Airfix 1/72 Swordfish with rigging

[Tim K]

Well thanks for the comments on my little man - rear gunner 😆. Been waiting for some sun and no winds to photograph outdoors but alas, Storm Ceira and previous rain put paid to that and now moving house under way wanted to get at least some photos of the completed???? model on the web site.

You may remember my previous attempts to sort out the fixing of the upper wing to lower by cooking at gas mark 1/2 and all I ended up with the upper wing slumped forward and the straight struts as beautiful 'S' bends - if had wanted to do it I couldn't...

It's a bit of a walk around...

 

The radial engine before the fitters got on with the propellor

 

And at this time I'd made two torpedo aiming sights form wire and the little bits I use for the rigging (Uschi the thinnest elastic, the little bag is in the a removal box somewhere) attachments. On one of its missions one of them got blown off together with the pitot tube!

 

 

A very fine CD - "Best of the Rolling Stones 71-93"

Tamiya Paints - I don't go along with you can't paint with them. My technique was mix up with Mr Color levelling at the time of use and use thin mixes. I think where the paint don't stick I think there's some grease. Anyway... I'd applied about 3 coats and sprayed with Tamiya rattle can varnish and the paint crazed. So burying my head in the sand ignored that and carried on. Then came the cooking fiasco.

My remedy was try to over paint but it didn't really work and cut out the bent struts and make some more... In hindsight after making fixing and painting found a set of struts in the box that would have been used if I had gone along the wing hinging possibility of the kit. Well what doesn't kill ya makes ya stronger... Atlas watch out!

 

Starboard side (the half baked side!)

 

 

Starboard wing and rigging

 

 

More rigging - For the Eagle eyed the pilots cockpit perspex windscreen didn't want to fit, so I used so I used a Hurricaine front screen.

 

 

My little gunner - (sung to the tune of My Perfect Cousin - The Undertones) and rear rigging

 

 

Which reminds me - the transfers weren't great and I lost the serial number ones so again the yellow roundels come form either a spitfire or Hurricaine kit.

 

Rudder and tail plane.

The rigging was too fine so i tried to beef them up with Tamiya Paints - it worked of sorts but the slightest touched bent the "wires" - remedied by cellulose thinners so the the Uschi line was allowed to spring back but after touching the wires 3 times and getting high on the cellulose fumes decided my lungs deserved better than the looks of the model.

The vertical red and white and blue stripes on the fin also got washed away so had to remake from the other kits mentioned

 

Port Rear view

 

 

Port side

 

 

 

Port Front

And now I have just noticed the flattened tyres have been put on the square axles incorrectly! Oh well another Atlas moment

 

From the front Port 

 

 

And finally top front

 

 

Weathering

The first major one was using the salt technique along the fuselage, ground sea salt on a water base dried and then a thin wash of a sandy colour.

When dry I washed the salt away and then blended the resultant wash with more thinners - Liked the result and I am using it again on 1/700 liberty ship.

Finer details used the Daler Rowney acrylic inks, 

Chipping Prisma Colour silver pencil

Tamiya weathering powders?

 

Review of my time with the kit

For the main part enjoyed this kit but didn't like all the filling and sanding around the struts, very time consuming.

Transfers I didn't enjoy.

New house move, finish the Liberty Ship (really for practice at rigging) and then get onto F2b Wingnut Wings kit, which I've been striving to up my modelling skills to do it and me justice.

 

Any comments gratefully received especially where improvements could have been made.🤪

Edited February 11, 2020 by Tim K
didnt know I had unused notes below the screen

[kev67]

Very nice, one thing I hate is doing rigging

[GREG DESTEC]

Stunning Stringbag! 

 

Great work all round, and fantastic paint job 👍

 

Well done!

 

Cheers Greg

[Spitfire31]

I like her – she's got a sort of brutal look about her that rings true with her business! Many Stringbags look so polite…

 

Hate to breakt it to you, but she also looks like a 'piece of French a**', if you pardon the expression. 😉  I'll leave it to you to figure out what I mean…

 

Nice work!

 

Kind regards,

 

Joachim

[kapam]

Well, that's a challenge well met!

Rigging a biplane is one of those tasks that I continue to put off.

That's despite having several biplane kits in the stash. 😜

Your obvious determination and application to the task is a big inspiration.