1:72 Airfix Bristol Bulldog

[dr_gn]

El stovey said:

dr_gn said:

Fairing done - also added a bead sight to the uppermost (green painted) cone:

Fantastic

Thanks. Getting a bit twitchy now - usually all the sub assemblies look good and I mess some elementary thing up during final building.

[dr_gn]

Fitted the lower wing in place - got to start with one fixed reference I suppose:



The upper wing drops in place, but is slightly skewed, so I’ll have to figure out how to cure that somehow. The upper wing is what it is, but that’s as good as I can get it. Painted the fuel tanks a darker silver, put the stencils on and varnished it:





Also BMF’d the undercarriage leg spring fairings:



Next job is to fettle the location points for the upper wing without damaging anything...

[dr_gn]

So I got the top wing on, after much fiddling and fettling (as usual). It’s very slightly out of alignment, but ok. Of course, a crack re-appeared along the joint line:



It’s actually on a break line on the real aircraft, so I’ll have to find a method of turning it into an extremely fine panel line. Tried a strip of black decal (too obvious), silver painted masking tape (would also need red decals in the appropriate places, and looks clunky). Current idea is to use super fine elastic rigging looped around the whole wing and fixed with Klear...

Anyway, the elastic rigging is done - used the drilled lower wing method, which I’ve never used before. As expected it greatly simplifies one thing (the rigging), at the expense of greatly complicating the painting of the lower wing.



So after filling and flatting the rigging holes (predictably not very well), it’s now painted and awaiting the thankfully extensive decals:





In the meantime I made some better rudder horns out of flattened and filed brass tube:

[dr_gn]

The lower wings been stripped and re-painted twice since this morning (decal disaster and temperamental paint). The combination of silver paint (main issue - it’s a nightmare) and a rigged biplane was not a great choice. Drilling through the lower wing and repairing the holes was a really daft idea. So close to finishing it, yet I can feel something’s going to push this one towards the bin. At least I’ve got another two sets of decals before I run out.

Edited by dr_gn on Saturday 25th January 20:58

[dr_gn]

Finally got the decals on without something going wrong. Jeez.

Also added a circular disc to represent the oil cooler vent. I’ve seen one image with what looks like a ventral lamp under there too, but can’t find a definitive reference.

ETA note the deliberate stencil mistake. Wouldn’t be the same to finish a stage without a correction to make.

Edited by dr_gn on Saturday 25th January 22:55

[perdu]

Note to self

Don't enter this class at Halifax..

[Skii]

perdu said:

Note to self

Don't enter this class at Halifax..

He's a bit good isn't he

[Equus]

Skii said:

He's a bit good isn't he

And this is one that's teetering on the edge of the bin?

[dr_gn]

Equus said:

Skii said:

He's a bit good isn't he

And this is one that's teetering on the edge of the bin?

Yup. It’s fked.

For some odd reason, a crack appeared in the upper wing. I’ve tried to cover it by making it into an assembly break line (which would have been ok), but it looked gash:



So I’ve tried to scrape it out and dissolve some sprue into it:



But obviously it means re-painting....and yet another decal:



I very much doubt the wing can take another flat and re-paint, and it’s now fitted and rigged, making any repair 10x more difficult.

I think I’ll end up stripping the wings off and retaining the fuselage and engine etc for another life. Shame really, since I must have spent dozens of hours on it, and most of it looks very good (and I’m quite critical of my own work).

[dr_gn]

perdu said:

Note to self

Don't enter this class at Halifax..

Ha ha - thanks, but this one won’t be going...

[perdu]

I can see why but it is a terrible shame

Anyway, what other classes should I refrain from?

[dr_gn]

perdu said:

I can see why but it is a terrible shame

Anyway, what other classes should I refrain from?

I know you're joking - IIRC the last time we were in the same class, you smashed it with your Westland Scout??

Bit of a sparse 12 months for me this time: Macchi 202, Kittyhawk, both with aftermarket stuff. Matchbox P-12E (OOB) and the Airfix Refuelling set (not sure what class they'd be in). None of them particularly outstanding, but it's good to have a goal of entering them in a competition whatever they end up like. Alos got a OOB Cyber Hobby Helldiver (terrible, terrible kit) on the bench, which is going about as well as the Bulldog. That's supposed to be for a review though, so I could just bin it and pretend it never happened...

Nathan's pretty proud of his Warhammer stuff, and he's building a Panda Monk figure that he bought there last year, so he'll take them along I guess.

How about you - I don't see things you're building these days?

[perdu]

There's a Chinook of the Special Forces Sqn 7 sqn which might be OK and a Merlin of the FAA, not much else really

Kinda concentrating on rotary these days
Oh and a Palouste jet starter for the craic

All in proper gentleman's scale, 72th

[dr_gn]

perdu said:

There's a Chinook of the Special Forces Sqn 7 sqn which might be OK and a Merlin of the FAA, not much else really

Kinda concentrating on rotary these days
Oh and a Palouste jet starter for the craic

All in proper gentleman's scale, 72th

Look forward to seeing them. It's always a nice show.

[Smiler.]

The level of detail in this work is bordering forensic.

And fascinating.

Possibly more effort than to build the actual aircraft.

[Eric Mc]

I was really looking forward to seeing the finished model.

[AER]

You've got access to a resin printer, don't you dr_gn? Print an uncovered wing structure for the top wing for sts and giggles...

[kiseca]

Dragging off topic again (will stop soon!)... speaking of the Halifax show, are there any shows closer to Surrey / Berkshire that are worth going to? I've been going through the list of shows on IPMS (UK) and there are a lot of promising looking ones in the next couple of months but they're all getting on for 2 hours travel away.

I'm looking for a show that has built models on display and models / accessories for sale as well. Never been to a modelling show before so would love to know if any are really recommended. There's one in Feb at the tank museum in Dorset that looks promising but I haven't found anything closer than that.

Then again, dr_gn has already put my google skills to shame a couple of times in these forums so maybe I'm just looking with my eyes shut again!

[dr_gn]

kiseca said:

Dragging off topic again (will stop soon!)... speaking of the Halifax show, are there any shows closer to Surrey / Berkshire that are worth going to? I've been going through the list of shows on IPMS (UK) and there are a lot of promising looking ones in the next couple of months but they're all getting on for 2 hours travel away.

I'm looking for a show that has built models on display and models / accessories for sale as well. Never been to a modelling show before so would love to know if any are really recommended. There's one in Feb at the tank museum in Dorset that looks promising but I haven't found anything closer than that.

Then again, dr_gn has already put my google skills to shame a couple of times in these forums so maybe I'm just looking with my eyes shut again!

Theres a list of IPMS shows here:

https://ipmsuk.org/calendar/category/uk-model-show...

ETA, sorry, you mentioned IPMS stuff already. No idea apart from these.

Edited by dr_gn on Thursday 30th January 16:49

[robemcdonald]

kiseca said:

Dragging off topic again (will stop soon!)... speaking of the Halifax show, are there any shows closer to Surrey / Berkshire that are worth going to? I've been going through the list of shows on IPMS (UK) and there are a lot of promising looking ones in the next couple of months but they're all getting on for 2 hours travel away.

I'm looking for a show that has built models on display and models / accessories for sale as well. Never been to a modelling show before so would love to know if any are really recommended. There's one in Feb at the tank museum in Dorset that looks promising but I haven't found anything closer than that.

Then again, dr_gn has already put my google skills to shame a couple of times in these forums so maybe I'm just looking with my eyes shut again!

Milton Keynes is a good one, Elstree is a new show and a bit smaller, shuttleworth is in a couple of weeks and there is also the aircraft to have a mooch around.