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Plan 'D'HC


alancmlaird

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Following on from my paint probs with the Twin Otter (which requires some quiet reflection and serious testing), I have decided on Plan 'D'....

Do something else.

In the spirit of 'Royal Progression' I thought I'd prepare an 'Heir and a Spare' in case the Twin Otter project fails.

 

So, straight from the historic stash, here they are....

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The Beaver seems to be in its initial boxing, while the Chipmunk is in its third...poly bag with paper header, then card and clear moulded container, to this very crushable box.

Not sure which came first, but both are from Airfix's 'Rivets with everything' era, though the Beaver's are more restrained than the Chipmunk's which just have to be removed. I might leave the Beaver's rivets where they are - what do other builders think?

I'm aiming for two simple builds, more or less straight from the box, though, is it 40+ years on, surely not, the decal are yellowed and cracked. I wouldn't have been using them anyway - I have two simple schemes in mind.

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I was prompted to pull my half-built Airfix Beaver from the back of the closet and have a look.  Those rivets really are too prominent - off with their heads, says the Queen of Hearts.

 

 

Something else to look out for - the prop warning stripes on the floats are moulded as raised lines where they really should be painted on.  Easy to fix.

 

 

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3 hours ago, RJP said:

I was prompted to pull my half-built Airfix Beaver from the back of the closet and have a look.  Those rivets really are too prominent - off with their heads, says the Queen of Hearts.

 

 

Something else to look out for - the prop warning stripes on the floats are moulded as raised lines where they really should be painted on.  Easy to fix.

 

 

Build the other half 🙂

The Beaver rivets, by the time they have a couple of coats of gloss white should be all but invisible - and at least they are in straight lines. Chipmunk's are twice the size, too close together and wonky. They will have to go, but the Beaver's get a reprieve - maybe.

I wondered about that - I used a pair of those floats on a Frog Proctor XI conversion, and filed them off because they weren't in the photo ref I used. I thought the might have been some military-style strengthening for ice or debris - so they are just paint!!! Thanks.

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Quote
34 minutes ago, zebra said:

Nice choice and great to see another Beaver and Chipmunk in the GB. Which colour schemes are you planning?

 

Civilian, and surprisingly local, considering. The Chipmunk will be quite testing, but the Beaver should make quite a splash :facepalm:

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Some progress...

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Since the Beaver was provided with a reasonably detailed interior, it seemed churlish not to assemble and paint it it an appropriate but imagined scheme.

Not so the Chipmunk who's entire innards consisted of seats which looked very much like a pair of half-priced sofas. Since my model-building began when Airfix provided a pilot that looked like a Dan Dare alien with a rudimentary shelf to sit on, I've never got too involved in the soft furnishings and fittings of the crew quarters. However, sitting alongside the Beaver, the Chippy felt a tad minimalist in its provision, so I added bulkheads, instrument panels, and curved seat-backs. Oh, and fabricated sprue-sticks (apologies to A.A. Milne) which look more like German WW2 grenades!

 

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Rest assured, as assembly progresses, almost none of this will ever be seen again, such is the thickness of the clear canopy material.

(Just one Beaver 'kit review' note; while the doors themselves fitted perfectly, once the windows were installed they stuck out like a sore thumb, necessitating the removal of the lip at the sides of the top of the door aperture to allow the doors to sit flush.) 

At last I'm getting to the good bit - building a recognisable model aeroplane.

Edited by alancmlaird
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Nothing much to report - just a bit of filling and sanding. Considering their age and lack of care in storage, both needed much less work that many modern kits.

 

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The worst joint on the Beaver was just behind the cabin roof window (those top windows really just don't fit - next time I'll cut new ones!), while the Chipmunk's underside centre-section to fuselage and tailplane roots were a bit iffy and needed a bit of filler, then primer (actually any thickish matt enamel of a suitable colour) and a rub down with fine wet'n'dry to seal the porous filler prior to painting. While the sandpaper was out, the boiler-plate rivets were removed.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...

I really intended each kit progress report to appear concurrently, so although the Chipmunk is progressing, er, progressively, i've no intention of inflicting the blow-by-blow account of masking and paint-drying on members. 

Yet.

 

The particular Beaver I chose to model, however, threw me a wobbly....

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The float assembly's struts are aerofoil shaped rather than tubular, and so the kit's have to be discarded and replaced with (very fragile and wobbly) styrene strip. Here I have to admit I refrained from forming a careful aerofoil cross section and just rounded the edges a bit for strength. What a fiddle! It wasn't just the section that was cross, let me tell you 😠

 

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....but after using up most of the patience I had left, I got all 24 bits of the float assembly on to the fuselage. And about time too, I say.

 

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5 hours ago, 81-er said:

it might have been frustrating, but it's paid off :)

 

James

Thanks James - did I mention that I carefully opened the kit's blanked off strut-fuselage mounting holes before glueing the halves together, only to find the attachment points were different and I had to fill them in again! :facepalm:

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Sorry for the unscheduled/scheduled delay - I ran out of white enamel and became a grandfather(!).

So anyway, the Beaver has received its first coat of gloss white, but being on white plastic, looks no different yet, but the Chipmunk it coming on, all paint on, masking fails requiring touch-up visible, canopy only resting in place with as yet unfinished framing in a mix of paint and cut strips of white masking tape.

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Suprisingly, though the Chipmunk is seemingly on finals, a later sudden rush of blood to the head brought the Beaver this far...

 

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....with just some minor details, like the prop, wing struts and various tiny plastic sticky-out things to break/lose/cover in glue. (Note to self: I really must pay more attention to the wing-half joins before I get to this stage)

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So, nearly finished and on schedule each now at the same stage...

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...with just a bit of touching up to do (and try to take some better pics!). And yet....

...on the Beaver, there's a yellow stain on the forward part of the stripe decal, plus I'm not happy with the transparent backing as it shows up the rivets (curse them) and panel lines as a darker shadow

...while on the Chipmunk, there's a breakage at the lower front of the canopy where the canopy was wrenched from the sprue (not by me, guv), and the white backing on the decal shows through on the registration more than I'd like.

I may (or may not) do another set for both models (on white background) and overlay them on the existing decal. That works well usually, but on another couple of models ended in disaster!

 

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.......a.....n.....d.......FINISHED!

 

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If you have a spare pair of Beaver floats.....

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...There are loads of things you can build on to them, like the one and only Percival Proctor MkVI.

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Historical footnote:

 

The subject Beaver floatplane, G-DHCB, was actually based for a while (1980s - 90s?) on Loch Earn just a few miles from where I live, but I never knew it was there till it was gone dammit - dismantled on the water, crated and sold in Canada to be restored. Such an interesting aircraft - probably the only float-equipped Beaver in the UK.

Note the bigger rear cabin window replacing the usual porthole, and the bigger ventral fin under the tail.

 

The Chipmunk is built 'straight from the box', but has anti-spin strakes added - prompted by disinterring a Chipmunk I built 50 years ago and noticing I'd made that mod way back when. The subject, part of the CAFU fleet used for pilot certification testing, was often seen at the 'executive parking' end of the main terminal of Prestwick Airport, and probably was disposed of and sold on to a private buyer from there.

Which reminds me; one of the first projects I completed on here as a 'Get it finished' Group Build was a DH Dove I'd converted from an Airfix Heron, also about 50 years ago. It turned into quite a marathon (now a Snickers) which involved cutting off the roof! The CAFU scheme served to hide a multitude of sins.

Amodel released their kit a couple of months later....

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The actual Dove is now in the Museum of Flight at East Fortune, near Edinburgh.

 

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