Hello
,
I've been modelling aircraft - mainly jets, along with some modern armour - for the last twelve years. Despite those subject choices I've had a love of First War aircraft for many years but this is my first attempt to model something since the early seventies. Then I made, I'm pretty certain, all the available mainstream 1/72 kits at that time - Revell, Airfix, Esci etc. Overseas work occurred around this time and it was all left well behind though not forgotten.
Quite sometime back - have no idea when and certainly on a whim - I bought a 1/72 Roden kit of one of my favourite fighters the Fokker EV/DVlll. Though there was no intention to build it it sparked a desire to add more and slowly a small collection grew adding all those previously made along with some types only dreamed about before, the Siemens Shuckert for instance and some of the 'new' (to me) 1/48 scale. It's not a big collection by any means, none save one were ever intended to be built (Hanriot HD2 float plane) but even that still sits in the box.
When WnW were first released I confess I considered them to be far to expensive but, as time went on with build articles perused in great depth, seeing them at shows and on the net I have finally succumbed to their remarkable charm.
We - my wife that is - have several WW1 Aviation prints around the home. I say we as it's always been a joint decision to buy them. It all began with a Robert Taylor print of Sopwith Camels and grew from there. Since WnW evolution I have harboured the idea that it would be nice to have a small case with two aircraft in on the sideboard below one of the prints. That's my intent at this point though the desire to build others has obviously grown but 'first steps first'
I bought the Hobby Craft Camel quite sometime ago. I had previously entered one of my jets at Telford and whilst it did not place it was awarded the NeOmega prize which was any item to the value of £20. I chose the Le Rhone 1/32 scale engine thinking of it as an addition to the collection. When I saw the Camel sometime later I bought it to go with it even though it's the Clerget version.
Now it's not exactly a great kit by today's standards but it does appear quite accurate in shape and I've often looked at it with half an eye as to whether to have a go. This site has done more than most in making my mind up !
Enough of the preamble then - it's time to make that first step.
I bought the Windsock book recently, also available was a copy of WW1 Scale Drawings and the Harleyford books I still have from my interest in the sixities.
The wing has very prominent rib tapes and poorly represented riblets - quite thin and not reaching the spar position. At first I considered the rib tapes too wide so it was decided to remove everything right back to the main surface and replace them using masking tape. It was only after they were removed and several studies of the Ian Stair drawings later (particularly the cutaway) I noticed that there are two tapes per rib the top one being 2-1/2 wide which made the kit ones just about right!
A test piece was made from a piece of plastic card moulded to the approximate section of the wing and a trial to see how well the tape would adhere made.
The tape used was Kamoi tape - not used usually for it's intended use as it is a bit more adhesive than Tamiya. The tape was given a swipe with Mek Pak then primed - a quick test that showed promise. It was at this point I found I could not enlarge on the printer by percentage increments which scuppered thoughts of scaling the drawings up so the spacing was drawn to the scaled dimensions.
With the wings devoid of all protrusions the leading edges were added using several coats of primer
Once the test piece was complete the wing was tackled. This went well until it was realised the rib tape coincided with the strut locations
With some of the previously applied tapes now glued on, rather than change the positions which might lead to misalignment it was felt that a slight deviation in tape spacing could be lived with - 'this was after all a test project anyway' Hmm not so sure about that now!
After several thin coats of grey primer to seal the tapes each sanded down with 800 wet and dry paper the top surface was given a good coat of white 'high build' primer to help flare in the riblets and leading edge.
Apart from that spacing issue I was reasonably satisfied with the outcome and felt the extra work was worth it - now the fuselage could be tackled.
That's enough for a first post I'm sure you'd agree but I do have two questions which I hope someone will be able to help with.
The first is - Were roundels applied 'over' a PC10 coating or were they applied direct to the linen. I ask because given the probable opacity of PC10 I can't imagine a roundel would likely be seen through the underside covering if applied over the top of the coating.
The second is - I prefer using Tamiya paint to all other for spraying and do not particularly wish to change products. Can any one say what is considered the nearest colour in their range that approximates PC10.
I have sprayed the wheels today using 'Kahki Drab' - it 'looks right' if a little on the brown side. I'm not looking for the exact shade just a near approximation as a base to start from.
Many thanks in advance - hope that's not too long for a first post.
Regards - Tug
