Latest Progress From The Duke

[Mark Deliduka]

Now that I finished my RF-4 Phantom, I'm concentrating on getting this Badger done. I've made some good progress here, getting the decals on. Then after that, I added all the gear bay and bomb bay doors as well as all the fiddly little antenna bits, and even the tail guns. Now all that's left is some touchup painting and detail work.

 

Here she is:

 

 

You can see that I made it a Guards aircraft even though the instructions say nothing about it. I also added the Excellence award to this plane as well. Hey they were on the decal sheet so I used them!

 

A shot of the opposite side nose art:

 

 

Next are some fuzzy close up shots of the wingtips showing the nav lights. Pretty cool:

 

 

 

Here's the completed tail finally. No more gaping maw to look at:

 

 

And now of course, the payload. A bomber's gotta have a payload right?

 

 

Well, that completes my 'walk-around' of this model that is so close to being finished! I can't wait!

 

Thanks for looking, comments are welcome.

[Mark Deliduka]

Now that many of the projects I've been working on are finished, here is an update on what's going on at Maddog Manufacturing.

 

I have been working on the Horten a bit more, and now have it at the decal stage.

 

Here is a pic of the Horten where she is now:

 

 

Next is a couple shots of the 1/72 scale Gran Mi-1 Hoplite that I started about a week ago. This first shows how it was after the first day I started it:

 

 

Here is the progress I made on it since:

 

 

Not much I know, but those are the clear parts and there's still another one I have to fit on it. The blue is the interior color. So far it's fitting together pretty well for an Eastern European kit, but the last clear part is gonna have issues. I can tell from the test fitting...

 

 

 

Now on to some of the projects I started.

 

I decided I needed to build a few more helicopters. So, I started with one that I got from John's Models in Pensacola when I was there earlier this month. I met a friend and fellow LEMur named Robert and he took me in to the back room of John's where the stash of a recently passed member of his club was being inventoried for sale. I chose a 1/72 scale Hobby Boss Sea Knight since I'd been needing one for my Marines. It had been started by the previous owner who did an outstanding job on the interior painting. All I had to do was finish some of the final assembly of the cockpit (seats) and then close it into the fuselage.

 

Here it is all closed up. You can see where I had some difficulty getting it closed up. Gonna need a little filler underneath, but this is coming together pretty well so far.

 

 

 

 

Next is another model of a 1/72 scale Italeri HH53C helicopter I'm going to do in Vietnam colors. I got the interior finished up here:

 

 

A blurry view of the cockpit, (my macro doesn't work like it used to!)

 

 

I then installed all the interior windows to the main fuselage. Here is the interior test-fit inside the fuselage halves:

 

 

 

This last project is a Savoia S.21F floatplane. This is in fact a model of a plane from a Japanese animation film called Porco Rosso (Crimson Pig). It's a story set in the between years between WWI and WWII in the Adriatic. It's about a WWI flyer who was the last surviving member of his squadron because he happened to duck into a cloud to escape. Because he feels guilty about surviving, he considers himself a pig and thus had become one. In the movie he's a flying bounty hunter and this is his plane. If you look closely, you'll see him in the cockpit.

 

Here is the 1/72 scale Fine Molds Savoia S.21F:

 

 

 

Note: I've seen the movie and even own it. It is a great film that I love to watch. The plane is pretty fantastic too.

 

 

Well, those are the latest projects I have going on. Thanks for looking and comments are welcome.

[Mark Deliduka]

Here is my latest progress on my three helicopters. The Hoplite now has the entire canopy closed up. This one is almost ready for final assembly:

 

 

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That Hoplite canopy in three parts was a real BEAR to put together! I am happy with it though.

 

 

Next I got the final assembly done on my CH-46 Sea Knight. Except for the wheels, rotors, the canopy and some detail parts, this one is ready for paint:

 

 

 

 

Finally, I also got some progress done on my CH-53 Jolly Green Giant. I added some extra parts to this, and later I'll be sanding it down smoother:

 

 

 

 

 

All these helicopters are almost ready for paint. Hopefully soon I can get started on them.

 

Speaking of paint, the instructions on the Sea Knight say to paint it an overall dark grey. What color is best? Any Marines wanna chime in and let me know?

 

 

That's all I have for these so far. Thanks all for looking, comments are welcome.

 

 

 

For those interested, I also made progress on some ships and an artillery piece. Feel free to check out the Armor and Ships forums to see what else I was working on.