Me-410B-1 Hornisse 1/48

[CheshireGap]

Its been a while since I did WiP, modelling mojo has been lacking so there has been little progress with the 4 kits I have at various stages, but one that is now heading for the paint shop is this old one from Revell-Monogram under their Pro-Modeller badge. It is very much showing its age, with some nice moulding in places

First thing I noticed was damage: I have had this kit in the stash a long, long time, so this may have been caused by me sometime in the past, but I have no memory of doing it (or of a lot of things now it has to be said)

 

There is some nice detail moulding, and even some slide moulding, innovative for the period (1997)

 

However on the downside there are some chunky gates...

 

...and some dodgy spelling...

 

...which may be why they decided to do this:

 

Seriously!?! even in 1997 this must have been an obviously bad idea, I know Revell did this a lot in the 60's & 70's, if they even thought about it now...

Anyway, on with the show...the cockpit is the usual Monogram attempt to get as much as possible into a single piece, with varying results but here not bad, so addition were restricted to some wiring behind the instrument panel and the shoulder harnesses, that were missing even though lap belts were moulded in. Otherwise just carful painting and weathering.

 

Main construction is not too hard, but everything needs a fettle and I decided to go to lengths to get the fit as good as possible in all areas, adding wedges where necessary to reduce steps and mismatches. Filling was mainly around the wing leading edges and the air intake to the side of the nacelles, 3M Red glazing putty was used as usual

 

The repair to the damage on the nose underside is looking good, just the merest trave visible under a test coat of paint; again this was the 3M

 

I wasn't going to rivet originally as I couldn't find any plans online, but in the end thought what the heck and made some up! its only light so won't show too much

 

The nacelle & wing joints are looking quite good now

 

 

Next up was the undercarriage; Monogram actually moulded the brake line in place, it isn't great but I decided to improve it rather than replace it, and do you know what it isn't bad!

 

That big canopy is next, and it is as fiddly as it looks! there is some heavy internal framing moulded on the inside to paint, but the framing on the outside is a bit poorly defined making the masking tricky, and the undercut on the gunners windows means a multi-piece canopy that doesn't line up easily

 

It is on, but there is a bit of a step between the two halves, which, thanks to the use of superglue, I ham going to have to live with.

And we are up to painting stage; and yes wings and fuselage are not together yet! I believe that the wing to fuselage joint is good enough, at least on the top, to get away with painting them separately, which will make masking a whole lot easier. So far I have only got down a mix of Vallejo RML 84 and AK RML 76 version 2 over a coat of MRP Grey Primer

 

TBH I am mixed about the AK Interactive 3rd generation; I have tried so far only their grey primer - it wipes off with light finger pressure making it completely useless and the bottle is going in the bin - which was frankly a waste of 8 quid, and this RLM 76 disagreed with my preferred thinner and retarder, I had to make several mixes with different brands before coming up with a version that looked half decent, and tbh that was probably only because I increased the proportion of Vallejo. I am unlikely to try them again for airbrushing but they do look like they would be good for brush painting detail, so I may try an interior colour or two. For airbrushing I am an MRP convert.

 

Next up is a 74/75 camo, and there is a Hobbyboss 1/48 Me-262 waiting in the wings for a similar scheme. I did not take enough photos to really warrant a WiP for that, but here is a taster:

 

 

 

 

[bissyboat]

Nice looking office. ⚓👍

[antonio argudo]

nice projects! one tip, the control column is in backward position in the me410, cheers 

 

 

[Thom216]

Brilliant!

[Zephyr91]

Some excellent work going on here.

[mick]

great work on the pit

[CheshireGap]

Told you I slow...this one is within an ace of the finish line now so this post will finish the WiP.

We left it with the primer down and various shades of the light blue, time to follow up with the top colours: this is a RLM17/74 scheme, and not having the wings attached yet makes things a lot easier

 

 

After dealing with some overspray, lightened versions of the colours were used to add variation, perhaps a bit too subtle as most of this seem to vanish after the gloss went down

 

 

Decals were an issue, the larger ones proved too fragile to use, so I had to source the main insignia from other sheets; I just about got away with the codes and most of the stencils, but all the decals were somewhat too bright and would need toning down.

 

 

Finally some main assembly, and there is indeed no gap to worry about - full marks Monogram! A wash follows and then some streaking and weathering

 

 

A shot of the underside also shows nothing worth worrying about at the wing roots; more weathering and its nearly done

 

 

There is a queue of finished models needing their pictures taken as Ready for Inspection, I will add this to the end and post a bundle when get time!