Hi Eetu!

Looks good! I like the way the preshading came out. Nice and subtle! Other side tomorrow?

Jean-Luc

P.S. For those thinking the wheel bays are looking like frying pans, well... it's the way they looked on those Moranes! :-)

I finished painting the camo today. Yesterday I mixed a batch of scale black to an empty vallejo bottle because I will be painting several FAF models in the future. I thought that just black and brown would make a too dark color so I mixed in some dark grey too. So, about equal amounts of black, brown and german grey were mixed. Before starting shooting it to the model, I painted a sample on some cardboard (with a brush, a mistake). It looked fine so I started painting my plane. I masked the and sprayed the green first. (masks for the black areas were enlarged photocopies from the instructions cut to shape and fixed with liquid masking agent.
Then I masked the edges of the green areas with white-tac sausages and masking tape and started spraying on my scale black. Tell me if there's something wrong with my eyes, but the color looked purple on the model!


It may be because it was sprayed on, not brushed. Or because of the artificial light. Perhaps it looks fine when varnished. I need to make some experiments with that... What do you think, does it look okay?
Anyway, my initial reaction was to fix the 'issue' by carefully over-spraying the ares with black. This of course pretty much removed the faint preshading effect the purplish black-brown had. After I removed the masks I noticed that I should have masked the entire green areas, not just like an inch from the edge. I had some overspray in the middle of some green areas. Fixing that wasn't good for the prashading either. Next time I'll spare no time masking everything that's not supposed to be certain color.

There, now it's black and green then, and ready for glossing.

I have to say that the preshading turned out the best on the yellow eastern front markings, the smallest areas on the whole model! Because of that I'll have to do some washing on the panel lines in the upper side.
I also need to experiment with that scale black. See how it looks with gloss and flat varnish, and most of all, is it purple or what! :-)

I was thinking about glossing the model with future before applying the decals. For that, I was thinking about trying the bottom feed mode of my 360. I presume I need to use more pressure? Gravity fed, I've used around 10-12 psi, how much should I use with bottom feed?

I got the decals in place today.



I found out the kit-supplied decals to be one of the worts I've ever used. I started with the wing-walks and they silvered very badly and I chose to paint them instead. Removing the decals revealed awfull adhesive stains, which fortunately will be covered with paint.

At the start I thought about only replacing the swastikas, as the color of the crosses was too light (and they came in two pieces), but I ended up using only the yellow number ones on the vertical stabilizer (fortunately they didn't go over the hinge line, I would have had to make masks and spray the numbers as the decals didn't want to react with micro-sol at all), and the tiny V's on the MS-631 codes. Cutting the decal film from the yellow 1's was quite easy but the V's were tiny!
Other than those, all markings came from Techmod's new Finnish air force markings sheets (which inluce a sheet of swastikas (either the early ones with white and late with bluegrey background) and two sheets of numbers and letters. The style of the lettering isn't 100% accurate but it's enough for me.

Hi Eetu,

Wow, you go man!

My B239 is coming along. I understand why CA has "Dry-fit all parts and check alignment' notes on almost all sets.

The engine and resin accessories are mounted on the firewall and engine mounts. The engine mount forward ring is too small for the hole in the firewall.

The wings have been assembled. They need smoothing. One side I used liquid cement, the fit was bad and left gaps all around. The other side I used thick CA. The fit was worse but the gaps are filled.

The cockpit and tailwheel bulkheads have been mounted and reinforced with thick CA. The tailwheel well front and roof appear to need filing to make the fuselage close.

Photos pending.

Ok, here comes an update from me... or rather lack of update... Planing to build C.A:s Buffalo, and yet I haven't even opened the box... Have to blame the for ones beautiful summer, but will hopefully get going soon.

My Morane is almost completed now. Pretty much all there's left is attaching the landing gear and removing the canopy masks, and perhaps do some more subtle weathering.
Also, I had a little accident with one the wing swastikas. Yesterday I noticed a small smudge of black paint under the right wing. I masked and touched up the spot. When I removed the tape, it lifted up a little piece of the wing marking. Fortunately it was on the light blue area. I decided to touch up that as well. This time I played it safe and stuck the tape to the table to make the adhesive less sticky. In the process I had to remove one piece of tape and re-position it. I ripped off half of the marking. Strange, it should have held. The decal was applied over future, one coat of future over it plus a coat of flat varnish..
Anyway, it was easy to fix by using a another swastika decal cut in half.
I'll post pics of my first finished entry soon.

My first entry to this campaign is finished! I finished the kit a couple of days ago but I had trouble getting good photos of it. After some trial & error and more than hundred pics taken, I got some good photos to show.










(this pic is one of the grainy ones, but it shows the peculiar camber of the wheels and the landing light which I added under the wing)





Opinions are very welcome as always.

I built the model built from MPM's kit (based on classic airframes' Ms.406) with the following additions:
- photoetched seatbelts from Model design construction
- pitot tube made from a needle and brass tubing
- machine guns made from brass tubing and styrene rod
- Decals, except for the yellow number ones on the rudder and the tiny V's under the serials, were replaced with markings from techmod's new Finnish markings set.

Painting was done mainly with vallejo and xtracrylics.
This was certainly a jump in painting quality for me, as this is my first completed model painted with an airbrush. Also, this was the first time I tried pastels in weathering, I simulated the exhaust and machine gun stains with dark grey and black pastels I borrowed from my sister.
I'm really surprised how much better this model looks when compared to my brush-painted efforts.

Speaking of brush-painted models, here's my "quickie" hurricane which I finally managed to finish. (if you remember, I started this as an "extended-weekend-off-quick-build" but it didn't quite go as planned...) As I started (and mostly completed) this kit before this campaign began, I can't really enter it, I'll just show it off.













This is kind of an "end of an era" type of build. My last model before I started airbrushing.
Pretty basic stuff, Revell's 1:72 kit, built straight from the box, decals came from Inscale's hurricane sheet. The only modification's were filling the outer two gun ports on the wings, as the kit is a mk.I made to resemble a mk.II by sloppily adding the outer MGs to the wings. The kit-decals were the only mk.II operated by FAF and a one russian plane. I really don't know why they marketed this as a mk.II, when you can have several different Finnish paint schemes on mk.I's.
I have onether of these kits in my stash and I'll build that with greater care to seams, paint job, decaling, adding extratech PE parts, and making those exhaust stains a little less heavy! :-)

Hi Eetu

great job on both models!

... just one question: Are you sure the main wheels on the Mörkö Morane are right? It really looks strange. Maybe you should try to use a metal axle (hypodermic needle or similar stuff) to have a better angle for them.

I really like the Morane, besides my comment !!!!

best wishes

Steffen

Eetu!
Looking very good my friend.
Ive been watching the thread but not had chance to reply til now.
Isnt it amazing the difference between airbrushing and brush painting.
Very nice preshading btw :-)
Question for you. What paints did you use on the Morane?
Im just getting into building the Hurricane you sent me the decals for ages ok and I'll be using the same colours :-)
2 very nice builds there, and nice to see FUMS taking shape.
Nige

Thanks for the compliments!

Alpha_Tango:
The wheels on the morane were really angled like that. I built the landing gear as it came in the kit, and they look a little too angled, but not that much. Modifying them could have easily resulted in a badly sitting model.
Here how the real thing looked like:


lampie:
I used the following paints for my Morane:
Xtracrylics RLM 65
Xtracrylics RLM 04
Vallejo 890 reflective green
black
(although mixing a 'scale black' will probably look better than using straight black)

Quite many people are apparently going to build CA's brewster (or are already building). Have you decided what markings you'll be using?

What shall I build next? Another one for FUMS, or perhaps something else?
I got two Brewsters (1:72 Hasegawa, 1:48 CA), a Bf-109 G-2, another 1:72 hurricane and a 1:48 Fiat G.50.
I was thinking about building that small scale B-239 as kind of a warm-up for the larger one.

Hi Eetu

thanks for the picture!

Still I can't believe it was operational that way .... there must be much broken axles ...

best wishes

Steffen

Here's the site were I found that pic. It's in russian but has some nice photos and drawings.
http://www.airwar.ru/enc/fww2/morko.html

Still not convinced about the wheels, huh?
Here's a couple of links with pics of morane ms-406, from which the Mörkö was converted.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.S.406
http://batfredland.free.fr/Meeting3.htm
http://modelingmadness.com/reviews/allies/boil3800.htm (pics of a model, but some really nice shots of a well built model)
http://www.kczum.ch/aviation/Morane/index.htm

Today I kicked off my second build for FUMS, hasegawa's 1:72 B-239 by washing all the parts. Since the kit's only serious flaw is the spartan cockpit (no sidewall detail at all, seat being too thick, only a decal for the instrument panel), I purchased a resin cockpit set made by Pavla. Actually, it's for a F2A-2, but it looks like I can use it pretty much as it comes. The instrument panel needs the lower panel triangular panel replaced by a rectangular one (sheet styrene and the kit decal will probably work fine), and shave off the shoulder belts from the seat and install an armor plate to it (Hasegawa's kit has it, of course, but it's grossly out of scale and has an ugly ejector mark in the middle), I think aluminium from a beverage can would hit the spot.
I'll be posting pics when I make some progress.

Hi Eetu and Stephen!

Yes, the landing gear was like that on the MS 406:



On Eetu's model the angle seems to be too pronounced indeed. But maybe it's because of the pictures. Could you shoot a picture from the front so we can compare with the plan above Eetu?

Jean-Luc

Hi Eetu and Jean-Luc

Ok, ok ...... I give in to so much reference :-) :-) :-) :-)

only the french can build such strange aircraft configuration ....

cheers

Steffen

^^No, it's not the pics, that's how the wheel fit to the landing gear legs.
Damn, I should have fixed that before I assembled the landing gear.
Here's a head-on pic:

Strange, internet modeler had an build-article of the kit and the author didn't say anything about the wrong angle in the kit parts (this led me to assume he built them straight from the box), and yet the photos show the angle being about right.
The article can be found HERE.


Are you aware of any way to loosen super-glued joints without removing paint, other than good old gentle violence?
How would you correct the angle of the wheels?
I can think of two ways.
- Removing the wheels and sanding the contact surface in the landing gear legs. Getting the angle right on both legs could be troublesome, and then there's the risk of damaging the legs and the rest of the model)
- Remove the wheels and drill holes in both the landing gear leg and the wheel and using epoxy to glue the wheels at the correct angle, epoxy working both as glue and filler.

I got the wheels fixed. I gently tried to remove the wheels. One wheel came off nicely, the other had bonded better and the landing gear leg snapped at the bottom of the oleo strut. I drilled holes to both pieces and joined them at the right angle with copper wire. Fortunately the slight bend is at the the bottom of the leg, and is covered by the landing gear door. The other wheel was even easier, as I could just glue the wheel at the correct angle. I used epoxy for strenght and bacause it acts also as a filler. Here's how it looks now.





All there is still to do is to touch up any shiny spots of glue with flat varnish.

Hi Eetu!

Looks much better now! I will build the MS 406 from Classic Airframes for the "Duel" Campaign later this year (I just have to scan the sky for a nice target, read Messerschmitt ) . I think the basic kit is the same so what you did go through will help me a lot! Thanks in advance!

Jean-Luc

Very Nice job Eetu!!!
That undercarriage is very unusual,,I wonder what the thinking was behind the strange angle?


Heavy hint JL,,LOL
The Camel will be finished this weekend,and Ive started the Hurricane.As soon as this gets to the primer stage I will start the 109.
Im ordering paints for both next week
Nige

Yes, you're right, the kit is the same, except for the nose. It builds up nicely, although extra work is needed to get the wheel well and components inside the fuselage to fit in. Also, the horizontal stabilizers need some sanding as the hinge lines are othewise at a slight angle, a point which I failed to notice before painting was already done.

Have you ordered the paints yet? On the IPMS-Finland's forums I was informed that the light blue I used is too blue.
I've tried searhing for references and I came up with this:

http://www.simmerspaintshop.com/colours/Finland.html

The page has a list of colors used on FAF aircraft in ww2 with FS codes. (it also has RGB and HEX values, but I don't think they'll be very usefull in modeling! )

I got started with my 1:72 Brewster. I've been fitting the Pavla cockpit and trimming the vac-canopies. I also wired the engine.







That resin interior really hits the spot. Note the nice detail on the sidewall panels. The amount improvement can't be even measured, the kit didn't have any sidewall details! :-) I included the kit-supplied parts for comparison. The armor plate on the seat was made using the kit part as reference from some left-over PE. The instrument panel was modified with the lower panel cut from the kit part (the interior is really for an F2A-2, but it looks the part, at leat in this scale) That will recieve the corresponding part of the instrument decal after painting. The vac-canopies are nice and thin and I'm thinking about making a opened canopy on this one.

Hi Eetu!
Looking good.The wiring is very impressive.I must have a go at that one day soon.
Ive ordered the paints for my hurricane and the 109 build already.Is the blue very different from what it should be?
Work on the Hurricane is starting to kick into gear now, and I shall be posting pics in the near future.
Nige

About that underside color. I'm not 100% sure, but lightening RLM65 with a little will probably do it. The color used was in fact RLM65, but I was told that xtracrylics' shade is a little too blue straight from the bottle.

I got this information as a response on the IPMS-Finland forum.

The undersurface color could be divided into four types.
1. The color in which the planes were purchased/found/captured etc. This color could change when the plane underwent major maintenance. However, painting just for the sake of changing the color was even banned.

2. Aluminium/silver: Aircraft manufactured and repainted in Finland. (usually represented as light grey or white in illustrations

3. ight grey was used on warplanes manufactured in Finland and planes repainted during the time the color was in use.

4. The so called "DN color" (RLM65 recieved with along Dornier 17 planes) replaced the light grey on undersurfaces, but orders were given to use up remaining grey paint before starting to use DN. This resulted in many different shades being used.

Thanks Eetu.
A very concise answer,and as with most of these debates, there is no definative answer. Im going to use the Xtraacrylics RLM65 and blend the decals in with a light mist of grey,which will take some of the blue tone out of the main colour anyway.
The fusalage is now closed up on my hurricane and its starting to take shape.That Revell Hurricane is a nice little kit!
Nige

Hi Guys,

The underside would depend upon the time the Buffalo was flying. Classic Airframes, Osprey and I recall the Finnish Air Force site all note that the B239s were delivered in overall aluminum lacquered. They were given the black & green top camouflage when war started and many were left with aluminum undersides, at least until overhaul.

They note the same with the cockpit, that many were left aluminum, but painted black as conditions permitted.

I acquired Osprey's Finnish Aces book and am reading through it.

Looking forward to everyones' models!

Fred

Hi all.
Work on my Hurricane is progressing quite well. The fusalage is together and Ive been working on the seams today.Its generally a very good fit so this shouldnt be too bad. Ive also filled the out of place outer machine gun ports on the wings and Im going to re position these.
My paints have arrived from Hannants today so it should come along relatively quickly now.
I'll post pics soon.
Nige