My Next Adventure - An Eastern Express 1/72 E.E. Canberra B(I)8

[Brigbeale]

Tonight I made some more improvements to the Canberra.

I looked through my spares box for two suitable pieces of sprue to make the wing tip lights, but all the clear sprue I had was too thin. I even looked about the house for an odd piece of clear acrylic but found nothing suitable. I knew I had two sheets of clear acrylic in my shed that somebody gave me before they took them to the tip.(approx 1m x .75m) but I thought that was too thin. I went on EBay to find 3mm clear acrylic sheet and found some and ordered it. Shortly afterwards I went to the shed for something else and my eye caught the sheets of acrylic. They were thicker than I remembered and measured 3mm thick!  I did manage to cancel the order on EBay though. Looking on the bright side, I’ve got enough acrylic to make a fair number of wing tip lights (or incase of a few misadventures in making them)

I cut a 2” square  piece to make the lights out of.

Firstly I cut the small sections from the wing tips.

 

The acrylic parts were cut and filed to fit the stepped notches in the wing. I also used a 1.5mm drill to make an indentation in each part to make a forward facing lamp (which I painted silver) and then a 1mm drill bit was made to make holes in each one to make the green (starboard) and red (port) lamps. I had to check which colour went where as I’m sure I would have been pulled up on it!😆. They were TET’d in to position and left to dry for at least a day prior to shaping and polishing.

 

Once they had set for a bit, it suddenly occurred to me that I forgot to make some suitable exhausts before I closed the wings up - I knew I’d forget something.

I can still make a pair of exhausts, so I decided to improve the kit exhausts by filing the hole back to more of a circle than that which was provided by the kit manufacturer.

 

Earlier today, I applied some more Mr Surfacer to the upper fuselage seam as I could feel a step with my fingernail. I sanded that back tonight to get a step-free finish between the two halves. I will probably need to address the flat leading edge of the tail fin as I believe it should be more rounded in shape.

 

 

Edited October 6, 2021 by Brigbeale

[bigbadbadge]

The acrylic was a stroke of luck being thick enough, I was scrabbling through my clear plastic box looking for suitably thick material for wingtip lights and couldn't find anything, but now you mention Acrylic I have some next to me in the mancave that I have taped some wet and dry to for cleaning up edges of Vacform models ( I only have one under construction on and off when the mood takes me), I could have used some of that!!!

The lights look great.

Chris

[opus999]

The 3-D printed bomb bay and landing gear bays look spectacular.  You are going to really transform this old kit into a work of art!

[Brigbeale]

I double checked the fitted acrylic wing tip lights to make sure they were secure enough to be sanded to shape. I’m glad to say they were, so I trimmed them with a pair of nippers and followed up with various grades of a sanding stick. 

 

The engine nacelles were further cleaned up to remove excess flash and to make the holes round to accept the intakes and the exhausts. Mr Surfacer was painted along the leading edge of the wings and the forward engine nacelle joints. 
 

Tonight I cleaned the nacelle joints back to smooth them out - well, one anyway. In all of the excitement, I forgot to sand the port one!.

I then proceeded to fit the main wings. They fitted quite well with only the starboard one needing the slot adjusting with a file to allow the wing upwards to line up. the port one was fine though. Both wings had a gap underneath wing to fuselage joint, so pieces of styrene card were added to fill them in and give some extra fixing material.

Once the wings had set enough to take the fuselage weight, I again checked the balance by placing cocktail sticks in the main gear mounts and adding the rear stabilisers. The result as you can see - the Canberra will still sit on its nose-gear.

Edited October 8, 2021 by Brigbeale

[bigbadbadge]

Wicked  great to see the wings on and that it stands and doesn't sit on the tail.

Cracking job 

Chris

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Yes, that is really handsome!  Perhaps you've answered this already elsewhere, so please forgive me if so: what are your plans for the engine intakes?  Will you sand off the "blanks" and add compressor faces?

[Brigbeale]

9 hours ago, TheyJammedKenny! said:

Yes, that is really handsome!  Perhaps you've answered this already elsewhere, so please forgive me if so: what are your plans for the engine intakes?  Will you sand off the "blanks" and add compressor faces?

I’m not sure at the moment, but I may resort to finding a decent front end image of the Avon engine and make a couple of decals.

[Brigbeale]

Another upgrade of the kit parts was called for - the nose wheel bay this time.

Again, i took a screenshot of a Youtube video to get the detail of a 1/48 scale nose wheel bay. 
The detail isn’t exactly as the original part but using that and the kit provided ‘wheel bay’ for dimensions I designed a passable replacement.

 

I had to nip off the mounting tabs for the original part from the fuselage and the replacement dropped straight in. The only hitch was it could go all the way in, so I needed a way to stop that. Hmmm…. A piece of sponge would suffice, so that’s what I used. Sprue goo was used to fix the nose wheel bay into the fuselage and Tamiya tape was wrapped around the fuselage to hold it in position until the glue had set.

 

I then scribed the panel lines on the rear stabilisers as per @canberra kid’s website pictures

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Nice work on the forward wheel bay!  Like your cockpit, it seems perfectly integrated with its surroundings.  This is turning out to be a handsome model.

[Brigbeale]

I started tonight’s modelling by removing the tape and sanding flush the excess sprue goo around the nose wheel bay. The said wheel bay seems to be solidly fitted so hopefully it’ll stay that way.

 

The next plan of attack was to position the cockpit canopy and draw a pencil line around it. This was to paint the area underneath matt black. While the matt paint was drying, I started masking the canopy using slim strips of Tamiya tape. I then used Humbrol Clearfix to fit the canopy in position (after refitting the ejection seat after I knocked it when re-sanding smooth the centre seam). The canopy was given an initial coat of Mr Neo Masking solution. To make sure it was sufficiently masked, as second application was applied later on.

 

Liquid correction fluid was used to fill the wing to fuselage seams. I’ll allow that to dry fully before removing the excess.

 

The next thing on the mental list was that flat leading edge to the tail fin. I could have simply applied modelling filler (Revell Plasto) to build it up, but I decided to cut a strip of 1.5mm styrene rod to form a forward ‘spine’ to give me something to work to. The top will need blending in a bit at the top, but it’s looking promising so far…

Edited October 11, 2021 by Brigbeale

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Excellent techniques on display here.  I never thought to correct the fin leading edge the way you have.  Next time!  Also, the use of correction fluid is new to me.

[ColinChipmunkfan]

Amazing skills on display here.  I built the Frog kit when it fist came out.  You have lifted it to a whole new level.

Well done sir- am following this with interest,

Colin

[AdrianMF]

Love the drop in nose bay on top of the sponge! And the new fin LE too.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[Hook]

Lovely indeed!

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

[bigbadbadge]

Great job on the replacement undercarriage bay. This is really progressing well now.  

Chris 

[Brigbeale]

Tonight, I filled the two sides of the leading edge on the tail-fin with Revell Plasto. 
While that was drying, I set about designing better exhaust tubes for the rear of the nacelles (where else would they be?😆). The kit provided ones were little more than just a pair of rings.

 

I 3D printed the replacements and they’ve turned out better than expected and look a lot better than the kit offerings.

 

After a sanding session of the Plasto on the tails-fin leading edge, a couple of divots could be seen, so I filled them in and I’m going to leave them until tomorrow night to fully cure before I sand them back again. It definitely looks better than it did though.

[bigbadbadge]

The tail leading edge looks a lot better and the exhausts look great, cracking work. 

Chris

[Brigbeale]

I lightly sanded the leading edge of the tail-fin and it looks a lot better now.

 

I also had to fix an issue which cropped up when cleaning back the ‘filler’ on the wing-to-fuselage joints, where the foil re-enforcement plate on the starboard side lifted and creased. The only option was to replace it. It’s a good job I had a spare pattern available.

 

The clear nose was fitted and a minor adjustment was made to the exhausts.

The kit did provide a pair of wheel bay covers for the wheels up option. I lightly glued these into position to act as masks for the wheel bays.

It’s looking more like a Canberra now.

[bigbadbadge]

Great work on the tail fin leading edge, it's all looking rather splendid now.

Great job

Chris

[Brigbeale]

Now that the clear nose had set, I had to slightly sand the edge to remove the step/flash on it to match the curvature of the fuselage. I did this with a nail sanding stick with 6 grades of ‘grit’ to get it back to a shiny part. However the part came off again so I finished polishing it and reattached it using Mr Cement S. To cover it in Mr Neo masking solution, I cut a very thin strip of Tamiya tape and wrapped it around just behind where the fuselage and clear part met. I followed it up with a slightly wider section and then painted the Mr Neo on. The tape was removed while the masking solution was still wet to form a neat line ready for painting.

 

A piece of sponge was used to fill the nose wheel bay. 
 

I then set about making the opened weapons bay doors. Images show the doors with a concertina’d section towards the top of the weapons bay while the lower half hangs near vertical.


I designed my own.

 

I have used the original plain closed doors to mask the weapons bay as it’s a nice snug fit and doesn’t need any extra help to stay there while I paint the Canberra.

 

Its getting very close to laying some primer on to see if all is well prior to the colour coats.

 

Edited October 15, 2021 by Brigbeale

[Brigbeale]

I 3D printed the weapons bay doors which took about 90 minutes to print the pair simultaneously  using a 0.2 nozzle.

 

After a little cleanup I tried them in the Canberra.

 

I did a few final things of preparation to get ready for spraying Halfords plastic primer on.

To spray the primer, I found a rolled cardboard ‘stick’ ( I have no idea where it came from or what I was saving it for), and inserted it into the front of one of the engine nacelles. A hole was drilled into a suitable size piece of wood to act as a stable base to spray the primer on which meant the Canberra was vertical with the nose down.

As my workbench in the shed was a right mess after the last car I repaired (with tools waiting to be cleaned before I put them away) meant I had to spray the primer outside. Fortunately, there was very little wind.

 

Once the primer had dried, it revealed the wing to fuselage joints needed attention as well as the top front seam behind the clear nose. Also the starboard strengthening plate behind the wing showed it wasn’t fully glued at the top edge. I tried to roll it flat with the handle of a craft knife initially, but it required some glue adding on the end of a sharp cocktail stick. It was then pushed down again and left to set. Once that was dry, I applied Mr Surfacer 1000 to the visible joints to fill them. They were left to dry/cure overnight so I can sand them back. Once I’m happy with them, I’ll give the Canberra another coat of primer and then see about masking up for the colour coats of paint and possibly some light weathering.

Edited October 17, 2021 by Brigbeale

[bigbadbadge]

Great to see some paint going on,  great job on the Bomb bay doors too.

Chris

[opus999]

Terrific work on that tail fin leading edge!  This is turning out superb so far.

[Brigbeale]

I started proceedings tonight by sanding back the dried Mr Surfacer. The top joints turned out ok but the bottom ones on the main wings still had a step which will require sorting out even though it’s underneath. I’ve done a fair bit to upgrade the Canberra, so it would be a shame to just let something like that to slide.

 

After looking at a couple of photos of Canberra’s, especially XM263 taking off (at least I hope so, as if it’s landing, the pilot’s left it a bit late to lower the gear!), which shows the external rings the same colour as the fuselage. So, I glued them on.

 

I then flipped the Canberra on its back and filled the gaps in the front and rear of the weapons bay (which I’d forgotten to do earlier) with sprue goo and also ran some along those underwing seams where the wings meet the fuselage. Sorry - forgot to take pictures of it.

 

I then started to think about the actual colours for the Canberra itself. I’ve read that the underside is neither silver or grey - it’s somewhere in between. I built an Airfix Lightning F3 (if I remember correctly), which I painted the underside Tamiya Chrome Silver. It looked ok when I painted it but now, with the talk of the ‘Canberra underside colour, it now seems too Silver. I also built an Novo Hunter which I painted the undersides a Sea Grey (probably as I’d run out of Sky Grey). And then there’s the Matchbox Buccaneer which has a grey underside but I can’t remember which (but it’s a bit too dark anyway for consideration).

 

Also in that photo is the kit closed weapons bay doors which painted with Sky Grey (at the top), then Chrome Silver (bottom left) and a mix of 1 part Sky Grey to 1.5 - 2 parts Chrome Silver which I think is the shade I’m aiming for.

 

Now that leaves the top. I’m thinking Tamiya Ocean Grey 2 (RAF) for the grey (obviously) and a Tamiya Dark Green 2 (RAF) as on the Buccaneer, Jaguar and Lightning. The Hunter has a different Grey (Tamiya XF-83 Medium Sea Grey) on it which may be more in keeping with the Canberra. 

 

Hmmm. Decisions, decisions……..

Edited October 17, 2021 by Brigbeale

[TheyJammedKenny!]

This is looking really good!  Regarding paint, I'd for whatever makes you happy on the underside.  If it looks silver-grey, then mix the two and see how they look.  

 

I'll keep in mind your work as I modify my own into a PR.7.