Landlubber Mike

Tom, no worries at all and many thanks for the kind words. I had a really hard time choosing the color scheme myself as these planes came in all different colors, including white, black, green, yellow, etc. Some had the full cowl painted like the ones I did, others had only half the cowl painted. I'd probably still be trying to decide if I had only one kit in the stash Great start on the Vaporetto by the way. Looking forward to watching you progress on that one!

Great start Tom! And love the organized work space!

Yves, this is absolutely incredible work. Just caught up on your log and I'm just completely astounded. I would have given a thumbs up to every one of your posts, but I didn't want to blow up your notifications box Nice job! For flags, you can also see if you can find a cloth/vinyl flag. They are easy to fold and add PVA to hold the creases in place. I've seen some take aluminum foil and paint it but my guess is the flag is too complicated in design to do that.

Incredible work as always! Very nice job, thanks for sharing with us.

Hello! A warm welcome to the forum from across the Potomac!

Absolutely beautiful! Very nice job!

Looking great Greg, another masterpiece in the works. I'll also echo what others said - that catapult is absolutely amazing, very nicely done.

Looking really good OC. Nice to see it with some teeth in

Very cool! I have their wherry model kit, and saw that they also had these 1:1 kits. Looking forward to watching it come together! Probably can't build it on the kitchen table, eh?

Very nice job - especially given that scale! Thanks for sharing with us.

I'm in on this one! Agree with Egilman - so impressive that one can pull off these models with all the intricate curves using card as opposed to pre-formed plastic. Looking forward to following along!

Thanks Ken, really appreciate the tips. I did just pick up that JLC one from UMM along with the mini miter box. They look great, and I think will help a lot with the resin. Can never have too many tools

Here’s a question - some of the resin parts are on fairly big plugs that are bigger than a quarter in size and a good 5-10mm in depth. Any recommendations on how to remove the plug? I bought a micro razor saw and was thinking of using it to cut as much as I can off, and using a rotary tool and/or sanding blocks to remove the rest. I read that resin dust is harmful (but really, what dust isn’t?), So just want to do things as easily and safely as possible.

Thanks for that info guys. I read Ian Toll’s first two books on the Pacific War which I highly recommend. Just saw that third and final book in series is out now - hooray! I was all jazzed up late night to start building, but instead i spent time fixing some of the parts that had broken, washed them to get the residue off, and organized the parts in a plastic box rather than stuff them back into a plastic bag. Also spent time organizing my thoughts on how to proceed by matching up the instructions for the kit with the Aires and Eduard aftermarket sets. The kit doesn’t have many parts, but my guess is that the Aires set is going to triple the build time with al the intricate details. The engine Itself has probably 2-3 dozen parts when all is said and done. The Aires set has replacement panels so you can show off things like the engine, the gun bays, etc. I’ll see how things go, but I might do a diorama of the plane getting maintenance on a carrier deck to be able to show things off and keep the panels.

Hey Roger, agree about the progression. Interesting stuff. Apparently the Wildcats were slower than the Zeros but built sturdier and ended the war with a great kill/loss ratio of 6.9 : 1 according to Wikipedia. Actually, a raft sounds a lot more likely. One would think the parachute would be with the pilot in the cockpit! For resin, you have to use CA and not the typical plastic cement. I don't know if the white glues work, but had some resin parts in my F4B-4 and P-6E builds that I attached using CA without problem.

Anyone know what part RP52 is supposed to represent? It's on the spine of the aircraft behind the cockpit. Is it supposed to be the parachute? It looks like it has the shape and texture of something like cloth:

So I spent some time working through the kit and the aftermarket. The kit is fairly simple to assemble, with only nine or so steps, and can probably be done in a week out of the box. Interesting way they approach the cockpit - the kit has you assemble the fuselage first, and then run the cockpit up into the fuselage from under the plane. At least on the last few planes I've built, the cockpit was built first and the fuselage assembled around it. The Aires aftermarket packet is a bit overwhelming. Lots of resin pieces, along with two small sheets of PE! The kit details are pretty nice, but in the second picture below, you can see some examples of how the Aires set adds a little bit more detail (for the top item, there's actually additional PE you're supposed to add to the part like the gear chains). Of course, one won't be able to see most of this detail, but I suppose the fun is knowing it's there. I also have the Eduard PE set for the kit, and it is mostly focused on the cockpit. Some of the details like the seatbelts and the dashboard are nicer than the Aires set. I might try both out, or possibly swap out some of the Aires stuff with Eduard PE if it looks nicer. I'll just have to take a deep breath and figure things out. Some of the parts are on fairly thick plugs, so it's going to take a lot of work to remove them. And the instructions are pretty much pictures. They are fairly well done, but sparse is probably a good way to describe them. Fingers crossed this goes smoothly...

Thanks guys, really appreciate the kind words!

Thanks man, really appreciate the kind words. I'm slowly getting the hang of this plastic stuff - a lot trickier than it looks! Thank you! Really appreciate it! Get better soon Lou! I'll try to delay my wife as much as I can

Hey Lou, thanks for the kind words! Really appreciate it. You didn't miss much the last few weeks except for me working out a bunch of new cuss words on things like the cowl, the pitot tubes, etc. You should definitely build that JRS-1! What a cool looking bird! I tend to like the quirky stuff. I'm not itching to build in 1/72 any time soon, but I've been looking for one of those since you mentioned it a few months ago. They are pretty rare for sure! Looking at plane "boats" I did come across the Airfix Walrus which is now in the stash. Ugly looking thing but I like it! Even found a cool catapult set to build with it to set it up as a diorama when I get a little more skilled. I'll blame you for inspiring me if my wife finds it

Unless you are going to build your own, I would consider getting the sliding table. Makes cross cutting so much easier -- and more importantly, much safer. Not sure if Jim is still building them, but consider getting a wider table top for the saw. With the wider table, you can keep the fence on the table while using the sliding table, rather than have to remove and reinstall the fence when changing the cuts you're making.

Probably logical, but I chose it because the box is in terrible shape and I was worried about keeping the contents secure! I have a Special Hobby 1/32 Buffalo in Finnish markings that probably should have gone next time wise, but it's a pretty nice kit and with a more complicated camo scheme, and I figured I needed a little more experience. Your card F4F sounds like a great, yet tricky, project! It has been nice building these in somewhat of a chronological order to follow the development of planes during this time. Amazing how much development there was, even during war time.

Awesome, count me in on this one. I have the kit as well in the stash with I think the Infini upgrade set. Looks like it builds into a really nice model.

With the F3Fs completed, I'm going to build the F4F-4 Wildcat, but as the FM-1 version. The Wildcat was a carrier based fighter that began with the US Navy in 1940 (and was known as the Martlet with the British Royal Navy). It was built by Grumman, but Grumman ceased making the plane in 1943 to focus on the newer, and more superior, F6F Hellcat. General Motors/Eastern Aircraft continued making the Wildcat identical to the F4F-4, but reduced the number of guns to four and added wing racks for two 250lb bombs or six rockets. I'm going to build it using the Tamiya F4F-4 Wildcat kit. From everything I read, the kit goes together very well and easily. Of course as per my usual, I'm making things more complex for myself by adding a bunch of aftermarket, including a wing fold set from Wolfpack that allows you to build the kit as the FM-1. I happened to get very lucky and find this kit on eBay with all the aftermarket shown below, aside from the Wolfpack set, for under $50 with shipping from Greece of all places. The Aires set alone, which has a ton of resin and PE components, retails for $55 or over, so I figured why not? For the color scheme, it's fairly simple - a nice change from my past yellow wing builds! Here is sheet from the Wolfpack set, along with a diagram I found of what the scheme looks like (reminds me of the coloring of Great White sharks): Finally, here are pictures of an FM-1 in the Smithsonian collection. While I live in the DC area, unfortunately it looks like it's not on display at the moment (and I believe the museum is closed due to Covid). Oh well 😕 https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/eastern-division-fm-1-grumman-f4f-4-wildcat/nasm_A19610122000 Should be a fun build! Thanks for looking in.

Thanks Roger, that's really nice of you. With the pitot tube and the rigging, I feel like I need some kind of displace base just to keep them protected, let alone, to show in a diorama setting. I knocked the pitot tube off one of them last night when taking the final pictures, and it took me 20 minutes to reattach