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1/72 captured Luftwaffe Lioré et Olivier LeO 451T (Heller) ** RETIRED HURT **


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16 minutes ago, Ozzy said:

Unfortunately not as I’m an Armour build mostly, I do hear about people using Klear on canopy’s. Again not sure what it does.

I’ve since had a crack at it with some toothpaste and it’s just made it worse. There’s some nasty crazing in there now. I think this ones going to go on the back burner until I can find a cheap LeO kit from which I will use only the cockpit canopy. 😢

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1 hour ago, TonyOD said:

I’ve since had a crack at it with some toothpaste and it’s just made it worse. There’s some nasty crazing in there now. I think this ones going to go on the back burner until I can find a cheap LeO kit from which I will use only the cockpit canopy. 😢

 

I messed up the upper gunners canopy on my recent Airfix HE-111 BoB build and coated it with 'Johnsons Klear' and it worked out not too bad, maybe try that?  Polish with very very fine wet and dry first. 

Great shame.

 

Davey.

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5 hours ago, TonyOD said:

Any ideas how I can get the transparency transparent again?

Sanding with finer and finer grades of paper then dip it in Future(pledge). Takes care of most things like this. It may still have a distortion at certain angles but nothing obvious.  

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2 hours ago, DaveyGair said:

 

I messed up the upper gunners canopy on my recent Airfix HE-111 BoB build and coated it with 'Johnsons Klear' and it worked out not too bad, maybe try that?  Polish with very very fine wet and dry first. 

 


mum pretty sure it’s shot Dave, I’ve “burnt” part of it off with the buffer and the crazing appears to go right through.

 

I’m going to take a couple of weeks off and spend some time on some other stuff, then get me another kit so I can use the canopy. I’ll just think of it as “aftermarket” 😉

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2 minutes ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Sanding with finer and finer grades of paper then dip it in Future(pledge). Takes care of most things like this. It may still have a distortion at certain angles but nothing obvious.  


it can’t do any harm to give it a try I suppose...

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It transpires that there’s a vacform set by Falcon that includes bits for the 451 as well as a whole bunch of other Heller kits, some of which I might well build sooner or later. Seems like the way to go.

Edited by TonyOD
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I bought the Falcon set number 26 from Hannants a while back Tony. It's well worth getting if you intend building many French planes. The parts fit really well once trimmed and they are very thin and crystal clear. There's something like fifteen planes worth in the set. 

 

I bumped my bill up by ordering a few Heller kits to go with the set, it was the best way of spreading the postage costs... Honest.

 

20201014-153329.jpg

 

Tony.

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1 hour ago, TonyW said:

the best way of spreading the postage costs... Honest.

“Well I might as well order some more stuff... to spread the postage...” is going to bankrupt me.

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Looks like a good project so far, I like your interior work!

A bit of a shock to see what happened to your canopy though. I would say that if you could sand that canopy smooth you could crash mould a new one with a sheet of acetate. About that Falcon French vacform set, I was disappointed that they didn't include the Bloch 174 in there as I would have gone halves with you on the set!

I bet Hannants must see a rise in sales every time a group build starts on here!😆

Hope you get it back on track.

 

Martin

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On 11/1/2020 at 11:57 PM, Lightningboy2000 said:

I bet Hannants must see a rise in sales every time a group build starts on here!

Let's put it this way, they had four of that Falcon set in stock a couple of days before I ordered mine. Out of stock now.

 

Sometimes it's good to have a couple of weeks away from a build when it's a bit of a bruiser. Looking forward to getting back on it now.

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On 11/12/2020 at 8:43 AM, RidgeRunner said:

Hi Tony! How’s this one going? Did I see that you stalled it for a while? 
 

Martin

 

I have shiny new vacform canopies so need to be cracking on. Actually, I'm waiting for you to break cover so I can see what you do with yours 😆. In the meantime I've allowed my head to be turned by a couple of Heller Classic GB efforts. Back on it this weekend, thanks for the interest!

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On 11/13/2020 at 3:03 PM, TonyOD said:

I'm waiting for you to break cover so I can see what you do with yours 😆

Ha ha!! This week I started a MiG Monday and today was a continuation of that. I really must get it done and I reckon that'll be by Friday unless I get any hiccups. That'll mean that I'll be back on the LeO next Monday :). The next jobs are getting the wings completed before I return to the fuselage  :). I'll tackle the vacform canopies at that point. :)

 

Good luck!

 

Martin

 

 

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9 minutes ago, RidgeRunner said:

Ha ha!! This week I started a MiG Monday and today was a continuation of that. I really must get it done and I reckon that'll be by Friday unless I get any hiccups. That'll mean that I'll be back on the LeO next Monday :). The next jobs are getting the wings completed before I return to the fuselage  :). I'll tackle the vacform canopies at that point. :)

 

Good luck!

 

Martin

 

 

Looks like I’m going to have to put my big boy pants on then. Vacfrom canopies scare me.

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3 hours ago, RidgeRunner said:

I'll tackle the vacform canopies at that point. :)

 

2 hours ago, TonyOD said:

Looks like I’m going to have to put my big boy pants on then. Vacfrom canopies scare me.

Im not sure how you guys do Vacu-form canopies. Myself Ive always trimmed the excess away using scissors and scalpel but leave about 1mm of border on. Then i file and trim slowly to fit. In 30 years I've not had one go bad that way. Only time Ive had bad ones is by attempting to score exactly on the edges and the blade slipped and gouged the canopy. 

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16 minutes ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Only time Ive had bad ones is by attempting to score exactly on the edges and the blade slipped and gouged the canopy

⬆️That.

 

More care required.

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Well, back on the LeO after a bit off fun with a P-47. Spent an hour trimming and sanding the vacform canopy to fit. Whereas the kit transparency is a poor fit, the Falcon vacform (if cut precisely to its edges) seems to be spot on, so I’ve created a problem for myself by putting that shim in. Just about sorted it. The question now is to use the vacform nose and dorsal transparencies too; the originals are masked and good to go but the mismatch might look odd.

 

For reasons I can’t put my finger on I’m vaguely dissatisfied with this build. I think I could have done a better job on the interior, not that it’ll be that visible, vacforms or no. Still, I’ve invested too much time by now not to persevere...

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44 minutes ago, TonyOD said:

 

 

For reasons I can’t put my finger on I’m vaguely dissatisfied with this build. I think I could have done a better job on the interior, not that it’ll be that visible, vacforms or no. Still, I’ve invested too much time by now not to persevere...

 

I feel like that with most of my builds!  But it'll turn out ok in the end I'm sure, looking forward to the finished piece.

 

Davey.

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9 hours ago, TonyOD said:

I’m vaguely dissatisfied with this build

Don't be, Tony. It will turn out great. I'm certain of that. I know how it can get you but burn on through ;). 

 

Good news on the canopy cutting :)

 

Martin

 

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With a sharp knife, sandpaper and infinite care and patience I’ve been fettling the two halves of the vacform nose cone for about 90 minutes, but I’m pretty sure I’ve rendered it unusable. I have the pilot’s canopy prepped up but I’m not comfortable with the mismatch between the transparencies.


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I’m not writing this build off but I’m really not in a good place with it right now, so I’m going to put it on the back burner and concentrate on my Amiot for a bit. 


If anyone happens to have a spare LeO 451 kit pilot’s canopy's kicking around...

Edited by TonyOD
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Tony, 

With mine Leo I have also dilemma with canopies because they are very thick, moreover - there is a small air bauble inside. I am not sure if  it will be visible or not. So I am afraid  if it will not spoil the result by unwanted internal reflections and things like that . So I was even thinking on home made of main canopy by pressing (stamp). I have made a silicon form but not finished it yet. So I did not introduced this dilemma into my thread. Still I am not sure if the original one will work OK or not. I think that I will try to use original and when (if? ) disappointed I will turn to home made. However I cannot get the problem with vacu nose canopy - was it molded in two parts? It is very strange since it requires vacu-vacu gluing and it will not work almost for sure, I mean the join will be very difficult to look acceptable. If it was done this way - why Falcon did it in such unnatural way? The shape is very simply, so maybe the pressing method will work better then glued together from two pieces vacu? You can do the stamp from resin (milliput?) copy of front canopy...

Regards

J-W
 

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OK, I'm back in the game. Just picked up a Smer boxing of the Leo together with a Heller Humbrol boxing of the MS 230 on the 'Bay, both for a tenner. This means that I will have a new canopy for the LeO and the sting of the additional cost (because God knows I've been chucking enough money at this build what with rare decals and abortive vacform canopies) is eased by adding a kit that I don't already have to the Heller stash. I will beat this kit if it kills me.

 

19 hours ago, JWM said:

However I cannot get the problem with vacu nose canopy - was it molded in two parts? It is very strange since it requires vacu-vacu gluing and it will not work almost for sure, I mean the join will be very difficult to look acceptable.

 

To be honest I think it my Falcon nose canopy was doomed to failure from the start. I spent over an hour carefully trimming and sanding it but I didn't get it quite right, the fit was terrible and in any case, how would I stick the two halves together? It's maybe 0.5mm thick, there's nothing there to glue! I think it's a dumb to produce them in two halves like this. (The same set has a similar two-halves canopy for the Potez 63 11 which I also have in the stash, but to use that one I'd literally need to cut a large part of the fuselage away and I'm not sure I'd want to take that risk). I'm happy to use the kit originals, yes they're thick but they're easy to work with and the interior of my LeO is really nothing special anyway, best to hide it!

 

@JWM Although my Falcon nose canopy is ruined I still have the pilot's canopy cut to size, it's a good fit. If it's any use for your build I'd be happy to send it to you.

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