1/32 Trumpeter P-38L Lightning- "Kicked Up A Notch"

[chuck540z3]

They are great. I didn't say your photos were bad. I hope your ego is satiated. I could stroke mine with a link to my business page or a pic of the $3000 check for a wedding last weekend, but I don't need to get in a pissing contest. :) I should have known better to post anything here anyway.

Thanks. Pics are taken down.

Peace,

Chuck

Edited August 23, 2015 by chuck540z3

[jinmmydel]

Anyway, my apologies. I didn't mean to hijack, or get into a combative argument, I was just giving my perspective.

I've been lurking here a long time, and I've followed - though not always commented - all of your builds. I enjoy them, and I admire your level of dedication to them that I can just never achieve. Honest to goodness.

[chuck540z3]

Anyway, my apologies. I didn't mean to hijack, or get into a combative argument, I was just giving my perspective.

I've been lurking here a long time, and I've followed - though not always commented - all of your builds. I enjoy them, and I admire your level of dedication to them that I can just never achieve. Honest to goodness.

Hey, no worries. I just checked out your models and I'm not sure If I like the model or the photography more. They are both fantastic!

[jester292]

How did this thread become so unhinged? Was looking forward to some sweet updates. Keep plugging along Chuck. Can't wait to see more.

Aaron

[jester292]

What do you use to rescribe lost detail? I want to update my hardware.

Aaron

Edited August 29, 2015 by jester292

[chuck540z3]

Patience grasshopper, patience! :D I have done a LOT of work lately, but not much to show as real progress. I should have a decent update in about 4-5 days. I am really happy with my results so far, which should answer your question about restoring lost detail- and eliminating detail that should not be there.

Cheers,

Chuck

[ascomt]

Hi Chuck

to say that your work is inspirational would simply be the understatement of the century. Add to that, the patience and dedication you show in sharing your knowledge and skills, not only in modelling, but other ancillary subjects, such as photography, makes you the Best.

Thanks and please keep this wealth flowing. God Bless You.

Alex

[chuck540z3]

Hi Chuck

to say that your work is inspirational would simply be the understatement of the century. Add to that, the patience and dedication you show in sharing your knowledge and skills, not only in modelling, but other ancillary subjects, such as photography, makes you the Best.

Thanks and please keep this wealth flowing. God Bless You.

Alex

Wow, you're making me blush Alex! Thank you very much for the kind comments.

Sept 1/15

Now a real update. As shown earlier, the boom to wing fit is not good at all and there are many changes that need to be made. Here's how I tackled it on the right boom.

BEFORE Pic. Note the gaps and mismatched panel lines.

For the outer wing to boom join, there are two panel lines underneath the wing that converge at the front of the wing root. Scribing a curved panel line is very difficult at the best of times, but scribing a curve on a curve cleanly is REALLY hard! You need a guide for your scriber tool and Dymo tape won't bend, so I just used a thin strip of Tamiya tape. Since the tape moves easily, you have to be very gentle with the first very strokes until you establish a groove. Meanwhile, the boom to wing join was sanded smooth and filled with CA glue where a remnant of the join remained.

There's a circular vent between the two panel lines which should be offset to the outside, but since the existing panel lines converge so quickly, I just left in the center.

AFTER Pic

The rear fit was a bit rough as well.

BEFORE Pic

After letting the join dry for a week, I sanded it down and rescribed the panel line and added some more rivet detail as required.

AFTER Pic

Remember that big gap underneath?

BEFORE Pic

After the join was filled with styrene, everything is nice a smooth now. You might note that I continue to use Tamiya panel line accent wash on all the joins to not only highlight them, but to also show any flaws. If there was still a ridge along the styrene it would show up, which it did, so I re-sanded the join and reapplied more dark wash until it disappeared.

AFTER Pic

Another view from the front to show the new panel lines that were added.

The other side was much easier to fix with just plastic cement as a filler. After drying for a week, I rescribed all the panel lines and added a few vents.

Before I added the left boom, I thought I’d check out the fit of the front gun panels and windscreen. Checking other builds of this kit, this area seems to have created a lot of difficulty with lots of putty and styrene required to fill gaps. After a lot of dry fitting, I think I have an easier and cleaner solution.

Almost all of the problems are caused by the center rib that the gun panels attach to. Left as is, it sits too high, dragging everything up with it. Trimming the bottom of the tab and cutting off a bit of the rib on the firewall it attaches to, will allow it to sit flush as it should. Further, the sides of the cockpit need to be shaved down for the windscreen to fit properly. There is also a gap on the left side of the nose where the left gun panel will not fit flush, so I added more liquid sprue and sanded it down.

Edited September 1, 2015 by chuck540z3

[chuck540z3]

Something really odd with the firewall is that it has a notch in the top of it, but the center rib does not fit within it, so I cut an small notch in it to allow the rib to fit in the notch. This allows the sides of the rib fitting to sit on the firewall directly.

With these modifications, the gun door panels fit fairly well when dry fitted. Since the nose will be closed up, I didn’t worry about the internal hinges and other parts on the doors.

The other side, where I added liquid sprue to fill the gap. Pretty good, and with plastic cement it will tighten up even further.

A view from the top. Nice and clean looking so far….

Next step is the nose and the guns. As shown earlier, the nose cone is really stressed with pin marks that distort the edges in 4 places.

This one is really bad.

The fix is more liquid sprue to fill the depressions. I need to recreate rivet detail, but putty is too brittle and CA glue too hard, while LS works perfectly if you put it on thin and let it dry for a week.

I’m also going to be using the Profimodeler Brass Gun set which is super detailed an much better than the kit gun barrels, which you can see cut off from the kit guns. The brass machine guns are two piece with a barrel and outside vent shroud, just like the real deal.

Things are moving right along again and I hope to be finished this build in November, one year after I started this kit, which is my usual pace of completion. Thanks for your continued interest in this project.

Cheers,

Chuck

Edited September 1, 2015 by chuck540z3

[A-10 LOADER]

SUPERB WORK but, we all would expect nothing less from you. This looks to be another stunner in the making, keep it going Chuck.

Steve

[Joel_W]

Chuck,

Excellent update. You sure covered a lot of ground. Just one question. The nose cone. Why not go with Thick Gel CA glue rather then the LS? It dries so much faster, and lets you shape, scribe, and add rivet holes in less then a hour, vs a week of waiting for the LS to dry and cure enough.

Joel

[chuck540z3]

Chuck,

Excellent update. You sure covered a lot of ground. Just one question. The nose cone. Why not go with Thick Gel CA glue rather then the LS? It dries so much faster, and lets you shape, scribe, and add rivet holes in less then a hour, vs a week of waiting for the LS to dry and cure enough.

Joel

Thanks Joel and Steve!

No real answer to your question Joel, other than I still like LS the best if I'm not in a hurry. It looks the same and scribes and rivets the same as the plastic, because it IS the plastic! Now I just add LS to a variety of parts I know I'll be needing fill in later, then just forget about them for a week or two until I need them. If the LS is thin enough, it's OK to work with in just a few days.

I've never tried the Thick Gel CA glue before. How does it scribe and rivet? The regular CA glue scribes and rivets just fine if you do it within half an hour, but it's just not the same as the rest of the plastic......

[Joel_W]

Thanks Joel and Steve!

No real answer to your question Joel, other than I still like LS the best if I'm not in a hurry. It looks the same and scribes and rivets the same as the plastic, because it IS the plastic! Now I just add LS to a variety of parts I know I'll be needing fill in later, then just forget about them for a week or two until I need them. If the LS is thin enough, it's OK to work with in just a few days.

I've never tried the Thick Gel CA glue before. How does it scribe and rivet? The regular CA glue scribes and rivets just fine if you do it within half an hour, but it's just not the same as the rest of the plastic......

Chuck,

I've only used the gel Ca glue a few times to fill in seams, and once dry, it sanded and took scribed lines just as well as thin CA that I would normally have had to use a few coats. I've yet to rivet in CA glue, but I don't see why not.

Joel

[chuck540z3]

Pretty quiet around this forum these days.

Sept 3/15

Here is something I tried that I think is a winner if you’re building this particular kit. As shown above, the nose cone is crude and I found that it doesn’t fit the gun doors very well, which presents a number of problems:

1) This model is awkward to handle due to its size, twin booms and extra weight required to keep it from being a tail sitter. Sanding down the nose area and adding detail on the assembled model will be very tough to do.

2) How am I going to fit the guns, once I get the nose cone on? I’d rather leave them off until the end of the build to avoid masking them in the tiny holes of the nose.

3) How do I get the gun barrels to fit straight within the holes and still fit the gun from behind?

So here is what I did. First, the brass guns were painted with gloss black lacquer followed by Alclad Gun Metal. According to instructions, you cut off the kit barrels and then drill holes in the front of each gun to accommodate the new guns. If the gun fit is off a bit or the rear of the gun isn’t perfectly aligned with the nose cone holes for the guns, the gun barrels will bind. The solution is to drill holes larger than required provide flexibility later. The front of the gun assembly was also painted black, because I don’t want to be able to see anything through the gun holes from the front later.

Next, I decided to assemble the nose cone to the gun doors as a separate item, so that I could sand and detail the front area much easier than glued onto the model. To do this, I detailed and cleaned up the nose cone first. I then dry fit the gun doors to the front with tape as in the pics above, then sanded down the rear of the nose cone and the front of the gun doors to get a flush fit. With everything taped nice and flush to the front fuselage, I applied some Tamiya Extra Thin Cement to the top of the doors and the nose cone, allowing capillary action to suck the glue into the joins. After the glue dried overnight, I removed the assembly and liberally applied additional glue to the inside where it wouldn’t show, which created a very strong bond. When that dried for 8 hours or so, I sanded down all parts to remove any bumps and lumps, then re-detailed everything. In hindsight, I should have waited a bit longer, because not all the glue was dry enough to re-scribe the panel lines cleanly, so what you see is still a work in progress. Some of those panel lines will be cleaned up later to make them more crisp and sharper.

I then glued the front of the guns to the nose cone from behind without the gun barrels. There are tabs on both parts to provide the right alignment, so this step was relatively easy. In order to have this assembly a “drop in” part, the rear of the gun assembly needs to be cut off to allow the firewall to fit between it and that rear tab. Crude as it is, I just used my sprue cutters to cut it off since you’ll never see it again later.

Here’s how it looks from the top after sliding it down from above over the rear firewall. Pretty good fit if I do say so myself. I still need to work on that oval cannon opening to make it more symmetrical, but those ovals around each gun hole will have to stay as is, even though they are not centered very well. They were hard enough to re-scribe the kit lines, so changing them now is almost impossible- and not worth it!

With the wide opening drilled in the gun fronts, the gun barrels slip into each gun easily, so I can keep them off the model until the end.

From the right side. After glue, those small gaps will disappear. The center cannon will also be raised within its opening once it is glued from behind.

The left side, which brings up a question for you P-38 experts. The front of the longer upper gun is almost flush with the front of the middle cannon. Is this correct? Looking at a variety of reference pics, this alignment seems to be all over the place from aircraft to aircraft.

So now I can just glue on the front without fighting with nose cone and gun door fit, but I need to wait until I add the other fuselage boom before I do. I still need to stuff some weight in the nose and I won’t know how much until this next big step is completed.

Since I’ve been yakking about Tamiya Panel Line Accent Color quite a bit, here’s what it looks like for those of you who have not seen it before. Besides highlighting detail and revealing flaws during assembly, it works really well as a pre-shade if you are painting lighter colors, like light grey on jets. Of course the main use of this product is post-shading as a panel line wash

Here I used it on my last build of the Trumpeter A-10 before paint.

After painting, those panel lines show up nicely, without being overdone with sprayed black lines like many models these days.

That’s it for now boys. Thanks for checking in.

Cheers,

Chuck

Edited September 3, 2015 by chuck540z3

[Joel_W]

Chuck,

I have used a similar technique for installing gun barrels both in the wings and nose cones of various 1/48 scale props. What I'm going to "borrow" from you is enlarging the holes that the barrels seat in. I've struggled with that off center/out of proper alignment issue more times then I care to admit. My F2A-3 Buffalo's wing guns were installed that way. When I looked really close, I could see that the barrels just aren't perfectly centers, and do in fact touch a part of the wing opening when in reality they shouldn't touch any part of the wing.

Joel

[chuck540z3]

Here's another mini-update- and one I'm not looking forward to. Looking at my pics above, it's pretty clear that the huge football shaped cannon opening is WAY too large and it's off center to the right to boot. I can accept the off center ovals around the gun openings, but this hole looks like a crooked moon crater to me.

As much as I dread the future work involved- and very lengthy time to dry- I have no choice but to fill it with liquid sprue and drill a new hole about half of the original size.

Using liquid sprue this thick is asking for future trouble, as I found many times on my A-10 build. Still, I see no alternative that will look good and if I can beat the problems I had with the A-10, I can beat almost anything! Time will tell......

Edited September 4, 2015 by chuck540z3

[kike]

I check every one of your updates and often just check the thread in order to have everything clear! the problem for me is that I have ran out of things to say! no questions because you explain everything in a stoopid-proof way so I have to remain silent just shacking my head laughing at me! but getting inspired and getting knowdledge for my futur builds!

Just wanted to let clear that my or our silence is not because of lack of interest, in my case is lack of things to say other that WOW! and it gets old really fast! Please keep updating the way you've always done!

Regards

[Skinny_Mike]

Looking great so far, and good luck with that nose

[Youngtiger1]

I'm with kike, so Judy plain Wow will have to do

[coneheadff]

Awesome work Chuck!!!...as usual :)

Learning from your A-10 build and an Alpha Jet build where I used LS to close a big gap I started avoiding LS, but I tried something else on another build.

I took a peace of sprue, soaked it in Tamiya Extra Thin for a couple of seconds and pressed it into the gap.

That way you use the same material, but it doesn't take that long to cure AND you avoid the problems of having too much solvent in your model.

Alex

[Spad]

As always, I follow your progress with great interest and attention !!!

[chuck540z3]

Hey Guys, I just posted this on LSP, so I thought I'd do the same over here if anybody is interested.

Liquid Sprue Tutorial

So- called “Liquid Sprue” (LS) has been around for a long time and it has many uses as a filler and an adhesive, but like most things used in modeling, it has its strengths and weaknesses. I am no expert on the stuff, but I have experienced what many of these properties are in the past 18 months since I started using it, so I offer what I have learned so far. The LS I am using is made entirely of Regular Tamiya plastic cement and small bits of sprue melted into a thick mixture right in the bottle. It is best to start off with a bottle of glue that is maybe only 1/3 full, to make room for the sprue. The consistency of LS I use is as thick as possible, but still thin enough that you can apply it easily. This is very much like creamed honey that is white and not the much thinner yellow honey that is easily poured. The thicker the LS, the less glue that needs to dry, which is very important as you will see later. It might take a day or two to achieve the right mixture, since the sprue usually takes several hours to completely dissolve before you can stir it. To apply LS, I just use the brush on the cap of the glue bottle or a small microbrush.

Let’s start with an example on my most recent attempt to tighten and straighten the cannon hole on the nose of this P-38 build. Here is the “Before” pic of the football sized hole as found on the kit part. Not only is the hole too large, but it is offset to the right.

This is what it looks like today after the application of LS a week ago. You can barely make out the outline of the old opening, but there are no holes or blemishes. Pretty amazing if I do say so myself.

Here is how I did it. I filled the hole with some LS, being careful to fill the entire hole and only a small amount of the surrounding edge of the hole. I then made sure I applied about twice the thickness I needed, to compensate for shrinking, but you also have to compensate for sinking. This honey-like mixture wants to fall through the hole due to gravity, so I inverted the nose piece several times over the period of 5-10 minutes until the LS set as it started to dry.

Here it is after drying for 1 week. You can’t let LS dry long enough, but 1 week for this thickness of LS is a minimum time period. Note how the LS has shrunk and wrinkled.

After sanding down the LS to conform to the rest of the nose cone, I drilled a small hole, then used a fine circular file to enlarge the hole to the size and location I wanted it, then carefully sanded it smooth. The base of the brass cannon has a large collar which I’ll never see, so to allow insertion of the cannon from the front, I placed the end of it in a power drill, using the drill as a lathe as I applied a file to the base, grinding it down to size.

With the cannon in place, the hole looks much better and more to scale, but a few problems are still left behind, both of which are very common when using LS. As the LS shrinks, or if you work the LS too much when applying it, air bubbles are very common. This pic shows that I also didn’t apply the LS to the upper right margin enough, which has left a depression behind.

To fix these problems I used to apply a bit more LS, let it dry, then sand it down again. My experience has shown that new LS applied to the older LS melts it and makes it unstable, so the process of adding more LS and fixing flaws can takes weeks to achieve a satisfactory result. The quicker and easier solution is to fill all flaws with ordinary thin CA glue, apply accelerator, then sand it right away. Before you do, it is best to open up the air pockets with a needle so that the CA glue can fill the entire cavity.

Here again is the nose after using CA glue to fill the gaps, then sanding it down smooth. As before, I applied a dark wash to check for flaws, which seem to have disappeared- at least around the hole. I will let this sit for another few weeks before painting to make sure there is no more additional shrinkage. More on that later.

Now I’ll show another example on my last build of the Trumpeter A-10 kit. The fit of the upper and lower wing halves at the wing tip have a very large and ragged gap on the underside.

To fill the gap and adhere the wings together solidly, I applied a liberal amount of LS to both sides, then squeezed the wing halves together, followed by more LS to the outside of the join.

After letting the LS sprue dry for about a week, I sanded it down, leaving a nice smooth finish. After paint, things looked pretty darn good.

Well, about 2 full months after paint, small depressions started to show up on the wingtips, making them look lumpy! AAAAGGGHHH! Apparently the thick application of LS was still drying months later- and shrinking- making it unstable. I bet I fixed both wingtips at least 6 times over the course of the next 2 months before things settled down. Lesson learned. If I had to do this all over again, I would still use LS, but much less of it and I would repair any flaws with CA glue. So here are a few tips that I now use:

Liquid Sprue Tips:

1) Make the LS mixture as thick as possible, while still thin enough to apply easily. The less glue, the less shrinkage. If the mixture is quite “stringy” when applying, that is about right.

2) LS will shrink approximately 40%, so double what you need in the first application to compensate for this.

3) Totally the opposite of the above, try to use as little LS as possible. It’s a fine line, I know.

4) Let LS dry for at least a week before sanding. You can still sand it after only a few days, but due to additional shrinkage over time, you may be wasting your time.

5) If you need to scribe a panel line through LS, let it dry for a month at least, otherwise your panel line will be ragged as the LS tears rather than cuts.

6) Try to apply LS in one application. Multiple applications of LS are unstable and they invite air pockets.

7) To fill air pockets and other flaws, use thin CA glue to fill them rather than more LS. For air pockets after sanding, poke a hole in them with a needle to make them wide enough to accept CA glue.

8) For the first 5-10 minutes, LS wants to sink due to gravity, so if you want it to remain upright, rotate the model or part until it sets.

9) If you used quite a bit of LS for whatever reason, give it an extra few weeks to dry before painting to make sure there is no more shrinking.

10) The last tip is very obvious based upon the above. Liquid Sprue can be wonderful stuff, but only if you are very patient and not in a hurry. If you rush it, it will bite you!

Cheers,

Chuck

Edited September 9, 2015 by chuck540z3

[zaxos345]

Great tutorial....as always Chuck!!

Love your work and attention to detail!!

John

[wardog]

Excellent work as usual Chuck; she's coming along nicely. The repair of the hole for the nose cannon looks much better. Good luck with the rest of the build.

Elmo

[kvlazer22]

Chuck, first I want to say your posts and tutorials are amazing! As a web admin and avid photographer I respect and appreciate the work you put in to creating such amazing posts, not even mentioning your phenomenal modeling skills. Standing ovation to you sir.

Now that I buttered you up I was wondering if you have any tips or tricks to your wiring techniques. The wire strands you created in the wheel wells and especially in the P-51 build would drive me off a ledge.

Keep up the great work!

-Eric