WildBill50

Hey! What's wrong with bourbon?

Thanks, guys. I've got the fuselage and wings glued, filled and sanded..it's ready for paint. All I need to do is cover all of the windows and then on to the spray booth sometime this week or over the weekend. This will look cool sitting with my AC-119. Pictures soon. Bill

Having see this in person at our meeting, I think Ed chipped and filed more grooves in that suit than anyone should have to. The mold shift on the suit was horrible. Every time he comes in it looks better and better. Between this and his Space Pod from "2001", I hope he gets them done soon. They really look great ithe flesh (resin?". Nice job Ed.

Hey all, here is the result of having leftover paint from another build. Since I have been on a Viet Nam kick the last couple of builds, I pulled out another one as long as there was paint leftover in the color cup. I used up the MM Acryl Dark tan on the fuselage and wings and then things got more involved. I just kept moving along and this is the result after two days. I had to add a section of plastic over the wing area to close up a gap that would have been noticeable if you were to look inside the fuselage, Once this was added the interior was painted dark green. Parts are painted and detailed. I scratched up a flare box made with basswood, drilled out the top and added plastic rod "flares". This I painted medium green with Aluminum painted flares. Also added to the floor are ammo boxes, strapped down with wine bottle foil. Pictures I have show ballistic curtains hanging over the windows on the gun side (port). I ran a thin wire between the aft and fore bulkheads with a cut piece of kleenex tissue skewered on it. I opened it up and spread it accross the windows. I think it does a serviceable job of what it is to be representing. The cockpit has a throttle qudrant added made from some leftover photo etch with blobs of glue for handles. Lap belts made from Tamiya tape with photo etch buckles are also installed. I then added a optical gunsight in the port side window for the pilot to aim the guns with.. I detailed up the Pratt and Whitneys with some small wire and painted and dry brushed the rest of the engines. The cowlings are all painted on the inside and most of the small stuff is ready to be added. I was able to close up the fuselage last night, so hopefully I'll get this bad boy painted within the next day or two. I drilled out the exhausts and painted them a rust color. So far, so good. The fit of the model is really good with no major filling to do. It's been fun so far. Thanks for looking. Bill

Nice looking Hawk, Steve. The markings are really cool looking. How did all of the kits that you posted go together, as they all look very good. Welcome back. Are all of them new releases from Airfix? Bill

That's a chunk of metal to be whirling around, I'll tell you that. I really like this one, Mark. Very breezy, I mean cool! Bill

No pics this time out. I've got most of the camo repainted and now a mini-disaster. While placing he canopy on the model, I grabbed it a bit too tight to get it to seal to the fuselage...CRACK! Now it's off to vac-u land to try to make a new canopy...unless anyone has a spare they would like to get rid of. I've never tried to make a vacuform part before, so this should be a treat (I keep telling me this, so it must be true). What I will do in the mean time is get the rest of this build completed and then just have the canopy to attach. Stay tuned. Cant' say that bad luck is better than no luck on my last couple of builds. But I plod on. Bill

Mark, The Corsair looks great. The markings look really cool. The F-84 looks really nice too. What did you use for the natural metal? Maybe the markings just peeled up from you flying it around the room at too high of a speed while making jet sounds :gold-plane: .? Are you going to touch them up, or hide it in the back of the cabinet on a shelf? Anyway, really nice stuff. Bill

Nice job on all of the photo-etch. It really takes a ship model to another level. I don't know how you do it in 700th scale. I have enough probs in 350th. Keep it up. Bill

Thanks everybody. I used MM radome tan for the perspex seals. Yellow always seem to stark for the color. Markings are for the 45th TRS out of Shaw AFB. Glad it's finished and glad I finished it. It was a good sense of accomplishment and a great learning tool. Maybe a two banger F-106 is in the works. Thanks again, Bill

Finally finished. Overall, a good 3 footer. I'm pretty happy overall. MM Viet Nam colors. I used metalizers for the keel and engines. The only problem I really encountered was with the canopy. It just never really looked clear: even in a future bath. Hope you like it.

I haven't had a chance to look ath the Airfix kit, so I can't compare. I was pleasantly happy of the fit and finish of the CA kit though. So far so good. I just have to tighten up the camo now and it will be ready for decals and such. So far so good. Thanks again for looking. Bill

John, That -D model looks really cool. I always liked the calibration markings on that plane. The B-57 always looks quite sinister in it's all black paint scheme. Nice job on both kits. Bill

Gil, The upper paint scheme shown is just the medium green (34102) and the tan. I resprayed over the dark green in these photos. The sanded area is where there were a few swirls of paint that needed to be cleaned up. Now i can re-apply the dark green (34079). The difference between the Voodoo and this plane is pretty remarkable. The Voodoo just looks fast where as this thing looks like a bomber (with fighter like qualities due to this wing). It is a big aircraft! It was pretty amazing and versatile during the Air War in Viet Nam. The Osprey book on operations in Viet Nam is really a great read. Bill

While waiting for things to dry on my RF-101 and trying to figure out what to build for my next project, I looked at the stash and found this 1/48th CA B-57. It started out with trying to test fit a couple pieces and went pretty quickly to what is shown here. The fit of the model was pretty good overall but I had one major issue to deal with. The problem was in the resin parts. For the wheel wells you get some really nice resin parts that fit in the wings really well after a bit of sanding. What I didn't notice at first was in my kit I received two port side main wells. This does not bode well for keeping the plane on its landing gear. I was going to try to scratch up a new well at first by copying off the port side into the starboard side well area. Then I got an idea. One of my club members built most of the Classic Airframes kits and knows the kit manufacturer. He has some extra kits that did not get sold after CA closed down. Of course he did not have a B-57 in the collection though. What he did have though was a buildup of one of the Brit models of the Canberra that was used for displays at conventions. He gave me the model to part out the wheel well. When opening up the fuselage, I found out how much weight was going to be needed to keep this bad boy off it's tail. There was lead in the nose, engine nacelles and even inside the nose wheel well. When I built mine I just added three extra large fishing weight plus the lead shot that was in the built up kit. You could use this thing like a billy club. Over all, the fit was pretty good. I sanded each glue surface and then put them together. I pinned the wings and stabilizers to the fuselage as all there is is a butt joint. The interior is all resin with some really nice detail. It fit into the kit nicely. One thing about this kit is that there is plenty of room inside it. I cut down the nose wheel gear and pinned it back together to give the plane its nose down sit. So far it is going together pretty fast. I painted it up with Humbrol Night black for the bottom and MM Acryl FS 34102, 34079 and 32177 Greens and tan for the topside. After painting it up, the camouflage did not look right to me. I looked at my Testor's 1/72nd kit and then at some other references and found out they have the greens reversed on the painting instructions. I am in the process of fixing that now. Anyway, here are some "in action" shots. thanks for looking. Bill

Thank you for the complement, sir. I can't wait to get both of these done. Too long in between getting them completed.

Here are some new images. Camo done. I added a tail light be cutting off the grey plastic and using a piece of clear sprue. I sanded the piece and polished it and then drilled two small holes for bulbs. I then added a drop of clear orange and a drop of white into the holes. It came out really nice, if I do say so. Decals are up next. David, while checking up on the KY squadron markings, I found out that they were flying RF-101G's. Wrong bird, sorry to say. The last picture is what happens while waiting for things to dry. I started the CA B-57 and got to the point of it needing paint at the same time. Pictures of that will be on a different post. ALMOST DONE, ALMOST DONE.

Repainted the fuselage. Today the clear coat goes on and hopefully decals. Just the gear and drop tanks to go. Mark, that light better not be a train now! Pictures real soon.

Mark, that Halo is really looking awesome. Keep up the good work! I agree with Mark...The hurrier i go, the behinder I get! Put that Corsair next to that main rotor and see...Size does matter! And now, off to the paint booth I go. Great job on all of your builds. Bill

Duke, I feel for you on the metal DC-6. That's why the B-35 got the camo treatment...hey, a nice camo DC-6, yeah, that's the ticket. The Morser is really cool looking also. Nice job on all of your builds. Bill

Setback! I was getting the camo redone and retouched up when I noticed that the front of the fin started splitting along the seam. I opened it up a bit to slide in a little Tenax when the top of the fuselage split about half way to the canopy. All repaired now but now I have to repaint the resanded and repaired area. I think Iknow why we start other projects and let others languish after this. Too close to the finish now though. Decals, wheels and drop tanks are all that's left. The final push is on....I hope! Bill

I was able to return to the original Photobucket with the help of my teen daughter. I guess you just have to go with whomever can get the job done. She was able to get into the system in just a couple of steps. Thanks for everybodies help here, guys. I really do appreciate the different avenues you told me to take or try. And also for you trying them so you could help me out. Also, thanks Kelly (my daughter) for going the simple route to figure a way around. Bill PS...All she did was use a different browser, ie from Yahoo to Google Chrome to get into Photobucket. Too simple.

Nice job, Mark. I don't really build armor...only a couple of pieces in 50 years. But I really like the Hetzer, it has some cool lines. Are you going to keep it clean or weather it up? It looks nice as it is. Bill

Hey Mark, I didn't do it. My 17 year old daughter figured it out. Hopefully what she showed me works from Photobucket again. Bill

I have reposted the pictures from above so maybe you can actually see them now. I got back into Photobucket (actually my daughter got me back into Photobucket) so here are the pictures.