Els

Keith, thanks. Any pics of your Su-27? The only thing that I got done today was the crew. Here they are pretty much as finished as can get them. I have to give the people that paint war gaming figures a lot of credit. I don't know how they can do such a good job on these little things. I test fit these figures and the cockpit into the upper fuselage about 20 times while I was building it with no problems. Then of course when I had everything glued together and tried to install it it didn't fit. After a few adjustments this is what they look like in the plane. This is what they loo

Marlin, Qian, and The Bruin, thanks for checking my build out. Pinguis, I bought an RC aircraft prop the other day while I was at the LHS. I was going to build an engine and mount it on the tail of the aircraft like a pusher prop, but until I decide what I am going to do with the wings, this will have to wait. I like your cannon idea. You can never have to many BFG's. I did some work on the cockpit today. This is what I came up with. It doesn't need to be very detailed because you can't see much of it when installed. My sculpting talent was not up to the job. I sacrificed an crew fr

I got a little done today. I put some work into the top and added some more parts. I was going to vent the exhaust out of the top, but after cutting the holes, I don't like it. I will have to fix or modify that. I added quite a bit of piping to the bottom. I am not sure what to do with the intakes. This will not be a jet engined aircraft so it doesn't really need the intakes, but I still want it to look somewhat like a SU-37. I guess it would have been a good idea to have a plan before I started cutting, drilling and glueing parts. I like to build my aircraft kits in flight so I do

Thanks, It is a kit. Its hollow cast resin and it is huge. It is made by Black Heart Enterprises. They have several 1:1 scale kits. This is a link to the store: http://blackheartmodels.com/shop/index.html Els

Rom, Holmes, and Pinguis, thank you for the encouragment. It is a rough kit but I am not to worried about that since I will be heavily modifying it. Pinguis, I am not sure it will turn out in the steampunk style or the crap style. I am shooting for somewhere in between. I didn't get much done today, I had to buy supplies. First I chopped off the wings. I am thinking about making them flappable, sort of like the aircraft in Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. I am not sure though, that might be too far of a reach. I can always reattach them if I change my mind. I went to the LHS a

This is the only kit that I have in my stash that I have no idea where it came from. It is 1:48 and made by Mini Hobby Models, and I am sure that it is probably a knock off of someone elses kit. I have opened up the box and looked at it about 20 times since I have had it but could never get the motivation to start it. It has about a million parts in a huge box. Today I was looking for the next kit to start on and this box was in the way, again. I was seriously thinking about trashing it, to many parts to give to my son to work on. Then I remembered that me and the kids had watched 20,0

Moeggo, Thanks, I would post a couple more pics of the B-17, but I have already hung the kit from the ceiling (No shelf space). Besides, if I post more pictures, people will start to see all the mistakes I made. Here is a picture of the 1:1 predator. Sorry the picture sucks, but it is hanging on the wall and I had to use the flash on my camera. It really brought out the pinks in its mouth, they are not really that bright.

ChukW, Dahut, and Mikester, thanks for the positive comments. Ollie and Javlin, good luck on your builds, having masked the canopies and turrets I feel for what you are going through. Diego, I had a look at your blog and you build some very nice kits. Your painting is excellent. Again, thanks Els

After seeing Erwins, very nice build up of the 21st Century Toys 1:32 JU-87, I decided to pull mine out of the stash. This is supposed to be a Ju-87B-2 Stuka of 5./StG 77, Graz-Thalerhof, Austria, Spring of 1941. At least that is what the decal sheet says. I did a mini how-to for the the base here: http://www.arcforums.com/forums/air/index....howtopic=217733 I love these 21st Century kits. They are not the most detailed kits but they were cheap so you could experiment on them without breaking the bank. To bad they went out of business. I think I paid $10 for this when I bought it

Angels 49 and Jay thanks for the positive comments. Jay, I think this kit would look cool with some decals on it. I would like to see one decaled up like the old clipper ship aircraft. Els

Uncle Uncool, Thanks for the link. Thats a cool song. I am more of a Metallica type music fan but by the time the girls voice kicked in, I was bobbing my head and tapping my toe to the music. I looked for it on iTunes, but no luck. There are about a million versions of tubular bells though. I tried the method you suggested with the bomb but it looked a little off because of how far forward the acrylic is. It pushed the bomb out in front of the aircraft, and it looked like the bomb had fallen faster than the aircraft. I tried dremeling a groove into the bomb so that it would sit back fa

This is great, I love it. You integrated the parts from the two kits very nicely. It looks like you selected the perfect aircrew for this kit to. Nice Els

All, Thanks for the positive comments and suggestions for the bomb. I have made some progress with the kit. It is pretty much together and nearly ready for paint. I have just set it on the base for this photo. If I made another, I think I would use a little bit thicker acrylic sheet. This one holds it, but there is a little bit of a wobble. Progress was slowed because the company accidentaly gave me 2 left side tails. Since they are out of business, I had to modify one of the sides to make it a right. Toadwbg, I like your SBD. That is a good idea running the support through the pro

After seeing Erwins very nice build-up of the 1:32 JU-87, I decided that I wanted to dig mine out of the stash. Last year I was TDY to a couple of locations that had museums and in one of them there were some hand carved wooden aircraft models on display. I think it was at the Museum of Aviation at Warner Robins Georgia, but I have looked at the web site and cannot find any info. The exhibit was incredible, especially since he carved all the aircraft out of wood. I wish that I could remember the gentleman's name. If anyone out there knows what I am talking about please let me know. I am

SnakeJake and Aaron, Thanks for the positive comments. When I was just looking at the picture I noticed I forgot to put the clear parts on the leading edge. I already threw out what I thought was the empty box/sprues. I guess I will have to do a little trash can diving. Aaron, on a side note, I grew up in Yakima and my grandparents had a farm in Ellensburg. Its been about 25 years since I was there last. Its not a city you see pop up very often. I always had a blast when I was there. It used to be a nice small town. How is it now? Els

I just finished this B-17. It was built OOB except for the decals. I used Aeromaster decals to model Just Plain Lonesome from the 324th BS at Bassingbourne. Sorry about the crappy picture, my area to take pictures was not big enough for this kit. Other than a 1:1 scale Predator head, this is the biggest kit that I have worked on. I have to give props to the people building these 48 scale bomber kits. At times it felt more like wrestling than modelling. No matter how I was holding this thing, the wing or the tail or something was knocking stuff off of my modelling desk. I had to hang it

Paul, First of all thanks for coming out with after market items for kits like this. I don't really want/have room for two of these kits, but there isn't much to this kit so I have been thinking about taking it apart and adding the AM. Els

I was a lot more detailed before having kids. Now I have a limited amount of free time. I can either spend my little bit of free time researching details that 99% of the people that will see the kit in my display cabinet will have no idea about, or I can just build a model. More and more of late, I am satisfied to just build a nice looking two and a half to three footer. For 72nd scale I am happy with just after market decals. Usually with 48 scale I will also upgrade the cockpit. If there is an aircraft that I had some personal connection with, I will go the extra mile for that, but tha

I bought my old bottle at the commissary at RAF Lakenheath. Els

Thanks for all the positive comments. I just saw the other day that paraGrafix released a photoetch set for this kit (http://www.paragrafix.biz/product_detail.asp?MainCat=blank&SubCat=blank&PPartNum=PGX132). I wish I would have waited a little longer to build the kit so that I could have used that. It figures, I have a lot of kits in the stash that I wait years to build and they don't release anything. I couldn't wait to get started on this kit and they release something right after I finished it. Oh well... Els

I had to retire the first bottle of future floor wax that I ever bought for modelling. It was old and tired and should have been retired a while ago. I just kept trying to use it a little longer. Today I tried to brush paint it on a kit and it was thick and streaking. I don't know if you can thin future, I didn't try. I just decided it was time to let it go. I have had that bottle for about seven or eight years, and used it on a lot of kits. I went and bought a new bottle and did not realize how bad the old bottle was until I sprayed some of the new stuff on my kit. If you have had a b

Here are my latest from the chicken coup. I usually build three or four kits at a time so that while paint or glue is drying on one I can continue with another. First off a Zero that I changed to an Air racer. I used pine wood derby car dry transfers for the decals Next is an F-16. I was in the 36th at Osan so I used some Two Bobs A-10 decals to make up a flying fiend. Next a P-40. I used 1:72 Sky Decals for this one. I think that 72nd scale decals make nice sized nose art on egg planes. And last and most depressing is Eggie Rickenbacker's Nieuport 28 that I made from a corsair.

This is beautiful. Its got it all. Great building skills, Great painting skills, Great layout, and it tells a nice little story. The perfect package. Els

All, Thanks for taking the time to help me out. The ARC is such a great resource to have at your finger tips. This is the first forum that I have ever been a part of and for me it is so cool that I can post a picture of a kit I completed or ask a question and get respones from all around the world in a manner of minutes/hours. Angels49, I wish you hadn't added that list of F-105 decals. I saw a few that I will have to track down and buy. Since there are so few markings and the ones that are there are so degraded, I might be able to get away with making some on my computer. Those mixed w

I forgot to put in the first post that I did a google search and Wikipedia states that the aircraft is an F-105D, 60-0492. Els