**** DONE: GB-36 1/48 Macchi C.202 Folgore - Axis Manufactured Aircraft of WWII

[Airframes]

great stuff Kirby, and glad you fixed the warping problems. That wheel bay loos the bog's dollocks !!

 

[Wayne Little]

Sweet work man...

 

[fubar57]

Great looking under innards Kirby

 

[Gnomey]

Lovely work so far!

 

[turbo]

Thanks guys! Work on the airframe continues - the radiator and oil cooler were installed after adding various PE struts to the insides of the housings, painting, and giving them an oil wash.

I also noticed this kit has the dreaded moulded navigation lights.

I couldn't let this go so cut the moulded lights out with my Tamiya PE saw. To fashion the navigation lights I cut two lengths of clear sprue and drilled small 0.5mm holes into them. The holes were filled with clear red and green paint for the port and starboard lights, respectively, and then the outside of the pieces of sprue painted with aluminium metalizer. Once dry, the pieces of sprue were glued into position using Tamiya Extra Thin.

Once dry, excess sprue was cut off using the PE saw.

You can now see the hole that was filled with clear red, representing the red light bulb. The excess sprue was sanded to shape with progressively finer grades of sandpaper and finally given a coat of Pledge.

Thanks for stopping by guys. Few odds and ends to add and we'll be ready for paint at last...

 

[Wurger]

 

[Crimea_River]

Good work there Kirby. Looking at the back of the radiator housing, I think I would have thinned down those edges.

 

[turbo]

Hmm, looking at reference pictures I think you're right Andy. A bit hard to get at now so I'm going to have to live with it!

 

[Airframes]

Great stuff Kirby. I'm rather surprised that the Tamiya extra thin gave enough bond to the clear sprue to allow sanding to shape - I normally just use CA, to make sure !
I guess that, when finished, this could be described as a metal model with some plastic parts !!!

 

[turbo]

I guess that, when finished, this could be described as a metal model with some plastic parts !!!

You're telling me Terry! I'm going to do a proper count for my final post but between the kit-supplied parts and the undercarriage bay upgrade set this model has around 100 PE parts and more than a dozen resin parts. I'm sick of the sight of PE!!

 

[fubar57]

Nice job on the light Kirby. Like Terry, I thought CA was the way to go but if it works, it works. Still don't have the cojones to attempt this yet

 

[turbo]

Thanks guys. I went with TET rather than CA to weld the part in a bit and not leave any gaps. Also fused the aluminium paint to the wing. I must admit one of them did break off once but that was operator error as I got too exuberant with the sanding. Take it nice and easy and no problems at all with sawing and sanding.

 

[Airframes]

I agree. As shown in my 'Gustav' build, I did a similar thing. The clear sprue was filed and sanded flat, then fixed to the cut-out 'notch' on the wing tip with CA. The end was then cut at an angle approximating that of the curve of the lens, using a fine razor saw, and then filed and sanded to final shape, then given a polish with 'T-Cut' car body colour restorer
It sounds daunting at first Geo, but it's a lot easier than it looks, as the clear sprue sands quite easily, and doesn't actually take that long. As Kirby mentioned, just take it nice and easy, and there shouldn't be any problems.

 

[Crimea_River]

And it's always good to remember to do this before you finish paint the model, unlike yours truly.

 

[JKim]

Nice work on the Folgore, Kirby! Always a toss-up for me to just paint those wing lights or go through the trouble of shimming a piece of clear plastic.

 

[Gnomey]

Good work so far!

 

[Wayne Little]

Done good man...!

 

[turbo]

Thanks fellas! Short update, installed the gun sight and the resin supercharger intake. The kit gun sight was the usual clear part affair with an ugly seam running down the middle of a thick reflector screen. But, surprise, surprise, Eduard have provided tiny PE parts so the kit reflector screen was sawn off with my PE saw and replaced with the PE parts and a piece of acetate sheet for the reflector screen. This was more tiny, fiddly, PE work and I must admit I'm getting a bit over it and glad I'm getting to the end of the construction phase of this project, although there is still more to go on the landing gear, of course!

I've just noticed on this close up there's a bit of a step left on the tail of the radiator fairing underneath - will attend to that with a sanding stick. Eduard provides 2 resin options for the supercharger intake, the early version and the later sand filter version. This early Serie Folgore was fitted with the early version.

I punched out and fashioned a butterfly valve from styrene strip but on close up it still looks a bit thick so i might remove it and sand it thinner. What do you think?

Thanks for checking in guys.

 

[Wurger]

 

[JKim]

Good work on the gun sight. I'd rather the manufacturer mold the gun sight in regular plastic without the glass elements just to simplify things. The butterfly valve looks ok to me. Maybe just a tad thinner?