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1/48 B-66 Destroyer- DONE!


ghodges

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I've begun building the 1/48 resin CollectAire kit. It'll be OOTB with a NMF. The interior is done, so here's pics of it. The rear seat areas are only viewable through the small fuselage side windows once it's enclosed.

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I only added seat belts made from painted medical tape with simple foil buckles. Also note that even the crew entrance walls under the cockpit floor have molded on detailing (and a few pieces of Hodgepodge pe were used in the making of those wall boxes! :smiley32: ).

 

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This shows the molded in detailing on the inside of the fuselages, as well as the nose gear well.

 

All that's needed is to throw in some nose weight, add the cockpit and nose gear well, and I can close her up! Things should proceed pretty rapidly after that. More pics when it's all assembled. Cheers!

 

GIL :smiley16:

Edited by ghodges
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Way to go Gil. This is one of my favorite bombers. I just like the looks of it. Your interior look great so far.

No major problems so far?

 

I shall be watching.

 

Bill

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The good news is that the fuselage is assembled! :smiley20:

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The bad news is I'll be going and buying quite a few more coarse sanding sticks...... :smiley18: And maybe some Blue emu oil for my arm..... :P

 

GIL :smiley16:

Edited by ghodges
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Gil, that looks a lot better than the Collect-Aire XB-51 I have. It has a fuselage in 45 parts and all suffered shrinkage, none the same. But I really want a 1/48 XB-51 so maybe I should drag it out before I get to old. Anyway, I have a pretty good belt sander and respirator.

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Moving along, the main landing gear is assembled...

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The metal gear wall attaches to the center bulkhead. Each main gear leg attaches to the gear wall, and the actuators are added. It looks a bit complex, and references help since you're assembling it upside down; but it's not as tough as it looks.

 

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Here's the assembly's been added into the fuselage gear well. The fit is tight, but that's good because it helps lock the gear legs in place with each trunion pinned against the front wall. It did take some fiddling with the parts to make sure it slid all the way into the well. I've since added the bottom fuselage piece that covers the gap, and it too needed some trimming to get an acceptable fit.

 

I've moved on to the canopy now, and it's currently drying after a bath in Future. I've also masked off the framing on the spare canopy to prepare to cut out the canopy window masks. More pics on that soon!

 

GIL :smiley16:

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Made some significant progress...

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Engines are assembled, except for the stators that go in the intakes, which will be painted and added later. As you can see by the scratches, still a bit of fine sanding needed before I can apply the NMF.

 

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The vac canopy is on and masked off. I used the second vac canopy to make the masks for this one. It fit pretty well, except for at the very tip of the windshield, where I used super glue/baby powder for filler. The small bumps at the rear edge of the canopy were sawn off before all of the sanding was done and reattached afterward, as they wouldn't have survived the work. The small side windows were made from clear sheet, added with super glue, sanded and polished, and then masked off.

 

I also have to make a confession here......I got the canopy on, filled and sanded it to my satisfaction; and then realized I'd left out the pilot's ejection seat! :smiley7: Sooo.....I sliced the canopy back off (carefully), added the seat, and then repeated all of the work to add the canopy back on and smooth it in! :blush:

 

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And the wings are on! :smiley20: The black is actually the inside color for the canopy, as much as a quick primer to check on the seams. Still quite a bit of fine sanding and priming to do before adding the engines, but once that's done it's almost there!

 

Questions, comments, and critiques welcome; as always!

 

GIL :smiley16:

Edited by ghodges
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Hey Gil,

 

Two things:

 

#1 So your "Hodgepodge" of p/e is a take off of your name? :smiley2: You know me, I just had to say it.

 

#2 We have one here at Shaw with a "stick up it's butt" (actually his belly). I'm not that up to date with the different B-66 variants. If you want/need any detail photos of it let me know. I'll be glad to shoot the thing & send you a CD-Rom with the photos my friend. I pass the thing every day so it'll be no problem.

 

Tim

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Yep...I chose Hodgepodge as a play on my name and also because my parts were mostly "generic", although I did produce specific sets for the P-47 Thunderbolt and the F6F Hellcat. What I really wish is that I could find some more of those generic cockpit sets and especially some more of my belts and buckles. I'm out!

 

Thanks for the pics offer, but I'm building this strictly OOTB and not worried about any omissions. It'll be the best 1/48 B-66 on the table for some time to come at most contests! :smiley2:

 

GIL :smiley16:

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Nice job. I wish you could put the Hodgepodge photoetch back in production, especially the generic stuff. Very handy it was!

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First full primer coat is on!

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Used Floquil Old Silver cut with some lacquer thinner for the primer coat. Next up is an overall coat of Alclad Aluminum. After that, lots of masking to apply all of the various NMF panels! More pics when that's done.

 

GIL :smiley16:

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Terrific work, as per your usual, Gil. I've never built a Collect-Aire kit, but many years ago I did purchase their F2H-3/4 Banshee kit, but was disappointed with the poor quality of the resin castings and cast metal parts, so I ended up selling it. Your B-66 is shaping up to be another stellar build from you.

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Got most of the differing NMF panel work done....

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The center wing panel is not nearly as dark as this pic makes it look due to the angle of the flash, and is actually much closer to the diagonal antenna panel on the tail fin

 

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Here the center panel is much more washed out in the pic than as seen with the naked eye, but the other varying paneling shows up a bit more starkly than they really are.

 

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Engines and tail planes, showing where the differing colors are, but not really accurate for their true contrast values. The dark panels on the engines are the same color used on the wing panels, so you can see how much that color varies depending on the angle of reflection in the pic.

 

One thing I did was airbrush a lot of the more "polished" looking panels freehand, and that saved a LOT of masking time. The Duraluminum panels on the engines, wing, and tail plane center panels did require masking though.

 

I used Alclad airframe aluminum as the base color, with AK Aluminum used for the shinier panels. Alclad Duraluminum is on the darker panels and Metalizer Burnt Metal was used on the engine tail cones and the square antenna panels on the upper tail fin.

 

Next up are all the trim colors.....

 

GIL :smiley16:

Edited by ghodges
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While it's not light, it's not as heavy as you might think. The fuselage was cast hollow for the most part, though the wings are solid resin. I decided not to use the wingtip tanks just to avoid having the extra weight out there.....

 

The main gear are substantial metal castings that have stood up to all of the handling so far, after having to put them in place when assembling the gear bay since they're not designed to be added later in the build. The real test will be how the gear axles stand the test after a year or so. I've had several CA models where the gear did fine but the tires went crooked as the axles bent over time.

 

GIL :smiley16:

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Hey Gil,

 

This going to be an ELINT bird or will it have the tail stinger on it?

 

Nice work with the NMF on it so far.

 

Bill

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Will it have a button on the top of the fuselage to make it drop a bomb like the old Monogram (?) kit?? :-D

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And she's done!

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10th build of the year for me, getting this one done in exactly one month since I finished my Tiger tank. Questions, comments, and critiques welcome!

 

GIL :smiley16:

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Holy crap! Done already? Man, not only is that fast, it is amazingly spectacular! Wow, I wish I could pick up my building speed like this! I bow to the Master. :smiley32: :smiley20:

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