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I've started on the Mirage 1:48 Lublin R.XIII D. This was originally a Spojnia molding, Mirage added two color options plus a note on a variation on one of the two. I'm going for aircraft 56-115, from the 26th Observation Flight, 2nd Air Regiment, Krakow--I like the unit badge :)

Here's the current box:

Lublin_R.XIII_D.jpg

One of the wing struts is pretty warped.

I'm also using the Part S48-001 aircraft detail set. I've also have the Part S48-098 Vickers 7.9 MM MG. I've got a profile on its way, but decided to start in on the cockpit PE.

Here are the basic cockpit sub-assemblies:

Part_48-001_a.jpg

The observant reader will notice the plastic throttle housing--the original launched into a LEO (low Earth orbit)....

And here's the cockpit further along.

Part_48-001_b.jpg

The stick (plastic rod & PE horns), MG drums, rudder pedals, and seats are yet to be added.

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The throttle had a body and 4 individual levers. The body was folded up nicely, including the rounded top. I picked it up with some tweezers to figure out where to put the 4 levers and, well, that was the last I saw of the body. I do find I need to study the Part directions fairly carefully. Even with that, I still find that some bits only make sense as I'm actually building the thing. Once it's built though, it's a pretty neat unit to replace the crude bits in the kit.

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Bought "Lublin R.XIII Variants Aircraft Profile" on eBay. I should have it late this week; will wait till then to finish up the cockpit.

Built the wing next. Sadly, the upper right wing was badly fractured. The fracture was completely through, like a tear.

Lublin_fractured_wing.jpg

Here it is after a lot of sanding and scraping to get the upper and lower panels to mate properly.

Lublin_built_wing.jpg

The wing roots had rounded edges, so I glued a thin strip into the, um, valleys. Will sand that smooth. Also thinking about sanding down the fabric texture, which seems very overdone to me... Also may thin the aileron control horns. I wonder why the PE set didn't have replacements? Perhaps the profile will tell me...

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Yes, you're probably right on the aileron horn. They would be 1.75" (45mm) thick at full scale, so that seems a tad over size.

Built the Vickers MG (Part S48-098). Did the magazines last night. Each was supposed to be formed by wrapping a band around a 4.5mm disc. I used a 3/16" (4.8mm) tube from Evergreen that I chucked in the ol' Dewalt and sanded down to the correct diameter. Sliced to 1.5mm thick using The Chopper from NWSL; set the stop and rolled the tube under the blade until I had a good score, then sliced clean through. Wrapped the band around, placed the top disc on and then attached the handle. Et voila, 3 magazines...

The weapon itself was built tonight. Folded up the main body, then noticed there was no bottom. So, I sanded some flat stock down to thickness and trimmed it up to fill the body and provide the bottom (you can see the little bit of white in the photo). A 0.02" rod provided the barrel. Built the handle (5 layers), and attached it and the other little bits to the body. Getting the sights on the barrel was quite the trick, but I finally managed to get it right.

Vickers.jpg

I'm happy :woo:

Hmmm, I need to redo one of those magazines...

BTW, the cockpit PE (Part S48-001) also has the top plate for three magazines, but the directions in step "L" are a little, hmmm, scant. So, anybody else that builds the S48-001 set now knows they need to put a 4.5mm diam x 1.5mm thick disk underneath the magazine discs in that set. Those are then placed in the box that sits next to the gunner on the cockpit floor.

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Working on the engine, prop, and fuselage.

The exhausts for the engine suffered from mold misalignment. So, had to trim about 20%-25% off on each side, leaving them a little wonky looking. I made the mistake of cutting them off the sprue before cleaning them up, so it took some effort to hold them with my fat fingers while I cleaned them up. Cleaning up the engine was easy. That's all glued up and ready for painting. Still waiting on the profile book, but in the mean time, I did find a picture of a J-5 on the net, so I may just go and paint that up.

The prop also needed cleaning up. Most of the blades cleaned up fairly well, but the blade roots were clunky. Spent some time cleaning those up based on various photos I found. Also filled in a sink hole on the hub. Will check again when I get the profile, but I think it's fairly good now.

Lublin-engine-prop.jpg

Worked on the fuselage next. Scraped off the plastic interior framing. Cleaned up the misaligned coaming around the pilot. Placed the PE cockpit in and saw the fuselage was too wide--i.e., the outside of the PE was about 0.042" from the inside of the fuselage on each side.

Lublin-too-wide.jpg

Thought about putting some plastic strips between the PE and fuselage, but they would have been about 2" wide full scale. So, bit the bullet and narrowed down the fuselage by sanding away the centerline of each fuselage half. The cockpit now fits well, but the observer/gunner's location, which was circular, is a little pointy now at the centerline. Luckily, the PE gun mount will cover this up.

Lublin-thinned.jpg

Hopefully, this doesn't cause problems with the wing struts...

Filled in the locating holes for the plastic step (using PE now) and a sink hole on the right-rear. Also calmed down the rough surface detail (it looks a little excessive to me). In doing this, I mangled the rudder control cable guides just aft of the observer/gunner, so I cut some 0.030" rod to length, drilled the ends with a #78 drill for the future Wonder Wire, shaved off the old bits, and glued in new pieces (see 1st photo). Also drilled holes in the forward rudder cable exits.

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Here's the ready-to-install cockpit

Lublin_cockpit.jpg

And the instrument panel

Lublin_instruments.jpg

Here's the fuselage joined and ready for trimming

Lublin_joined-fuselage.jpg

Dang... Just noticed the rudder pedals are still on the fret... :bandhead2:

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  • 2 weeks later...

Finally! Back to work!!! :nanner:

Here's the Lewis MG mounted on the gun ring. I replaced the flat mounting ring from the PE set with an 0.025" brass rod--I just didn't like the flat look of the PE arm.

Lublin_Lewis.jpg

I also finished up the fuselage by making the gunner's mount circular once again (see Sept 11 post) and mounting some PE plates. Finally, I have the engine mostly painted up. The pushrods are a part on the cowling.

Lublin_Whirlwind.jpg

That will have to do for a while, I'm off to NYC for my honey's 30th HS reunion this weekend, and then to Kôln for a conference. I'll be in Frankfurt next weekend; I'll check out Hobbytreff am Zoo and P M - Modellbau.

Edited by David N Lombard
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  • 3 weeks later...

Back to the USA! Köln and Hamburg were nice, but quite rainy on Thursday and Friday. Saturday in Frankfurt was nice enough that I was able to get around. Visited Hobbytreff am Zoo; while there were some Heller and a few other kits I hadn't seen, it was mostly like I find in the several LHS around here I frequent--I guess that just confirms the global nature of our hobby :thumbsup:

Anyway, back to building. In Aircraft Profile #231 and Mirage's color plates, what I 'spose is a wing-mounted generator is quite clearly visible. Found some sprue about the right size and shaped it for the generator body. Made the one-bladed prop from PE fret and used 0.025" rod for the shaft.

Lublin_wing_gen.jpg

With the pre-shading also done, looks like I'm now ready to commit paint to plastic.

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Painted the under surfaces with a mix of aluminum and grey. Looking at the rudder and elevator hinge lines v. the Profile, which shows a fairly large gap, I decided I didn't like the effect of the solid web between the stabilizer and elevator and fin and rudder, so I cut them apart and put in 0.18" brass rod for hinges... Much better... :)

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Yeah, the control horns on the ailerons, rudder, and elevator have been bugging me. They're a scale 2" thick. I'm going to use 6 mil Wonder Wire for the control wires, so I'm thinking 12 mil horns would be about right. I have some brass shim stock at that thickness. I've got 20 mil rod that I could use for the wire ends; perhaps I'll just butt them to the horns. I also found some potential stock for the cockpit coamings...

For the 3-color camo, I've enlarged the Mirage color sheets to the right size; I'll just cut the masks from that.

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  • 1 month later...

I've finally got most of the painting done. Here's the full aircraft

Lublin_camo.jpg

Here's the wing generator

Lublin_wing-gen_camo.jpg

And here's the tail

Lublin_tail_camo.jpg

As you can see, I cut the control surfaces off and pinned them back on--looks a lot better than the original solid web. You can also see the open space between the stabilizer and fin (and can't see the similar space between the fuselage and stabilizer). At first, I was concerned about the amount of putty needed to get those joints closed up, but I finally saw that the fuselage, stabilizer, and fin should not actually marry. While I intended to have the surfaces at a neutral position, there's a little down elevator, and I like the look of it.

Sadly, I found another molding problem. One of the struts is well cast, the other is ill-formed, so it's a tad short and mis-aligned. I measured the span between locating holes on the wing and fuselage; both port and stbd sides are exactly 2.3125 in apart, so it looks like I need to fabricate a replacement. I may well do both so they're more consistent.

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So I decided to fabricate both struts. Here's the better formed of the two original struts along with the rough shaped bits for the replacements.

Lublin_struts.jpg

Now, I just need to fine shape them and make sure I glue them up as I've laid them out here and not make two identical assemblies. :whistle:

I have an older boxing from Mirage and the parts are generally better formed; some misalignment clearly crept in. I've also had to replace the stabilizer struts and will replace two more bits of the wing struts, but at least these are all simple rods.

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Really neat, I particularly like the Lewis guns and the gunners mount.

It's nice to see what has turned up in this GB so far. It was such an interesting period of aviation but it usually gets lost in the mix of wartime aircraft.

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Decals are on. They mostly went on ok except for the unit badge, which partially disintegrated as they went on. They all took a long soak to get them to part company with the paper.

Here's the fuselage

Lublin_fuselage_decals.jpg

As you can see, the struts are on and I'm pretty happy with them.

And here's the tail

Lublin_tail_decals.jpg

You can see the gap between the vertical fin and stabilizer.

Applying a wash is next, followed by a flat coat and assembly of the final bits.

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