De Havilland Mosquito FB Mk. XVIII Airfix 1:72

[flundstrom2]

Inspired after a fairly successful build of the Boulton Paul Defiant, I've decided to go for my Mosquito. My first acquaintance with a Mosq, was in a Tintin comic. I've built another ~100+part aircraft (a Stuka) before, so I'm really looking forward to building this one. It won't be too hard, and not too boring. It will also be the physically largest one so far, with its twin engines, and also the first one I paint using Vallejo Model Color.

I've also got an idea to complement this one with a Hasegawa Beaufighter from the same squadron. It would look nice in the shelves ... But first things, first...

[Kevthemodeller]

I built that back in the 70's https://www.scalemates.com/kits/186904- ... h-mosquito it appears it's the same kit. It made a nice model as I remember. Take a look at Tamiya 1/72 they're less hit and miss than Airfix. .

[Smiffy]

Looking forward to seeing your build. I also built this kit back in the early 90s as the version with the molins gun

[Smiffy]

Looking forward to seeing your build. I also built this kit back in the early 90s as the version with the molins gun

[flundstrom2]

Build has been going slow. I guess something called "life" got in the way. But finally, there's something to show.


The poor legless-pilot, with his and his companions messed-up faces. I did add some lighter flesh-tones to their foreheads, chins, nose, and jaw, hopefully enhancing the face. I also carved out a little surrounding their hands to give it a less molded look. Still not good, but better than it was. The instrument panel was very boring to start with, so I added a little gray to the dials, and emphasized the surrounding rings with silver paint to make them a little more visible when peeking into the cockpit. It looks a little sloppy, despite being painted with a 00000 brush, but I'm counting on that not being visible when watching from above. Maybe I should have used the Tamya weathering kit's silver instead?



After weathering the rest of the cockpit with Tamiya weathering kits (black, silver for highlighting the edges of the seats and some details on the walls, and some various shades of mud under the pilots' feet) I glued the things together. The dials do show up as I had intended, when watching from above. And the pilots remind me of the Thomson twins in Tintin.



And a dash of the mud can be noticed if looking carefully down on the floor.

The next step is to fasten the left fuselage. I'm also working on the stabilizers and some wing parts. The nose will need a lot of sanding and filling, though, so don't expect any new pictures soon.

[flundstrom2]

The cockpit was a little boring - so far no plane has beat the Stuka I did a while ago in terms of interesting details. But today, I left work early and decided to glue the fuselage. Due to some poor fitting of the instrument panel (maybe I had glued it just a tad too much to the front), I needed quite some sanding of the cockpit in order to get the fusealge to fit properly. Clothes pegs for the win, but I had to come up with something else for the front of the fuselage, especially considering the poor fitting. Some 20 years ago, I had boughy 100 re-usable cable ties.

They have basically as many uses as silver tape!

[flundstrom2]

Slowly, but steadily, progressing. Interior of wheel-well and engine mount painted with first layer. I intend to weather the insides prior to mounting the landingwheels.

The nose-cone pre-molded on the fuselages must be cut off, and replaced with another nose-cone for the XVII version, which is the one I'm building. So I bought myself a saw and sawed it off (relatively) easily, but I had to do quite some sanding to make it fit reasonably. Still, some filling and more sanding is required.
This is by the way, the first model I'm doing any filling on, but so far, things have turned out ok.

[flundstrom2]

A friend just shared a video of a flying Mosquito (one of the two airworthy planes in the world) on my FB, so I figured it's fitting here as well!
[youtube]rGfQQWOsoB8[/youtube]

The video also has a short article at https://www.warhistoryonline.com/whotub ... k-day.html.

[flundstrom2]

Continued with the landing gears. Vallejo Silver, followed by Tamiya Weathering master mainly in soot and a few shades of mud to get the dirty impression inevitable from those the runways.


And a detail:


But for some f*** sh*** da*mn f***muppet nuggetfar*ing c**k, a vital part has disappeared during the night!!! Will need to test my skill in sprue-converting to thinner thread. Willp must certainly be challenging!

[flundstrom2]

But for some f*** sh*** da*mn f***muppet nuggetfar*ing c**k, a vital part has disappeared during the night!!! Will need to test my skill in sprue-converting to thinner thread. Willp must certainly be challenging!

Yohooo! I found it while looking through the trashcan!

[flundstrom2]

After a lot of fiddling, the landing gear is finally fitted, together with the prop as well. The engine/landing gear mount took some bashing of the tweezers and a few curses, but that I'll fix later on. I expect to curse a little more during the touch-up anyway, since there are some parts that will be almost impossible to reach with neither a needlefile nor brush.


Anyway, the landing gear is in 6 parts, with a total of 11 (!) glue points that need to be glued at the same time as the engine/landing gear mount (!), and an almost perfect fit (i.e. "If I caaaaarefully bend a little here, and a little there, and increase the holesize for the guidance pins to add flexibility, I miiiiight get it right").

Next up: The second engine and landing gear!

[Vleugelmoer]

That is coming along nicely. looking forward to seeing her done.

As always happy modeling and keep sticking styrene.

Paul

[panzerman825]

Great job on this vintage Mosquito. Glad you used the aircrew....look good in there. Good luck with the rest of the build.
Bill

[flundstrom2]

After more than half a year, I'm back in business again. Summer forced me down onto the beach. During the autumn I stashed everything in the hobby-room and let the room to a student in a dire need of a temporary place to stay.

But finally, I've reorganized the bench, and gotten started again!



Anyway, what's been going on?

I've sanded and put on a second layer of Tamiya putty. It dries fast, and is slightly hard to get to stick to the plastics. Got to get it right within 20-30s, or it will dry to a sandy consistency, rather than a smooth, nicely sandable, finish.


And while that one cures overnight, I've begun painting the left wing, and priming the same side's engine/wheel mount.

[flundstrom2]

Yeah, I've done a lot; The fuselage has been sanded, re-putty:ed sand sanded again. A few very discrete jutting panel lines were slighly damaged, but there's nothing much to do about that. Despite sanding, there are some slight sub-mm dents in the putty, caused by the putty drying while I attempted to flatten it out. No matter how hard I tried, there were always some small blob that refused to dry properly. Anyway, looks good enough to me. The joint between the nose-cone and the sawed fuselage is almost invisible.

As can be seen, I have also painted it, this time with Vallejo, rather than the Humbrols I've used on previous models. It's been so long since I did a major paint job, I have actually forgotten how to do it, and thus I'm also unused with Vallejo. First layer became too thick, but the other layers turned out ok. I was a little careless, leaving occasional brush-marks and air-bubbles. It's very obvious that Vallejo is less forgiving with regards to scratches than Humbrol.

I even made a super-fast-gluing session of a Hawker Sea Fury T-20's fuselage,wings and stabilizers, to be used as a dummy. Always good to have.

[panzerman825]

Good work on the Mossie. Love the aircrew. Planes look better populated. Bill

[flundstrom2]

Weekend's here and I've been a little productive! Stabilizers were done on Wednesday, curing overnight. Yesterday (night) was the nigh of wing-fitting.



But ... Nothing fun is without a challenge. I was careless when I dry-fitted the first wing, not properly checking that it slid nicely into the cavities for the wing. I simply assumed it was poor fitting that caused the wing to fall off immediately, and applied glue ... by which time I realized that yes, it was poor fitting. It didn't slide in at all. It was time to use the file. Another file. A scalpel. The first file again. Applying force. Carving out a little. Filing. More force... Etc. Until I could get the wing completely in place. No matter how much I carved, filed and adjusted, the wing always seemed 0.1mm too thick, if not at one position, it would be in another.

After I finally had gotten the wing in place (making sure I could re-position it again prior to applying glue), the same procedure would be required for the second wing. In the end, I had accidentally scratched the paint of the fuselage, and the seams on the bottom had split a little. I guess there will be a day of filling, sanding and re-painting to come...


It's always hard to comprehend the size of the plane until the wings are fitted. In this case 23cm a wing-span. I've got a small Russian 1:72 fighter which looks like an ant compared to this one!

Next up: Continue on the left engine/landing gear. Did a little painting earlier today, but there's nothing new to show yet.