1/72 AP-2H TRIM Neptune

[Beekster]

No, gentlemen and ladies (I know there are a few here...), your eyes do not deceive you.  Mr. Sherman is starting a thread on an airplane.  As you know, inspiration has been lacking of late for working on my armor projects.  I've decided to return to my roots in aircraft for a while.  And as you might expect from me, I don't start with anything easy.  This is the bird:

That's the back cover of the old Squadron/Signal P2 Neptune in Action book.  Napalm Nellie was one of four aircraft converted for project TRIM, Trails & Roads Interdiction Multisensor.  No two were exactly alike.  They had early Low-Light Level TV and infrared sensors under the nose, a twin 20mm stinger in the tail, possibly 40mm grenade launchers in the fuselage (sources are unclear), and wing stations for bombs (usually napalm) and a pair of 7.62mm minigun pods angled down 30 degrees on pylons.  This initially got me interested:
 

The February 1987 issue of FineScale modeler magazine.  In the spring of 1988 I visited the Pima Air Museum where the surviving aircraft is displayed, and shot some photos.  Not nearly enough, as it turned out, but these days the internet comes to the rescule.  I bought the Hasegawa kit, the Superscale Decal sheet, and a resin conversion from In-Country Hobbies in Mesa, AZ.  More recently, I've picked up a metal landing gear set.



The In-Country set was pretty crude, even by 1980s standards.  Here's the bits laid out.  In the foreground, you see the tail stinger, belly panel, and belly sensor pod.  The stinger was molded solid; just this week I hogged it out with the Dremel.  The belly plug is undersized, and the little vent things are actually on the wrong side.  The sensor pod isn't too awful, but casting quality is poor.


I got as far as removing the MAD boom at the tail, an ECM blister under the tail, and the belly radar bulge, then ground to a halt.  At the time, I had only a hot knife for surgery; no razor saws in the arsenal.  To be blunt, my skill set and tool kit was woefully inadequate for a project like this.  I've pulled it out and looked at it numerous times over the years, but this time I decided to pile in on it.  Skills and tools are far in advance of what I could do 35 years ago.  So here's the fuselage today:

Everything in white has been added this week.  The belly area is filled in with .100"x.250" stock, trimmed with thinner sheet.  This was necessary for structural strength.  This kit has too few alignment pins as it is.  Not seen is a new floor where the rear square windows are; seats and stuff will follow later.  Also not seen are strips of .010"x.156" strip to provide additional alignment & glue surfaces to help fortify the whole structure.

I started to work on the belly bit, but quickly became disenchanted with the ancient resin parts.  What really sealed the decision to rebuild from scratch was this:



These internet images show a more complex contour to the belly plug, and resulting shape change to the sensor pod.  Here are mine in process, with the originals for comparison:




And finally (for today), the kit instrument panel was missing a big recess in the center and had fictitious raised details.  The center console also had fictitious details, and was much too short as well.  There were no side consoles at all.  This is where things are at now, with a bit more detail to add yet (to say nothing of detailing the seats).  Control yokes have been swiped from a C130 parts kit that I had stuffed away in the attic.




A trip to Michael's is in order to find some small wooden or plastic beads; I need one about 11-12mm in diameter to make the bulb on the sensor pod.  The regular hobby shop will provide brass for the jet exhaust flame dampeners which I will build according to the old FSM article.

[JCON]

Fun to see a different subject my friend!!!

[JED]

Enjoying this

[Beekster]

This essential piece of reference arrived yesterday:

Very useful if any of the Vietnam-era gunships are on your project list. There are a few pages on the AP-2H and good photos for establishing the wrap-around camo pattern. Unfortunately, like everywhere else that this aircraft is documented the images are almost all taken Stateside before or after service, when a lot of the goodies are missing. But the book is still helpful.

I've been working on adding some detail to the aft compartment. It isn't perfect, but it will look good enough through the big windows. I didn't feel right leaving the area totally vacant.




Similar work is ongoing for the radio compartment behind the cockpit, though that will be less detailed since the windows there are much smaller and the view from the cockpit canopy is also restricted.

Reading through In-Country's instructions and looking at reference images, it became clear that the aircraft had a long, thin SLAR antenna on each side of the aft fuselage. My bag of resin had only one. Did I lose the other one ages ago? Maybe, but more likely it was never in the bag in the first place. The resin part is crude and uneven in shape, so I used it as a pattern to make two new parts out of .250" half-round styrene stock.



And the radar pod under the fuselage is taking shape nicely. There's more fettling to do here as well as adding details, but I like how it is (literally) shaping up compared to the resin blob. The resin part, among other shortcomings, had too much curvature to the sides so that the top surface is too narrow. I've ground away at the rear under surface of the new part to match the belly plug. The fit isn't perfect, especially where the plug contour dips below the nominal surface level, but I will continue to finesse that. The radar dome is a plastic bead from a pack of various sizes bought at Micheal's for $4.99.

[JCON]

That should do nicely...

[Beekster]

Work is also progressing with the chin fairing for the LLLTV and FLIR sensors. I've beefed up the TV port frame with strip stock and drilled a hole for the camera lens. A rectangular piece of clear sheet will cover everything in the end. You can see that the fit up front is pretty poor, and the shape of the fairing isn't quite right...the sides have a visible undercut and they should be pretty much vertical. Fine, that's a job for epoxy putty once the fuselage halves are glued together.

But things are uglier at the back. Notice that the whole fairing is too long, intruding considerably into the nose landing gear well.


That's going to take a lot of grinding to shorten the fairing, and to reshape it as a result. The angle of the thing will have to become steeper as it goes back from the high point where the sensors are to the end point, which should taper to a point right in front of the gear bay. Oh, joy...

Actually, this probably won't be all that bad.  Cutting off the back of the chin housing was quick, and I even got the length just about right.  Sanding it down to a fine edge was also pretty straightforward.  Here's where good reference material comes in.  It appears that the shape of the housing wasn't straight across the back; rather the outer corners did extend a bit beyond the forward edge of the gear bay.  I've superglued a piece of .080"x.080" stock across the back, and when that's cured I will fill in the bottom of the fairing with epoxy putty.  When that's dry, I can sand to shape and most of what I sand away will be plastic or epoxy, which doesn't generate the noxious smell that resin dust does.  I do try to keep that to a minimum by working under running water as much as possible, but it still smells.

[Robbo]

This looks interesting

[Beekster]

Slow progress on the major structural bits. This is as good as it gets for the chin fairing for now; it will be finessed when in place to make a smooth join. The little hole on both sides is a reference point; they are for the pitot tubes and must be kept clear of the fairing.


The fuselage plug and radar pod are coming along nicely. There's obviously some fettling still to do, and a couple of little bits to add to the radar pod. Also, that slot is a little too far forward so it will be back to the Dremel with a cutting wheel to grind things out to the rear, followed by file work and fresh material at the forward end.




And the seats have been dressed up a little with seat cushions and arm rests. Simple stuff that makes the crude old Hasegawa parts look a lot better.

I





I'm still dithering with what to do with the radio compartment. My tendency is to make it nice, but the windows are quite small so not much will be seen (unlike the aft fuselage area). More on that when I get something put together.

[Beekster]

Got a mold made for casting copies of the SUU-11 minigun pod. The first two pours look good; I'll cast a couple more and use the best two for the model. As seen here, the castings are raw...not cut from the pour sprue and no cleanup done. A two-piece mold makes getting good examples of a part like this pretty easy.


And basic construction on the interior is done. I sprayed the Dark Gull Gray last night. As you can see, I went a little overboard on detailing the radio compartment, given the limited sight lines. But with a flashlight, some of this will be visible.







Interior bits will rest a day or to for the gray to cure and then I'll start in on detail painting. Eventually some gloss and a few decal bits for the side & center consoles, followed by the control yokes and a final flat coat.

[JCON]

Looks really good!!!

[JED]

They say if it was easy everybody would do it, rather you than me!!

[Beekster]

Aug 14, 2023 4:36:58 GMT -6 JED said:

They say if it was easy everybody would do it, rather you than me!!

Honestly, Jed, this one has surprised me with its relative ease so far.  The things that forced me to abandon the project decades ago have proven to be quite straightforward to deal with now.  More years of experience; better tools...that's all.  There will be challenges ahead for sure...dealing with the tiny little vacuform bubble canopy for the aft gun position is going to be difficult; I've never liked vacuform parts...too bendy.  And it's clear that the main landing gear will have to be installed when I build the fairings under the wing that house them, rather than just inserting the gear afterwards.  Which in turn will mean that I have to have the fuselage closed up and the wings ready to snap in place long enough to ensure that the gear sits flat on the ground.  Sequencing of operations has to be carefully considered.

[rustybaer]

Scratch building is scratch building, no matter what the subject is. Cool.

[Beekster]

Slow progress this week; we've had four days over a hundred degrees and the house A/C can't quite keep the war room comfortable when that happens, since it's the furthest room from the thermostat. But I've installed a couple of vent panels in the fuselage, among the few parts of the In-Country set that are actually worth using.




The position for these was pretty easy to establish, but not so much for some of the other bits. The instructions are vague and the illustrations are beyond crude. The modeler is repeatedly told to "see photographs". Yeah. Easier said than done, since half the references listed on the instructions are decades out of print and the other half (the books) much better for paint schemes than detail shots to place various objects on the airplane. My own few images and the internet will have to guide me here, so it will be slow going. It also appears that some of the fiddly bits provided are rather undersized, so those will have to be fabricated from styrene stock.

On the other hand, the cockpit is now complete and ready to be installed, once the fuselage parts are ready to be put together. I used cut up scraps of instrument panel decals from the spares bin to dress things up a little. It should show well under the canopy.

[JED]

Its looking pretty good in my opinion and only really appreciated when you understand the time and work that go's into achieving such results

[Beekster]

Glad you like it, Jed. The cockpit enhancements weren't as time-consuming as it looks, really. Mostly basic work with styrene strip stock of various dimensions, and with the right tools from NorthWest Short Line (a Chopper II and True Sander) making stuff like this is pretty straightforward. If you haven't tackled anything like this, buy the tools and get started. Competence and confidence come pretty quickly.

[JCON]

Nice work going on here sir!!!

[DuckyShot]

You're brave. I've still got a B-24 on my desk and its been there for 2 years.

[Beekster]

Still plugging away. I've got the SLAR fairings on, which required a fair dose of superglue to fill in some gaps followed by a quick brush coat of gray to find flaws and some putty work to finish filling the seams. The bottom of the fairings is flat; the sides of the fuselage are compound curves...hence the need to fill gaps. They look pretty good, though.

I've continued to fuss with shaping the radar pod and the belly fairing. The latter now has the patch of vents added from .030" quarter round styrene stock. When the fuselage is together and the plug installed, I will tack in the radar pod with liquid glue and fill in gaps with epoxy putty.

I have also built the muffler/flame arrester cans for the jet pods. I used the patterns in the FSM article for these, made of brass tube and styrene angle & rod stock. The rods will be trimmed up a bit and the inside surfaces sanded lightly to ensure a good fit to the jet pods. The pictures show the resin parts from the conversion; undersized and cast solid.




And finally, the engines are painted and mounted inside the cowlings. They have decent detail, but there's precious little to be seen in there even now, and less when the props are installed. I'm hunting for a set of the long-gone Aeroclub metal prop set for the Neptune. I've reached out to Joe's Models who try to scour the world for Aeroclub stuff and buy it up. No joy on the P-109 Neptune set right now, but he's made a note of it. You never know when a collection of stuff might turn up, and that's what he buys up.

[JCON]

Looking good!!!