Thanks Robert! I'm glad to see you stop in! Here's my latest update....
Well it's been a tough couple weeks, tougher than usual for me, but I've managed to get a good amount done in my hobby room. It has helped me a lot to keep my sanity and not blow my brains out!
I'll start with the work I've been doing on my aircraft. It's mostly been sanding and filling, sanding and filling, sanding and filling... and more sanding and filling... ad nauseum. This is the A-400 which has so many issues with the canopy fit that I've had to really glop on the Mr. Surfacer 500:
You can see where I had to also fill a lot of sink marks as well. I've been sanding that quite a bit lately and it's starting to look like an aircraft now.
I've also been working on the C-54, but since I'm still sanding and filling and sanding that, there's not much to show.
By the way, did I mention I was doing a lot of sanding and filling?
What I can show is the work I did on the An-124. First off, I wanted to test fit the landing gear bays in the openings of the fuselage but when I pulled them down from where I had them stored, I noticed that one side was missing some pieces off a couple of the landing gear. How they went missing is beyond me! See if you can find the two and a half missing pieces:
Oh well, they won't be seen once I get the gear bay doors on and this thing is sitting on the landing gear. Speaking of which, the gear bays fit into the openings quite well once I got them sanded and shaped a bit:
These fit so snug and tight that I won't even need to glue them in; they are staying in place very nicely:
I did notice the step in the fuselage from the resin coating on the fiberglass that was also evident on the top. So, I taped both sides of the step and proceeded to sand it smooth. That went faster than expected:
Even though you can't tell from that pic, I assure you that is now very smooth!
Later I hope to finish the gear doors and then figure out how to get the cockpit and the canopy attached. After that I'll be adding the wings and tail feathers to this bird and then it's paint time! Wow, that will be quite the thrill to get that far! I better stock up on paint.....
Okay, moving on to my armor, I've got a huge update there since I've been trying to focus on getting a lot of my vehicles finished. I'll start with the BTR-3K that I've been working on.
It has the funky turret that is already tough to comprehend. However with the difficult instructions, it was even more tough! I spent a couple hours just gluing in, and then tearing out and re-gluing these twelve parts four or five times before I figured out how each of them went together and fit in the turret up to this point:
I left the tweezers there to give you an idea of the sizes of everything I've been working on. After that assembly, I jumped ahead and assembled the rocket pods and launching station. There are six pieces in each assembly. The one in front is upside down:
Then I glued them to the main frame above:
Next I needed to add the photo-etch before I could go any further. So, the first parts went on okay as you can see here:
You can also see where I added the smoke dischargers to the base of the turret.
The second box was etched wrong so I folded it wrong. Naturally when I tried to reverse the folds, it all fell apart. This is my attempt to glue it back together:
That didn't actually work but I eventually got that whole thing to glue in it's place after another few hours of fighting it.
Then part 14 fell and disappeared as I was trying to test fit it. It's not a small piece but despite my best efforts and a couple flashlights; I could not find it anywhere. So, I resorted to sheet styrene. I pulled out some very thin stock and placed it under the photo-etch fret and cut out the shape of the part using it as a template:
Later I added that to the back of the turret. Mehinks it is a spent shell capture basket:
Okay, I'd had enough of that so it all got set aside to dry. I next did something simple.
On my 1/35th scale Patton, I took the time to re-spray a light coat of OD over the overly bright modulation I did before. I think it looks far better now; even though this pic doesn't show it too well:
I then airbrushed black over the tracks for this in preparation for adding them to the tank:
Now to show you the models that are all painted. I'll start first with the Churchill Mk II AVRE. I just finished up all the detail parts and got it fully to the paint stage:
Later I shot it with the closest equivalent to the greenish brown color these had... according to the instruction sheet:
Once that dried, I shot the model with a clear gloss in preparation for the decals:
I'm not sure what that hinky pattern is on the side of the turret; possibly a loit of sanding dust left behind. I'll see what I can do to fix that.
I also had done the same with the Mk IV AVRE, getting it fully to the paint stage first:
When I shot the Mk III I also shot this one:
Of course, I followed it with the gloss clearcoat when I do the previous tank:
Looks a little grainy. I'll be shooting another coat on that one later,
Moving on, I finally also completed the Japanese tank transporter in preparation for paint:
They made this model so you could also tip the cab to see the engine:
Next was the paint. I shot it with a deep green used by the JGSDF:
Later this got glossed as well:
While still on tank transporters, I moved on to my other American ones. I brought the HEMMTT Tractor all the way to the paint stage. The only thing missing are a couple detail parts that will go on last and the big honkin' cylinder thing that is supposed to go on the side. I know I built it; it's somewhere on the desk but I am not waiting to find it! I started the paint and whenever that thing shows up again, I'll add it to the model:
These were going to be three-tone NATO patterns so I started with the black first, adding the spots to where they are supposed to go. Later I'll add the Silly Putty over that, paint the brown, then more Silly Putty and finally the green.
Here's the HEMMTT tractor trailer with the first shots of black:
Later I did the same thing with the M-1070 tractor. Another friend who built this model suggested adding some wire or thread to the cable drums before closing them up, so I did, I used silver thread here and you can see the glue was still wet:
Here they are both completed and closed up:
Finally this tractor was completed enough to start shooting paint. Again, I'll have to wait till that axle assembly shows up and add it when it does, Until then, I'm not waiting; this truck is getting done:
And here it is with the first coat of black squiggles:
Okay, that's all for this big update. I'm hoping to get these all done by November... not that there's any shows happening to show them. Still, I have more models I want to start but want to clear these first.
Thanks again for looking in, comments are always welcome.
