Why do I not learn (part deux)? Bf109.........T-2

[jackroadkill]

Here's my first (hopefully of two or three) entries for the GB.  I seem to revel in learning by my mistakes, so hell, why not make a few more in the name of discovery?  My Bf109 obsession (or should that be fetish?) is no secret around these parts, and neither is my lack of model building experience.  I don't suppose it will come as a surprise to many of you that I also have a smart Alec strip that gets the better of me from time to time.  With that in mind, please behold the paragon of glory that is this:

 

 

I'll be honest, this doesn't look like the best kit in the world.  It has occurred to me just to nick the resin wingtip extensions and use them on another kit, but what the hell, I'm in for a penny so I'm in for a pound.  Which of the paint schemes I go for will be decided at a later date; my smart Alec stripe says go for the one on the box, but in all honesty I might end up taking the fifth and doing the much more conventional alternate scheme, which just looks like your common or Garden Emil with longer wings.

 

Annoyingly the canopy can only be positioned closed (unless I chop it up, of course) and there's no pilot.  For some reason I quite like the idea of displaying this in flight, but given that there's no wheels-up option that might involve some hackery, bodging and swearing to achieve.  Finding a pilot in the spares box should be simple enough, so I may go that route if I feel the need to make the job harder.

 

Cheers,

 

JRK

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

The T variant is my 🦄 and Ive been wanting to build one since the late 90’s. I think I will be following your build if thats ok.

[jackroadkill]

11 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

The T variant is my 🦄 and Ive been wanting to build one since the late 90’s. I think I will be following your build if thats ok.

 

Of course, Dennis - you'd be very welcome.

 

Don't get your hopes up too much, though - I could easily snatch defeat from the jaws of victory with this one!

[vppelt68]

I´m sure the BM GB 109 massive will come up with wheels up-parts for your build. I´m pretty sure I have a pair of Matchbox flat ones somewhere, do you want them?

[jackroadkill]

1 minute ago, vppelt68 said:

I´m sure the BM GB 109 massive will come up with wheels up-parts for your build. I´m pretty sure I have a pair of Matchbox flat ones somewhere, do you want them?

I'll get back to you on that one, thanks VP. It's a kind offer but I've got a set of Airfix parts that I may be able to butcher to fit, so I'll try that first.  If I have no luck I'll give you a shout, though.

[vppelt68]

3 minutes ago, jackroadkill said:

I'll get back to you on that one, thanks VP. It's a kind offer but I've got a set of Airfix parts that I may be able to butcher to fit, so I'll try that first.  If I have no luck I'll give you a shout, though.

Does the Airfix Emil also come with them? In that case, I should have a pair of those too.

[Col.]

Good luck and enjoy this one JRK. The best way to improve is by experience and the best way to gain experience is by practice  

[jackroadkill]

Thanks @Col.  I’m planning some practise this evening, with luck and a following wind. 

[sampanzer]

I picked this kit up for a £5 at Telford a couple of years ago... Not sure about the 'limited edition' though, there was a pallet load of kits 🤣!!

[jackroadkill]

5 hours ago, sampanzer said:

I picked this kit up for a £5 at Telford a couple of years ago... Not sure about the 'limited edition' though, there was a pallet load of kits 🤣!!

They seem to be pretty widely available, that's for certain!

[jackroadkill]

Okay, just so that you don't all think I'd forgotten about this GB (life getting in the way again), here's an amazing photo of just how much stellar progress I've made in the last two weeks:

 

 

I managed to find some time this evening to get the internal RLM 02 onto the necessary bits and pieces.  Most of it you won't see as the lid will be on and the undercarriage will be up, but hey....

[Col.]

Hey, any move forward is progress  

[jackroadkill]

Sitrep (or should that be kitrep, I wonder?) for tonight is as follows:

 

This kit is not the greatest.  It's not the worst I've built - that honour goes to the 1426 boxing of the Italeri 1/72 Spitfire Vb, by the way - but it's a long way from the best.  In fact, the Airfix Emil that is 80% done is way better in every respect.  The shape of this one's not brilliant, and the detailing is scant and the fit, well, the fit is less than amazing, let's say that.  The seam down the back of the cockpit (you know, where the storage door should be, if the kit had one) is particularly jarring, as is the rather flattened top of the cowling.

 

Other than that it's brilliant.

 

Anyway, enough of the sarcasm; I've got the cockpit internals in and painted, the wings on and the tailplane sorted.  This wasn't without high-jinks of its own:

 

 

As you can see, the support struts gave a dihedral angle approaching the comedic, and they needed shortening by about 3mm to solve this.

 

An example of the lovely accurate fit, in this case the totally differing shapes of the IP and fuselage halves:

 

 

I'm hoping the addition of a scounged Airfix pilot might detract from this a bit (sorry for the cruddy iPhone photo here, by the way) so we shall see if the carnage can be reduced to the IKIT variety.

 

Still, she's mostly together in terms of the airframe now.  The next job is to saw the wingtips off and glue on the resin extensions:

 

[jackroadkill]

 

As you can see from the picture above, the wingtip extensions are on.  What you can't see, though, is the half-gallon or so of filler that's been liberally splashed around the place to fill the gaps, weird seam lines etc that abound.  So far I'm still having fun.

[Roberto]

Good result with those wingtips!

[Col.]

Well done for taming this beast into submission

[jackroadkill]

Have been very busy with work again and have managed only a little progress.  However, any progress is progress, so I'll take it.

[Dandie Dinmont]

How did I miss this until now? You do excel in finding unusual ways to torture yourself but you seem to be bringing this beast under control nicely. 
 

Craig. 

[jackroadkill]

12 hours ago, Dandie Dinmont said:

You do excel in finding unusual ways to torture yourself

Yes, there's a definite pattern emerging, isn't there?!

[jackroadkill]

Thanks to some eejits who should have known better I am now in self-isolation for the next ten days.  With that in mind I'm cracking on with some builds and hoping to be able to fill the time I'm not doing enforced work from home.

 

 

I'd got this far a couple of days ago; I decided to experiment with trying ultra-thin layers of paint and rather than spraying one colour all over the shop and overspraying with the second, just try to overlap a little.  As you can see....

 

 

....it worked reasonably well, a few glaring boo-boos notwithstanding!  Still, it won't be hard to sort these out and I'm pleased with the results otherwise, and am looking forward to cracking on.  Once the touch-ups are done I need to wrangle the U/C fairings, legs and wheels into a closed position.

 

Cheers,

 

JRK

[jackroadkill]

 

Sorted; am now thinking about making a mask and spraying the red flame down each side of the nose rather than using decals as I think it would look better.

[jackroadkill]

Today's mini-update -

 

 

Next up is a bit of 74/75 mottling on the higher reaches of the fuselage and then the flame on each side of the nose.

[jackroadkill]

Self-isolation may have many drawbacks (like those endless jeffing Teams meetings, for example) but it has meant that I can make some reasonable progress with the build.  I'm very aware that the Beaufighter needs starting on ASAP, and that I have two models parked on the Shelf Of Little Movement, too, so this is no bad thing.  If I can't go shooting or fishing, I might as well crack on with the T.

 

I've hacked the undercarriage legs, such as they were, up and arranged them so that they'll look halfway decent when the aircraft is posed in flight.  There was no wheels-up option available so this was unavoidable.  I've not done much in the way of modifications to kits yet, but I think this one has worked rather well.  Here you can see it mocked-up and prior to painting, but

it should be okay, I think:

 

 

 

 

In this picture you can see the flame along the nose and fuselage sections.  I had to draw this using the decals as a template and then assemble it into one stencil.  This side possibly doesn't look as good as the other side but it will do, I think.  I've cleaned the two red spots off the nose (dodgy masking, I must confess) now and she looks better in reality than on the photo.  This picture also shows what a crummy job Academy have done of the wing root; I thought about doing something with it but wasn't sure where to start, so it's as is:

 

 

 

I've also painted the shocking prop (wish I'd found a resin replacement for it now, but hey ho), tyres and some of the pilot.  In order to make the pilot fit I had to heat him up and bend his legs to get the feet closer together, then cut off most of each foot (this won't be visible; the huuuuuge IP will get in the way), carve away huge chunks from his Aristotle and narrow and re-angle his shoulders slightly.  The pilot and his seat have been stolen from an Airfix Emil as Academy didn't think to provide one:

 

 

I also bought a set of Master guns for the kit, as the ones that come with it are atrocious, to say the least.  The nose-mounted MG's would obviously have been staggered, but by a scale metre?  I don't think so, Academy, I don't think so one tiny wee bit.  As the cowling is only resting in place I'll get the new ones fitted easily enough.

 

Cheers,

 

JRK

[Col.]

Those experiments have worked out well for you

[jackroadkill]

 

The much hacked-about undercarriage is in.