28 Sqn Westland Wapiti (1/48) scratch 'n' print

[k5054nz]

4 hours ago, wellsprop said:

Unbelievable... 

I believe, I just don't have the words to properly convey my admiration!!

[Fritag]

12 hours ago, TheBaron said:

I can barely keep up with the sheer range of parts which you've produced, let alone the amount of assembly and painting that's subsequently happened to them.

 

That’s how I feel too.  Chuck into the mix the inventiveness of the problem solving and the quality of the work and it’s all a bit mind boggling.

 

Oh - and then remember that this was in production in parallel with that Scout…..

 

11 hours ago, wellsprop said:

Unbelievable... 

 

Yes, that too.  

 

Although, not without considerable cognitive dissonance I also find it only too believable of Alan 

 

 

 

 

[giemme]

Impressive update, Alan  I'm particularly amazed by the tiny details, either printed or scratch built - I love the shot with the mounted Vickers gun!    

 

Ciao

[AdrianMF]

Terrific. I am lost in admiration of how much planning and forethought you have put in, before I even get to admiring the thingeybobs themselves.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[mark.au]

Nothing makes me feel more like a hack than dropping into one of your WIP threads.  This one more than most…. 

[hendie]

17 hours ago, wellsprop said:

Unbelievable... 

12 hours ago, k5054nz said:

I believe, I just don't have the words to properly convey my admiration!!

On 12/5/2021 at 3:48 AM, RidgeRunner said:

I’ve just picked up this thread and I am in awe, Alan. I’m not brave enough to attempt a biplane so I am happy to observe skills such as yours :). Great work. I’ve also never attempted 3D printing, although my son has one. One day maybe :).

 

Martin

 

thanks guys - much appreciated. 

 

16 hours ago, PeteH1969 said:

Great work hendie can I ask which clear resin have you used for printing the glazing parts machine gun etc?

 

Pete

 

Pete, I just use standard Elegoo offerings. ( Elegoo Translucent resin )  They've worked for me so far and I don't see the need to deviate from them.

 

18 hours ago, TheBaron said:

You've had an incredibly rich and productive time with this aircract of late Alan - I can barely keep up with the sheer range of parts which you've produced, let alone the amount of assembly and painting that's subsequently happened to them.

 

Absolutely love this shot:

Can I ask what thickness and layer height you used on the windshield and how the optical quality turned out?

 

hi Tony, for the side windows I had a wall thickness of 0.12 mm, and for the front armored portion I used 0.75mm.  FOr layer height I used 0.2 mm as these parts are so tiny I wasn't all that concerned with striations showing up and though there were some visible, they were not too bad to be honest.  I dipped the windscreen in floor polish and it actually made things worse - while it did make some portions clearer, it pooled in the corners of the frame making painting a pain as I had to distinct sharp edges to work to.

It would be interesting to try a full canopy and try to remove striations with careful polishing.  The biggest issue is the yellowing but careful careful cure timing may (or may not) eliminate that issue.

 

On 12/5/2021 at 3:02 AM, Pete in Lincs said:

And you can see inside when you get a jam.

 

Lovely collection of small transparent bits and bobs. The exhaust clamp arrangement is very smart.

 

At some point in time the Aircraft didn't have shields, and then one day they did. Pick a day.

 

Good point Pete.  Without having any information whatsoever on what's on that shield, I may be picking the day before it was painted on 

 

6 hours ago, Fritag said:

 

That’s how I feel too.  Chuck into the mix the inventiveness of the problem solving and the quality of the work and it’s all a bit mind boggling.

 

Oh - and then remember that this was in production in parallel with that Scout…..

 

 

Yes, that too.  

 

Although, not without considerable cognitive dissonance I also find it only too believable of Alan 

 

 

 

 

 

aw shucks Steve, you're way too kind

 

5 hours ago, giemme said:

Impressive update, Alan  I'm particularly amazed by the tiny details, either printed or scratch built - I love the shot with the mounted Vickers gun!    

 

Ciao

 

me too Giorgio.  Great minds.... or is it small things amuse.... ?

 

4 hours ago, AdrianMF said:

Terrific. I am lost in admiration of how much planning and forethought you have put in, before I even get to admiring the thingeybobs themselves.

 

Regards,

Adrian

 

Planning?  Forethought?  Admiration?

Just what thread is it you are reading Adrian?

 

2 hours ago, mark.au said:

Nothing makes me feel more like a hack than dropping into one of your WIP threads.  This one more than most…. 

 

thanks Mark - that brought a smile to my face this morning though I'm sure you've no need to feel that way at all. We've all got the same goal at the end of the day haven't we - enjoyment from the hobby - though that just may be a vicious rumor (if I go from personal experience. and Fly models)

 

 

 

 

[TheBaron]

18 hours ago, hendie said:

It would be interesting to try a full canopy and try to remove striations with careful polishing.

Thanks for sharing that info Alan.

I'd originally (and very very briefly) considered printing the SV canopy in the early days of the build but bailed out of the idea when realizing I had no viable way of dealing with striations on the inside of that narrow tunnel of a canopy at 1/72.<shudders>.

[hendie]

14 hours ago, TheBaron said:

I'd originally (and very very briefly) considered printing the SV canopy in the early days of the build but bailed out of the idea when realizing I had no viable way of dealing with striations on the inside of that narrow tunnel of a canopy at 1/72.<shudders>.

 

Toothpaste and a cotton bud?  You may get it polished enough to let the floor polish do the rest?

 

I'm definitely on a roll with this build now, except I've now got to that part where everything takes an inordinate amount of time to achieve the smallest step forward.

True to form, as I was adding the exhaust on the starboard side, I had one of those involuntary jerks and managed to catch one of the rigging wires. To make matters worse it was the wire which had been fed through the undercarriage pin. The wing side was easy enough to repair, but at the fuselage end, I could no longer feed it through the opening as there was a stinkin' brass rod in the hole.  I had to resort to some precision drilling which involved lots of holding of breath and the occasional curse.  It worked though - that's the main thing.

 

 

While I was in rigging mode I opted to drill the ailerons and add the rigging between the upper and lower ailerons using e-z line.

 

 

Once the heart rate was back to normal I went for the last part of the nose end undercarriage. This was the hypotenuse section of a triangular support arrangement. More holes drilled in the fuselage, and 0.5 mm rod used to create the support.  I'm not sure if you can see it in this shot, but I flattened the end of the rod in the vice and  folded it down so that it looks like the end is capped.  If I had resin nuts that were small enough I would have added one there, but I don't, so I didn't, so there.

 

 

Rigging linkage added to the rudder.  I found a piece of PE left over from the Bristol (I think) that looked about right, and I found that the thickness of the PE is about the same as the thickness of a razor saw.  Once careful cut later and I was able to jiggle the wotsit into place. No glue needed as the fit was pretty tight.

 

 

The starboard exhaust received a branch just aft of the cylinder heads.  It appears that not all Wapiti's have this additional carbuncle but as best I can tell, those of 28 Sqn did, so I did, so there.

 

 

Scarff ring.  They're always a bit of a pain.  I had one left over from the abortive Bristol build of some time ago and was quite pleased with it - no surprise that when I came to fit it, the diameter was just ever so slightly too small.  That's it on the left of this shot.  I cut a portion out of the PE ring which allowed me to gently prise it open - and it sort of worked.  However the more I thought about it the more I thought I should just start over - guess what happened next ?

CAD draw, print, cure, paint.

This was more of an experiment and to be honest I didn't have a huge hope that it would be successful - I was wrong. My biggest fear was that the cogged elevation doobries would never see the light of day as they were only about 0.3 mm thick.  Pleasantly surprised I was.

 

 

Printing them and painting them is one thing.  Actually, painting them was difficult enough. Handling them is another ball game entirely, then making a brass gun mount the right size and not break anything in the process of fitting it was no mean feat.

 

 

Then as you do - you sit and stare at it and there's this thought going through your head.... there's something missing isn't there?  There was.

I've no idea what they are or what they're called, but I had to make two of them - and fit them on the gun mounting bar.  This pair was made up from 0.8 mm rod drilled through with a 0.5 mm drill, then two slices of 1.2 mm diameter Wasp undercarriage cast-off stuck on either side of it.

 

 

Then I spent a happy twenty minutes or more trying to fit them onto the gun mount bar, after which, everything was painted black.   I even went to the trouble of adding the bungee cords from ridiculously small lengths of 0.12 mm fishing line, painted "aged cement".  Then as I look at this photo, I realize I have fitted the bungees in the wrong place. Oh well, at least that's an easy fix. 

 

 

It looks the part when fitted though.  Although it was a paint to build, I think the effort was worth it - or it will be when I fix the darned bungee cords.

 

 

Another one of those poke toothpicks in your eyes jobs was painting the propeller boss.

 

 

Fitting the propeller was proving a bit of a challenge - I had left an ~2mm hole though the engine casing, but I didn't want to have to drill a 2mm hole into the propeller as it was only 4 mm or so deep at the boss.  The hole through the engine casing was just slightly smaller than 2 mm which meant that the tube was a good snug fit in there.

I then took a 1 mm rod and flattened one end in the vice - this prevented that end of the rod from slipping through the tube. A couple of quick measurements and the 1 mm rod was cut, slipped through the 2 mm tube and the end of the rod glued into the propeller.  This allows the propeller to spin freely, with no danger of falling out. 

 

 

Getting that assembly into the engine casing was more fun, and something I probably should have left for the end of the build but hindsight is not something I usually plan ahead for.

 

 

It's certainly starting to look the part now.

 

 

Todays shenanigans were finished off with painting up the aileron horns, or rather, several sets of aileron horns.

 

 

I have printed off three different sets - with a small connector thingamajig pointing at 20, 25, and 30 degrees. Tomorrows easy start will be to see which angle is more appropriate when fitted to the flying surfaces.

 

Not photographed (as it would have been pointless) was my mornings exploits with the new printer and trying to print some custom decals.  I spent several frustrating hours trying to get prints that didn't bleed ink everywhere.  I can't say that endeavor was a complete success but I got prints that are good enough to work with.  They've now been coated and I'll leave them overnight before playing with them tomorrow

 

until the next time... 

 

 

[k5054nz]

Just gorgeous!

[TheBaron]

Absolutely stunning update Alan.

I'd not be in the least surprised that your next update includes connecting the joystick and rudder pedals to their control lines so that it's a flyable replica. The rigging, the gun mounting, all of it of the most exisquite variety and depth.

 

Best advent calendar ever!

[Fritag]

Jeepers Alan.  Just that 

 

 

[perdu]

9 hours ago, hendie said:

I spent several frustrating hours trying to get prints that didn't bleed ink everywhere.  I can't say that endeavor was a complete success but I got prints that are good enough to work with.  They've now been coated and I'll leave them overnight before playing with them tomorrow

What version of Epson printer is it Alan?

 

If I may make an observation re: print bleeding in prep.

 

It is often good enough to use a lower print quality when making transfers, the temptation is to go for high quality print definition which will tend to put more ink on the paper than you need and that will automatically flood the workpiece.

 

I find the setting for printing text and image gives me good colour strength and high definition.

 

Not sure if your Printer System Management set up allows it, mine is an Epson XP-215 217 series printer and there are 5 different print options on it.

 

Heavily saturated print colours will seep as they dry out, what do they say?

 

LESS IS MORE.

 

👍

[hendie]

2 hours ago, perdu said:

What version of Epson printer is it Alan?

 

It's a Workforce WF-2850 Bill.  My last Epson was an NX430 and I found that it produced good quality decals when I set everything to the high end - premium photo paper, glossy etc.

I assumed this new Epson would be similar, but there's a lot less knobs to twiddle in the printer controls. There are about 6 or 7 different paper types and standard and high settings for each.  I spent the morning going through and trying each and every one and it wasn't until I got to the very last selection - Premium Presentation Paper Matte - that I got an acceptable print.  Then I found that I could use the standard plain paper setting and bump the quality up to the highest level and get very similar results.  They're still not as good as the NX430 produced but will work for this job.

As you rightly observed Bill, sometimes less is more.

[perdu]

I've found that using the lesser part of the program and setting the paper at Epson Photo Paper the quality works nicely.

Used to be the same when I had a Canon  or HP one too, most cheap printers worked ok if I played with the paper type in the configuration menu.

 

Anyroadup, hope you are getting the results today.

 

[Bandsaw Steve]

‘Put ‘em together and what have you got?

 

Wippity, Wappitty, Woo!’ 🎶 

 

 

[Brandy]

14 hours ago, hendie said:

If I had resin nuts that were small enough

Not something most of us dream of but hey-ho, each to his own! (and where IS our @CedB?)

 

More fantastic detailing though, and I do like that prop, even though you have apparently succumbed to the "prop must rotate" school of thought.

This is truly turning into an epic one-off build.

 

Ian

[Heather Kay]

3 minutes ago, Brandy said:

apparently succumbed to the "prop must rotate" school of thought

While many of my builds end up with fixed props, allowing the spinny bit to spin can be seen as a way to avoid accidental breakage.

[TEXANTOMCAT]

15 hours ago, hendie said:

 

 

 

 

Want a prop that won't drop out when there's danger all about - SHAFT!

 

Right on )

 

With apologies to Issac Hayes

 

 

[Pete in Lincs]

19 hours ago, hendie said:

It's certainly starting to look the part now.

And then some!

[mark.au]

I’ve always found inkjet printing decals to be a crapshoot, what worked once didn’t the next time.  I’ve had some success once with laser printing some black decals, pure luck because every time I tried afterwards it just melted the decal sheet.

[The Spadgent]

Cor blimey. Another beauty of a catch up. I can’t quite get my jaw from off the ground. The sheer work that has gone into this is breathtaking. Not sure which bit I like the most so I’ll go with all of it.   Bravo x 10 👌
 

Johnny 

[giemme]

On 08/12/2021 at 00:36, hendie said:

It looks the part when fitted though.  Although it was a paint to build, I think the effort was worth it - or it will be when I fix the darned bungee cords.

 

 

   

 

 

Ciao

[hendie]

Salutations to you all dear BM'ers.

 

Advance warning - this is going to be a fairly picture heavy post, just like my usual I suppose, but I've spared you some of the pain as I'm going to put some of them in an RFI.    Whats that? RFI ? Yup, I think I have finally beaten this one into submission and completed it.  That being said, I had the exact same thought about three times since my last post, so I may have to scrap the RFI idea and do it all over again.

I should also warn you that the pictures aren't of the best quality as I had the camera on the wrong setting (again).

Anyway, enough rambling - lets get to the action.

 

The first of the home brewed decals went on

 

 

then promptly came off again when I applied the microstuff as I found that I had mistakenly applied art fixative over the decal instead of an acrylic clear coat, and the fixative started peeling off.  Not very fixative then was it?  Luckily I had made multiple sheets and got it right about 50% of the time.  I don't know why they make the aerosols look exactly the same.  I haven't got time to read the labels when there's a build going on have I?

Once I had figured out which sheets actually had an acrylic clear I started putting the pretty pictures on the pretty aeroplane.  Pretty neat huh?

 

 

The decals that gave me the biggest challenge were the serial numbers on the rear fuselage.  Half of the serial was on the black band while the other half was on the silver dope. Since the serials were black (?), the part on the black fuselage band had a white background, but not so on the part on the silver dope.

The solution was actually very simple, though somewhat challenging to execute.  I designed the serial to sit partly within a black box. I then printed the serial on both clear decal paper, and on white decal paper.

One of these is clear decal paper and the other is white.  Don't ask me which is which. Why can't they put the clear decal film on a blue background paper or something?

Anyway - my plan was to slice the decal at the edge of the black box - this way the serial on white decal paper would have a white background behind the serial number, and I could use the edge of the black box to align the serial with the black fuselage band - does that make sense?   With the decal printed on clear film, I just needed to slice the black box half away and apply what was left of the serial.  It seemed to make sense to me at the time.

 

 

Then, if the plan is executed with some degree of finesse we may end up with a serial number looking something like this. Rinse and repeat for the other side, but in reverse if you know what I mean.

 

 

Thankfully, there wasn't a lot of colorful bits on this one so the transfer sticking went quite quickly. - Which then brought me to these darned things... the aileron actuators.  They were those things I had printed and painted up at the end of the last post.

They were awkward because they were so small I could barely hold them in the tweezers. Then after they were fitted, I had to fit the control rods from the actuator disappearing into the wing - from 0.2 mm wire.

 

 

With the decaling complete, everything was given a clear coat followed by the flat coat - I checked this time - it wasn't Fixative.  That allowed me to finish off the rigging on the tail section.

 

 

Now that all the constructions works were complete (or so I thought) on the underbelly, I could start adding all those greeblies on the top side which were just begging to get knocked off at the slightest uncoordinated movement.

Aileron actuators installed, along with navigation lights, then the slat actuators. Oh what fun... and you get to do the same dance on both wings!

 

 

It was getting so close to the end, I was almost getting excited.  Just some more tiny bits to get fitted now - such as the tail lamp on the rudder.

 

 

The rudder could then safely be fitted and all that was left was to do yet more rigging. I almost made a mistake by attaching the wrong lines but caught the error quickly and managed to rectify it without any damage.

 

 

There's so many holes on this thing, with so many fairleads, so many rigging lines, and so many attachment points. Who said biplanes were fun? Ian!

I splashed out a few months ago and bought a PE sheet of control horns and other biplanery greebles, and used the PE parts on the elevators

 

 

repeat the fun on the other side....

 

 

It's now getting to the point where there is almost no safe way to handle/maneuver this aircraft without a real and present danger of damaging something somewhere.

 

 

All the rigging is done!  At this point I thought I had finished, but then remembered I had broken the control column when I stuffed kitchen roll into the cockpit as a painting mask.

Out with the brass and paint again.

 

 

then more fun drilling out the remnants of the original broken piece

 

 

Was it worth it?  Well, you can just about see it if you really really squint, and point a bright light at it. Using your imagination is much easier.

 

 

Are we there yet?   Not quite.  I repaired the bungee cords on the scarff ring, and made sure they were attached to the right components this time, then all that was left was to fit the gunners gun thing. This was a leftover from one of the Bristol kits - I can't remember of it was Eduard or Roden, anyways, after all this time I really couldn't be bothered trying to design and print one when I had one sitting in the spares box. 

 

 

I had found a photo with the gun in this position and kind of liked it so copied it here. - It seemed to make sense as there's a lot going on over on the port side, and not so much here so the gun position adds something... I think.

 

 

and there was me thinking I had finally finished after all this but once again I remembered something. Dammit!   As you are all well aware of by now, 28 Sqn was an Army Cooperation Squadron, and in order to cooperate, they had to pick up messages, lunchboxes, part invites - stuff like that. Just like on the Audax, they needed a hook to grab the lunchbox.

0.5 mm tube with some 0.2 mm wire forming the hooked part.  I had thought about not telling you lot about the hook and just plodding on in the hope no-one would notice, but that gremlin inside my head kept gnawing at me...

 

 

Then fitted into position using whatever I could find - which happened to be a piece of the Wessex tail rotor mechanism I printed so many moons ago. A small length of thread serves as the rope attachment.  I ran superglule up and down the thread while holding is taught so that the hook appears to "hang" when she's the right way up.

 

 

I then managed to turn here over without breaking anything off.  What a relief.

 

Then once more I thought I was finished. Really.  I think I am.  I can't think of anything else that I've missed so maybe I have actually finished this build.  What a weird feeling - two builds completed within a week or two - and this one only took 11 months!  That's pretty quick for me innit?

I suppose you want to see some photos of the final article now don't you?  Okay then.

Giorgio - this is for you... I even drove down to Walmart this afternoon to buy some blue card to use as a backdrop because you're always complaining... if it's not complaining about no paint, it's complaints about the backdrop.  Always complaining.

Is this better Giorgio?

 

 

And one from the rear... sheesh, how we miss Ced these days...

 

 

one more just for the fun of it.

 

 

I'll post more over in an RFI.    

 

Even stranger - I've now finished two builds within a week or so - and I don't have any other builds on the go.  What to do?  I'm at a loss.  Guess I'll need to search the stash - all 5 kits and see what's next for the bench

 

RFI  over there...

 

 

 

one thing's for sure... I'll never be buying another kit from this manufacturer again.  

[Pinback]

Wow, wow and more wow - just brilliant

[mark.au]

27 minutes ago, hendie said:

Using your imagination is much easier

That made me smile.  
 

There’s an emoji missing from the selection for quick reactions which might be akin to incredulity.  Maybe this one… 🤯

 

Thanks for sharing the journeys in your projects, they’re inspiring as well as entertaining and very much add to the richness of BM as a whole.