**** DONE: 1/48 Hawk H-81-A-2, AVG - Aircraft in Foreign Service WWII

[meatloaf109]

I think I know what happened to yours Paul. In test fitting I noticed that if I just glued the wing half's together as is the fuselage would be too tight for the opening for it between the upper wing halves so I when I glued them I moved them outward taking up as much play in the alignment tabs as there was. It made the bulges of the landing gear fairings not line up perfectly, and a slight step in the joint at the wingtip, but nothing a bit of CA filler and careful filing didn't solve. The end result was a near perfect fit at the wing roots.

Ah! I was not quick enough to get that in test fitting. As a result, I sanded away too much wing, and now will have to replace with small shims!
Oops!

 

[N4521U]

The wing fit on mine is sloppy and will have to use pieces of styrene to build up wing part to meet the fusey.

 

[T Bolt]

Have you tried spreading the fuselage with a piece of sprue? That sometimes works

 

[N4521U]

I'll investugate.

 

[T Bolt]

I haven't posted progress here lately but I've been working on it a little at a time getting ready for paint and here is the work of the last week.

1) The .50s in the nose. Left one is not cleaned up yet and right and is cleaned up, slightly reshaped and the barrel drilled out.

2) The guns installed.

3) There is an intake for cockpit ventilation that was missing on the right side wing root so I drilled it in. Also the joint between the upper wing and fuselage did not match the real panel line so it was filled and re-scribed so it now falls on the outside of the air intake.

4&5) The kit had fixed trim tabs like the one at the blue arrow molded on both ailerons, but the trim tab on the left aileron was a movable one positioned a little further outboard so I filed off the fixed one and scribed a movable one (red arrow).

6) The tail joint had a pretty large gap so it was filled with CA, filed and sanded.

7) All together and ready for paint.

 

[Crimea_River]

Very sharp Glenn. Another winner in the making!

 

[Wurger]

Looking good. But these MG barrels could be replaced by hypodermic needles of correct diameter. It would cause a better appearance of them.

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Looking sharp Glenn and I'll be putting some pieces of tube just inside the hole for the barrels on my H75A nose.

 

[Wayne Little]

some good progress Glenn...

 

[dneid]

Looking very nice, Glenn

 

[T Bolt]

Thanks guys.
After much thought I decided to leave the nose guns as-is and went on with the painting. I sprayed the bottom Model Master Camouflage Grey yesterday afternoon, than masked it off and sprayed the dark earth late last night. I neglected to take pictures along the way but will take one tonight and post it.

 

[T Bolt]

Picture as promised.
It doesn't show in this picture but there are some areas that look a little thin so as soon as the space heater warms up the back porch(it's 49F out there right now and a windy 16F outside) I'm going to spray on another thin coat of the Dark Earth. Don't know if I'll get to any of the masking for the green tonight.

 

[Wurger]

Looking good though.

 

[Crimea_River]

Sure is.

 

[woody]

Nice work Glenn.

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Very nice Glenn.

 

[N4521U]

Garsk that looks nice Glenn.

 

[Gnomey]

Looks good so far Glenn!

 

[Lucky13]

Nice work young man!

 

[Wayne Little]

Nice and smooth Glenn..