Not really on hold yet... I had a bit of extra time on my hands since it is still more than 48 hours until I can start my Phantoms...


Unmasked clear areas painted black...


...primed...


...and painted silver. Voilà - Vampire on a stick!



Magnus

A shifty looking little man shuffles up beside you and mutters "Vampire? Onna stick? Only a Million Kronor and that's cutin' me own throat!"

Must be Mr cut-my-own-throat-de-Havilland...

:)

Magnus

This one has stalled for a special reason...


You see that little crack in the windscreen (sorry for the ugly photo but it wasn't that easy to get a photo of it...)? It is a real crack, not just a defect that can be polished out as I thought from the beginning.

Airfix sent me a spare clear sprue with the same defect, the same goes for all other Vampires I have checked in the hobby shops trying to hunt down a good windscreen...

I have however been in contact with Airfix again today and I have sent them the photo so they maybe can (or already have) done something about it. I'm hoping for the best!



Magnus

He Magnus,

That is an unpleasant surprise. I will check my kit to see if the same crack is present. Let's hope not, but reading your post that could be whishful thinking...



Jelger

Beautiful work mate!
Want to get a couple of 1/48 Vampires, for my old air base in Östersund, F4.....
Carry on!

Magnus, any update on the progress with Airfix on a replacement windscreen?

Joel

Jan! There ought to come a mainstream 48-scale Vampire soon I think! I didn't know there ever were Vampires at Frösön but I assume that you've done your homework on that one !

Jelger and Joel! Just got a mail from Airfix that "my spares have been sent". I'll let you know what they look like as soon as they arrive here!

Time for a restart, this project has stood still for more than a year now.

I did get a few canopies from Airfix but none were perfect, all had the annoying crack to some extent. I picked the best of the lot, masked it, painted it and glued it in place. Better a Vampire with a small crack in the windshield than no Vampire at all I suppose...

There was another small problem as well: the sink marks I had filled in on the flaps caused a bit of a trouble when I painted the model more than a year ago. The putty was attacked by the Tamiya spray (yes, I know, always put it on in thin layers, I know...) and produced small voids in the surface. This was all sanded down together with the seam on top of the nose that had a small but visible indention.


Earlier this afternoon, before painting...


...and tonight, half way through an absolutely excellent Xtradecal sheet!



Magnus

Looking good Magnus, the Vamire, as well the other De Havilland jets are very unique birds, thanks to their twinn booms.
So its better to have one perfect or not too perfect in the collection.
(Still lacking on this type )

Bernd

Magnus,
It's starting to really come together with the additions of the decals.
Joel

Been away for a week (kids had their autumn leave from school) so not much modelling done and tonight I am leaving for Telford. I might meet some of you there!


All stencilling finally on, next step is a coat of semi-matte varnish and then on to the dayglo fields!



Magnus

Hi Magnus,looking very good ! How did your Ki-100 perform at Malmö?

Best
Bernd

Magnus,
The Vampire is really starting to come together quite nicely now.

One thing I also learned the hard way. Most modeling putties are lacquer based, which is how I always thin them. Tamiya rattle cans are lacquers and put out a tremendous amount of paint, which will attack the raw putty. Tack coats work if you can just mist it on. I prefer to seal my putty with thin CA glue, which I give a few min to setup, then lightly sand and polish. I've also successfully sealed Green Stuff (still my regular choice for general putty work), with Mr. Primer Surfacer 1,000,let dry, then lightly sand and polish. I only use it when I want to check the putty blending.

Joel

Bernd! The Ki-100 got a Bronze at Malmö, which I think was quite fair by the way even if I would have preferred a Gold :}! Thanks for asking !

Joel! Nice to hear that I am not alone in my putty misery !



Magnus

Congratulations Magnus, it was clearly a winner, gold comes with the next one !

Best
Bernd

I've finally recovered after a great weekend in Telford and now I'm full of inspiration for modelling! Dayglo has a tendency to kill that enthusiasm quickly though...


Masking (carefully)...


...a sealing coat of Tamiya clear around the edges and then some thin gloss Tamiya white as a base...


...then on to LifeColor fluorescent paint. Hell in a bottle. Not that it differs much from any of the other fluorescent paints I've tried and reading about the full-scale aircraft the stuff they used before the Scotchfilm stickers was described as "porridge" so it's probably rather accurate then !



The result, after a thin coat of Tamiya clear to give it a nice sheen, is actually quite nice! Just the rest of those fields to do now...



Magnus

Magnus,
Your procedure for applying Dayglo worked perfectly.
Joel

This wasn't yesterday - the Vampire has stood on the shelf of doom for close to five years by now.

If I don't get this wrong, I had mishap with a fingerprint in the dayglo paint-job that then got worse when I accidentally peeled off a decal when trying to fix it, finally managing to get some kind of black smudge on the wing when trying to polish it. Then I gave up...

However, right now I'm waiting for a pair of Arma Hobby Yaks to turn up, I will try to avoid starting another project until then so in order to do something useful with my modelling time and maybe finish a bonus kit this year, I went for the low hanging fruit !


The state of the project for the time being, finding the loose bits required a major SAR-effort in the stash...


...and the decal mishap...



Magnus

There is hope!


Careful masking with the meekest tape I could find without resorting to Parafilm...


...some careful painting using Vallejo "White Aluminium" (didn't feel like attacking with the rattle-can at this stage)...


...and a perfectly acceptable result!

Tonight I'll add the missing national insignia below the wing!



Magnus

Once again back at the workbench!


Swedish Vampires look fairly clean in photos but I need to do something to make the model look a bit more interesting. I've gone over the starboard wing with pigments in this photos...


...and here both are finished and sealad with a thin coat of semi-gloss clear.



Magnus

Looking good Magnus, nice job of masking to cover up the black ghost!

It is a great feeling to get a long-standing hangar queen out of the hiding place, finished and on display. The bright scheme on this one is eye-catching and will definitely be an attractive addition to the collection.

Cheers, D

Damian! Thanks a lot ! I might even be able to sneak in another one from the shelf of doom before my next project turns up (no, I'm sorry, it won't be the infamous Lancaster!















I wish the kit was a bit more refined (panel lines are a bit on the deep side) but the engineering is first-class with very good solutions for assembly and alignment.

It ended up a bit on the over-weathered side (that's what happens when just applying "the usual recipe" on a model) and I missed another fact that could have been used for making a more interesting model: I assumed they were silver painted overall in Swedish service, turns out they weren't! They were all natural metal except for the fuselage nacelle that was silver doped (being of plywood sandwich construction). So much for not checking my readily available references !

Anyway, I'm happy to have finished it and wouldn't mind doing another one in the future, there is no lack of interesting paint schemes for these.

Avatar happily retired...
...and model has now moved to the collection.

Now on to find something else from the hall of shame to finish !



Magnus

Magnus, it seems that I'm very late to this show, however, as always, I'm more than impressed by your work.

Congrats on another fine addition to the collection

Watching with interest to see what next comes off the shelf of doom.

Absolutely gorgeous, Magnus and a long time in coming! I truly wish my version had turned out as well. Again I'd like to thank you for doing the original review and following it with this thread. They have proved invaluable in assisting me in completing my more modest example of this kit.

Cheers,
--Jan