Bomber Glazing of the Cockpit

[dov]

Hi

Now I would like to touch on a topic that has accompanied me since the beginning of my modelling hobby.

To discuss the issue of the bomber glazing of the cockpit in detail with the experience and with your help.

It is so that the inaccuracies of the manufacturers of the kits should be corrected.

 

1. First of all, the frame of the glasses should be mentioned here. In particular, it is the rear and side areas of the glazing, the inner frames, which are hardly shown correctly.

On the model there are only outer frames, which contributes to a strong visual impairment of the appearance.

Because the inner farmes are shown as outer frames!

In particular, it should be noted that there are very often suspension points for equipment or weapons on the inner frame.

For example Mosquito and Ju 87.

 

2. The second place here is the sealing, usually missing, of the weapon used in the cockpit.

The gluing or fastening of the weapon to the glazing of the cockpit is then the major challenge.

 

3. Armored glass that is glued as a component over another glass.

How do you make it streak-free and transparent without traces of glue?

 

4. Resin glasses, neat, beautiful bonding.

How does it work?

 

Add.1 Sanding and grinding with flat-files and sandpaper, polishing by hand or machine.

Replica of the inner frame with Polisterol or Evergreen profiles.

 

Add. 2 Seal formed as a leather sleeve with paper and glue.

Then colored.

 

Add.3 Only stick on the outside of the frame.

 

Add.4 Glue with super glue.

 

In the next few weeks I will start with 2 Ju 88s and 3 Do 17, 215 and 217.

In the 1:48 scale from ICM.

All models already built several times. However, the quality of my work was always in need of improvement.

 

Thank you

[ckw]

I agree with your comments with regard to the inaccurate framing of canopies (and not just bombers) however, I would suggest that doing this accurately and realistically is hampered by the thickness of the plastic (particularly in smaller scales) For example simply adding evergreen strips inside the canopy would not look right because it would be distanced from the outer frames by a thickness of several scale inches or more. Moreover, the inner profile of the canopies is often wrong. I think to take your approach would require the use of thin vacuform canopies - but with ready made ones, removing outer framing would be difficult, if not impossible. So you would need to make your own smooth version and then add both inner and outer framing.

 

On your point of armored glass layers - using Klear/future as the bonding agent - or possibly clear varnish - should work

 

Cheers

 

Colin

[dov]

Yes, you are absolutely right.

The thickness of the glass! Vac-Form is not a valid option because the optical imperfections would counteract the result.

You are also right that the distancing of the inner frames must not be forgotten.

From all the mistakes and possibilities I would like to simply achieve a better result than is possible with the existing kits as standard.

My solution approaches lie within this area!

And precisely about bringing in your knowledge to work out nice opportunities together.

My doing, I would place on the WIP.

Thank you

[Jochen Barett]

As long as we are talking about flat glass, one could try to use real glass from microscope slide&coverglass (Objektträger und Deckglas) or slide mounts formerly used in film based photograpy (Diarähmchen).

 

For cementing / glueing one could use UV curing cement (UHU Glas) or even canada balsam.

 

Framing will be a pain and in case one would achieve success for the flat panels the difference to curved parts will be - oh well never mind, I never said that.

[Space Ranger]

As to outer and inner frames, the usual solution is to:

(1) Mask the kit canopy

(2) Paint the frames the inner color and allow to dry

(3) Paint the outer color.

(4) Remove mask.

 

Alternatively, you could use painted strips of decal on the canopy frames.

 

Either of these techniques work satisfactorily in the smaller scales, in my experience.