Zenrat's Flying Circus

[zenrat]

Started painting the '17. I'm doing the Airfix 1940 scheme (70 & 71 over 65) from the kit but then adding "rescue" markings painted over the balkenkreuzes.

I've also revisited an old build modifying and adding to it.
This is Pigsticker.
2009-08-01 at 16-08-04 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr
Built at least 10 years ago from one of these...

...I was never happy with the handlebars or the width of the footpegs.  It also didn't have a stand.
So i narrowed the pegs, rebuilt the apehangers as drag bars, and scratched up a kickstand from a piece of jumbo paperclip and tube.
I still think the seat nose is too wide and square but rectifying that will require major frame mods which i'm not willing to do as i'd have to disassemble the whole thing.  It'd be comfortable though with the big seat.
Pigsticker - 2 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr
Pigsticker - 5 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr
Pigsticker - 6 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr
Pigsticker - 10 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr
Pigsticker - 11 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr
Pigsticker - 19 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr

Engine, wheels, rear suspension, 'guards, lights, instruments, and grips are from the kit.  Everything else is scratchbuilt except the tank which is from a Revell Chopper.

[killnoizer]

Oh nice , four ashtrays direct in front of the driver !

That thing reminds me on the 80's with the upcoming custom chopper style here in germany , mostly based on Japanese 4 cylinders  , phantastic build !   

[killnoizer]

Snorkels are very popular on the urban 4wds I see round here.  The ones that never get water above their hubs.
I think i've got the PSR almost done and i've drilled a big hole through the front wing for the snork.

Always asked for a snorkel on our ( realy hard used )  4WD , i tell those guys that I don't need wet shoes and all the dirt into a vintage car  when we drove  out to sleep in the woods . 
I spend days of work  to scratch the old mud out of the frame and I bet I can find a lot more if I search again .

[NARSES2]

Pigsticker looks good 

[Old Wombat]

  

[Weaver]

The pigsticker's excellent: now all it needs is a sticker of a pig on it...

So you scratchbuilt the frame and the forks? Wow, that's a non-trivial undertaking - well done! 

I've thought about making a custom bike model a few times, but the nature of bike models throws up a few hurdles, like, for instance, the fact that they usually mould the chains and sprockets in one piece, so how do you stretch the chain to fit a hardtail back end? You could do a BMW/Zundapp chop with an extended shaft of course, but that's kinda been done to death for obvious reasons, I do have a CB400N that's destined to be a cheapo rat bike one of these decades though...

[Pellson]

Bikes are REALLY not my thing. But that is really impressive! 

Snorkels - well, there's two sides to that. I met for one having ridden with a mate in a Defender 90 when he managed to just dip the side air intake when negotiating a forest tractor track with deep puddles. The standard intake of a Defender sits lower than you might think, especially if you happen to lean over a bit to the right..

Also, and perhaps more importantly, when driving on really dusty roads, the front wheel will kick up dust just where the intake is located. Hence, a snorkel will spare your air filter.

The main downside though is the restriction of the airflow an extended inlet channel will bring. But a modern diesel will basically operate on regulating the amount of fuel in  an abundance of air, so there are some margins before things get complicated.

[zenrat]

Thanks folks.

H.  One way to extend a rigidly moulded chain (if you don't have a second identical example) is to use the top run to extend the bottom and then hide the fact with a chain guard.

[DogfighterZen]

Very cool bike!   

[zenrat]

Thanks mate.

I had a bike building phase when about 16 to 18 and have a box of 1/12 bikes which need fixing up in various ways.

[su27rules]

Very nice!!  

[zenrat]

Thanks.

RDO today.  So after completing a couple of chores I decamped to my shed.

More paint on the Do.17.  After some vacillating i've decided to go Finnish rather than Nazi.  Same colours but with curves rather than splinters in the top side camo.

First paint on an Eduard FW.190.  I'm adapting one of these schemes.
You cannot view this attachment.

Knocked up some partially lowered door windows for the WOT8, attached them and glued the cab roof on.

Finished painting the pilot and fiddled with a Space Battleship Yamato 2199 Cosmo Falcon (1/72 space fighter).  Decided on a scheme for her.

Also did work on the interiors of a Chevelle and a Brumby and on the engine of a Fiero.

Didn't start anything new.

[NARSES2]

Must admit I like the Red 10 scheme in the Me 109 K-14's, one of mine may get it as I've done a similar one to Herman Graf scheme already.

[Wardukw]

I've got several Eduard Me-109s in the stash and no idea what to do with em ..at the price I payed for em tho I couldn't care less ..so when a plan does come along I'm good to go 

[zenrat]

As I have been smitten by lurgi again (head cold - should be able to shake it pretty quickly based on past experience) sitting in The Shed all afternoon was frowned upon. Having napped on the sofa all morning while Mrs z binge watched Shadow and Bone I needed to do something creative so I went and dug out an unstarted armour kit as that would be simple clean up and glueing which I can do at the dinner table.

I grabbed the first 1/35 kit i bought when I got back into models other than cars.  Dragon 6265 PzKpfw IV Ausf D 3in1.  My release has a set of nazi tankers included.



I got this because I had memories of a similar kit way back when I was young.  Can't remember the make but it was a short barrelled Pz IV moulded in sand, all the hatches could be posed open, and the hull mounted machine gun had a moveable mount (young me thought that was pretty cool).
This is one of THOSE kits.  The parts breakdown is almost prototypical and the instructions complex as they are trying to show three build options plus choices of detail level (in symbols rather than words to save money on translators in international markets).
The drive sprockets are each made up of seven parts.  Unless you choose to use the sprocket rings with individual bolts.  In which case it goes up to 31 parts each.  I chose not to fit 24 tiny plastic bolts into 24 tiny holes (per side) as I didn't think it would look any different when painted.  Still took me an hour to build the first one.
On the plus side the road wheels have separate tyres which will make painting them much easier.
Tracks are individual link Magic Tracks (abracadabra - as if by magic my sanity disappeared) but they are at least already loose in bags (no or minimal clean up I hope) and there is a jig for building the top run and ends.
It will be whiffed.  Not massively, with DUKWy type scratchbuilt wonderfulness, but it won't be standard.  It's going to be in Hydra service for one thing.  Maybe in a corrupted Auscam scheme...

...oh, and with a dozer blade.