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I never found the elusive Airfix Lightning back in the pre-internet days. Looking forward to finally be able to build one - not being nostalgic I went for a more modern kit:

 

orLo255.jpg

 

This is a blond spot for me - I know nothing about the plane, operations they were invlolved in, or even what’s in the box. Will I want some AM goodies? Next week will be spent pondering about this and learning something about the subject.

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Welcome along to the build with an interesting model and great subject!!!

 

One of these were built in the last STGB by our illustrious Cookie ( @Cookenbacher), it wasn't the easiest of builds and required some work, but in the end was the top model for the build.

 

"Will I want some AM goodies?"  :rofl2:  It's ok, I have corrected this mistaken statement for you....... "I need lots of AM goodies!!!"  :D

 

Well good luck with the build, it should all be good in your capable hands.

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Hi,

 

If you're looking for some info on this aircraft, go to the Fündekals website, select 1/48 and look for the P-38 decals. If you look at the P-38 decal page, you can find and download a free .pdf  with the instructions.

There's 50 pages of P-38 info there, the aircraft pictured in your box-art is on pages 30-31.

 

Below is an attempt at a direct link to the P-38 page.

https://fundekals.net/product/p-38-e-f-g-h-lightnings/ 

 

Cheers, Stefan.

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Hi @Torbjorn - looking forward to your P-38!

As far as I can remember, the main difficulty I had with this kit was getting the cockpit and nose gear bay to fit in the central cupola - there's quite a bit of overlap in the parts as molded!

Here are some pics of my rather clumsy solution:

Sorry, they're a bit "photobuckety"!

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On 9/4/2022 at 12:11 AM, trickyrich said:

Welcome along to the build with an interesting model and great subject!!!

 

One of these were built in the last STGB by our illustrious Cookie ( @Cookenbacher), it wasn't the easiest of builds and required some work, but in the end was the top model for the build.

Oh, I was fooled by the nicely packed box (plastic wrap and all). 

 

On 9/4/2022 at 12:11 AM, trickyrich said:

"Will I want some AM goodies?"  :rofl2:  It's ok, I have corrected this mistaken statement for you....... "I need lots of AM goodies!!!"  :D

 

Hmm, I did find this on my drawers:

InCRuUy.jpg

 

I must have bought it with this kit in mond. Seems to be mostly cockpit stuff, which in turn requires an open canopy… 

 

 

On 9/4/2022 at 4:35 PM, Stefan Buysse said:

Hi,

 

If you're looking for some info on this aircraft, go to the Fündekals website, select 1/48 and look for the P-38 decals. If you look at the P-38 decal page, you can find and download a free .pdf  with the instructions.

There's 50 pages of P-38 info there, the aircraft pictured in your box-art is on pages 30-31.

 

Below is an attempt at a direct link to the P-38 page.

https://fundekals.net/product/p-38-e-f-g-h-lightnings/ 

 

Cheers, Stefan.

 

That’s very useful, thanks alot! This box seems also to contain decals for several version of the same plane.

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21 hours ago, Cookenbacher said:

Hi @Torbjorn - looking forward to your P-38!

As far as I can remember, the main difficulty I had with this kit was getting the cockpit and nose gear bay to fit in the central cupola - there's quite a bit of overlap in the parts as molded!

Here are some pics of my rather clumsy solution:

Sorry, they're a bit "photobuckety"!

Many thanks, I’ll make sure to read and avoid the pitfalls. It does look a bit troublesome at first look :confused:

 

Though the results were stunning!

Edited by Torbjorn
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Might as well show sprue shots while awaiting  the whistle.

 

 

SbA9K66.jpg

 

There is a bit flash, but the details are fine and the edges are sharply defined. Got drop tanks and bombs, but dunno if we will use them.

 

hTt1wXQ.jpg

Engine cowls and other bits. Wheel bays are aft in one piece, front one split longitudinally.

 

t61QQAn.jpg

Booms and underside wings.

 

Not sprues, but decals:

 

hZviFsI.jpg

For the following options:

 

mtCCvLN.jpg

I get to choose from olive drab, olive drab and olive drab :)

 

A separate bag with the canopy and resin guns. The guns are nicely molded:

CqogXpL.jpg

 

 

Finally, I found this in my archives:

KaNAHW9.jpg

 

Not sure if the F canopy was identical, but it isn’t identical to the kit: instead of two braces running perpendicularly in the aftermost canopy section, it has only one running along the centreline aft-fore. Not sure what gives,googling found no sure answer. Will get back to that.

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I think the canopy difference is that canopy brace, the Tamiya one gives you a choice of two, with the only difference mostly being the canopy. You might be best sticking with the kit one.

 

Nice AM!

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On 9/7/2022 at 7:21 AM, Christer A said:

Olive drab with nose art, olive drab with other nose art, sharkmouths...

It's nothing wrong with that decal sheet, that's for sure!

 

I'll keep my fingers crossed for a smooth trouble free build 😀

I don’t think your fingercrossing will work, but thanks all the same :D

On 9/7/2022 at 11:03 AM, trickyrich said:

I think the canopy difference is that canopy brace, the Tamiya one gives you a choice of two, with the only difference mostly being the canopy. You might be best sticking with the kit one.

 

Nice AM!

Yes, I’m leaning towards the kit canopy, becaus eof the braces but also because the cockpit walls will be rather thick. Which means I must to go buy a P-38F to get use of my vac form. 😎

 

 

— 

 

I could barely wait to get started. The first in line was the engine hoods and booms because it’s always the cockpit otherwise. However, I’ve only glued the halves together so far, which is too boring to write about, so the first post will be about the cockpit anyway. Wise from Cookenbacher’s escapades, I started by getting the front parts to fit.

 

This is the nose wheel bay seen from above. Two pieces, with an ugly longitudinal non-fixable seam:

9nEgjAWm.jpg

 

The cockpit is built up by one floor and two walls. Ignoring all the details for now, I glued them together for fitting purposes, using as little glue as possible to be able to separate them later. 

 

Taping the wheelbay and cockpit to the fuselage pieces and dryfitting them shows this:

 

tNQ8aw5m.jpg

 

The blue arrow shows the cockpit wall sticking up with 1.5 mm due to being pushed up by the wheelbay. That’s what we need to address. There’s several things to be done:

 

1. The cockpit sits too deep in the back, the aft bulkhead/wall need to the reduced in height quite a bit, and tapered to follow the form of the fuselage (blue arrow in pic below)

 

2. The fuselage sides need considerable thinning to fit the cockpit, both upper and lower halves. With a dremel this is quick work

 

3. The bottom of the cockpit was thinned as much as I dared. Bottom sides tapered too. Again the dremel.

 

4. The wheel bay top is too thick. Instead of the dremel, out came the saw:

 

 

Pics for the above

 

1. Back of cockpit wall reduced in height. It’s hidden, arrow shows what I mean. I also roughened the IP shroud, in preparation for an idea I knicked from Cookenbacher’s build.

XScMPVBm.jpg

 

 

2+3:

U61NUDZm.jpg

 

 

4.

v0F1icGm.jpg

 

In fact the nose bay doesn’t fit well. Either side can be made to fit nicely with the fuselage piece - but not both sides at the same time. I therefore massacred the bay and only kept the long side walls, so they could be glued to the fuselage one at a time (pic below). The short walls and bottom can be added easily from plastic sheet, using the thinnest available to solve the fit issue with the cockpit. I also reduced the height of the aft part of the side walls with about 0.5 mm, a result of the sawing - the front part was cut away with a scalpel to keep correct depth for the landing gear. Frtunately the entire landing gear is forward of the cockpit.

As a bonus, this solution also solves the  issue with the unseemly seam!

 

04KTaxMm.jpg

 

 

As reported in the build thread linked in the post  (again, thanks for letting us know!) there is a step between the fuselage halves: the upper is about 0.7 mm narrower than the lower. I made a quick fix by abuse of the digital calipers used to acquire said measurement (I a have cheap tool - don’t do this with an expensive tool please). First I measured the upper half and locked the calipers with the locking screw, then squeezed the lower half into the calipers. This was dipped in boiling water for 2-3 seconds*. This causes plastic deformation (hah!) and the lower half now fits quite well. I don’t like to have stresses built into models by squeezing together while gluing - sometimes I do squeexe-n-glue, and give it a dip in boiling water afterwards, but in this case that would mean having to dip a finished and painted cockpit.

 

* I still did dip it a bit too long: the tip of one of the thin very thin flaps curled due to the heat, but this was easily fixed.

 

 

Anyway, the whole shebang now fits reasonably, and we can proceed to the fun things.

Edited by Torbjorn
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there is some serious work going on there!! 

 

It's almost like you're trying to fit an Aires AM Cockpit!!! They often need just as much work to get them to fit!!!

 

I'm wondering if it is almost better to do away with the nose wheel well completely, or the bit causing all the grief! It's not something you are really ever going to see notice, the cockpit might be a bit too deep but it might make life a bit easier?

 

Anyway you look to be having fun and it's not in the bin yet so all is good, hopefully the struggling part of the build is almost over.

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12 hours ago, trickyrich said:

there is some serious work going on there!! 

 

It's almost like you're trying to fit an Aires AM Cockpit!!! They often need just as much work to get them to fit!!!

 

I'm wondering if it is almost better to do away with the nose wheel well completely, or the bit causing all the grief! It's not something you are really ever going to see notice, the cockpit might be a bit too deep but it might make life a bit easier?

 

Anyway you look to be having fun and it's not in the bin yet so all is good, hopefully the struggling part of the build is almost over.

Most of the effort went to find the problem area. Now that I know I could probably fix another in less than an hour (which is also why I bother you all with all the details, so I can go back if I ever buy one more).

 

Regarding the wheel bay. The cockpit will sit too low even if you skip the wheel bay, so some carving is necessary anyway. With a rotary tool it’s a matter of a few minutes work - on the other hand, I’m not sure if I would bother if had only hand tools to be honest. 

 

Also, the wheel bat doesn’t really fit as is. Cutting loose the side walls, then adding the other sides is quicker and easier than trying to fill and sand the original. Or ar least I thought so.

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Thanks guys. Sure to have ave

 

 

Replaced the kit seat of type thick stone throne with the rather neat PE from Brengun, and used most of the rest of the interior PE as well. 

 

I have to admit I have a thing for radios, and the 3 boxes in the kit didn’t look like the alleged SCR274N it said it was, so I replaced them with bits and bobs found in the scrap drawer.

ba5cKUn.jpg

 

 

Painted with Vallejo interior green on a dark base. A bit too dark perhaps. I dared to add some of the levers, which I didn’t bother painting since I’ll surely knock them of 2-3 times before it is canopy time.

 

Quq6UIA.jpg

 

 

I didn’t do all homework though. The IP does not fit. It requires the boxy thing in the middle of the forward cockpit to be cut down a mm or two.  :angrysoapbox.sml:

 

I’m also having fun with mending seams:

7QqSBA6.jpg

 

 

 

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Here’s the idea I knicked from Mr C - simulating the shroud with tissue paper. I have a lot lying around, having used it for simulating sail and other textiles. In this case it’s its ability to form neat realistic folds that I’m after. Applied by simply pressing it with my thumb over the cover, then bit by bit applying some diluted PVA on top of it. The paper is porous, so the glue just seeps through and forms a bond. When wet the paper can be pressed against the underlying surface with a brush or fingers to conform. After drying a bit I folded it around the edges and applied glue on the underside.

 

After drying jusy cut off the excess. I painted it with varnish to make it appear slightly less porous.

 

gDJVS2R.jpg

 

 

 

After that I started assembling the stuff. Upper and lower fuselag fitted fine after all prep work. Outer lower wings fit well. The booms on the other hand…. They wobble and and do not fit good, making alignement difficult.

Ended up glueing the butt ends only, and at the same time the elevator/stab in order to use it for alignment. This was then carefully rigged to dry aligned. Afterwards the fore ends was glued in place, using wedges to force the sides to butt against wing sides (picture below). The wheel bays were only dryfitted. 

miSMgqh.jpg

 

After each side was glued, so were the wheel wells. Finally the badly fitting  nacelles were attached. Filling and sanding feast commences!

 

BzSRR5b.jpg

 

 

zSoguRa.jpg

Edited by Torbjorn
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13 hours ago, Torbjorn said:

Here’s the idea I knicked from Mr C - simulating the shroud with tissue paper. I have a lot lying around, having used it for simulating sail and other textiles. In this case it’s its ability to form neat realistic folds that I’m after. Applied by simply pressing it with my thumb over the cover, then bit by bit applying some diluted PVA on top of it. The paper is porous, so the glue just seeps through and forms a bond. When wet the paper can be pressed against the underlying surface with a brush or fingers to conform. After drying a bit I folded it around the edges and applied glue on the underside.

 

After drying jusy cut off the excess. I painted it with varnish to make it appear slightly less porous.

 

gDJVS2R.jpg

 

 

 

After that I started assembling the stuff. Upper and lower fuselag fitted fine after all prep work. Outer lower wings fit well. The booms on the other hand…. They wobble and and do not fit good, making alignement difficult.

Ended up glueing the butt ends only, and at the same time the elevator/stab in order to use it for alignment. This was then carefully rigged to dry aligned. Afterwards the fore ends was glued in place, using wedges to force the sides to butt against wing sides (picture below). The wheel bays were only dryfitted. 

miSMgqh.jpg

 

After each side was glued, so were the wheel wells. Finally the badly fitting  nacelles were attached. Filling and sanding feast commences!

 

BzSRR5b.jpg

 

 

zSoguRa.jpg

I do the very same thing as you with pegs, I kept four halves to use to wedge and support, my this is coming along nicely, you’re certainly winning this battle! You’ll have the Japanese off those islands in no time!👍😎:goodjob:

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On 16/09/2022 at 08:20, Andwil said:

I like the tissue paper idea for the IP shroud, might give it a go myself.

 

AW 

Me too - can't let someone else's good idea go to waste! Lovely work...

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18 hours ago, Christer A said:

Drilling out all the intakes as well I see ;)

 

I sure hope that the sanding and filling job goes smoothly now.

Yep, roughly. I finalize it with smaller drills/knife just before painting, since the edges become sensitive when thinned. The double large circular intakes under the props will get PE grills from Brengun, so at least they are easily fixed.

 

Thanks for looking in - nothing to show now. It’s indeed fighting back, the booms would not conform to both the wheel bay inserts and nacelles at the same time, so there’s some awkward filling there to do.

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