On Heather's Workbench - Strike Hard, Strike Sure: RAF Bomber Command 1940

[Stick]

Beautifully detailed narrative and pics.
A joy to read, as always.
More power to your Mojo!

Stick

[MOK61]

Very neat work in the cockpit. I am very jealous of the job you've done with the central levers and the instrument panel. 

 

As to the galley area some people have said that this was only present in the later transport version, but as the original Air Ministry spec called for a bomber/troopcarrier I think it could be right after all.

 

You have no idea how tempted I was to model a hapless Erk wrestling the Elsan up the boarding ladder. Or worse, wrestling it down!

 

Murray

[Heather Kay]

4 hours ago, MOK61 said:

As to the galley area

I just followed the instructions. There’s no mention of the galley area in the Wingleader book, but then that doesn’t mention the comfy armchair for mid-flight snoozes either!

 

Most of the cockpit detail will never be visible. That’s why I’ve not bothered with the Eduard radio set upgrade. Even the engineer's panel will barely be spotted once the clear greenhouse is fitted.

 

A couple of days of Paying Work, plus some domestic stuff, have seen the Stirling shuffled off the bench for a bit. More soon.

[Heather Kay]

I spent a bit of time unpicking some of the work I did earlier. This is because I am a twit. I forgot to add some of the PE upgrades round the navigator's area.

 

I ended up carefully carving away the moulded radio block, and reinstating some bits and pieces from scrap styrene. More paint retouching went on, and I added the yellow circles that indicate armour plate where I could. Note I’ve not fitted the glycol tank behind the co-pilot position. The first production aircraft didn’t have the windscreen de-icing stuff.
 

Then I spent time chain-drilling, cutting and filing out the blanked-off windows around the fuselage. Now, that’s a tedious job. Next, some more colour round the innards, and to see if all the kit glazing still fits or if I need to use the resin stuff like I did on the Airfix upgrade.

 

First, though, a stand up and stretch. Hunched over the bench far too long!

[elger]

I recall from when I built my early Mk 1 a few years back that I left out that radio you've fitted to the navigator's station - I think that those were only fitted to mk IV glider tugs. Didn't know about the glycol tank not fitted to early aircraft though, and worked really hard on putting mine on a little platform... oh well

[Heather Kay]

4 minutes ago, elger said:

I think that those were only fitted to mk IV glider tugs.

Interesting. Like my Airfix bodge upgrade, I am following details in the Wingleader book on the early Stirlings. I understand the navigator had a receiver for direction finding. I have another image which shows a radar receiver or similar, too. Obviously, that wouldn’t be on a 1940 build. There’s a lot of little PE bits to add to the fuselage wall, too. It’ll just look nicely busy, I think.

[MOK61]

2 hours ago, Heather Kay said:

I spent a bit of time unpicking some of the work I did earlier. This is because I am a twit. I forgot to add some of the PE upgrades round the navigator's area.

 

I ended up carefully carving away the moulded radio block, and reinstating some bits and pieces from scrap styrene. More paint retouching went on, and I added the yellow circles that indicate armour plate where I could. Note I’ve not fitted the glycol tank behind the co-pilot position. The first production aircraft didn’t have the windscreen de-icing stuff.
 

Then I spent time chain-drilling, cutting and filing out the blanked-off windows around the fuselage. Now, that’s a tedious job. Next, some more colour round the innards, and to see if all the kit glazing still fits or if I need to use the resin stuff like I did on the Airfix upgrade.

 

First, though, a stand up and stretch. Hunched over the bench far too long!

That's a double win with the glycol tank, Heather, as Signor Italeri would have you mount it direct onto the floor. My understanding is that, when it was fitted, it was on a deceptively simple-looking platform, which was actually a bit of a swine to fabricate and, of course, you can ignore the super fiddly, and vulnerable, spray mountings on the nose.  It is all too easy to get sucked down the rabbit hole of the folding trapdoor, that gives access to the bomb-aimer's position, and the navigator's storage locker, or  perhaps it is a croquet set, under that heating pipe. Even if anyone were so obsessed as to scratch them they will never be seen again once the canopy is on. Ask me how I know! 😆

 

I rebuilt the navigator's bulkhead multiple times too. First following the kit instructions with the second Rx set, then I pulled that off and replaced it with the photo etch, which is a far better representation of a radio set but possibly should not be there, and then I think I messed about with the height of the nav table and replaced the legs.

 

All part of the fun and completely invisible now! 😉

 

Murray

[Heather Kay]

Slow progress today.

 

I installed the glazing. Inevitably, the blanked holes I opened up yesterday were not quite accurate enough, leaving little gaps. I should have followed my gut feeling and gone the resin windows route. Instead, I persevered with the kit clear parts. Tiny gaps were mostly filled with Perfect Plastic Putty - slap it on, moist cotton bud and wipe it back off again. I think it might need another pass here and there. Then I did a polishing routine, sanding things down to get them levelled off. Not perfect, but adequate.

 

PE bits scattered around the cockpit, and some nice blackout drapes. Last time, I made them black. This time, I made them a dark green. Same routine as before: thin acid-free tissue, which I painted on both sides and then cut into strips, mangled with tweezers and applied with a drop of PVA.

 

 

Happy with that. The tail details are still to be worked on. I’m not entirely sure whether I can finagle the nose turret into place after the fuselage halves are joined. I’m not keen on having to mask the thing up for painting the fuselage. We shall see.

 

There will be another short break in proceedings while Real Life rears its ugly noggin once more.

[Nick21]

15 hours ago, Heather Kay said:

Slow progress today.

 

I installed the glazing. Inevitably, the blanked holes I opened up yesterday were not quite accurate enough, leaving little gaps. I should have followed my gut feeling and gone the resin windows route. Instead, I persevered with the kit clear parts. Tiny gaps were mostly filled with Perfect Plastic Putty - slap it on, moist cotton bud and wipe it back off again. I think it might need another pass here and there. Then I did a polishing routine, sanding things down to get them levelled off. Not perfect, but adequate.

 

PE bits scattered around the cockpit, and some nice blackout drapes. Last time, I made them black. This time, I made them a dark green. Same routine as before: thin acid-free tissue, which I painted on both sides and then cut into strips, mangled with tweezers and applied with a drop of PVA.

 

 

Happy with that. The tail details are still to be worked on. I’m not entirely sure whether I can finagle the nose turret into place after the fuselage halves are joined. I’m not keen on having to mask the thing up for painting the fuselage. We shall see.

 

There will be another short break in proceedings while Real Life rears its ugly noggin once more.

Great work! I like the way you created the Curtains, as I painted mine in place and will see what that looks like at the great reveal, once I remove all the masking! The front Turret - I've opted for the same approach as yourself, the "Finagle" option! Had to file off the lower mounting mould on the turret and had seen another video (see link below, scroll through to 22mins 13secs) where a guy was building the Italeri Mk3 version (I'm assuming the front turret fit was no different to the Mk1 kit) and he managed to slide it into place!! I have a Lancaster in my small stash, I'm huge fan of the B-17 Flying Fortress but taken by your builds of the other RAF Bombers too........which is your favourite and which one would recommend as my next RAF WW2 bomber build other than the Stirling and Lanc, appreciate your thoughts  on this? 

 

Click on this link -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iHIzSctqLU

 

 

Edited June 30 by Nick21

[Heather Kay]

3 hours ago, Nick21 said:

which is your favourite and which one would recommend as my next RAF WW2 bomber build

Now, that’s a good question. All of them provided challenges, in different ways. As they all sit in the display cabinet, I think my favourite finished build is the Manchester, with the Halifax close behind. I think I’ll have to say as a pleasant build I would recommend it would be hard to beat the current Airfix Wellington. 
 

Thanks for that video. I’ll peruse it later. I think it’ll pay me to follow the instructions, build up the turret, and then see if it can be fiddled into place before I join the fuselage together. 

[MOK61]

I bottled out of finagling the front turret. It looks like it should be possible but as Nick has said it requires pretty brutal surgery, by my newbie standards, to the mounting ring.

 

I was "lucky" that I had already decided to replace the kit barrels with brass so at least I could leave them off.

 

Murray.

 

[Chuck1945]

I like the blackout curtains, nice touch. I tried thin paint to simulate the curtains in various patterns for the windows of a 1/144 HP.42; kinda worked but wouldn’t work in a larger scale such as 1/72.