The RAF's sole Savoia Marchetti SM-77 - Egypt, 1942

[PR19_Kit]

How about this for a camo scheme then? 



That's the RA's 'smoke rings' overlaid on the RAF's repaired wing of the SM-77. The smoke rings are a home printed, re-sized decal scanned from a Taurus original, with the repair areas cut out after the decal was applied. Yes, that's the WHOLE wing covered in a decal, and no, I didn't do it all in one piece! 

Then there's a home printed triple FA fasces decal which has been roughly overpainted with Mid Stone and then an RAF B Type roundel on top of that. It was a bit complicated..... 

[tigercat]

My Hat off to your level of Patience good Sir 

[ericr]

 

[PR19_Kit]

I've got the other wing to do yet. That'll be another whole evening I won't ever get back...............

But it does look JUST like I intended a long time ago when I bought the S-55X kit. 

[buzzbomb]

Really well done.

[zenrat]

 

[PR19_Kit]

Lots of fiddly, little jobs on the SM-77 today, while the umpteenth layer of Mid Stone paint is drying.

The Delta kit comes with two small beaching trollies, as the aeroplane has two hulls of course, but they're NOTHING like the last beaching trolley I built, the monster, all hydraulic one for the Monetery! But, having built them and tested them under the SM-77, I found it was a full-time tail sitter of course, as the engines aren't real ones to give it the correct CG. So I figured it'd need some jockey wheels under the aft end of each hull, and the Lancaster tail wheels were going spare of course, so they've been pressed into service. 

The job I've been putting off for ages was to build the port engine pylon, but now I've bitten the bullet on that and the glue is drying prior to assembling it under the port engine pair.

I've also done the two sideways sliding bomb  racks, complete with their weapons loads, bombs on the starboard side and depth charges on the port. The depth charges were made by just cutting off the rounded noses of some bombs and filing them flat (-ish...)

[buzzbomb]

Details like that will set this whole build off 

[PR19_Kit]

MORE fiddly stuff, but included in that was the last construction work on the port engine nacelle.  With luck that'll be glued in place later today.

But first I've got to paint that wonderfully detailed Merlin that Revell supply in their Lanc kit, TWO of them even! Still, someone's got to do it....

I've painted up the torpedoes and the beaching trollies and finally assembled the gun turrets, with FOUR 0.303s each. You can never have enough fire power. 

The four props are almost done too, just awaiting their yellow tips now.

[PR19_Kit]

Now it's got FOUR engines. 

Sorry Tophe, it's symmetrical now.




The engine detail painting was fiddly, and needed some thought to do the various colours in the correct order. It needs a bit of tidying up yet, but it's not too bad.

[PR19_Kit]

 

The painting of the yellow prop tips didn't work worth a light.

My previous method was to dip them in a shallow pool of yellow paint poured into the cap of a defunct Humbrol tinlet, but this time the paint seems to have crawled UP the prop blades so there's far too much yellow. Maybe extra surface tension because of the cold?

I've now had to re-do the black and I'll do it the old way, a dab with a brush.

[kitbasher]

Great work, Kit 

[ericr]

 

[Tophe]

Sorry Tophe, it's symmetrical now.

You are forgiven

[NARSES2]

Great work, Kit 

'Tis indeed