Special Hobby 1/32 Nieuport 11 Bebe - French Aces

[macsporran]

After completing Roden's Nie 27 and CSM's Nie 17 I was full of enthusiasm for another Nieuport and managed to acquire a Special Hobby Bebe for a good price from a certain auction site.

First impressions are excellent. (Little did I know what was to follow!)
Typical shortish run model with nicely moulded wings with good rib detail, fuselage, tail plane and rudder and a good selection of minor parts in plastic and PE brass. The propellors (2) looked undernourished but I've got plenty of spares from other builds. On first sight I was delighted with the transfer sheet (decals to you - but they are always waterslide transfers, trannies, to me!). Perfect in register, good colours and commendably thin. (Huh - see what happens on application - later!)

I hope Special Hobby re-release this kit - but they have to change a few things - details later.

Sandy

[macsporran]

Onto construction and the interior was put together, detailed and painted ready for closing up.

I use the foiled trays from pharmacy tablets as little mixing dishes - here, for mixing oils with fast-drying medium. (one of the few benefits of getting older - you have tablet trays in ready supply!)
Sandy

[lcarroll]

Ha! I had a good chuckle when I saw your pharmacy "mixing tray" Sandy. I use the blister packs my hearing aid batteries are packaged in, age does have a few advantages!



Cheers!
Lance

[pepperman42]

Nice start!! I know the kit has quirks so I'm going to watch closely but I love the 11!! .....little eye drop bottles...what can I use those for?.....

Steve

[RAGIII]

Excellent interior work! I am looking forward to seeing more! I hope Special Hobby re releases this one.
RAGIII

[KiwiZac]

As a future Ni.11 builder - albeit in 1/72 and 1/48 - I'm excited to follow along with your build Sandy!

[Dirigible-Al]

Hello Sandy
I love Nieuports so I would like to follow this too.
Regarding Lance's post on mixing trays I use beer bottle tops. A whole new thread could be started elsewhere on this subject.
Alan.

[Bughunter]

Oh, Nieuport weeks! Nice selection Sandy.

On first sight I was delighted with the transfer sheet (decals to you - but they are always waterslide transfers, trannies, to me!). Perfect in register, good colours and commendably thin. (Huh - see what happens on application - later!)

I have build some Special Hobby kits and had no problem with their waterslide transfers. Ok, one Limited kit was equipped with Cartograf printed ones, which is high end, but also the other had no problems in application and looks nice on the models. Even the white print was opaque.

Have fun,
Frank

[WD]

I love anything and everything Nieuporty. 

Watching with interest.

WD

[Alexis]

Hey Sandy , following with interest as well , kinda of hard not to really .


Alexis

[macsporran]

Thank you for the encouragement chaps - we'll need it soon, as you will see!

So, basic construction - fuselage closed up, wings and tailplane prep'd, the all major components primed in white, ribs & spars etc drawn in in pencil and initial layer of MRP Linen applied.
Forgive me if I miss out detail pictures but I'm just using a Sony Xperia camera phone and can't get sharp enough pictures. (I bought a ring flash unit for my SLR but haven't been able to get them to communicate as yet!)

Lovely resin and PE engine completed and set aside.
Ribs were masked and Tamiya smoke wafted over raised areas. Tapes then removed and further coats of MRP Linen applied until I was happy with result.

At this stage I started to contemplate mounting wings and realised that although the interplane struts had attachment points indicated on upper and lower wings there were no locating points for cabane struts on either fuselage or centre section.
Hmmm.
S

[RAGIII]

The painting of the wings looks gorgeous. Interesting about the lack of moun ting locations for the cabanes. I am sure you will get it sorted 
RAGIII

[macsporran]

Much head scratching and test fitting, accompanied by much cursing led to little forward momentum - so the nettle was grasped and all struts - wings and undercarriage - drilled and metal pins fitted.

Holes drilled and carved for forward cabane struts and test fitted with blu-tac to guage correct height for top wing. At the same time the rear cabane struts were test fitted and fettled until a convincing upper wing location was established.
This step was crucially important as the lower wing mounting lugs were vestigial with little indication of where they should fit. Thus the only sensible plan was to mount the upper wing first then hang the lower wings from the V-struts and establish mounting points for them on fuselage.
This is a terrible let-down in a nicely moulded kit and almost caused me to bin the whole thing after futtering about with drills and blu-tac over several evenings. If Special Hobby re-release this kit, they MUST re-engineer cabane locators.

Finally, cabanes were mounted ready for next stage and in the picture you can see blu-tac around the undercarriage struts which also lack any indication where they should be mounted.

Of course I made many mistakes during this build and you'll see I've given the cabanes a wood finish - Doh!
S

[Radarman]

Sandy,
Thanks for posting this build. I'll be following your progress closely.

                                                                                    Kevin

[RAGIII]

Your strut mounting ordeal sounds scary but it seems you managed to overcome the difficulty. Again, I have to compliment the painting of wings and fuselage!
RAGIII