Scratch build Boeing F4B-4

[Wurger]

 

[Gnomey]

Lovely work so far!

 

[Skyediamonds]

Lovely work so far!

Thank you for watching.

 

[Skyediamonds]

The gun troughs were next. I borrowed the idea of pre-rolling the glossy cardstock from watching videos of papercraft models prior to bending & squeezing into the cutouts.

My upmost respect to those guys who do papercrafting. The level of detail & the workmanship on such tiny objects needs to be seen to believe.

I try to borrow ideas from a wide variety of sources such as plastic modeling, r/c scale planes, real aircraft restoration & of course papercraft.

I'm always open to ideas & suggestions. So if anyone has some ideas on flat wire rigging, please feel free to chime in.

 

[Skyediamonds]

The gun troughs were given a once over with filler compound to smooth out some of the cracks & gaps. Then a couple of shots of grey primer to help harden the glossy paper cardstock as well as preparing the surfaces for paint.

In the first picture, you can see some of the white filler along the edges of the trough to help smooth out the surfaces.

Since I don't have a spray gun & only use rattle cans for spray paint, trying to get enough spray into the narrow troughs without over spraying the outside surfaces was a challenge.

 

[Skyediamonds]

One of the ( many ) reference pictures shows the center section underside of the top wing with either a rear view mirror or compass. I chose a compass. It was an arbitrary choice or just a mental flip of the coin.

 

[Wurger]

Nicely done !

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Agree with Wojtek.

 

[special ed]

As you learn other's techniques, you pass them to us. Keep it going.

 

[Gnomey]

Nicely done so far!

 

[Skyediamonds]

As you learn other's techniques, you pass them to us. Keep it going.

Thank you. I've always felt that sharing one's experiences will benefit us all.

 

[Skyediamonds]

Nicely done so far!

Thank you, sir.

 

[Skyediamonds]

Good evening everyone.

Made lots of progress & finally beginning to see the light at the end of a very long tunnel.

As this photo shows, even after lots of templates were cut out & hours devoted to making the cockpit enclosure looking decent, I wasn't too happy with the results. If you zoom up on this picture, you can see I've made several attempts to putty up the enclosure & it really didn't turn out all that great.

So, I decided to do something about it….

 

[Skyediamonds]

I sanded the old enclosure down to the point where it split open & thereby relieved the stress that was imposed upon the surrounding cardstock.

From there, I used a clear piece of .015" (0.4mm) thick clear plastic sheet & laid it over the existing enclosure. I chose clear plastic for the reasons of being able to see through the plastic & trace the outline of the cockpit enclosure.

Then it was just a matter of gluing on the clear plastic over the enclosure, including the cardstock.

 

[Skyediamonds]

As you can see, the results were very good. Not perfect, but much better than it was before. With the plastic laminated over the cardstock, the two added additional strength.

You can see also from the periphery that I've done much work. So I shall continue posting those results as well.

 

[Skyediamonds]

Next, it was time to add the lower wing root fillet at the fuselage junction. But first, I felt it would be a good idea to practice on my faux fuselage.

I used a product called Milliput. It comes in two separate parts when worked together, forms a clay-like substance that hardens after 3-4 hours. It can be sanded, cut & carved. I'm sure many of our fellow modelers will relate to this stuff.

After it dried (& hardened) I added some Spackling Compound (a dry wall filler) to help smooth out the finish. I comes out pink colored, but turns white when dry.

After the cure of Spackling, I sanded the results & determined this would work on the model.

Better to find out on something expendable than to ruin the model…

 

[Skyediamonds]

I added wax paper to the lower wing & taped it down using blue masking tape. Nothing special about this tape. Just happens to be blue colored..

 

[Skyediamonds]

The lower wing / taped wax paper were then attached to the fuselage.

I used Milliput & worked it into a roll. Added the roll into the fuselage/ lower wing junction & worked it in as far as I dared without breaking anything as I was conscious of the film covering on the wing.

 

[Skyediamonds]

This time, I added a little water & diluted the compound so it was the consistency of melted ice cream. Soft, but not runny. This gave me the opportunity of using a fine bristled paint brush to apply it over the hardened Milliput. By using this brush-on method, the application process was much more smooth than even if were to use my fingers.

Plus, I could see the results as I was applying the compound. This gives me a chance to make any corrections as I went along.

 

[Skyediamonds]

After the Spackling filler was dried, I sanded it as smooth as possible starting with a # 320 sandpaper & ended with a # 400 dry. Even though the #400 sandpaper is the wet-n-dry type, I never use water or any moisture because the Spackling filler is extremely water soluble.

I then masked off & sprayed the area with a gray colored primer coat.

After the primer was dried, I purposely left the masking tape in place as I sanded it smooth again using a # 400 & # 600 wet-n-dry sandpaper for that extra smooth finish. The masking tape helps to protect the surrounding finish.

Then the tape was peeled off.