Global Scale Modeller

Doing this little bad boy for a Buddy Build on Facebook, figured I might as well do a build thread on it. Already have a lot of pics so I'll split it up into a couple of posts.



A bit of dry fitting on the engine, some nice detail here, except for the wiring harness.





I really like the detail inside the wing folds, but it won't be seen as I'll be building it with the wings unfolded.



Assembling the wheel bays, no issues here



Internal structure of the fuselage, should add a bit of strength, but none of it will be seen, which is a good thing considering how blurry it is.

Primed the cockpit. It's a bit basic in detail but so was the real thing as far as I can tell.



Two part instrument panel, a clear piece on top of a regular one with a decal to be sandwiched in between. I masked the instrument faces with Micro Mask and sprayed both parts with black primer. The masking went well but in removing it I scratched some of the faces. Will have to be more careful next time.



Here's the end result. Bottom part didn't come out too well but it looks alright from a distance. I always find decals hard to position over raised details, let me know if anyone has any advice on doing that. Next time I'll probably just paint it.



Here's the cockpit nearly done, I ignored the instructions and went with an interior green floor as opposed to grey. Couldn't find any pictures to confirm this but it seemed appropriate for the time period. The weathering was done by dry brushing a bit of aluminium here and there, black Tamiya panel line wash and the dust effect was created with Concrete Ultimate Weathering Wash. I also added a bit of tonal variation to the green with several shades of oil paints.



The wheel bays got a coat of Chromate green (Tamiya Yellow-Green)



and were weathered with brown PLW and some oil paints for a bit of tonal variation. I think they're still a bit too clean so I might add some more oily stuff later on.



Added some strip styrene to help with aligning the wings and add some more strength.



She's getting bigger. (yes, my workbench is a mess, yes, I should be ashamed, no, I am not :p)



Delicate photo-etch parts that like to ping away when you so much as look at them? Check! Still managed to

successfully install these two three-part belts. Once I annealed them they became rather easy to shape.

This is the loadout I want to put on, unfortunately the kit only comes with two 2000 lb bombs. Luckily My fellow LSP-er Jack sorted me out with a third one, which should arrive sometime next week. Not sure what I'll do about the central bomb rack though. I haven't been able to find any clear pictures of one from that time period. I'll probably customize one of the wing pylons to fit the center.



Another problem are the HVAR rockets. The top one is what the kit ones are like, the bottom one is from the Hobby Boss Thunderjet and supposedly the correct size. Guess which ones I'll be using. :p



I'm hollowing out the back ends of the rockets. I know there's supposed to be some sort of grating in the back but I'm not going to bother with that.



One happy explosive family!



Seam lines on the cylinders taken care of. A bit of sprue goo on top, sanded down and rescribed. Didn't bother with the sides as they won't be visible with the cowling closed.



Bit of fiddling on the wiring harness. These will serve as a guide to add some wiring later on.



Judging by what I found on the WWW this might not even be the correct variant of the R-3350 for this Skyraider, nevertheless I'm basing myself on pictures that look closest to the engine that's in the kit.



So that means adding some bits and bobs here and there:



That's it for now, enjoy!

Lovely start. MOAR!