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Oops, I done it again! Restoring a Koster PB4Y-2 Privateer FINISHED!


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Also a full rescribing which I didn't do originally either, and see if my new ponce wheel can add some additional detail.

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Did a close inspection and many imperfections from  both my doing and the original vacing.

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Its hard to see but the ponce wheel did a decent job. once I get the sides joined and a light coat of primer on it , I should be able to see what else needs attention.

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Since I don't have the lip to attach pieces together with plastic strip will do the job.

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Joined together they butted up nice and neat. I may have to also make some strengthing bulkheads in places. that I will determine when I get the other side done.

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It's been a while since the last update, so a progress report is in order, such that it is. After several failed print attempts I discovered what all resin makers find out... the LCD screen has run its course. Since getting this little printer 6 months ago Its seen a lot of heavy useage. I was wondering how long the screen would last. Statistically the life span of the screen is  between 250-350 hrs. so far at last count I had between 500-and 600 hours, so I can't complain too much. 

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Luckily i still had a clear area large enough to print out the Side Turret glass and the cockpit floor. I have a new screen on order but it won't arrive until next week.

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Of course, jump from one frying pan into.... another frying pan. Vac machine playing up. I switched to a thinner plastic to heat quicker and show more detail. so far so good, but then the plastic was covering the mould worse than the thick stuff. turns out no vacuum. 

the little rubber nozzle had come loose NO rest for one of the "Usual Suspects" 😒

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I'll have to go to town later and see if I can find a suitable adhesive to fix this issue but no matter. Forward into the fog and on with the report.

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The only real area of the interior that will be seen is the cockpit area. so for the walls the usual frame bracing and stringers and a few boxes. Once the interior is painted before buttoning up I'll add the cabling and witring.

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Removed the old deck supports and replaced with sturdier stock. And because of the fragility of the old vac plastic, additional bulkheads for strength. The small windows will have to be reblocked  or squared and new glass replaced.

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The new cockpit floor properly lengthened and detailed. I couldn't show all the detail I wanted. I went with a thicker layer height which obscured much of the detail of the center control area. I did add some thin strip for the throttle and other engine controls. I'm still in the process of building new seats and will probably have them ready later today.

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On the exterior the fuselage sections have been joined and smoothed out. I remember now why I used so much bondo before was the severe offsets of the joins between the plastic and the vac parts. I did manage to trim more back to make for a better join but some unevenness still remains but no where near as bad, so I'll take that as a win. I get these all smoothed out and a light priming then I'll re-scribe and add more rivets before continuing further.  Not exactly a walk in the park, but it is shaping up to being an interesting challenge in model building.

 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Its been a bit since last we saw the old girls restoration, I figured a progress report was needed. After many twists and turns up blind alleys and not to mention a McGuffin or two I have managed to make some headway. Working out the cockpit and forward areas Itried to show a little bit of detail.at the time the only decent references for the interior were for B-24's, They're basically the same right? Not quite. trouble was I had proceeded to this whilst waiting for a reference book in the mail. BUt to follow the time line correctly lets look at what I did, then see what needed to be changed.

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Started with the pilots seats. I would have liked to have found the P/E set for the B-24J cockpit but those are as rare as hens teeth and even more expensive ,so I found a picture of the set built and stole  borrowed some detail ideas from General Mechetts B-24 build in the past archives and tried to recreate the look as best I could in plastic. Since I Barely managed to print out the command deck base before printer screen scuppered that save some of the major work just had to add a few things like levers and I did have a P/E instrument panel in the stash for good measure. Adding the bulkhead behind the seats and primered it up to see what I had.

And this was the end result.

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 I'll add the control wheels when I'm done and before sealing the halves together.

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And then the good news! MY Ginter Book on the Privateer came in the post! Bad news. My Ginter book came in the post! Not only showed  me what was different from the B-24 to the Privateer (Bad) Showed me all these really neat things that I could add as detail(WORSE!) So I had to steel myself to not go too overboard in adding(yeah right) I split the difference, I'll add detail that probably(might) be  seen from the front looking in through the Bomb aimers glass and the area behind the command deck( Radar, ECM, Navigation, and Radio) that could be seen with the top turret removed. The rear areas for the side turrets and rear turret( Ammo feeds , walkways, Head, and Galley) I won't add. That's my story and I'm sticking to it!😎

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Plus, I did manage to get a new, working LCD screen for my printer. took 2 trys, the first one was DOA , somebody on the assembly line didn't attach all the leads to the screen didn't want to light up. can't imaging why 🤔

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THat al sorted out and New, Newer plan of attack devised I went back and added more ribbing for starters

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I wish I could get my ribbing to look as nice and neat and smick as TomProbert and others do. NO matter how hard I try it end up looking like the path a drunken sailor took while on liberty in Bristol. Maybe one of these Millenium it will all come together. If I don't forget where I put it in the meantime.

Something I had my suspicions about but could not prove was the rear upper Turrets floor design. The turret is placed over what would be the aft area of the bombbay. That might have been a wee bit drafty, like it wasn't already drafty, but no matter. a shelf was offset and cut into the bay coming forward a bit. So I cut the top area away to make a new floor and forward bulkhead. 

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After that I worked on the Electronics area  building racks and the various stations.

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Added the wiring and general piping to the Sides.

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Over all coat of interior green and highlighted with a black wash.

 

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The Full deck areas painted and plumbed or wired with bits of rod and my usual heavy thread for cabling.

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I did remove the navigators table from the front and moved it to the back, the same for the Astrolabe glass. it was behind the forward gunner instead of the nose as on a B-24.still have to touch up the bulkhead where the paint came off.

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Radar, Radio, ECM, Nav painted and wired.

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Seatbelts added using Tamiya tape and the last of my spare P/E belt buckles

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Keep up the good work :) equipment has a nasty habit of playing up when you need it most - it is the way.  Annoying, but that's how it is.  Looks like you're getting through it though, and you'll be an expert hurdler by the time you're done ;)

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The coming will be working on the Turrets and trying to come up with a way to redo the side turret glass. I fixed what I thought was the issue with my old Vac-U-Former. but I'm still getting serious air leak issues. For tearing down and looking at the individual parts I thing the plunger seal has finally decided to opt for retirement. The rubber is not sealing well enough to make a strong enough vac seal to draw down the plastic. Today I'll be out and see if  I can find a silicone sealer, barring that I may try to do a makeshift plumbing setup the reduce the size of the Vac tube 52mm(2 1/4")

down to the Vacuum cleaner nozzle of 28mm(1 1/4") so we shall see what this week holds.. Stay tuned.

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1 minute ago, Mike said:

Keep up the good work :) equipment has a nasty habit of playing up when you need it most - it is the way.  Annoying, but that's how it is.  Looks like you're getting through it though, and you'll be an expert hurdler by the time you're done ;)

 Thanks Mike!  Except with my big feet, I keep tripping over the hurdles.... Forward into the fog as they say:drink:

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As far as the build goes at least what I've encountered so far id that the Vac plastic has become incredibly fragile and delicate and will break at the slightest inclination. This could be due to the chemical soaking to remove the old paint the regular plastic is fine the PVC ,... welll.

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1 hour ago, LorenSharp said:

As far as the build goes at least what I've encountered so far id that the Vac plastic has become incredibly fragile and delicate and will break at the slightest inclination. This could be due to the chemical soaking to remove the old paint the regular plastic is fine the PVC ,... welll.

I have had the same situation when I have stripped paint off of a model, I think something in the plastic gets stripped out, as well.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Little bit of an update. Still working on the side turret vac issues, with luck I'll have them sorted out this weekend(heard that one before).I did get the interior of one turret completed and interior detailed out.

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A little bit of rod and strip for bracing and new seat. expanded on the front of the sighting rig, added frame for bulletproof glass and found an old P/E set in the morgue file  that had ammo belts from a B-24 that I built and never used. Not exactly keen on how the center braces for the upper and lower portions of the turret turn out. The pivot point I printed out, thats ok, the rest of the brace after two tries of cutting and drilling  just wasn't up to scratch. So I' went ahead and printed out new braces. that was far easier than I anticipated 

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The brace in the center is what was originally supplied with the kit. Unfortunately of 4 braces only one survived intact from disassembly. the others I printed out.

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Once installed they actually fit! Sometimes I scare myself.:analintruder:

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The kit guns are made from soft metal and the barrels bent themselves into knotted spaghetti. so I cut them off and kept the main part. I've printed new barrels and I'll add those on once everything is done. (I have a tendency to break little bits off needlessly.)

There you have it for now any luck and maybe I'll have another update this weekend.

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  • 4 months later...

IT\ts been a while since I've posted an update. NOw that the various GB have completed and dealing with Family tragedies. I finally have gotten back to the Privateer, if for just getting back in a good headspace. But no matter lets press on shall we?

The biggest drawback at the fuselage was the side turrets, or more precisely my geriatric museum piece of a vac-u-form. I was finally able to replace it with a proper Vac system

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It works great! If it lasts half as long as my old one I'll be pleased:yahoo:

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The plastic is a little bit thicker than the old but that's ok, it's a lot more sturdier.

 

 

 

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On 10/2/2020 at 5:07 PM, LorenSharp said:

Meteor products resin is even more rarer than Koster and more expensive. He has started back up with limited decals though. heres the link https://fineartofdecals.com

Small update I have heard that the man behind the meteor and cutting edge resins (Dave Klaus) is willing to sell his masters to anyone who is interested in buying them!!

 

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From there I add  the bullet proof glass to the front of the gunners rig,, and ammo belts from my spares box. 

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I added the original .50 cals but removed the barrels as they are made from soft metal and had a tendency to turn ing to twisted spaghetti at the slightest inclination. That was one thing I dislikes about the model originally.

I was going to replace the barrels with aftermarket brass ones but I couldn't justify the expense, so I printed out ne barrels. I'll add those once everything is done.

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Made the harness out of masking tape, I ran out of buckles to add but this isn't a problem as they won't be seen. I am working on experimenting with printing out extra harness buckles for future projects but I need to get the detail fine enough and strong enough to survive separating from the supports.

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The vac glass fit reasonably well considering this plastic was a little bit thicker than the original. I had made the moulds factoring in the old plastic sheets instead of the new. A little bit of putty solve that issue. 

Also updated my little compressor so now I can paint without spending more time fighting the brush clogging than painting.

It's so nice to be able to paint something in a few seconds    rather than spending 5 minutes most of which was cleaning out the brush so it would work.:wall:

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The little cones I printed out to hold the turret in place

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I separated the elevators and trim tabs from the horizontal stabilizers.

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I did forget an image of the nose weights. I had an ample space in a compartment underneath the cockpit floor .

For that I used kids modelling clay and a generous amount of bb's. About 40-50 grams.

The fuselage halves went together fairly well. there are some gaps

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I used a little bit if milliput to fill this and add strength to the joins.

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I'll let this dry and then sand down smooth followed by re-scribing  any lost panels lines. I'll try to get this posted later today.

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Fantastic stuff! I missed this on its first outing, good to catch up with such a rare bird in the process of rehabilitation 👍

 

I can see it's in good hands though 😉

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