Academy 1/32 Sopwith Camel refurb with WNW help

[Twokidsnosleep]

So, some may have seen I bought a damaged Sopwith Camel from eBay for $12 USD.
It was made by a modelling acquaintance, Harry, who passed away from cancer in 2017 and his daughter is selling his models.
No one was bidding so I thought what the hell...I paid twice the purchase for shipping from Chicago, but what the hell.

So here she is...loose rigging, missing prop and wheel assembly. A Bellyflopped Beauty


To honour Harry I am going to fix this up withought altering it too much. He was a good modeller and this aircraft was made and painted well. I also have an old Jaguar ss100 car and a Harley Chopper that he made so I am doing a little memorial display for him in my cabinet with his work.

[Twokidsnosleep]

So quite selfishly I also got this to mess around with WWI planes and see how they went together and see if I liked them.
I was fully prepared to make a prop, wheels and struts.
When I got the plane, I worked to identify what kit is was. A bit of googling and I find it is the Acadmy 1/32 one.
So that gives me paint schemes and such. Then I thought I could copy my WIngNut Wings parts, maybe another acrylic cast like I did on the Porsche whale tail.
But look.....WNW has extra parts in their box. Props, wheels and landing assembly. Hallelujah praise your personal god!!!
WNW instruction sheet with parts map...Blue stuff is unused parts.





Sweet sweet extra parts. They are beautifully moulded and I could not ever have scratchbuilt anything close.
These are all in Ultimate gelb yellow at the moment for primer base colour.


So with some slight mods, this will all fit. Hard part now is matching Harry’s paint as I have no idea what he used.

[Twokidsnosleep]

So I started with the prop.
Messed around with fitting it to the engine without breaking stuff...ya sure.
I drilled out the Center and put a brass machine bolt through, then sleeves of threaded brass tube to accept the bolt. More sleeves for bigger diameter and then drilled out the engine housing plastic bit. Now it slides on and can still spin.
Oops, no pics of that

Then painted everything Ultimate gelb as a base and brush painted Citadel Sunset and dark brown for the wood shade and some texture. Then just the dark brown for the grain. True Metal aluminum brush painted for metal bits. Quick brush of Future acrylic on top to seal and Bob’s your uncle we are done....my kids DO have an Uncle Bob.
Not bad for a first attempt at this and managed to get kinda close to Harry’s wooden fuselage areas.


So she now has a removable and moveable prop

[SMAddict66]

What a lovely bit of refurbishment and truly great back story.

Scott, you really are good man, a very good man.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Wheels and undercarriage painted and detailed


The plastic mouldings on these is second to none.
What I find odd is they engineered the attatchment for the wheel axle (painted aluminum here) to go inside the triangle of the supports and cement to a half circle space. So when we turn things over, the weight of the plane is on that glue joint and pushing it open with nothing plastic below it for support. I have had to re glue the darn thing already
What should happen is the axle should be seated into the bottom of the triangle so that the weight of the model pushes the joint together more While it sits on its wheels. Mechanical retention my friends, just a bit surprised at a kit with such a flawless reputation....but they saved my azz so shut up Scott

[Twokidsnosleep]

What a lovely bit of refurbishment and truly great back story.

Scott, you really are good man, a very good man.

Phil, that was a super nice thing to say and you made me blush
Thanks buddy

[Twokidsnosleep]

She will no longer be a sad bellyflopper....now upside down on her wings
I have the Ca glue on the struts for the subframe. I might brass pin in the rear arms as they have no mechanical hold otherwise


Have to find my easy line so I can redo the rigging...Harry didn’t finished it and I might as well practice that too

[Twokidsnosleep]

Got her to here...she is a pretty little bird
Still have the rigging to do, have to research it a bit first and I only have white EZ line

[Tomcat64]

Saw this on Dan's thread - superb work as always Scott and a really touching back-story.

Very, very well done.

[DrSprue]

Wow awesome Scott, just awesome!

[Twokidsnosleep]

Thanks Tony and Neil

[Fridgy]

She looks awesome mate, doing her proud

[Twokidsnosleep]

She looks awesome mate, doing her proud

Thanks bud
I have to make a LHS visit and get the dark EZ Line, I only have white and am too lazy to colour it
Maybe too chicken to start the rigging reno

[Twokidsnosleep]

Saturday morning’s lesson from the modelling torture chamber.....
Rigging a WWI Airplane

Firstly a few words of warning
Remove anything breakable and or precious from the vicinity
Small children and dogs WILL be offended by the verbiage you shout out...cats won’t give a shite
Alcohol swabs, but better yet drinks, are also mandatory.
Ok, now you are ready

Here are my accoutrements...I love that word

Soft glove for fuselage fondling
Those cool snippy scissors your wife has in her sewing set....used to have in her sewing set
Two fine tweezers
CA glue and kicker plus applicators and a glue pot

[Twokidsnosleep]

Ok part two after settling down the rabble in the Bomber thread

So my stretchy thread stuff, mislabeled “EZ” I might add is the wrong colour according to my research.
So I decided to get it silver/ grey but how???
Sharpie grey felt....ok but splotchy
Ultimate grey primer....a bit dark and it chips when you flex the thread
True Metal wax based paint...there you go, rub on between two cottons and dries lickety split



Annnd the picture gremlin wants to tilt this one sideways WTF

[Twokidsnosleep]

Let’s just move swiftly along shall we

So some threads are actual threads from Harry’s original work. The grey thread ties easily and is relatively user friendly.
The drawback is it frays and catches dust and DOG HAIR.
Anyway, nothing wrong with using thread.
Here I have CA glued the thread to the wheel base and used the unEZ Line for the Center part.
I used a little styrene ice cream cone shaped wedge to help hold the line in the fuselage and the underside of the wheel support with ca glue..there is no spot to tie it there otherwise


So you can see the fraying of the thread vs the elastic EZ stuff
The unEZ line is good, but is elastic so harder to tie, handle and whips and springs on you a bit.
I did manage to knot it and hold the knot tight with one set of tweezers whilst I applied Ca glue from the dabbler and hit it with kicker....three hands would be a helpful genetic modification

[Twokidsnosleep]

Lastly the wings

One side I was not careful of how I threaded and knotted the line through the openings at the top and bottom of the wing spars.
So I wound up wrapping line around the base of the support....no big deal, just a bit sloppy looking on close inspection
The line forming an X in the spar is coming off the wrong side and overlaps part of the front of the lower spar..sloppy

See how much line is visible around that upper support....hell it is all Ca glued in, F it now


But on the opposite side I was more careful of where I threaded the line and how I went only through the openings in the supports and did not wrap the whole spar
It makes for a cleaner look both on the top and bottom of the spars



It came out pretty good and I cleaned all the tags with those nice sharp little scissors

[Twokidsnosleep]

So some final words
It is a bit trying, you need some patience and good reference photos.
Be very cognizant of where your line goes in relation to other lines, parts and how it wraps the connection points...just to make things a bit more neat and tidy.
WNW were a bit disappointing in their instructions, I thought they would have the rigging all laid out like Tamiya does their hoses and such for cars, but no. Rigging is such an important part of the overall feel of a WWI aircraft, just surprising to me.

Thread works fine as does EZ Line. I got white so as to colour it what I wanted and ya that is ok.
I have heard others use stretched sprue...ya didn’t try that torture but it would work and no tying of lines

I did a final beauty shot of the aircraft, this time with a WWI figure...I think his posture really enforces how much fun one can have rigging an aircraft
Good Luck

[DrSprue]

Wow that was great (hmm tho, how did I miss this since Feb 12th??) I check every day and now I get your posts? Dunno??
Well done for Harry bud!!

(hmm that guy getting beheaded reminds me of an old movie I saw once......)

[Twokidsnosleep]

Wow that was great (hmm tho, how did I miss this since Feb 12th??) I check every day and now I get your posts? Dunno??
Well done for Harry bud!!

(hmm that guy getting beheaded reminds me of an old movie I saw once......)

I wrote these all in one go, just split up into a few posts
I have been giggling away at that ending photo just waiting to see the reactions

[DrSprue]

Wow that was great (hmm tho, how did I miss this since Feb 12th??) I check every day and now I get your posts? Dunno??
Well done for Harry bud!!

(hmm that guy getting beheaded reminds me of an old movie I saw once......)

I wrote these all in one go, just split up into a few posts
I have been giggling away at that ending photo just waiting to see the reactions

That aircraft does look really nice tho Scott. Awesome repair bud. Gets me to want to finish my old Monogram Wright Brothers Kitty Hawk. Hmm I think thats the only biplane I own... come to think about it.

[Stokesy44]

Dammit, I'm gutted I wasn't in on this from the start - should have looked more carefully.

Fantastic work and a great story to boot, what a brilliant stroke of luck you had the right WNW kit that came with spares - a superb restoration effort.

You certainly pick your projects mate. Really well done

[Twokidsnosleep]

Dammit, I'm gutted I wasn't in on this from the start - should have looked more carefully.

Fantastic work and a great story to boot, what a brilliant stroke of luck you had the right WNW kit that came with spares - a superb restoration effort.

You certainly pick your projects mate. Really well done

Hey this was a serious “how to “project
The guy with the chopped off head had it coming...or came that way

[exmoor]

Done a great job Scott

[Twokidsnosleep]

Done a great job Scott

Thanks Paul, appreciate it bud

[Tomcat64]

Absolutely stunning result mate - awesome work on the rigging

And a very poignant reminder to step back after starting up the engine too!

[Twokidsnosleep]

Absolutely stunning result mate - awesome work on the rigging

And a very poignant reminder to step back after starting up the engine too!

He he thanks
I had that photo in my head the second I got those figures
It is not so hard rigging, just a bit fiddly