1/35 Aerosani Vertolet (Aerosan helicopter)

[zenrat]

 

[Dizzyfugu]

Very cool, I really like the colors! The Mil Mi-1/2! 

[frank2056]

Thanks, everyone! I'm going to finish painting the figure I use for reference - his t-shirt isn't dirty; it was just pre-shaded...although it looks like a dirty work shirt.

[frank2056]

I finished the figure - it's the 1/35 Modern civilian in jeans and T-shirt (FRB) from Reed Oak.

The closeups show that he needs some paint cleanup, especially between the t-shirt and the arms:



The eyes are decals from Archer Fine Transfers. They're tiny, tiny, tiny... but better than the alternatives:



But at a normal viewing distance, he looks OK:

[Wardukw]

Dude my absolute best looking figure looks like total crap compared to that..very very nicely done Franky ..very nice indeed 

[PR19_Kit]

Archer do some very good stuff, I used their louvre 'decals' (Yes, really....) on the Caterham I built for my brother, and they work amazingly well. 

[NARSES2]

That's great work Frank 

The Archer "eye" decals are interesting. I wasn't aware of them and they do the job very well  Eyes are probably the most difficult thing to paint when it comes to figures.

[zenrat]

Looking good.  He looks French me for some reason.
<shrug>

Eye transfers are interesting.  Not sure if I could cope with ones that small though.  I paint eyes with toothpicks.

[Tophe]

Looking good.  He looks French me for some reason.
<shrug>

Thanks! As a French man, I am surprised and delighted that you imagine French = good... But, here like everywhere, there are good and bad individuals...

[frank2056]

Thanks guys. The figure is French - it's a 3D scan of a Frenchman. I did a better job on his companion a while ago; also 3D scanned, also French:

Before the final touches:


The other figure is a combination of a resin head from Hornet and body parts from the ICM "Russians on vacation in Afghanistan" part 1:





Reed Oak has a fantastic collection of 3D scanned and printed figures in several scales and for the quality, not that expensive. I've used a sharpened pin to do the eyes, but that's easy to screw up. It's not obvious in the pictures, but I used the blue iris decals on this one. The archer decals even have a reflection spot, which is too difficult for me to do by hand.

[zenrat]

Very good.  Like the Tee Shirt.

[frank2056]

It's a "Dead Kennedys" t-shirt.

[frank2056]

This is the second aerosan helicopter, based on the NKL-6.

I decided to make it a coaxial, similar to the Yakovlev EG. I was dreading either scratchbuilding or designing the rotor assembly in 3D, but in the end it was relatively easy.

Using a picture of the Yak EG and a side view line drawing, I made a coaxial rotor assembly that's similar in spirit. I printed the parts out today:



Some of the support arms for the main rotor mast stuck to the supports used to print the assembly, so I replaced them with styrene rod. The balance disks on the rotor arms also suffered some distortion from lack of support during printing, but since they all came out with the same error... I decided to call it a "design feature" and not a bug. Here it is assembled:



The top rotor turns as well:



Overall, it came out OK. There are some issues, but not enough to beg a reprint. The blades themselves will be made of either styrene or paper. 3D printing them in resin or in ABS on the FDM printer is probably more trouble than it's worth.

I'm pretty far along with the interior and the large radial engine - a Shvetsov M-11, which is the same engine used on the Yak-EG. The pilot's seat is just putty. I figured the pilot would need something more comfortable than some wooden slats to sit on. I also added a plastic rod as a fuel line:



Here's the engine close up. I may add ignition wires but the kit engine is pretty nice OOB:



I mocked up the engine and rotor placement. I still need to come up with an engine mount and a transmission for the rotors:



The windows in this kit aren't as bad as in the KM-4:



Still, I cut them out and glued  them in place.

[Tophe]

 

[Old Wombat]

Wooden bench seats with cushions for the pilot (passengers are BYO) is just so Soviet!