¹⁄35

The Mother Child ReUnion

At last, a big silver airframe. This is where the cotton gloves I mentioned earlier come in handy. Typically no aircraft has a consistent overall finish, and this is particularly noticeable on a NMF aircraft of large size. To achieve the inconsistent tonal quality of the aircraft, I used buffing to various degrees, as well as no buffing at all in some areas. This is the strength, in my opinion, of buffing metalizers. You can achieve varying textures using buffing techniques. I used a cotton cloth, cotton swabs and a motor tool with a buffing wheel to get variations, along with no buffing at all. At this point the assembled portion of the airframe contains five variations of Aluminum Plate, from one paint application and some buffing, all be it days of buffing, worth the effort to achieve the effect. The NMF was then given a coat of Gloss, and the big yellow tail section was painted. The B-29 kit National Insignia decals were of the wrong era, for this aircraft, so I replaced them with after market decals from my stash. The tail number had to be “constructed” from individual numbers, again from my stash of decals. The big brown throw pillow you may notice in some of the photos is to protect the NMF from any marring or contamination.

With the major components assembled and painted, I proceeded to attach the landing gear, and Tail control surfaces (which were finished separately, not painted but finished by simply applying SnJ silver polishing powder directly to the plastic by buffing and no gloss coat applied), and balance the aircraft by weight adjustment (more than the initial added weight was needed). To this point, except for the removal of the turrets, the B-29 was an Out of the Box build (soon to change).

Rework, Modifications and Add-Ons etc. etc. etc.

Just a reminder, the B-29 was to be constructed as a backdrop for the purpose of displaying the XF-85 “Goblin”.

The only rework that was truly required was on the engine cowls. The “Gills” area was much too thick and required thinning, and the “Gills” needed to be separated. This went pretty quickly, thanks to a motor tool and a razor saw. Applying SnJ powder with a cotton swab, and buffing then finished the nacelles. Here again no gloss coat was applied. As a finishing touch, I applied “burnt metal” Metalizer to the leading edge of the cowls, to produce a darkened look I had observed in several research photos.

Some of the things, I’m about to discuss, were necessary; others, well, I said I did some experimenting.

The Engines provided were a little plain, so I decided to experiment with a bit of detailing. Nothing much just a few added bits, with wire an solder I added some “piping” to one engine, and decided one was enough (sanity must prevail some time). However, having done some work on the Engine I decided I would show it exposed somehow. Using reference photos, I attempted to construct the configuration of an engine under servicing. As is usual for me, I did not want to proceed without a way to back out. So, instead of cutting up the kit provided cowling, I used a cowling from an old P-47 kit I had on hand. The P-47 cowl required some minor rework, basically the construction of the “double chin”. After place it on the front of the Engine, I added strapping (plastic strips) to represent the normal understructure, and made some “Gills” from paper stock.