ccoyle

Well, no pictures of landing gear today. Why no pictures? Because yet again, the diagrams in an Orlik kit leave much to be desired -- namely clarity. There's parts that aren't shown, parts that aren't numbered, parts shown in one perspective but not another, and even parts shown in locations that they cannot possibly be physically located in. Ah, but who doesn't love a challenge? 😑

Whew! Both sides done now. The starboard side, while not a perfect fit, did not require as much surgery as the port side, e.g. no paper mache -- was able to fill in the gaps with glue. Next step will be the landing gear, then the fuselage will be set aside for a bit to work on the engine and cowling. I love building radial engines out of card stock. 🙄

Ah, I forgot about Dom Bumagi. This log can stay in the kit section -- it's still the same kit, just bigger.

When you say "from the Ukraine," I'm guessing that this is the Orel kit?

Radiation was still a novelty back in those days. The military did a lot of wacky things with nuclear tests back then that make little sense based on what we know now.

Yep, and so were USS Saratoga and IJN Nagato. Personally, I think all three of them would have been priceless museum ships, especially Saratoga.

Ha! First time I ever used it! 😉

So here's the patch job. I did actually use a kind of paper mache (bits of paper towel soaked in white glue), covered by a bit of spackle, then sanded down. I touched it up a little more after this photo, so it looks better at the moment. And here's the entire left wing fillet. Only one more side to do! 🤪

Hold that thought. 😉

Okay, now things get a little ugly . . . First, the wheel wells were completed. You'll notice that there are a couple of pieces of fairing added to the front of them. That gap that was mentioned back in post #31 was not covered by these pieces. So, the first order of the day was to fill in this gap, beginning with a joiner piece cut from some scrap. But, as you can see in this shot, the ring that the joiner strip attaches to is too big. I had to snip the ring open, remove a bit of material, and then rejoin it so that the resulting skin structure could meet the underlying bulkhead properly. Once that was done, I had to create some filler pieces. I first made a template to fill the gap, then cut the fillers from one of the surplus color swatches provided in the kit. These were glued in and touched up -- some random "chipping" helps hide the surgery scars. And here's where it gets really messy. The wing fillets are made in two pieces. The larger aft piece (mostly obscured in the photo) actually fits well and was not a problem to install. Nope, the problem was with the smaller forward piece. There simply was no way that the fillet, the lower wing fairing, and the forward fuselage were going to meet properly. At all. Yet again, the diagrams did not present a clear view of this particular aspect of the build, meaning some guessing about the shaping was necessary, but even so, this joint wasn't going to happen cleanly. This brings back some rather unpleasant memories of my Yak-3 build, whose leading edge wing roots were also a major headache. Some filler is plainly going to be required here -- will report back later on the result.

Well, if I can help tempt anybody, $70 for the POB II kit is really a steal, and the finished model can be quite spectacular.

Your first cuts look up to the task.

Try a matte clear acrylic top coat.

I've got my fingers crossed for you -- just holler if you need any advice. I also read German, so let me know if you need something translated.

Mostly it's because bedtime is approaching. Sleepy modelers tend to rush and make mistakes -- it's best to know when to quit for the day.

A little more progress -- wing tips added and one wheel well built and installed. Parts for the second well have been cut out. You can see the rather torturous shape into which the wheel well wall (say that five times fast) must gently be shaped. I only had enough evening modeling mojo to complete one well.

Very well done -- congratulations! I always appreciate seeing a model that is a little off the beaten path.

From what I've been told, the Japanese used a very poor-quality paint that chipped and flaked easily, hence the characteristic scruffy look.

Changed my mind. Just a dry fit of the wing to fuselage.

So, this trough-like structure (circled) is the best I could come up with for the aft skeletal pieces. Whether it's correct or not is debatable, but the wing skin does fit properly, and the skinned wing will fit the fuselage correctly -- as far as I can tell at this point. I won't apply the skins until after I have built and fitted the wheel wells. BTW, a strange detail of this kit's construction is that optional parts are provided to make the ailerons as separate assemblies. This wasn't an option for the rear control surfaces -- the rudder and elevators were printed as separate parts, so separate they had to be. I won't make the ailerons separately, as IMO there is little to gain visually by doing so, unless one chooses to display them in an up or down configuration, and building them separately allows more opportunities for boogering things. There are two completed examples of this kit at kartonowki.pl, and both of them have separate ailerons, but with the ailerons displayed level with the wing. You can judge for yourselves whether the reward is worth the risk.

Frankly, I'm impressed by how much progress some of you guys have made on a kit that's only recently been issued!

All the time.

Actually, the situation I've run into is similar to what happened with the Mohawk, albeit on a different structure. Part of the wing construction hassle is that the perspective shown in the single diagram of the skeleton, which looks fore-to-aft, makes some aspects of the aft construction unclear, making a certain amount of guesswork necessary. To tackle this, I'm going to have to cut out and shape the wing skins to deduce where the contact points for some of the skeletal elements should be. Of course, I'll report later on whether this all worked out or not.

Well, a card model doesn't bear the same loads and stresses as a real airplane, but its builder does have to construct it without raising his blood pressure dangerously high, like this wing might be doing. 😆

Each wing is one piece except for the wingtips. Like most low-wing monoplanes, each wing will have a long fillet along its root where it joins the fuselage.