1/72 Blackburn Twin

[Alexis]

Excellent job on constructing the fuselages and looking forward on final stage . Floats turn out really super and the whole build is shaping up wonderfully so far 


Terri

[kensar]

Great progress, Stephen.  You'll knock this out in no time at this rate.

[Ryan]

Superlative Stephen.

Ryan

[RAGIII]

Outstanding work on the fuselage parts as always Stephen! You never cease to amaze Me with your Talent!
RAGIII

[lone modeller]

Evening All,

Thanks Terri, Ken, Ryan and Rick for the encouraging comments which I greatly appreciate.

I made two engines from a piece of sprue which I filed to the correct size for the centre and then added the cylinders from thick rod. I scribed the cylinders to represent the cooling fins and used thin rod for the push rods on the front.



The second fuselage was completed in the same way as the first and then I could cut out and add the fins to both. I also added the cockpit coamings at the rear from thin rod. The observant modeller will see just how much filler was needed to fair in rear fuselage decking on the second fuselage! One of the problems of these limited run kits is that sometimes the fit is not as good as WNW for example!!?





With the fuselages complete I could glue them to the lower wing. I did this one at a time and placed the wing and fuselage over the plan to make sure that all was correctly aligned: which I am pleased to report is the case!







Unlike the fuselages the wing to fuselage joints needed almost no filler at all - so sometimes limited run kits can be good after all. However the underside of the fuselage should protrude slightly below the under-surface of the wing so to make this look more realistic I cut some thin pieces of 20 thou card which were shaped to the under-wing profile on one edge and straight on the other. These were glued under the wing to align with the sides of the fuselages and then the gap between them had some card glued in place and finally liberal amounts of filler - which is even now setting so that I can start to sand and level it:



Thanks for looking.

Stephen.

[kensar]

I know how difficult it is to make two or more pieces exactly alike, but you have pulled it off here.  Especially impressive with 2 large pieces like fuselages.

[Borsos]

Wow, you don’t rust or rest, Stephen. Another impressive build and another evidence for your extraordinary skills.
That beast looks cool
 
Andreas

[Bughunter]

Fantastic progress, Stephen! Looks now like a twin Mustang
Very good scratch work with constant results, concentrating on what is important, in this small scale.

Cheers,
Frank

[RAGIII]

Amazing as always Stephen! Your fuselages came out great and look Fantastic on the wing!
RAGIII

[NinetythirdLiberator]

Coming along just great, Stephen!  I really like your tutorials...

[Manni]

Great progress, Stephen. Impressive sratch work. Thank you for showing.
Bye,
Manni

[lone modeller]

Evening All,

Many thanks to all who have left encouraging comments: I really appreciate them all.

I have done some more construction work and painted the bulk of the model and it is beginning to look like what you see in the photos. I completed the horizontal tail unit by cutting and inserting between the rear fuselages a piece of 30 thou card with Evergreen strip (10 x 20 thou) ribs. I also added the small units on the outer sides of the fuselage plus the tail bracing, and then the two rods which were set between the forward parts of the fuselages: I assume that these were for the engine controls on the starboard side (the pilot sat on the port side).

Painting followed - mainly acrylics for the upper and lower surfaces but Humbrol enamel white for the floats because I have some left from the past and I find that it gives a better coverage than the acrylic paint. The struts were Revell SM 382 which is another enamel - I just like the soft brown to represent the pine of the struts. The cockades were home printed and the serial came form an old set of RNAS/RFC numerals from Pegasus. The rudder stripes were painted:







The white dots on the upper surfaces are holes for the struts. To put the top wing in place I used a procedure which I have found from experience is most suitable for multi-bay biplanes. I put some of the cabane struts into the lower wing - in this case the pair on the inner side of each fuselage, and the outer pairs of main wing struts. I used ordinary styrene cement and placed the inner struts against the fuselage sides first, then quickly added the two outer pairs and lowered the top wing. I had put drops of cement into the respective holes in the top wing. I was lucky because three of the fuselage struts fitted exactly and the fourth only need a minor adjustment. The outer struts were a little more fiddly but still went into place quickly. The whole assembly was jigged with paint pots to keep it square while it dried out overnight. The result was what I desired:





This structure was quite robust when dry and allowed me to put in the remaining struts, one at a time, without problems. After these had been put into place I again left the assembly for a couple of hours to set properly before I added the kingposts on the outer parts of the top wing:







The model is now ready to add the floats and that will be the next stage.

Thanks for looking.

Stephen.

[Bughunter]

Stephen, that bird looks fantastic!

But may be the upper cockades needs a drop of softener?

Cheers,
Frank

[RLWP]

Incredibly cute!

Nice work Stephen

Richard

[Manni]

Fantastic work, Stephen. I love those "strange" planes.
Bye,
Manni