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Lightning Strikes Twice (at least)


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Now that the Mustangs are done, I started on the next pair for this GB.   Like my Mustang build this is the old best with the Academy kit vs the new king of the hill, the Tamiya.  

 

Opening the boxes there isn't anything that immediately stood out, the Tamiya detail is certainly more refined and there are clear differences in how the kits will o together though.  

 

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I started the Academy kit first, like most it starts with the cockpit.  The cockpit detail is adequate, with a floor, seat, seat cushion, frame, radio bay and separate sidewalls.  I gave it all a coat of MRP interior green, which quickly reminded me why I love lacquer paints.  It was dry by the time I ran a cup of thinner through my airbrush and I proceeded to brush paint the black parts with Vallejo Model Color acrylic.    I planned on doing this out of the box, but one thing I think all planes need are seatbelts.  To me they don't look right without them.    I looked through what I had expecting to find a set of Eduard American belts, but apparently I am out of those.   So instead I found a set of tan Luftwaffe seatbelts that look close enough.  They are generally the right color and it is having something in the seat that I wanted so I went with them.    The next thing looking at the instructions was opening up the holes in the wings for the lights, with Glacier Girl having one light and the other marking option having two.   I opted for version two, and opened up both holes.  The clear parts are thin and I installed them with some Revell Contacta clear glue which is my go to for clear parts lately.   Installing them at this stage is problematic since I will have to mask them, but I understand why Academy did this since they offer many versions of the P-38.    I did some dry fitting and alignment pins will help but getting everything lined up and glued without creating seams will be an issue.  The cockpit goes onto the one piece bottom wing and fuselage and then the top will sandwich it in so getting everything in place will be a little bit of a challenge.   I'll keep working on the cockpit this week and if the alignment doesn't go bad this should assemble fairly quickly.  

 

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I have built several Academy P-38s and they go together great.  My biggest complaint is the gear doors have no positive connection to the plane.  Looking forward to your progress.

 

Geoff M

 

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Finished the cockpit and glued the upper and lower wings/fuselage together.  The fit was good, my only complaint was seating the radio bay, it isn't seated up into the upper fuselage, but that will be really hard to see on the finished model.     The next step is the main wheel wells.  This looks problematic with the main gears being assembled this early in construction since that will be a fragile area to deal with while painting.    

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Got the main assembly complete.   Overall it is good, the landing gear can go on after assembling the booms, it just fits into notches.    The fit is generally good, there is a step on the boom where it attaches behind the wing it isn't too bad and won't be hard to fix.   While the fit is good it could be a little more sturdy, some tabs to lock in all together and get the right alignment would have been helpful.   The fit assembling the booms is good and there are a few locating pins on them.    

 

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Finished the main assembly this evening.  The fit for the cowlings and nose isn't horrible, but it's not great either.  These are pieces made for the specific version and this is where manufacturers tend to struggle getting all the parts for different versions to fit.   It won't take much more than some Mr Surfacer and a little sanding to smooth everything out though.   These issue could probably have been avoided with some tabs or slots to keep the pieces better aligned since all the joints are just butt joints.     The fit is better than I remember the Hasegawa kit and far better than the Revell/Monogram kit though.    Tomorrow I should get the seams filled and with a little luck be ready for paint by the weekend.  

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On 12/7/2019 at 2:24 AM, Kurt H. said:

Nice progress. The corner where the boom meets the wing looks pretty rough, but it sounds like you sorted it with little effort.

 

It's fixable, but not ideal at all.   I'll lose some detail sanding everything, but on this I'm not going to worry about rescribing it.    

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I've forgotten to take pictures, but the seams are fixed and the olive drab is painted.   I want a well worn Lightning as was common in the Pacific so I did some hairspray chipping.   My first attempt went a little overboard so I sanded it back and tried again with some better results.  

 

 

First attempt

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Round 2

 

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Here is where it's at now

 

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Some fun with masking this evening, I cut out the masks on a Cricut and applied them.   The mistake I did make was spraying the white first, I should have done it in reverse and painted the blue, masked over that and then painted the star.  That would have prevented the white showing at the edges, and I knew that but took the risk anyway.   Oh well, this can be fixed fairly easily since I cut out 4 times more masks than I needed.   

 

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On 12/16/2019 at 11:44 AM, Kurt H. said:

A very good example of "Fix that 💩" .  It actaully seems to work even better, where you painted over the overly chipped area,  the paint looks worn and thin as though it has been walked on. 

 

 

Thanks, I sanded it all back, but on the second attempt I sprayed a reddish brown underneath the olive drab to give the plane some tonal variation.      This unrestored P-38 that is at the Udvar-Hazy center is my inspiration without being as heavy as this, since this plane has had 75+ years to weather.   air_lightning4.jpg

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Discovered a self imposed problem.  The part I glued on for the front of the cockpit was not the right part.  There are two in the kit, one must be for the later models. So the front canopy wouldn't fit and I have to take the old part off.   Fortunately I was lucky and the part popped off with a little pressure, which was surprising  since it was all glued together with TET and I used some melted sprue to fill some small gaps.  Added the new part, I'll have to clean up the seam and repaint.  

 

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14 hours ago, Geoff M said:

Glad I am not the only one who doesn't follow the instructions 😁  Nice save.

 

Geoff M

 

I just saw the part on the sprue, it never crossed my mind there would be two of them for different versions.   It's fixed now.  

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Some progress.  One thing I really wanted to try to replicate is the distinctive pattern seen on many P-38s.  This seems to have been a tape and sealant applied over certain panel joints during shipping and with the removal of the tape dark lines were left around the panels.   I applied tape to the lines and sprayed MRP exhaust soot over it.  This is similar to Tamiya Smoke, it is very transparent and the effect I got is close to what I wanted but needs some work in a few spots.  The props were painted black and then the yellow tips sprayed on.   In hindsight I wish I had done some hairspray shipping on them since some P-38 props were beat up and the aircraft I am depicting operated on Guadalcanal.    The landing gear was attached, this presented no major issues, but the landing gear bays do look rather plain.  One mistake was the amount of weight I put in the nose was not quite enough to keep it from being a tail sitter.  Fortunately there is space in engine nacelles so I drilled holes behind the props and inserted lengths of lead wire into the holes.  I also got the exhaust installed.  I painted it first with MRP Exhaust Metal, then applied some AK Rust wash, and finally went over it with a thinned MRP desert tan.  

 

 

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Reference 

 

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