Hobby Craft Sopwith Camel

[lcarroll]

Tug,
     I'll join the chorus of singing the praises of your detail work; simply superb! I have two of these Kits that I stashed some time ago as "insurance" should Wingnut not release one, then they announced a future release. Notwithstanding they'll get used, at least one for a "Comic" version and your Post here will be a great reference.
    Great work thus far and a pleasure to follow along.
Cheers,
Lance
   

[Des]

This is shaping up beautifully Tug, the HobbyCraft and Academy Camel kits require a substantial amount of work but end up being nice looking models, yours is heading along those same lines and is looking extremely good.

Des.

[PrzemoL]

Beautiful effects on the fuselage - the wood panels especially look so damn convincing!

[Suffolk Lad]

Hello again guys, thanks for looking in Lance, Des and Prze and for your kind words of support.

Whilst I haven't been distracted by another project I have been busy elsewhere as the last few days (Friday thru' Monday) has seen preparation and 'put away' for a two day model exhibition in my home town over the weekend. I exhibited with my plastic model club on both days and also some model engine stuff so Saturday saw my 'Plastic' hat on and Sunday my 'ME' hat. Very well attended by the public and extremely well organised by the host club it made for a most enjoyable but extremely tiring weekend.

With it all put safely away until next year it was time to get back on the Camel 


First off was to establish the shape of the dashboard to allow the guns to come through then, once the shape was arrived at, before detailing it it was put to one side and attention turned to the front end. Looking at what info I have I noticed that some inspection panels (and the one below the fuselage) are held on with slightly protruding fasteners. These were simulated by squeezing the end of a piece of 0.4mm wire and shaping them a tad with a sanding stick cutting them off about 4-5mm long


Once fitted in drilled holes they made for a reasonable representation, the inside lengths trimmed back once cyano'd in place.
The spent cartridge chutes were simulated by drilling into the end of some evergreen stock then scraping out the corners to give the illusion of square tube.


The enlargement in the images makes them look a bit uneven but at life size it looks okay.



The guns were fitted to the top cowling and checked for ease of installing. They will have to be fitted to the top cowling first and the unit fitted as one in order to get them through the dash. The  Vickers machine guns are Eduard's Brassin range and, compared to the kits version, are exquisitely detailed. I left a couple of bits of etch off (in front of the pads) after finding it extremely fiddly to get it in the right place. The small holes underneath are where the pins go to locate them back in the cowling

With that done I could finally get to paint the front end. This was sprayed all over with Alclad 'airframe aluminium' first then pre shaded before applying the Tamiya 'Ocean Grey'. The guns are painted with Alcad black primer and given a dusting of steel pigment. A 'firewall' was cut from .010" card and some bolt heads simulated with PC punchings. The engine mount was turned from plastic and the whole area preshaded and sprayed with Alclad


(The light levels in my shop are not that good so flash was tried for that last image but it makes everything look so stark. I do have a light tent but that takes up to much space to have access to it all the time - back to the fluorescents then  )



Well that's the latest state of play as of tonight  - it grows slowly     Next up is to get the dash made and installed then the lower area of the cockpit can be tackled

Back soon - thanks for looking - Tug

[RAGIII]

Awesome work! I love what you are doing with this one!
RAGIII

[Des]

Excellent work Tug, what you have done so far is very good, the added detail is superb.

Des.

[coyotemagic]

Fantastic work on the access panel detail.  It adds tremendously to sense of realism.
Cheers,
Bud

[GAJouette]

 Tug,
Absolutely outstanding work my old friend. She's shaping up to be a real stunner. I've got to tell your wood effect is awesome and life like. Well Done.
Highest Regards,
Gregory Jouette

[bobs_buckles]

...and play of the highest order, Tug 
Keep going!

vB

[Doug Mace]

Yes, Tug....a stunner indeed...

[Suffolk Lad]

Hello RAG, Des, Bud, Gregory, Von B, Doug et all - thanks as usual for continuing to look in and those kind words of support.

Not a great deal of progress but what there has been has promoted a somewhat novel question - How big (or little) was the average WW1 British pilots rear end (that is as in backside  )

Sometime back I bought from Hannants one of those exquisitely sculpted and flawlessly moulded Barracuda Studios WW1 seats which has sat ready and waiting for this moment. With the dashboard shape established and painted with oils thoughts turned to fitting the seat 'whilst paint was dryin'. First up was to sculpt a cushion from some Duro Putty and it was then that I began to feel that this seat is rather on the small side for 1/32. The seat internal measurement is just 10mm which obviously makes for 320mm (12.6") full size which I think you'd agree would be a bit of a squeeze if the pilot was in his underpants let alone some warm thick trousers etc. Hmmmm



I dashed off an email to Barracuda in case somehow a 1/48 seat had gotten into a 1/32 package but so far no reply. I checked it against the WnW Snipe seat and though it's the same height at centre back it is woefully short in the width department. So, after a bit of thought - it's such a nice moulding it would have been a shame not to try to use it - I cut out the seat area leaving a small rib around the inner edge and then cut slots in the rib to allow it to be stretched open.


A piece of plastic card was shaped and cyano'd in place which resulted in a much more convincing place to 'park a rear end'


Thoughts turned to a new cushion with buttons so the seat was drilled and the buttons formed by heating the end of some 25 thou evergreen


Then the positions were pricked through using a needle from the underneath, opened from the top and the buttons pulled through to pull the somewhat flexible Duro putty downwards.


It has been quite sometime since I have used Duro and I had quite forgotten just how 'elastic it can be so this afternoon I found the buttons had 'sunk' well below this position as the putty swelled upwards.


It didn't look right so the cushion was prised off this evening, the 'buttons' drilled out and remade and the holes 'countersunk' a tad to improve the effect a little. I painted it straight after so it was too wet to take pics - hopefully tomorrow.

A town visit yesterday saw the usual detour to a well known local emporium so bought some HGW seat belts (for a Snipe and Triplane which I trust will be similar) and though I have those Yahu Pup dials some HGW instrument dials too so well set for the next stage 


Well, I guess that's all for tonight - hope you don't mind all this pratlin!

Regards - Tug

[Suffolk Lad]

Hi again guys,

Just thought you would like to know I have just heard from Roy Sutherland at Barracuda Studios who agrees with the 'assessment' and is going to have it remodelled and recast. Now I'm sure you'd agree that's dedication isn't it 

If he's reading this - 'Thanks indeed' Roy

Regards - Tug

[Suffolk Lad]

Hi Guys - just a quick update before the trek to Telford for the weekend.

The seat looks much better with a coat of paint on and the dash is nearly finished. After a bit of 'testing' the decision was made to use Aeroscale decals for the dials with a combination of the Yahu and HGW bezels. The compass was made from some Evergreen filed to shape and the switches from punchings of 30 thou PC. Not completely scale but it should look reasonably okay once installed. I'm having a rethink on using the HGW seatbelts but more on that later



I still have to try to [attempt] to fit the pulsometer. I just don't know how he does it! I spent quite some time trying to get the bottom attached to the top and I still have the glass to go! As a machinist in working life and used to working on (relatively) small components Lukasz's ability to produce such finely detailed renditions of the full size is nothing short of truly amazing.

Well that's it - all on hold for a few days and should you be near the Norfolk SMG stand do say hello

Regards - Tug


Addendum -
I thought there might be a area where this was more relevant but can't find one - if it needs moving Des please pop it in the right place

Does anyone else suffer from the 'well I'm blowed, I totally forgot I had that' syndrome? A model colleague called today and as we discussed the armour we used to make books started to come off the shelf and lo and behold these materialised


The one on the left was a reprint of 'engine' notes bought a few years ago when interest lay in the BR2. The one on the right was given to me many years back and is, I believe, an original and covers rigging notes of various airframes.

A couple of pages from the engine version.....


and a few more from the original


These are all separate pages held in with those dated studs each airframe has it's own page numbers and it looks as if some are missing as none start with 1!

These of course are somewhat topical 




I have checked the search facility to see if these have been referred to before and found nothing but if  they have apologies for repeating it. If not however should anyone feel they may contain something useful please ask.

Tug

[RAGIII]

Nice fix on the seat and cushion! The panel is excellent.
RAGIII

[Des]

Nice modification to the seat, it certainly does look wide enough now to suit any pilot. Have a look here, it may give you some information on the size of the seats.
http://www.wickerworks.com.au/wicker-pilot-seat.html

As you can see, the dimensions of a wicker seat to suit the Camel are as follows;

Width 47.5cm or 18 3/4"

Depth 38.8cm or 15 1/4"

Height 36cm or 14 1/4

Des.