Mark Deliduka

Brilliant work! Very lifelike!

Good idea Dave! I have a ton of those; I think I could spare one. ;) :D

Thanks Gil! Using that cement was tricky, be constantly aware of what's happening if you try it. Thanks Ed! I also love the look of Hercs in SEA camo; that's why I had to build this plane, warts and all. As far as I know, that pattern was standard for all MAC birds serving in SEA. I remember looking at them sitting on the tarmac at Hurlburt Field and they all looked pretty much the same. Thanks for the compliment on the prop repair. I don't have a casting kit or resin to cast anything, so this was the only way to go for me. I don't like working in resin too much anyway, but I still find myself building more and more resin conversion sets. Thanks again for the great comments guys! They really keep me motivated to keep going.

LOL! Yeah, I hear you! Fortunately, I am able to do this in parts. Various assemblies will be painted and decaled separately and the whole thing put together. Still, you're right. I'm gonna have to look into that 55 gallon drum of Future, after getting my 55 gallon drum of Panzer dark grey.

Here are three more tanks finished just this week. This brings my count up to 609 armor models finished. These are all the Dragon models in 1/72 scale. The Ha Go: The Ha Go North China version: And the Chi Ha early version: Here they are all together: There they are. Comments are welcome, thanks all for looking in.

Just a quick post. This is my MPC 1/72 scale C-130A Hercules transport. The decals suck on this; they were as thick as vacuform and I used Tamiya Extra Thin cement to get them to lay down. But the props look good; I can't tell which is the one I had to fix. Here it is: It's no award winner, but I'm happy that I have it done. I also finished three Japanese tanks. You can see them in the Armor Forums. Thanks for looking in.

Thanks Dave! Yeah, you'd be amazed at how much is in this kit! Yeah, she's huge, but this was a massive gun. I don't think it does fit regular HO tracks; unless they have a wide gauge HO/OO track. That might fit this, but I doubt it. And now for another small update here from Monday's Hobby Day. First off, I was told that the bus seats were the wrong color and should have been a wooden color. Easy fix: Then I moved on. I decided to brave the A-Stoff again, and this time I was able to get it assembled without any more bloodshed. I did stick my fingers to this about 12 times though with the extra thin CA glue. The good news: IT'S DONE!! Time to put paint on her: I may try and go back to fill in some of those gaps in the support beams later before I paint this. It all depends on how soon I wish to deal with CA again..... Moving right along. I decided to start what I thought would be some 'easy' models, but they were from ACE so they weren't as easy as I was hoping for. Still, I love building ACE kits because they have such great subjects and really look good when done. This one is a German heavy artillery piece whose designation escapes me right now.... I have a bunch more detail parts to add to that, but decided to let it dry a bit before I put them on. Meanwhile, I started another ACE gun; this one a Pak 43 88mm AT gun. I got as far as the barrel before bigger things started calling me: And they don't get no bigger than Dora here. I attached all the photo-etch screens to the connecting trucks (?) like this: I also took some time to sand the wheel trucks and try to remove the seams on the sides. It worked somewhat, but a bit of Mr. Surfacer 500 was needed. You can see it applied to the sides of the wheel trucks in these next pics. I had added some additional parts to the wheel trucks as well. Here they are, all four connector trucks done and sitting dry-fit on the wheel trucks: What the hey, I couldn't resist pulling out the big gun supports and dry fitting them to these trucks to check it out again. The braces I put underneath the connector trucks really made a big difference! Well that's about it for now. After all it is a small update. Remember, comments are welcome and thanks all for looking in.

Okay people! I have a nice looooong update here for you all. It's been a couple weeks and I've had some great Hobby Days to get things done. I apologize in advance for some of these pics. They were taken with my camera phone and it isn't always easy for me to get clear shots. Anyway, on with the Factory Tour. First off, I'll update you on my C-130A Hercules. As I'd mentioned before; I'd broken three propeller blades and lost one. Well, time to modify one from an old C-130 kit that was unbuildable due to warped parts. Here is the comparison of the two blades. One is obviously bigger and wider: So, I placed one on top of the other and marked the dimensions of the smaller one on the bigger one: Next I carved away the excess to get the basic shape of the blade: Next I sanded the blade so that it had the same contours and thickness of the original blade. This is the result: You can see how well the new blade matches the others here: After that, I repaired the other two broken blades, and then added the broken landing gear and one of the broken off landing gear doors. Here it is before I touched up all the paint and other details to finish it off: Moving right along, I was able to finish the sanding and filling for the F-18 Hornet. Looks good now. I also added the canopy to the cockpit as well: That Hornet is now ready for the canopy to be masked and for it to be painted. While doing all that, I finally got all the support beams on the mooring tower of my R-100 airship model. I painted the small tower windows and now this tower is finished. It just needs to be fastened to a base so it doesn't topple over when I put the R-100 on it: By the way, all the open windows in the base of the tower were 'glassed' in with Testor's clear parts cement and window maker. Now all I have to do is find the three little engine pods for the airship, get the tiny propellers on them, and then decal the thing and it'll be done. Moving on to armor, I did all this work at St. Crispin's Hobby Day Monday. First thing I did was paint Rommel's Car with a basecoat of grey: Later on, after that had dried for awhile; I finished detail painting the car and added the wheels to see if they'd all sit right: Looks good to me so far. I did notice that the front fender was put on wrong. I'll have to fix that. Next I made some progress on my bus. I got the interior built up and cemented to the chassis: I then decided to assemble the main body of the bus: The top of that bus is not attached. I'll cement that together later when I get the windows inside. Here's a dry-fit of the body on the chassis to see how this is going to look: That is so cool! I love this little model! Fast forward to Friday when I got to go in and help set up the Hall for the Saturday Hobby Day the night before. I had brought some things to work on that Saturday but after having gotten everything set up; I found I had some time to work on some things. Earlier that week, my friend Harmon and I had built my train display base. So I decided with the help of my friend Ken to try and determine my track and building layout for this base. Here is the preliminary layout for the tracks and station we came up with so far: The tracks will extend all the way to the end of the board. The main straight line on the one side will hold the Panzerzeug BP-44 armored train that is six and a half feet long. Well, on Saturday, since I was all fired up to do rail models, I decided to get started on a big project. Remember this monster? Well out she came and this was the first ever assembly I did on this model: That's eleven pieces on that assembly, and I had to make sixteen of them! This is what they were for; here's the first of the rail trucks assembled: I later fixed that gap issue on the side of that wheel truck. Some time later, I managed to finish the four inside trucks: Then I went to work on the four outer trucks: Now seeing that made me want to see just how big this bad boy really was. So, I pulled out the connector trucks and the main carriage parts and dry-fit them all together. Man this thing is gonna be HUGE! This is starting to get scary! Okay, moving along, the connector trucks that hold the wheeled trucks together needed some reinforcement braces underneath for the pegs that go into the wheeled trucks. So, I took one of those plastic DVD title covers and cut 32 little shapes from it after having measured out the size I needed. Sorry Harry Potter! Here's how they look underneath these support trucks: Finally after about an hour of tedious sanding and fitting of these braces, I got all four trucks done: Finally, I pulled out the photo etch screens they had in the kit and hit them with a grey primer. When dry, I re-bagged them until I was ready to use them again: To wrap this up, I also finished my three little Japanese tanks and my C-130A Hercules, but my batteries ran out so I couldn't take the pics. I'll see what I can find in this house and hopefully get them posted later on. Meanwhile, that's my progress for the last couple weeks. Enjoy the pics, and remember that comments are welcome. Thanks for looking in.

Yeah, I get it too. I love Steampunk. This is awesome! Very well done and extremely inventive! I do think it looks a bit front-heavy, like it's ready to fall forward. That's the beauty of Steampunk really, anything you can imagine would work. I love the figure too! He looks very "Phineas Fogg" Can't wait to see more!

Outstanding Gil! That is one awesome clean build! Quiet? I guess you haven't been following my build thread under On the Bench. I've been making a lot of noise there with three posts in the last week and a half. Not to mention the one aircraft and three armor I finished in that same time... Keep these posts coming, we need to keep the noise level up in here.

That looks superb already; I'd be calling it done myself, but then, I always build OOB since I don't add stowage. This is awesome Mark, you can do it!

I'm loving this! You've come up with a brilliant way to make one of these! I agree, highlight the raised parts in a lighter grey before covering them in sprue. That'll really add depth to this!

Thanks Dave! I'm glad you like it. It is definitely an interesting build. I'll see if I can get a pic of those hinges for you. And no, so far they have not given any extras. I've had a few heart-stopping moments when I thought I'd lost one!

Brilliant idea! Thanks!

That rocks! Way to go!

Awesome! Simply awesome!

Thanks guys! Yeah, I'll keep them coming! I got more on the way. Stay tuned!

Thanks guys! You're very kind; I appreciate your great comments!

And now for my latest three armor models completed this year. First is Trumpeter's 1/72 scale M1A1 Abrams tanks sporting mine rollers on the front. I'm calling this one done, although when I get some chains that look to scale, I'll be adding them to this later: These next two are a couple of German subjects, one truck and one tank. This first one is something I never thought I'd see in kit form, much less in my scale, but here it is: Dragon's 1/72 scale New Agricultural Tractor no. 3: The German translation of New Agricultural Tractor is Neubau Fahrzeug, no. 3 for those who may not know German. That is how this tank got it's funky name. Now for the last one, this is MAC Distributor's 1/72 scale Mercedes 3000 German cargo truck: And that completes my work for April. Thanks all for looking in, comments are welcome.

Hey all, here's one of my last completed models of April: I give you the Testor's B-57G Night Hawk in 1/72 scale. This was given to me by a friend of mine who started it but then knew he wasn't going to be able to finish it and knew I would. Here it is completed: There are a few things that will keep this from being an award winning model due to missing parts and other issues, but I'm happy with it and thrilled that it is finally done! Here's a fun little game: see if you can find the one glaring change I had to do. It may be a bit tough to see given the angle of the shot. Meanwhile, thanks for looking in, comments are always welcome!

Well, I know I'm overwhelming everyone into speechlessness, but here we are in a new month and I have some new progress. This will be a short and sweet update here showing my latest work to date. I'll start out with my three little Japanese tanks. They are fully camouflaged, all the tools are on them, and their tracks have been installed. All that's left is clearcoat, decals, dullcoat, then weathering: Ha Go: Ha Go, North China version: Chi Ha Early version: And one big happy family all together: Moving along, I managed to beat this little car into submission some more. It finally looks relatively aligned and clean now: Rommel's Car: Next I applied most of the photo etch to one of the Russian armored train turreted cars. Everything is on except the grab handles and steps: I have three more to do like that, then I can start laying down paint. I also filed down some of the edges of the photo etch panels that I'd applied to the engine and tender. Meanwhile, here's how the one turreted car looks with the completely photo-etched engine and tender: Yes, it's a small update, but then I did finish four other models along with completing all of this. Feel free to check them out in their respective Forums. Thanks all for looking in, comments are always welcome.

Awesome. It's great to see the models I missed when I couldn't return on Saturday.

'Nuff said! :D

LOL! Mark, 1/35th may be a "real" scale, but 1/72 is the "one, true" scale! :D Give it a whirl sometime sonny! Only real men who don't need BIG BOY pants can build in my scale!

Well, I'm back from Ohio and have a day to myself to get caught up posting pics that were taken before I left. I'll start with my Russian Armored Train. After exhausting and time consuming labor, I finally got all the P/E hinges and detail parts on the engine and tender. It really does make this train look good! Now to do all the tedious work on all the four train cars.... While that was drying, I pulled out my Mercedes 3000 truck and went to work. I got some detail parts, the windows and the fenders and storage boxes installed here, then set it up to paint some more details: Then while looking through the instructions, I realized how close I was to actually completing assembly, so I finished this off with all the rest of the parts. Wow, still pretty rough looking here: After some paint and clearcoat, it's looking much better: Now to figure out how I'm going to mark it. The only options given in the instruction sheet are for two Afrika Korps vehicles (which are painted sand and mine is grey) and one Spanish vehicle from the Spanish Civil War, (which I did not want to do) There are multiple markings on the decal sheet not even indicated on the instructions so I might just use what I want and damn the torpedoes. Moving right along, I painted a camo pattern on my Neubau-Fahrzeug after installing the fenders and various other detail parts: Afterwards, when it was dry, I applied a clearcoat and the decals, then attempted a wash using Citadel's dark brown wash. Epic Fail: While the Neubau-Fahrzeug was drying, I also added the camo pattern and clearcoat to the M1A1 Abrams with minerollers and also attempted the wash with the Citadel dark color wash. Another Epic Fail: Almost makes one want to give up trying to wash. I can NEVER get it looking as good as everyone else's wash! Moving along again, I decided to start another ACE kit, the Kfz 21 that was Rommel's personal car, or one of them. He had about 16 I'm told. After looking at this, you can see why I set it aside after awhile for something a little less frustrating: Yeah, that's gonna take some serous sanding, shaping and fitting, with extensive dry-fitting in between. I'll get back to you on that one later..... On to something a little more easy. These three little gems are being done for a Group Build on another Forum, the camo Group Build. Well, they are almost fully camouflaged, except on that Hobby Day I had left the green color at home so I couldn't paint the wheels that needed that color. Otherwise, they are ready for the P/E, clearcoat, decals and final weathering: Here's the one Ha Go: The other Ha Go, the North China version: And the Chi Ha early version: Finally, here's a shot of them all together: Now I wasn't only working on Armor all this time. I needed to 'cleanse the pallet' once in a while, so I had started a couple aircraft. This first one is Captain Steve Hillman's F/A-18 Hornet from the Independence Day movie. This kit is a Lindbergh kit and going together surprisingly well for a Lindbergh kit! yeah it's fictional, but hey, I have Maverick's F-14 from Top Gun, so why not Capt. Steve's plane from Independence day? This other kit is the Hasegawa F-111 in Australian markings. I'm a bit disappointed in this model because Hasegawa requires me to build this model with the wings extended. There's no option for letting them swing, or leaving them swept (which I need to do to fit this on my shelf!) So, I'm going to go ahead and complete it th3e way it demands I do it. Here's where I left off on this model: Well, that is all I have so far to show. I have another Hobby Day tomorrow where I'll be getting alot more done, and I'll even be starting one or two new kits that I got in Ohio at the Dayton model show. Stay tuned, and as always, comments are welcome.