1:32 scale Lancaster Mk.1 Hachette Partworks

[Gnomey]

Great work so far Gerry!

 

[Crimea_River]

Hi Gerry and welcome back. Once again a great update with some superior work. Just a couple of notes:

Part A is the starter motor and it's correctly placed. Not sure what B is but it could be some kind of filter. I will continue looking. The curved tank at the front of the engine is the coolant header tank, not oil. At the bottom of the tank, there would be a major cooling line running into the radiator. There would be two lines at the top of the engine between the cylinder backs which collect hot coolant from the engine and send it to the header tank to which they are connected.

 

[Airframes]

Great work Gerry !

 

[A4K]

Fantastic work Gerry! Congratulations on the new grandson too

 

[Gerry]

Part A is the starter motor and it's correctly placed. Not sure what B is but it could be some kind of filter. I will continue looking. The curved tank at the front of the engine is the coolant header tank, not oil. At the bottom of the tank, there would be a major cooling line running into the radiator. There would be two lines at the top of the engine between the cylinder backs which collect hot coolant from the engine and send it to the header tank to which they are connected.

Thanks Andy, I'd forgot about coolant. I'll bear your comments in mind when I get to work on the final engine. I was aware of the connection to the radiator but decided to leave it until where it's visible.

And thanks to everyone else who are still following this slowly evolving build. Now back to some more filling and smoothing...

Gerry

 

[Gerry]

Fantastic work Gerry! Congratulations on the new grandson too

Hi Evan,
Haven't heard from you for a while. Are you still based in Ireland? If so we should try to meet up some time.

Gerry

 

[A4K]

G'day Gerry!

Still here mate, so that would be great if we can! As it is, we've only been to Dublin 3 times since we last saw you, and it was always in a rush trying to arrange passports or go for scans.
Hope to make a 'relaxed' visit some time and catch up with you again.

 

[Mark1956]

It's taken me a while to start a thread on this project and I hope that the Administrators will think it a suitable subject for this forum. As some of you will be aware, Hachette launched a weekly Lancaster partworks series, to build a 1;32 Scale Lancaster S-Sugar over 125 weekly parts, more than two years ago. I subscribed from the start but decided early on not to build it week-by-week but to wait until I saw what exactly what they were supplying, particularly the interior detailing - as they didn't ever publish a list of contents for the series, which would have been very useful. Every week was a surprise. As it happens, I think I made the right decision, as I can now plan the build more logically rather than following their plan, which tended to jump from section to section each week and I can already see some later corrected errors that occurred in early issues' instructions.

View attachment 434889

So, what did I get for my bucks? The basic internal skeleton for the Lancaster is laser-cut light plywood. This on my first trial runs is excellent, with hardly any warping on the parts. The laser-cutting is very precise and the parts remove cleanly from the frets (so far), when the thin retaining lugs are cut with a craft knife. Considering my subscription came through the post from the UK in plastic envelopes, I suffered very little transit damage. I think I replaced about 6 issues in 125 either for broken frets, which couldn't be easily repaired, or parts missing from particular issues. The stringers are supplied as plastic strips. In the initial issues they came straight but in later issues they were bent to fit into smaller packages which makes it more difficult to glue them over long runs like on the wings, where you need to glue and hold on each individual rib or former, until dry. The internal detail is a mixture of metal (zinc?) and plastic. The skin is supplied in aluminium sheets most of which, in the early issues, are pre-cut to panel shapes and drilled as necessary. Unfortunately, they seemed to get lazy towards the end, as for instance, the skins for the bomb bay doors came as a single 10" X 8" sheet, accompanied by a template with 96 individual panels marked for cutting! Pictured below, is a typical issue which included a fret (the bomb bay doors) and a bag of small metal detailing parts for the hinges and deploying arms - and a typical instructions spread from the magazine.

View attachment 434890

View attachment 434891

The standard of internal detailing is quite good with a fully detailed bomb-aimers's position, flight deck and navigator's position. One glaring omission was no radio equipment for the radio op's position! There are three reasonably detailed turrets, flare chutes, ammo tracks, stowed parachutes, tools, dinghies, 4 engines, wing fuel tanks etc. This is not an exhaustive list but you get the idea. Obviously, apart from scratch-building missing equipment, scratch-building extra panels and dials would enhance the authenticity of the interior. There are some contradictions also in the parts they supplied. For instance the H2S radar equipment is supplied for the cabin but they didn't supply the fuselage dome. In fact, the (basic) decals supplied are for S-Sugar at 100 missions, before it went for a major refit and had the H2S radar installed, along with the wider bladed props. My decision, at present, would be to dispense with the H2S radar and depict it before its refit.

Let me say that I have no previous experience working with wood or metal, so what I'm proposing to do on this project may be over ambitious. My thoughts at the moment are to depict the port side as fully skinned and painted. The starboard side would be largely cut-away, as in diagrams, showing the structural detail, engines and interiors as much as possible. Whether I have the skill to follow through on this, we will just have to wait and see. Surprisingly, there are very few blogs of this build that I have found, so far. There are, however, two on other forums that I have found very helpful, as regards a week-by week account; pointing out build errors, bear-traps and hints. There is one excellent build incorporated into one of these threads, short on interior detail but showing a beautiful result on the exterior. I would be happy to post links to these posts, if the administrators agree.

Here's how far I've got at the moment. I did a test build of the nose and the port wing when I first subscribed, just to see how it came together. Since then, I think it would be better to leave the stringers until the last, as the will impede access to the interior spaces. In one issue, the instructions recommend you cut away an already finished fuselage section to gain access for interior detail! I want to avoid that sort of madness, if possible.

I've now started on the front fuselage sections and will do all of rest of the sections to a basic level before I start detailing. I see this as being a Marathon rather than a sprint and, as I don't want to cease building conventional kits, will probably need to break from time to time - so this thread could be a long haul.

A shot of the sections built so far. The 1:72 Lanc is to give some idea of the size of this monster, in comparison. BTW, that's a mini cutting-pad under it!

View attachment 434892

The front three sections loosely joined together for fit with toothpicks and double sided tape and a close up showing the cabin joined to the main spar, incorporating the inner wing ribs.

View attachment 434893

View attachment 434894

Detail of the ribs and stringing on the port wing.

View attachment 434895

One of the 4 Merlins, partially finished (the black parts).

View attachment 434896

A metal prop, spinner and two bombs. The kit supplies nine bombs, I got 11 in total with replacement issues.

View attachment 434897

So that's it for now. I'll continue to post as the build progresses..

Sláinte,

Gerry

Thanks so much for this information. I bought the entire series with a view of building it after I finished the Victory. The time has come. To my horror, the instructions for the first issue has been destroyed by a water leak in my roof. The parts are OK. Does anyone have the instructions for Issue 1? Is it possible to get some pictures? Tanks in advance

 

[Zipper730]

Thanks so much for this information. I bought the entire series with a view of building it after I finished the Victory.

Victory? You mean like Barnes Wallace's bomber?

 

[Mark1956]

Victory? You mean like Barnes Wallace's bomber?

The Victory was the Hachette HMS Victory. I'm now starting the Hachette Lancaster bomber series.

 

[T Bolt]

Wonderful work Gerry

 

[Tony Hill]

Very nice!!!

 

[Night Fighter Nut]

Beautiful work.

 

[Red 3]

Well, color me excited! Just finished reading through. Fantastic work Gerry. I didn't think I'd get the chance to comment before it was finished. I have one thought and one suggestion.
First the thought: going back to the landing gear looking short (sorry) perhaps just maybe Hachette did get this right in one of their better moments. With a decent load on board ready for a raid the gear would be compressed, your comparison photos were on unloaded aircraft. Not picking, just thinking.
Now the suggestion: how about pickup 40 more models and build a factory diorama?
I've really enjoyed reading through and seeing you do some amazing work, beat the setbacks and get to this point. I'm now waiting in eager anticipation along with all the other folk following along.
Also cudo's to the gents that have been helping you along the way, a wonderful collaboration.
Thanks again Gerry for bringing us along with you.

 

[ian lanc]

your comparison photos were on unloaded aircraft. Not picking, just thinking.

Only the ram pistons got depressed, the rest does not move.

 

[Red 3]

Ian, surely that's exactly the function of the shiny bits on the oleo's, to absorb vertical pressures. Particularly with landing in mind but just like any other suspension system when it's heavily loaded it's going to compress even if it's just a little.
Thoroughly enjoyed your build also, nice job.

 

[ian lanc]

Ian, surely that's exactly the function of the shiny bits on the oleo's,to absorb vertical pressures.

There's the odd model maker think all the big silver parts compress, just saying only the bottom section go up & down.

Wonder how far Gerry is with the model now ? Hope he's not given up! I nearly did with that dodgy HKM thing of a Lancaster kit.

 

[Red 3]

There's the odd model maker think all the big silver parts compress, just saying only the bottom section go up & down.

Wonder how far Gerry is with the model now ? Hope he's not given up! I nearly did with that dodgy HKM thing of a Lancaster kit.

For sure I'm hoping Gerry hasn't had any kind of another setback, so much effort has been put into it so far.
What was dodgy about the HKM? I don't think I'll ever tackle the Lanc but I do love the Mossie.

 

[ian lanc]

What was dodgy about the HKM?

Everything mate.....Everything for me to write what's wrong it would be an eye opener, I posted on the HKM page with my model and the list of faults, album was allowed up but then it got deleted! At a good guess HKM thought the model was good but then spotted the fault list and boom they removed my post as it didn't look good for them.

 

[Red 3]

Everything mate.....Everything for me to write what's wrong it would be an eye opener, I posted on the HKM page with my model and the list of faults, album was allowed up but then it got deleted! At a good guess HKM thought the model was good but then spotted the fault list and boom they removed my post as it didn't look good for them.

That's interesting! I quite fancy the idea of the Mosquito somewhere down the line but I have to improve my skills considerably before then. I love your build and would love to do it also but my mantle piece probably isn't quite big enough!