Area 88 1/144: Rocky Arrival (DC-3)

[PR19_Kit]

That's one of the best 'worn paint' jobs I've ever seen! It looks terrific. 

[Scotaidh]

I like that!  It looks like aircraft I saw in daily service in an African local-service airline - "Air Afrique".  They operated in Chad - southern reaches of the Sahara.  Their aircraft were burnished by air-bourne dust daily and prop-driven grit/sand every take-off and landing.  Their maintainance didn't exactly run to touching up the paint - I saw one lose an oil pump (literally fell off the aircraft) during a take-off.  The pump fell about 30 feet and bounced off the runway ... the pilot wisely aborted and landed instanter - just cut power and glided back down.  Never left the runway, really, other than that brief vertical excursion. 

[zenrat]

Excellent.  Especially given the scale.  I'd leave it as it is.
If in doubt put it away for a week and then get it out and re-evaluate.

[strobez]

Thanks for the encouragement guys! The windscreen was a bit of a hiccup, but it is what it is... I've moved on.  I'm also glad that the popular consensus around here was just to leave it.  My biggest mistake with the hairspray technique was not waiting long enough to let the water do it's job and losen the paint.  There are a couple of spots where I was a bit overeager and rubbed the aluminum finish off as well.  So I was planning on just rewinding a bit and starting over, but while taking off the green paint it just sort of hit me.... one of those "hey, waitasecond..." moments.

I figured a transport plane that services a mercenary airbase in a fictional North Africa/Middle East country during a civil war would be look pretty much like Scotaidh Air Afrique description - so it sounds like I got it spot on despite myself.

Anyway, we're into the last turn here.  The wheels are now on, but since it's depicted "in-flight" I decided to try something I'd seen done by some other bright spark on this forum (although I can't remember who now...) and make myself some clear disks as a spinning prop stand-in.  Although given the story about Air Afrique... perhaps spinning props are not necessarily a given...

I do have to say cutting the blades off the propellers was hard... given all the times I've spent trying to glue the damn things back on after I've snapped them off, it was a bit surreal to do it on purpose.



The underside stayed together... but it's almost time to rough it up a bit too.



From this angle you can see the biggest gaf right under the windscreen.  Luckily, it's a bit hard to spot given the rest of the painting carnage.



I sprayed some Taimya "smoke" acrylic on the discs so they wouldn't just be transparent... but I think they need something more.  I think I'll try to add a decal of that "squiggly line" people use to depict a spinning prop in the comics.  After all, this is a comic-derived build, so it's not cheating.

[Scotaidh]

She looks great!  I really like the Smoke on the prop discs!  I've tried the clear discs several times, and they never look 'right' - yours look really good. 

I have, in the past, done a faded-colour smear on the outward bit of the discs, to indicate the Hi-Viz "don't run into the prop" painted tips most propellers have.  I used a Q-tip dipped in thinned out yellow or orange.  I touched it to the disc and lightly dragged it, with decreasing pressure, around the disc, not to exceed a "reasonable" arc ... Difficulty: you have to define what "reasonable" is for each build.

'Course, that was before the squiggly line decals were available. 

[zenrat]

Texter.
Westland Wowhawk 3 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr

Paint/clear mix.
Mitsubishi Mu-2S zenrat industries 07 by Fred Maillardet, on Flickr

I'm not 100% happy with either but think the texter one is better.  Next time i'm going to try painting squiggles by hand with smoke paint.
BTW, I also hate cutting up good props so I made the spinners from bomb noses.

[strobez]

Thanks for the great reference pics!

I immediately regretted doing it.  I should've just used a bit of sprue for the spinners and saved the props... I don't know what I was thinking! Especially since I got an idea of how to really jazz this up.

It might be too late for this project... but I can hear the Roden kit calling my name... 

[strobez]

So... the Roden kit did indeed call my name.  Since this project was kind of a do-over, I just had it hovering around in the background of the other projects I was working on... however, as it go nearer to the finish line, it jumped the queue and pushed its way to the front of the workbench.  So low and behold... I finished the project before I actually got around to posting the WIP up here... so let's jump into the wayback machine and visit that time I re-built a 1/144 scale C-47 for my Area 88 project...

So, let's see if the Roden kit really is better than the Minicraft one...



Sprues look nice and clean... so I think it is better.



Quick cut and tape together of the fuselage... but it's the engines that will make or break this build, so they've been drilled and painted.



Engines motors assembled. Looks like they actually fit.  The wires will be going into the wings, so probably safer and will avoid the problems I had in some of my other builds.



Added the upgrades to the interior of the wings and then glued everything in place.



Painted the cabin interior black (just in case) and then glued in the windows.



Fuselage glued together and engines assembled and glued on.  Sound check... everything still humming.



That mess of wires is tidied up and consolidated down to two that will exit the fuselage.



All buttoned up... will it work?



Yep. It works. Two lights, two engines humming ( one's a bit squeaky) and a couple of friends flying in formation for moral support...



Windscreen in place and masked. Flaps cut and reglued in position.



First coat of paint down... looks like I can still see a seam.



Green paint finally on. The light's a bit harsh in this pic though.



A nice olive green. You can still see the shadow of the seam, but the sanding/putty/sanding was getting to point of no return in terms of making things better.  So I had to decide if killing the seam was worth killing all the rest of the details as well.



Painted the nose and added the landing gear.



A bit of very subtle chipping along the edge of the wing... nothing like last time!



Added all the bits and bobs... and gave it a bit of a panel wash.



There we are. All done.



So if you want to see it in full-action, feel free to check out the short youtube clip - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kzBfYdktrg

As for the other C-47 I originally built for this project, I think it will live (die?) on as part of an tragic Air India crash diorama from Tintin in Tibet.

[TheChronicOne]

Nice!!!   You'd be able to sell your projects for healthy sums I'd imagine.     (personally I'd never get into that "side" of the hobby... the minute a hobby becomes for-profit it becomes a "job" and thus is ruined.    Just my opinion though...)    In other words, though, magnificent work, I'm impressed!!!   



I wonder if Roden do a civil boxing of that kit?

[PR19_Kit]

That looks a lovely and complex job you've made of that, but...................

(I almost hate to write this)

Haven't you got both ailerons lowered instead of both flaps?

[strobez]

No... why do you ask?

[TheChronicOne]

Oh no!!! Easily fixed?? 

[strobez]

Shhh.... these are not the droids you are looking for...

[PR19_Kit]

It looks as if both ailerons are down, which isn't possible in the RW as they're geared to go in opposite directions to make the aircraft roll. The flaps are inboard of the ailerons and can only go down.



You can see the lowered flaps here inboard, and as they're split flaps they don't show on the upper surface of the wing. Just on the edge of the pic to the right is the starboard aileron in the down position, but the port one will be up.

[strobez]

Well, I guess we all learned something here today...

Luckily, a quick break and a bit more carefully placed glue... and the wings are now flat again... flaps? What flaps?

Truth be told, I did think the flaps looked a bit funny, but just not funny enough to cause me to stop and question my choices in life.  Oh well.  I guess that's what I get for not including the obligatory shot next to a Tamiya paint bottle... Kit forgets how small it is and just focuses on how how wrong it is...