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- #61
Crimea_River
Marshal
Thanks Glenn. Worked on the landing gear a bit but no pics at the moment.
**** DONE: GB-50 1:48 P-38F-15-LO - Zombie Build
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- Start date
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- Thread starter
- #62
Crimea_River
Marshal
A little bit to report again. I want to pose the unique boarding ladder deployed but Academy makes no provision for the needed slot in the rear fuselage even though the ladder is included in the kit. As a result, one needs to cut slots in the plastic. Here's the underside before:
And immediately after cutting a slot with my Dremel. I proceeded to do this against my better judgement and so should not have been surprised to see the slot become much wider than I wanted.
My better judgement took over and I went ahead and did the upper slot using a fine drill and razor saw but unfortunately took no close up pic. The lower slot has received some styrene card as filler to close the slot a bit and it now looks better.
The canopy has been masked and the middle sections added to close in the cockpit. In preparation for painting a base coat of grey primer and Alclad Dull Aluminum has been applied, the latter to areas that will see considerable wear:
Underside:
As you can see,, I did nothing to enhance the rather sparse wheel wells as I'm struggling with motivation on this build and know that if I start to detail the wells, I'll never finish. All I did was spray the wells Dull Aluminum and run a lot of black Tamiya panel wash inside.
Next up will be the start of finish painting. Thanks for looking.
And immediately after cutting a slot with my Dremel. I proceeded to do this against my better judgement and so should not have been surprised to see the slot become much wider than I wanted.
My better judgement took over and I went ahead and did the upper slot using a fine drill and razor saw but unfortunately took no close up pic. The lower slot has received some styrene card as filler to close the slot a bit and it now looks better.
The canopy has been masked and the middle sections added to close in the cockpit. In preparation for painting a base coat of grey primer and Alclad Dull Aluminum has been applied, the latter to areas that will see considerable wear:
Underside:
As you can see,, I did nothing to enhance the rather sparse wheel wells as I'm struggling with motivation on this build and know that if I start to detail the wells, I'll never finish. All I did was spray the wells Dull Aluminum and run a lot of black Tamiya panel wash inside.
Next up will be the start of finish painting. Thanks for looking.
fubar57
General
Looking good Andy. I too am struggling. Gardening, birding, bearing and just general lethargy are getting in the way
C'mon get stuck in.....
Don't let the B@stard win....
Don't let the B@stard win....
Lovely work so far Andy!
- Thread starter
- #67
Crimea_River
Marshal
Thanks gents. Managed to get another session in today to stay out of the smoke. Started with painting the wing tips and prop spinners red, followed by spraying a coat of interior green on the canopy frames.
Here you can see the upper ladder slot that I didn't show you yesterday.
Then, a coat of hairspray went onto the aluminum and then a topcoat of Tamiya XF-4 was sprayed to represent zinc chromate.
I then cracked open my Tamiya XF-54 and sprayed a rough coat of what I will make a very faded Neutral Grey on the undersides. There's also a closeup of the ladder slot that I fixed.
A small test of some chipping as then done on one of the nacelles. After wetting, a toothpick was used to scratch away the top coat to reveal the ZC at the spinner interface and a little more scrubbing took us through to the aluminum base. The rest of this chipping will be tackled later after more paint is splashed on.
Thanks again for your interest.
Here you can see the upper ladder slot that I didn't show you yesterday.
Then, a coat of hairspray went onto the aluminum and then a topcoat of Tamiya XF-4 was sprayed to represent zinc chromate.
I then cracked open my Tamiya XF-54 and sprayed a rough coat of what I will make a very faded Neutral Grey on the undersides. There's also a closeup of the ladder slot that I fixed.
A small test of some chipping as then done on one of the nacelles. After wetting, a toothpick was used to scratch away the top coat to reveal the ZC at the spinner interface and a little more scrubbing took us through to the aluminum base. The rest of this chipping will be tackled later after more paint is splashed on.
Thanks again for your interest.
N4521U
Colonel
Great work!
fubar57
General
Chipping turned out well
Good progress Andy..
- Thread starter
- #71
Crimea_River
Marshal
Thanks Geo. It was just a trial for this next series of steps. I read in lots of places that P-38s were shipped with doped tape over the seams and that this left very distinctive patterns on the seams., especially where the overlapped dope prevented the Olive Drab from fading. Lots of pics of this pattern can be found on the net and it got me thinking, of course after I did all of the following, that I thought that the P-38s of the 1st FG were flown over to England via Greenland/Iceland and so, did they have this tape pattern? In any event, before I had this epiphany, I went ahead and replicated it.
The first step was to paint the upper faded OD colour and for this I used Tamiya XF-49 Khaki lightened with a bit of XF-57 Buff. I sprayed this concoction all over the upper surfaces and then used XF-49 straight to create the soft demarcations with the Neutral Grey on the sides of the fuselage , booms, and nacelles and filled that colour in up to the upper surfaces and blended it. I then cut strips of tape and applied them to the seams.
The next step was to apply a very thin line of thinned XF-62 Olive Drab along the tape lines and at random patches and streaks along the uppers. I also applied it to the fairings around the cockpit as this area appears to have seen fresh paint in my reference pics. I then mixed up a batch of thinned, straight Buff and did the random patch and streak thing again. The pic below was taken when that was done and before the tape was removed.
This is what the model looked like with the tape removed
Then it was on to chipping the uppers. The hairpsray worked well as, with a little bit of water and a stiff brush and toothpick, I was able to easily remove the upper colours down to the Alclad Aluminum. Most of the Chromate Yellow also came off but some did stay. This was just after starting:
And after more of the same. I think I'll stop at this point and do some more on the bottom and some small areas on the booms.
This was a fun session and I'm liking how it's turning out so far. After a bit more chipping, I'll apply a gloss coat and add the decals. We'll then get some washes and a further salt weathering to really make this bird look weary. Thanks again for looking in.
The first step was to paint the upper faded OD colour and for this I used Tamiya XF-49 Khaki lightened with a bit of XF-57 Buff. I sprayed this concoction all over the upper surfaces and then used XF-49 straight to create the soft demarcations with the Neutral Grey on the sides of the fuselage , booms, and nacelles and filled that colour in up to the upper surfaces and blended it. I then cut strips of tape and applied them to the seams.
The next step was to apply a very thin line of thinned XF-62 Olive Drab along the tape lines and at random patches and streaks along the uppers. I also applied it to the fairings around the cockpit as this area appears to have seen fresh paint in my reference pics. I then mixed up a batch of thinned, straight Buff and did the random patch and streak thing again. The pic below was taken when that was done and before the tape was removed.
This is what the model looked like with the tape removed
Then it was on to chipping the uppers. The hairpsray worked well as, with a little bit of water and a stiff brush and toothpick, I was able to easily remove the upper colours down to the Alclad Aluminum. Most of the Chromate Yellow also came off but some did stay. This was just after starting:
And after more of the same. I think I'll stop at this point and do some more on the bottom and some small areas on the booms.
This was a fun session and I'm liking how it's turning out so far. After a bit more chipping, I'll apply a gloss coat and add the decals. We'll then get some washes and a further salt weathering to really make this bird look weary. Thanks again for looking in.
fubar57
General
Outstanding my friend
wow, really great effect already Andy
Snautzer01
Honourably banned
- 42,907
- Mar 26, 2007
Very nice.
le_steph40
Chief Master Sergeant
With all above Andy !!! 
- Thread starter
- #77
Crimea_River
Marshal
Thanks all. Gloss coated now on the uppers so waiting for that to cure.
- Thread starter
- #78
Crimea_River
Marshal
While waiting for the gloss coat to cure I continue to scratch my head about the markings of this aircraft as depicted by Eduard and various decal manufacturers.
First off, I am now in doubt about the alleged taping of the seams mentioned and used in many P-38 builds. I understand this was to protect the aircraft during shipping. However all of the 1st FG early P-38s were transferred by air, first to England via Greenland and then to Algeria. I need to find examples of other 1st FG aircraft displaying this odd phenomenon.
Secondly, the famous mission tally on HV-C is accompanied by the red outlined star and bar in all of the models I've seen but I understand that this marking was only temporary and was quickly replaced by the blue outline in August 1942. The reference pic showing the large tally is captioned to have been taken in Italy where the 27th was based as of January 1944 according to Wiki so how likely would it have been that the a/c still carried the red outlines?
Back to the books.
First off, I am now in doubt about the alleged taping of the seams mentioned and used in many P-38 builds. I understand this was to protect the aircraft during shipping. However all of the 1st FG early P-38s were transferred by air, first to England via Greenland and then to Algeria. I need to find examples of other 1st FG aircraft displaying this odd phenomenon.
Secondly, the famous mission tally on HV-C is accompanied by the red outlined star and bar in all of the models I've seen but I understand that this marking was only temporary and was quickly replaced by the blue outline in August 1942. The reference pic showing the large tally is captioned to have been taken in Italy where the 27th was based as of January 1944 according to Wiki so how likely would it have been that the a/c still carried the red outlines?
Back to the books.
fubar57
General
Still looking for motivation Andy so I have plenty of book time available
T Bolt
Colonel
Great weathering Andy
