snelson

Great work, even on the old conversion. It's amazing just how far both the aftermarket and mainstream kits in the past couple of decades. SN

Looks great..especially those checkers! One minor thing..the areas under the rear windows on P-40s should be the exterior color, rather than interior green. Steve Nelson IPMS#30925

Thanks guys! I've got all the WWII eggies..I've been toying with trying to convert the Avenger into a Wildcat. SN

Here's the latest product of my mad scientist's lair..the Hasegawa Eggplane Zero. She took third in Miscellaneous at the Toledo show last weekend. A made a bunch of "improvements" to the kit (check the "most outrageous kit" thread in General Discussion.) Markings are for the Yokosuka Naval Air Group, naturally. SN

I'll usually wipe down the area with alcohol to remove any residue from the polishing compound. In this case, I think I used a cotton swab dipped in mineral spirits, since the wings had already been painted with acrylics. Usually, I'm smart enough to do the wingtip lights before I paint the model (and some days, I can even tie my own shoes!) SN

I've heard good things about the Novus as well..a lot of fellow club members swear by it. I just use the Blue Magic because it's what I have and it works well. SN

I got them down to the general shape with a course sanding stick, then finished them with 400 and then 600 grit sanpaper, and finally poished them with Blue Magic polishing compound (I've been using the same tube for some 15 years, and it's still almost full.) Then after everything was finished, I carefully brushed them with Future. SN

Here's my latest project; Tamiya's 1/72 Mosquito B.IV. I built her for our club's bi-annual "challenge build"..this month's theme was "09," and the kit actually had decals for 109 Sq RAF. I had her more or less finished in time for last week's meeting, but decided to go back and tweak a few things I wasn't happy with (as usual, the result of trying to take some shortcuts to beat a deadline.) The biggest issue was the wingtip lights. The kit parts didn't fit well, and had sink marks to boot, so I popped them out and redid the lights using my tried-and-true method (which I should have done in the first place..would have save myself a lot of time and headaches!) I cut some clear stock to fit the openings, drilled a hole in the edge and painted it to simulated the "coloured" light bulb, then painted the inner edges silver. Here are the "raw" parts grafted into place.. ..and here is the final result, after sanding to shape and polishing, and repainting the wingtips. And here's the finished product in its entirety. This is definately the last predominently black scheme I'll do for awhile. It's as unforgiving as natural metal! Hopefully my various boo-boos and touch-ups won't be as glaringly obvious to the judges as they are to me. Cheers! Steve Nelson IPMS#30925

Very nice! I've been collecting the necessary bits & references to do that aircraft in 1/72. SN

I've been trying to pin this one down for years myself, and I've pretty much settled on unpainted aluminum. The photos of machines in service are inconclusive, but Martin didn't use interior green or zinc chromate on the interior of the Marauder, so I'm extrapolating that they had the same policy for the earlier aircraft. Of course, the Maryland was built specifically to French and later British specs, so it's possible that Martin followed those countries' interior color standards. The National Museum of the United State Air Force website has a bunch of detail photos of a Maryland showing an unpainted interior, but this was a one-off test aircraft purchased by the USAAF for evaluation. In short, I have yet to find a definative answer! Steve Nelson IPMS#30925

While I don't have it (holding out for the two-seat version) I've heard the new Academy Il-2 is a 1/72 clone of the Accurate Miniatures 1/48 kit. Apparently, the original AM was working on a 1/72 scale version before they went under. Academy eventually acquired the molds and released the kit. The only Il-2 I have is the 1/72 Eduard kit, which is very nice. SN

I doubt you'll find anything other than B&W pictures, so you can probably just pull the colors out of your a....I mean, make an educated guess. I've got a couple of the Island Airlines kits in the basement. "Someday" I plan to build one with a scratchbuilt interior, aftermarket engines, the works..as it appeared the day I flew in it. Of course the old Monogram kit is actually 1/76-ish scale. It's also the earlier, shorter 4-AT, while the Airfix kit is the later, longer 5-AT (and 1/72 scale.) In my dreams, Tamiya would release a new-tool 1/72 4-AT and 5-AT. I'm not holding my breath, though.... SN

Not to sidetrack the thread, but the Ford is probably my all-time favorite plane. I got my first airplane ride in the old Island Airlines Tri-Motor back in 1976, and have flown in a total of three (including over a dozen hops in the Kalamazoo Air Zoo's Tin Goose back when I was a museum volunteer.) I've also seen several others in various museums. SN

This thread really takes me back. I remember building the 'Profile Series' Mosquito when I was a kid back in the mid '70s. The Airfix Mossie is still a darned nice little kit. While we're on the subject of ancient Airfix/MPC corrugated three-engine thingies, here's my Ford Tri-Motor, built in 1991 (good grief..was that really 18 years ago?..seems like yesterday!) I made a replacement canopy with my trusty Mattell Vac-U-Form machine, replaced most of the engine nacelle struts with Evergreen rod stock, and added stretched sprue control cables. Decals are homemade, using some hand-painted elements (like the Ford logo) and dry-transfer letters/numbers. Paint is good old Testor's spray-bomb silver. Cheers! Steve