Landlubber Mike

Hi Henrik, many thanks for your thoughts and observations. Just to be clear, I didn’t mean to imply that the Euromodel kit was of the Venus. Clearly they are different ships. All I meant was that Chapman’s Architectura diagram - which the Euromodel kit is based - looks very similar to the Venus which Chapman designed. In zu Mondfeld’s book, he shows the stern of the Architectura kit (again, the subject of the Euromodel kit) and calls it the Jupiter. Whether there indeed was a Jupiter I don’t know and can’t find any evidence of such a ship. But, I think based on the fact that it was in Architectura and bears so many similarities to the Venus that it is likely a Swedish ship and not a French ship as Euromodel suggests. All that being said, I think this is one of the most beautiful kit subjects on the marketplace, and the kit itself is fantastic when it comes to the plans, materials, etc.

Wow lot of very cool detail in this kit. Nice job!

For me personally, the least guesswork in a kit the better. For example, I'm enjoying building the Euromodel La Renommee, but having to mark out the gunports and make sure they were aligned, proper sweep, same run on both sides of the hull, etc. ended up being many hours of extra work. Maybe I'm a bit of a perfectionist, and maybe this is not an issue for others, but it was a real drag on my overall positive experience with the model to the point that I was burned out by it and put it aside to work on other things. While I'm fine with doing some research on things like colors and potential bashes to add more detail to a kit, I'm there to build, and I really don't want to have to spend the time figuring out the basics. So, I think this is the right approach (at least for people like me), and I can tell you put in a lot of thought on other kits you've designed (I believe you did the Pegasus, but I could be wrong).

Those look fantastic! Great detail!

I'd look online on Craigslist. Lots of saws there that were barely used in one off projects that are now for sale. I picked up the Dewalt a few years ago that had been barely used, with stand, light and extra blades, for like under half of retail. I think you'd do better going that way than buying a Micromark tool (which generally don't have great reviews).

Fantastic work!!! Great modeling, and the diorama really brings the subject alive. Excellent job my friend!

That looks fantastic EG - thanks for taking the time to experiment and share the highs and lows. Seems to definitely have promise... Would adding a clear coat help seal the wax, etc. in to help with the masking? I know that with bare metal foil, paints like Alclad, etc., adding clear coats ends up dulling the finish. Ends up being a catch 22. For my F3Fs, I'm probably going to add a gloss coat after painting with the Vallejo Metals in order to put on decals/paint insignia and eventually weathering. I've noticed that in taping the canopy interior, a bit of paint came up from some of the taping. 🤬 And I didn't tape very hard, so I'm a bit nervous taping without a clear coat of some kind. *EDIT* Just saw that you were going to call it a day on this one. Again, many thanks for sharing the experiment with us. I've learned a lot! Certainly understand moving on.

Thanks for sharing your work on this. Did you consider insetting the walls into the deck as opposed to having the walls sitting on top of it? It's a little tricky as the kit doesn't have a sub-deck on which to add the planking. I have been working on other projects, but have been thinking about how to handle the deck and various deck items.

Really amazing work Patrick. Beautiful!

Fantastic video, thank you for sharing!

I built the Caldercraft kit a few years ago and enjoyed it. It's a nice subject, good luck!

I'm on a Mac, but Apple has a number of different preview options that enable you to scroll through a folder (thumbnail views, etc.) without having to individually open each file. Not sure if Windows has comparable functions. I agree with this 100%! Not only to be able to get everything back in the box, but this is especially important for some kits like the Rolls Royce Phantom kit where the body shell needs to be supported (many times the body is either warped or broken in my case). Paul sold me a replacement for a very reasonable price.

Grant, really nice job on the wheels! To me, the wire wheels is what really sets these (and other models where the builder scratches them to replace overscale plastic rims) apart. Excellent! The steering wheel is fantastic. I've seen the Model Motorcars upgrades and while expensive, they do look amazing. With the incredible job you're doing on this model, In the end, you'll be glad you bought the upgrade I've thought about whether I could scratch build the wheel, but I am not confident I can pull it off. With all the alcohol and swear jar deposits, my guess is I'll just be better off buying the upgraded part. Speaking of expensive, they offer wooden rims for the Pocher FIAT. They look amazing but not cheap! The end cost is close to what I paid for the kit

My confusion mostly related to the bottom drawing - it seems to have a sharp drop in taper, but maybe that's because where the bottom of the "U" hits (in the middle top portion of piece 7), that area is much thinner than, let's say, the top of part 5. When I did my stem, I created a gradual taper from the hull to the tend of piece 7. My guess is that it looked fairly close to the bottom drawing in the end.

Another masterpiece, wow! Very nice job! For the railings, I see the PE stanchions. Are the railings themselves brass as well, or are you using some other materials (thread, monofilament, etc.)?

Nice tutorial, thanks for sharing! If you don't mind me asking, do you dip your canopies in Future? I wasn't quite sure why that was done, or the proper time to do so (before or after painting the framing, etc.). Do you also use scratch removers like Novus?

You should have warned us with those pictures - I needed sunglasses to avoid the glare I wasn't aware that they made all those other products. I've liked their Micro Set and Micro Sol. I'll have to look up the others.

Very cool subject and interesting scale. I'm in for this one. By the way, I read something in the last week that said that Meng is releasing a Fokker DR.1 triplane this year. Apparently it might be the kit that the now (potentially) defunct Wingnut Wings was developing.

Thanks man, really appreciate it. I was mistaken - I have two Montex sets, and the Montex sets also have stencils to add numbering to the plane belly. So, maybe I'll try painting the insignias and numbering, leaving the decals for the squadron markings and the tiny identifiers on the tail. It seems there are those out there that prefer to paint insignias and other markings, so I might as well try it out and get some practice.

It reminds me of Gilt Cream, which I used on some wooden magic wands that I made for my girls this past Christmas. Imparted a great metallic finish with a lot of richness and character that I didn't think I could get using paints. I'm looking forward to trying out gilt creams on wooden models with carvings that are gold, silver, bronze, etc.

Here's a question - for the US insignia decals, is it worth painting white disks onto the top of the yellow wings so that the yellow doesn't show through the white part of the insignia? I noticed on my last pair of models that there was a slight yellowing, which was ok because I weathered the planes a bit. For these, I might try to keep them bright and shiny so I'd like the white to be nice and bright. Any suggestions on how to do this? I did find a Montex set of masks that allow you to paint the insignias. I might try that, though I only could locate one set so would only be able to paint the insignias on one of the planes. Not sure I want to necessarily go that route as I would have to paint six insignias per plane - two on the fuselage, two on the bottom of the lower wings, and two on the tops of the yellow wings.

Thanks for the tip Craig. Sorry, didn't realize you had commented. I made a bit of progress the last few days and pretty much have almost everything painted up except for the aluminum bodies of the fuselage. I did go ahead and spray the belly bands first, as I've heard that Vallejo Metals don't like to be taped. I used the Tamiya white spray primer which went over the Mr. Finisher 1500 very nicely. No issues with spitting, etc. from the rattle can. For the white tail of the F3F-1, I used Tamiya insignia white straight from the rattle can and also had no issues. I'm also happy to report that using Tamiya's TS Camel Yellow (decanted and straight with no thinner through the airbrush) went on very nicely. Much better experience than mistakenly using the PS rattle can (for polycarbonate RC models) on my last builds, which needed a number of layers to cover the gray plastic, and tended to spit. I'm taking my time between painting steps to make sure everything cures at least 24 hours before moving on. I noticed that the Vallejo Glossy Black primer needs at least that amount of time as it tends to remain a bit tacky unlike the Mr. Finisher and Tamiya primers which dry to the touch very quickly. Unlike the last couple of planes where I assumed everything then tried to mask and paint, this time I'm painting the different colored parts separately, and then will assemble. It wasn't particularly fun trying to mask all the parts, especially when I had glued things like the fin stabilizers. It sounds like the remaining parts should fit cleanly together (that's generally been my impression of this kit so far minus the top of the fuselage), so fingers crossed.

Looks fantastic EG - looking forward to seeing how it comes out on the full model!

Beautiful work OC! Really nice job!

Great start! You're going to have fun with all that PE - that's a ton in that Flyhawk package.