the wings. Using some hyper-technological jigs to set the correct angle:

 

 

I blatantly copied this idea from @CedB   

 

Prior to mating the wings to the fuselage, I glued the flaps to the wings - I figured it was a lot easier this way

 

Then, since we're talking of hi-tech tools, here's my setup for the wings

 

 

The wing anhedral diagram is in the instructions, I just scanned it and printed it out  

 

I left starboard wing to cure for a while, then moved on to gluing port one

 

 

Setting the correct angle left me with these gaps to sort, top

 

 

and bottom

 

 

So I reinforced the joins by running some CA into the gaps, filling then in with PPP. Like this

 

 

 

 

 

I'm pretty sure the primer coat will reveal some remedial work to be done here, but I don't want to risk the whiteboard marker check on top of PPP, so I'll just leave it as it is for the moment.

 

Almost time for some paint! All comments welcome, meanwhile  

 

Ciao

Edited April 26, 2020 by giemme
Swapped flaps for ailerons - doh!

[bbudde]

Looking great so far Giorgio. This was what I meant😀 Cheers

[keefr22]

That looks every bit a Frightning now G, looking forward to painting starting!

 

K

[CedB]

Great use of the Lego Giorgio and (as usual) impeccable gap filling - looking every bit a Lightning now  

[exdraken]

Very nice!!

[Wez]

This is a thread that continues to impress with every instalment,

 

Brilliant work Giorgio!

[Ray S]

Hello @giemme, can you please give me some advice?

 

You made the pitot tube with brass rod, then mentioned you cut off the plastic pitot and drilled out the mount. Now, I have tried that on my own 1/72 Lightnings, but can never secure the mount so I can drill it! Can you please let me into the (probably very simple!) secret as to how to secure/hold it so a drill can be used?

 

As to the rest of your work, it is absolutely stunning, and I have gleaned a number of ideas for more of my Lightnings. Thanks for going into such great detail with this build, it is truly inspirational for me!

 

Take care and stay safe,

 

Ray

[giemme]

10 hours ago, bbudde said:

Looking great so far Giorgio. This was what I meant😀 Cheers

Thanks Benedikt, glad you like it!

 

10 hours ago, keefr22 said:

That looks every bit a Frightning now G, looking forward to painting starting!

 

K

Cheers Keith, me too! There's going to be some paint test on some scrap parts first, though

 

2 hours ago, CedB said:

Great use of the Lego Giorgio and (as usual) impeccable gap filling - looking every bit a Lightning now  

Following your lead here, Ced 😉 As for the gap filling, I suspect it is not that impeccable, but we will see...

 

1 hour ago, exdraken said:

Very nice!!

Thank you!

 

1 hour ago, Wez said:

This is a thread that continues to impress with every instalment,

 

Brilliant work Giorgio!

Thanks Wez, you are way too kind

 

29 minutes ago, Ray S said:

Hello @giemme, can you please give me some advice?

 

You made the pitot tube with brass rod, then mentioned you cut off the plastic pitot and drilled out the mount. Now, I have tried that on my own 1/72 Lightnings, but can never secure the mount so I can drill it! Can you please let me into the (probably very simple!) secret as to how to secure/hold it so a drill can be used?

 

As to the rest of your work, it is absolutely stunning, and I have gleaned a number of ideas for more of my Lightnings. Thanks for going into such great detail with this build, it is truly inspirational for me!

 

Take care and stay safe,

 

Ray

Ray, first of all thank you very much for your praise  I'm happy If anything of what I do can be helpful - watching others' jobs on BM is how I learned and keep learning.

 

As for drilling out the pitot mount, it really is quite simple: I held it between my thumb and index finger, flat side against my index so to have a firm grasp.

The real point though, IMO, is how you drill the hole: I first marked the centre with a sewing needle mounted on a handle (I normally refer to this tool as INCIDO, 'cause I also use it to rescribe panel lines, and I got the idea from @Fritag ). Then I used a small electric drill to make the actual hole, at very low speed at the beginning, and continuously checking for the correct alignment.

 

It's a lot easier than it sounds, the important thing is to take your time and be patient. HTH

 

Ciao 

[Spookytooth]

Hi tech stuff you are using there G.

How long does it take to train for this gear.

 

Looking good from here mate.

 

Simon.

[giemme]

38 minutes ago, Spookytooth said:

Hi tech stuff you are using there G.

How long does it take to train for this gear

All your childhood .... and a bit more

 

Thanks mate

 

Ciao

[Ex-FAAWAFU]

Just gad a major catch-up, Giorgio; some top notch work!  Going to look lovely when done.

[giemme]

6 hours ago, Ex-FAAWAFU said:

Just gad a major catch-up, Giorgio; some top notch work!  Going to look lovely when done.

Hopefully so - thanks Crisp, much appreciated!  

Ciao

[Ray S]

23 hours ago, giemme said:

 

 I'm happy If anything of what I do can be helpful - watching others' jobs on BM is how I learned and keep learning.

 

As for drilling out the pitot mount, it really is quite simple: I held it between my thumb and index finger, flat side against my index so to have a firm grasp.

The real point though, IMO, is how you drill the hole: I first marked the centre with a sewing needle mounted on a handle (I normally refer to this tool as INCIDO, 'cause I also use it to rescribe panel lines, and I got the idea from @Fritag ). Then I used a small electric drill to make the actual hole, at very low speed at the beginning, and continuously checking for the correct alignment.

 

It's a lot easier than it sounds, the important thing is to take your time and be patient. HTH

 

Ciao 

 

@giemme, thanks for that advice, it is greatly appreciated, and I will try it out on the next pitot I add!

 

Ciao!

 

Ray

[phantom61]

great working 😉@giemme... 😉

 

I hope to see it soon ...

 

ciao 

Silvano

[Biggles87]

Excellent!

 

John

[Bas Hermsen]

Awesome job and nice to watch. 

[Massimo]

We've got some real progress here!!!!!!

You've been doing your homework!

I love the work you did on the pitot and those wheel bays!

Well done Giorgio!!!!

[Davetur]

On 4/25/2020 at 11:55 PM, giemme said:

Grazie Davide, that's an excellent advice! I'm afraid it came too late though: last night, after posting my last progress report, I went on and attached the wings and the tail planes ...  

Come to think of that, your idea would have been great for the latters too ...   Your T5 looks great, BTW; is that in 1/72 too?

 

 

Ciao

Yes, I was caught by the Lightning bug a few years ago, and this is the result...

 

A Trio of Lightnings

 

All the best

 

Davide

 

PS: what kind of stuff do you play on guitar 🎸???

[giemme]

On 27/04/2020 at 10:13, Ray S said:

 

@giemme, thanks for that advice, it is greatly appreciated, and I will try it out on the next pitot I add!

 

Ciao!

 

Ray

You're welcome Ray

On 27/04/2020 at 12:18, phantom61 said:

great working 😉@giemme... 😉

 

I hope to see it soon ...

 

ciao 

Silvano

Thanks Silvano   So now you saw it ...  

On 28/04/2020 at 06:43, Biggles87 said:

Excellent!

 

John

Cheers John, thank you

On 28/04/2020 at 08:27, Bas Hermsen said:

Awesome job and nice to watch. 

Thanks Bas, glad you like it  

On 28/04/2020 at 08:27, Massimo said:

We've got some real progress here!!!!!!

You've been doing your homework!

I love the work you did on the pitot and those wheel bays!

Well done Giorgio!!!!

Thank you Massimo, you're too kind! :thumbsup. 

On 29/04/2020 at 20:56, Davetur said:

Yes, I was caught by the Lightning bug a few years ago, and this is the result...

 

A Trio of Lightnings

 

All the best

 

Davide

 

PS: what kind of stuff do you play on guitar 🎸???

Ha, that's a nice set of Frightenings there, Davide!  As for the guitar (OT mode on, everybody): I started learning how to play it at the age of 40, and have been taking lessons on and off since - so almost ten years - but not having much time to devote to it, there hasn't been much progress. I like to play blues and "playing" with the minor pentatonic, but I also learned a few rock songs during my lessons (last one being Californication - Red Hot Chili Peppers). Now it's been almost a year since I last touched a guitar, though... OT Mode off.

 

A progress report is going to follow shortly - and I'm gonna need some expert's advice  Later chaps!

 

Ciao

[giemme]

Here's the update. Before the painting stage, there were a couple of things to check, first of which was the model stance. I think I mentioned when assembling the front U/C bay/radome part that I had to rebuild the nose wheel strut location, because it was a little ... vague, shall we say. So it was time to test the fit of all the legs and the resulting stance:

 

Nose down, so definitely not good. How much is this stance off? Well , to give a proper answer, I had to fix the front wheel assembly, because it was quite wobbly, and the wheel would fall off the fork under the weight of the model during the dry-fit, showing a worse stance than it was. So on with that; first thing to fix is the fork itself. Next pic shows that one of the fork arms is sensibly thinner than the other

 

BTW, the thinner one in the kit comes as a separate piece. Needless to say, it was a butt join with the main strut. Keep this in mind for later...

Anyway, I measured the thickness of the two arms, the left one being 0.75mm and the right one 0.55. So I thought of beefing it up with some 0.25 styrene sheet, thus

 

 

 

I glued the added strip with TET and left to set overnight before reshaping, blending it it and sanding down to the 0.75mm total thickness.

 

Another issue with this id the actual fit of the wheel: wobbly, as I said...

 

 

also because the mounting slots were quite shallow

 

Anyway, I decided to add a steel rod pin on top of the strut, to help with the correct positioning and be able to correct the stance (the rod was supposed to reach up to the top of the bay)

 

and then drill out the fork ends and the wheel to insert a metal rod - and this happened

 

I glued it back  and inserted a segment of 0.3mm brass pipe to mount the wheel

 

To make it fit properly, I actually had to add a small prescription needle cutout inside the wheel hub, so that the brass pipe could pass through it and the overall of the two be the correct hub size. Anyway, this was the stance after these fixes

 

I couldn't tell if it was good, I thought it needed to be a tad more "nose up". So I decided to add a ring on top of the wheel strut, to act as a spacer. the ring comes from a 2.3mm brass pipe

 

(the modified fork arm broke off once more during this stage, but this time I glued it back with CA+flour).

 

And here is the resulting stance:

 

 

So what do we think? Is this correct? Do I need to go more "nose up"? Or was the previous one better?

 

Another issue I had to sort is this: I did a final dry fit of the exhausts, and the top one showed quite a step with the rest of the fuselage, while it should have been flush with it

 

 

So out came the file and sanding tools, till I got here

 

 

Not entirely accurate, but definitely less annoying - to me, at least  

 

On a happier note, Silvano @phantom61 kindly donated this PE set for the boarding ladders and FOD covers, which I intend to use because I want to put the model on a simple base, representing Wattisham Air Base. Thanks Silvano!

 

 

 

In the middle of all of this, I also conducted some painting tests, but I will report tomorrow on that. Meanwhile, all comments welcome - and advice on the aircraft stance much needed...

 

Ciao

 

Edited April 30, 2020 by giemme
Missing pic

[bbudde]

Oh Giorgio, that looks lovely and promising for the next steps. Cheers