Canute

The kit fuselage has the opening for the chin turret already. That turret was a G model signature, as was the Cheyenne tail gun setup. Apparently, the last run of F models had the turrets, but if you want a tail number.... , A few F's were converted to YB-40 as long range escorts before the superb Mustang came on the scene and these also had chin turrets. See wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_B-17_Flying_Fortress Maybe a heavily gunned YB-40?

Really like your engine detailing there, Craig. Nicely done.

Denis, that's why Floquil was well liked. Fine pigment. Sure, you can use the dollar paints from a craft store and I do on structures and scenery. But for models that folks are going to study (thanks to hi-rez cameras and computer monitors), I'd like a paint blended for those models. Airbrushes do give finer coats, but not all of us are situated to set up a spray booth for any formulation of paint. Whether it's space available, solvent or lacquer and availability is also a factor. Thinning your brush paints like you suggest works very well. Oil paints are good for weathering. I've seen some master work done with oils.

I remember looking at the blimps going in and out of Lakehurst when we went to the Jersey shore when I was a little guy. What did they cruise at. They looked slow. I think we passed them if they were paralleling the Garden State Parkway (newly opened back then in the mid 50s).

Nothing there, Lou. No stress. It's like when you hear a certain tune on the radio/CD/mp3/streaming device and good memories pop into your noggin. I hear American Pie and think about me and my frontseater bugging the local base restaurant at Korat about the water buffalo steaks we were eating that they claimed was Kobe beef. Too chewy, by far. I lost him way too soon, although it was almost 10 years later. Peacetime flying accident. Overloaded airplane, underpowered airplane. Don't worry guys, I'm OK; that story has a thick scar over it. I did get film from Uncle Sam's photo guys to shoot slides while on missions. We had a "deal". Capeesh, Lou We couldn't let a combat photographer get in harm's way, you know. The film guys kept what they wanted and we got the rest. Sometimes half a roll of film might be shot on a tour of the water markets in Bangkok. Our standing joke was if we were shot down, we'd pull out the camera and swear we were just taking pictures, not combatants. 😁 Those dirigible hangars are a sight, Lou. You'd be wowed. Unknown if any still exist on the West Coast. Sorry I hijacked your log, Mark. Forgive me, brother.

Flashback with the paddy picture. NAS Lakehurst, in New Jersey, has a pair of those monster hangars. They train the Navy deck handlers in one of them, I was told. And you know of the history with the zepplin there.

Yeah, bad luck with the decals. Luckily, it's a popular kit with lots of them available. Paint job is superb, Craig.

I went to an engineering school. In 69-70, I had a class with an antiwar activist type (he spent the first 5 minutes of every class talking about stuff he was doing in that area). I had to attend my Wednesday morning class in uniform, since it was our weekly ROTC drill session right after this class. The first few weeks with this guy were frosty. At mid-term, I had a C. How much he influenced that I don't know. Anyway, we did an all-nighter, at my fraternity house, gathering assorted problems for our notebooks. Engineering school = open book finals. Should be easy? Nope, took all 4 allotted hours to do the final, burning up my slide rule. I must have aced the final, because my final grade was an A. I didn't get a welcome home from anyone outside my family until the mid 80s. A lot of misguided folks believed the propaganda being spewed in the 60-70s. Still a bit of a sore subject for me. Anyway, enough hijacking Lou's build.

Mark, primer on plastic, especially with using modeling putty. The putty sucks up paint; primer helps. And if you want to paint yellow or red, you must prime. They're translucent, so you need white or light gray underneath. Follow CDW, Popeye and others work on plastic.

Lou, check this link. Michael has a lot on these pages. https://www.cybermodeler.com/aircraft/h-1/h-1_all.shtml Yeah, my return to the Big BX was not too shiny. Told to stash the uniforms before we left Travis AFB, Cal. Got spit at by the yokels in San Francisco. Luckily, my relatives picked me up pretty quick and I went low profile for a while. When I got home to Jersey, I was pretty safe, since a lot of my relatives were vets, as were many guys on the block I grew up on. I went to Germany, the folks around our base were friendly and my squadron mates were great guys. The job was good, so I stayed.

Well, yeah, I stayed in after Nam and had some fun flying here, there and darn near everywhere. Not much call for fighter types. I did have a hip pocket link to a few big chemical companies (Dow, duPont, Mobil) thanks to interviews I had with them when I was in college. Problem for me was the 28 year break from college to AF retirement. Flying was fun, but the guys and gals I got to work with made up a big part of why I stayed in the AF.

Lou, do you know the difference between a fighter pilot war story and a fairy tale? The fairy tale starts out "Once upon a time....". War stories start out "this is no s**t... ". If you want war stories, I'll chime in where appropriate. I'm sure there are other vets, from any number of countries, with stories. Military Aviation is hours of boredom, interspersed with minutes of stark terror,

Looking forward to your commemorative build, Lou.

I remember using a couple of that size bottles, painting a Monogram P-47 and a Revell B-25 Tokyo Raider. I think we had a real hobby shop with those size bottles. Usually we had the little Testor's bottles.

Colors look good, Denis. Got a little fade in the OD. Nice. And you resurrected an ancient bottle of Pactra? Well done.

I think they overloaded the a/c with extra ammo on the bombers over Germany. More than the usual 9 yards of .50 cal per gun in a Mustang.

Wise move to use a light primer, Denis. Yellow (and red) are tough to paint onto dark colors. Too translucent. Yes, definitely an He-177. Some Wiki history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinkel_He_177

My condolences, too, Craig. Not many of the Greatest Generation left. I salute them all.👍 Yeah, the Phantom was known to be supersonic on the deck, despite the airspeed/mach meter saying not. A phenomenon of all the angles and sharp points. Those photos you see of F-4/14/15/16 and others with the visible shock cone are suitable proof. Never flew a Mudhen, but did snivel a hop or two in the F-15B. Thought I died and went to fighter pilot heaven. You are going to load this one up for bear, aren't you?

Greg, superb detailing on the island. Harley, that beat up carrier was the Franklin. Took a lot of punishment, but sailed back to NY for refurbishing. Although repaired, she never went back to sea in an active commissioned status. Wiki history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Franklin_(CV-13)

Actually, the He -177 was a 4 engine bomber, but it had 2 motors in each of the nacelles. Engine fires were a bugaboo, along with the landing gear collapsing under those nacelles. Like Chris said, all engines had to go into production of Reich Defense fighters. Thankfully, the Me262 being developed in mid war spent so much time messing around with making it into a dive bomber that they didn't have enough to form up full fighter wings. They had squadrons of 262s and protection squadrons of FW-190 and Ta 152s to cover them in their takeoff and landing phases. Look up or find a copy of "Warplanes of the Third Reich" by William Green. It's a very large tome. There is a lot of info on all this in Green's book. And black & white pictures.

I'm pretty sure the B-17 was it's own design, but the B-29, 307, B-50 and the C-97 shared a lot of parts. The double bubble fuselage and a lot of the wings and engines. I had to refuel behind KC-97s in Europe and they were pokey, even with the jet pods under the wings. Lou, you are correct about the Luftwaffe. Trained pilots on gliders, sent planes and crews to Spain in their civil war.

Every station stop was an opportunity for the crew to "oil around" the loco. Most US engines were swapped out about every 100 miles for added servicing. All the services needed for each loco was a big reason for the rush to dieselize after WW 2.

You got a lot of good information there. Early craftsman kits like these expected you to go down to your local brick and mortar hobby shop to pick up trucks and couplers. Those shops have disappeared. And if you are going to run this car in a train, find out if it's a scale layout or a Lionel O gauge layout. These make a big difference. Lionel uses bigger wheels and deeper flanges. They're really not compatible. Scalecoat is a solvent base sealer and paint. Just be careful if spraying; wear a chemical mask, available at big box hardware stores. Even if brushing, I'd still mask up, due to the odors. And consider doing it outside for peace on the home front. 😀 You may want to add additional interior bracing at the joints and along the roof. Sagging joints, especially in O scale, will look bad. The color of a galvanized roof raises a lot of discussion among model railroaders. I tend to use what is called SP lettering gray, it's a light gray color. Others use a dull silver; might be OK for a brand new car, but after running a while it fades. If you're weathering a car go dull gray on the roof. The Pan Pastels are excellent for weathering. This particular site is pitched to model railroaders and has some how-to videos. http://modelingcolors.com/index.html I'd find some color photos to give you some visual guidance on weathering. I use this site a lot. This is his section on Railbox cars. http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/rbox/rbox.htm Have fun. Be careful or you could fall down a new rabbit-hole in a new hobby.

Here's a link to Cybermodeler for info: https://www.cybermodeler.com/aircraft/rafale/rafale_all.shtml

Back in days of yore, one of my additional duties as a Phantom flyer was to pull Range Control Officer for a day, every so often. I'd spend the day at the range, controlling flights of fighters and helos. Strafing was always fun. The Marine helos came and parked/hovered at the foul line and blazed away with whatever they loaded up that day, usually 7.62 mm. Buzz saws at work. Most fighters has 20mm cannon, so that was OK. Bigger buzz saws. The A-10s couldn't shoot at the regular targets; rip 'em to shreds. We had a supply of good old M113 APCs for them to shoot at. Lots of fire, smoke and noise. And they'd turn the APCs into Swiss cheese.