and an update on my build. Como is done. I did it masking, not using the new airbrush. Just did not have enough time to master a new airbrush. I do like the output. Now it is time for decals and some weathering. After I will apply decals, i will spray some very thin Buff over the whole aircraft to blend in the colors. My assumption is that aircrafts in Africa were constantly cover with some dust.and now pictures:







and of course while making pictures i did brake an antenna....

Nice looking Henschel, Tom. Can't wait to see more!

Lovely paint job Tom, a mist coat will blend and tone it down beautifully.

6 weeks to go folks, time has rushed by but there is still plenty of time to get these birds flying!

Cheers, D

Sean and Damian: Thank You very much. Hopefully the shading will be visible after the weathering and after a flat coat.

Raj: Nice kit You have there. What scale is it?

Tom: Nice result on You Henschel!

For my anteater I had to buy new decals, as I lost the old one (the kit was bought in 2001, I guess). After opening the decals the crosses for the wings were far too big in their dimension . I checked the instruction, but it was 1/72.
So I tried the other crosses, but the decals were so thin, the main colour shines through and the white colour becomes a gray one


Even the spare box had no decals in the right size. Than I decided to paint them on. I tried this already before with Japanese circles, but here, it is more difficult.


After a long session of masking. I reckognized the white paint was empty . Not my day.

Oliver

2 steps forward, 3 steps back..

You're a braver man than I am. Hang in there.

Quite a tale of woe! Keep at it, Oliver! It's bound to get better.

Hi! Good work and progress here

Oliver, good work on the Do and bad luck with the decals.
Hope your massive Mask-erade will success.

Raj, nice choice for your kit!

Tom, well done so far on Your Henschel! Don't dust it too much, that won't be the biggest problem in Africa. There were probably more from fading in the direct sun.

Sean, great cutouts and a neat idea! Curious how this will turn out at the end.

My interior will mostly disappear after I closed the halves. Dryfitting showed a long gap between the upper sides and of course the already mentioned gap at the nose. The hole for the astrodome had to be drilled out - used my Dremel.
Gave the inside alredy a few signs of usage and added some scratched control sticks in red 'n yellow. Now all the side windows had to be installed before the final interior assembly and closing the fuselage









Thomas

Thomas,
Nice looking interior detail!

Gaz

Some fantastic builds.
My modelling room / man-cave is nearing completion so I should be able to get back to the Whitley soon.

Things progress with my twin twins build, I'm finishing off the painting and moving onto decaling the Do217E. I've got the Me328 to the point of being painted and decaled. Got some touch ups to do to the camo and then a little weathering and it'll be finished.

The Do217E is a little behind there is still the cockpit to finish detailing and installing the guns before I can glaze it. I need to mask the clear parts to finish the painting. The wheels are ready to go and the tailwheel doors need to be painted and installed. The main undercarriage doors need painting and installing, so lots of little things to do. The main headache next will be masking the canopy. I've sourced a mask for the Italeri Do217E which I'll modify to fit, I hope that'll make things easier. Here are some pics to show what progress I've made.

Chris teh Mystel is looking good!!!!!!!!!
Tom, excellent cammo!!

Gracias amigo! It's coming along nicely, I had an unfortunate disaster with one of the call sign decals which hit the plastic and literally stuck itself in place and broke apart. I'm waiting for it to dry and then I'll remove with masking tape ...I hope. And look for suitable replacement letters in my surplus decal stash.

Oliver, you look to be making a really good job to recover from your troubles, keep pushing on!

Thomas, very nice interior detail, there is plenty of glass there so some of it should still be visible once it is buttoned up.

Chris, nice progress, your twin twin build is looking good. A quick question at the risk of creating disharmony, have you installed the engine mounts on the 328 backwards? The angle of the engines under the wings doesn't look right.

Cheers, D

They are installed as per the instructions D, I agree the thrust line is all wrong, however they are angled sharply downward. I tried rotating the mounts but they simply reversed the angle the engines tilted at. Moving them further out didn't help either. I'm still tossing up whether I should rework them completely or just leave them as they are. In the original trials they were actually attached to the fuselage.

After looking at the kit and putting it on it's wheeled undercarriage the thrust line is straight with it on it's wheels so this might be intentional by Encore. This is purely conjectural as it is anyway so I guess poetic licence has to be expected.

All good Chris, it looks great! I was just comparing the build with the drawings in the instructions.
As you say, it is all conjectural anyway!

Cheers, D

Hi friends, finally I decided what to build for this campaign, here's my candidate:

I will use some detailing parts which I bought at different exhibitions, even before I got the actual kit
The cowlings of Quickboost are for the A-26K, but at least I have the better engines and exhausts.
Looking forward to cutting and glueing

You have a lot of fine models on your benches, so let's have fun, mates!

Hi Peter. Excellent choice, I have read some good things about this kit and one of my club members built one up a while back, he said it went together really nicely, no major issues.
One thing to note, only one of the marking sets in this kit is valid for a WWII aircraft, the other 3 are for post-war and Korean War options.
Good luck with the build, I am looking forward to following your progress.

Cheers, D

Yeah the drawings show them as horizontal but the actual build pics on the box show it as horizontal when on it's wheels ....... shrugs so I'm of two minds where to go with it.

I think I've worked it out! The clever engineers at Messerschmitt worked out a way to link the angle of the engines with the elevators and flaps, which increased the responsiveness and manoeuvrability hugely! At rest, they both angled downwards at the front due to the weight balance.

Given that, I would leave them and move on


Cheers, D

By Jove I think he's got it .... well that's our story and we're sticking with it!

[quote]....One thing to note, only one of the marking sets in this kit is valid for a WWII aircraft, the other 3 are for post-war and Korean War options.....

Thanks for the hint, Damian, unfortunately I've already decided to build the Korean War option...so I have to take that kit out of the campaign. There is still a P-38 Lightning in my stash, maybe...?
Have to think about it
Anyway have fun and I will follow the campaign

Good evening

I see lots of great updates. Pity that some of you guys are struggling with your kits of choice, but so far I see you dealt with problems fantastically.
So far I was lucky with only minor issues... Quite unusual, I'd say, taking into consideration it's me vs Airfix kit but if it's not the Airfix kit other thing had to hit me. My compressor doesn't like me and it keeps steady pressure only if it's more than 25 psi ... So I painted with one hand on aibrush and second on pressure gauge on compressor... quite comfy

It didn't go that bad though, so I can consider painting as complete. Here are results:






I'll let it dry for a day or two, then gloss coat and decals.

Cheers,
Radek

PS. Dang it... just saw on picture I broke top antenna and front machine gun...

Hi Radek,
your Dornier looks splendid so far!
And things like that happen to us modellers but we know how to deal with it, don't we?
Keep going!

Excellent choice Peter, I follow you