Egilman

Time to wake up and pay attention... (sorry for snoozing for so long, it just seemed the thing to do) I'm still here brother, never left... {chuckle}

Another small update Brothers... A bit more tweaking to the FOD Screens... I think they look good, not exact, but I think good enough for what I'm doing... Yep a tad overscale, but it cant be helped... If I made them any thinner just touching them would cause them to break when scaled down... And I don't want that to happen... Any way this is where I'm at this morning... A few more details and then on to the compressor... EG

Thanks Ken... I'm finding that I didn't retain as much of SW as I thought I would, a perfect example of use it or lose it.... I imagine the same is true for Rhino as well... The FOD screens that are part of the J-47's intake plenum are automatic, they are closed below 500 ft altitude and open above that... Every engine I knew of had maintenance screens for ground operations.... (needed to be installed by hand) These were the first I ever saw that were integral to the engine and operated automatically... The trick here is to make them appear as they normally would closed, and not too much out of scale... Where I'm at now... (the vanes in the screens (real life) would be .015 or .020 thick, way too small to replicate in scale) A quarter inch in scale is only .008" The printer can handle 50 microns, (just under .002") the actual screen mesh would be .000625" in scale, a fine human hair is .003" so the ideal is to print in a buildable way something that looks real, what it really was doesn't matter... I'm on my second attempt at it now.... I imagine it will get easier as I gain practice and experience... but right now it's slow slogging...

No worries brother, between the autocorrect and my own flyin finners, I won't pass Sister Mary's english articulation class either... It happen to us all from time to time...

Thanks Alan, But, I don't understand the "I'm for screens" reference? If you don't mind me asking.... {chuckle}

Another small update brothers... The four vanes inside the intake.... It took four complete start-over type retries to get them to look right.... Next up is another difficult one, the retractable intake screens... They go in the four bays between the fins, a pair in each... They were for foreign object avoidance while on the ground and retracted into the intake plenum when they were airborne... They will be obvious when sitting on a dolly on the ground... It's coming along slowly... EG

All right an update.... Took the image I posted above into Gimp and cleaned it of a few irregularities... Then loaded it up in Solidworks and scaled it 1-1 for modeling... Started with the intake, that's where the most issues were and seemed like as good a place as any... After a little more plugging around, (had to take a quickie refresher on SW) I got to what is beginning to resemble an intake for a Turbine engine.... More later... EG

Maybe if he stopped bumping things with it, they were kinda fragile...

First three episodes of Season 4 then she was dropped from the series.... Rumor had it that she and the "Fonz" didn't get along... There was always "Pink Cadillac".... {chuckle}

Depends upon the plastic Greg... If your talking styrene as used for modeling purposes, Tamiya thin or Testors liquid cement is the go to... Testors also makes a "tube glue" which is jellied liquid cement and has it's uses, but most generally use straight liquid... They don't work on silicone based plastics or UDMH plastics or resins from 3D printers, but will work on most others like Styrene's, Acetate's, and PVC's.... (according to Testor's claims, I only use them for styrene) Hope that helps..

Thank you my friends, I think I'm gonna give it a shot, I might as well, I have nothing but time and the skills gained will be of great benefit in the future... Of course I'll document the steps as I go for those that want to follow along... First step was finding or creating a suitable accurate image of the J-47-GE-27 to use... and I found one, not in the J-47 manuals, but in the F-86F maintenance manual... (go figure)... Here it is... This will allow me to create the basic shapes as individual parts and sculpt them according to the parts drawings... (the accessories fairing is going to be interesting to sculpt) Now, to remember how to load an image in Solidworks.... Thank you brothers for your input it is appreciated...

Your right roger, I went ahead and researched USAAC & USAF fighter cockpit colors WWII to post Korea... prior to WWII cockpit colors were generally ZC Yellow in the USAAC with black panels, (but it was all over the map as far as manufacturers using whatever they wanted) As WWII progress this changed to a mix of ZCG & ZCY and by 1943 an official directive was issued making the official cockpit color scheme Interior green, (a very dark form of ZC Green) and Matt Black from the lower edges of the instrument panels up... But still with the numbers of aircraft they were building per month, the manufacturers used whatever formulation of paints they could get as long as it held to the scheme... Post war, the USAAF retired virtually all it's fighter aircraft not tagged P-51 and turned over many existing deployed aircraft to allied nations... Along about 1947, the USAAF decided to change it's cockpit scheme in it's now F-51 aircraft to everything the pilot could see in the cockpit being black, everything else would be interior green except for the seat pan which would also be green... Of course this was of serious import to North American Aviation who was producing all these F-51's, their derivatives, and the soon to be F-86... 1948 the change in cockpit color scheme became official for all USAF fighter planes, with one change, Flat Black overall.... So NAA went to producing the F-86 with completely flat black cockpits. the change was easy for them as what they were producing was 99% black anyway... This lasted until November '53 just after the war ended, when they changed the scheme to Black panels over Grey Structure.... The orders also clearly laid out what to do with existing aircraft... When an aircraft came in for IRAN, the scheme would be changed to the new one anything less and they would leave it alone... There were probably aircraft in different schemes, rare but true... It usually took several months for a new scheme to be devised and tested and reported on and approved so I suspect some Sabres were painted Black over Grey in the cockpit prior to the end of the war, but not many.... Given the closeness to the end of the war the orders were issued making the change, I suspect this to be absolutely true... So the statement that 99% of the Sabre's built pre November '53 had all black cockpits is as far as I'm concerned completely true... Kevin, in 1943, the RAF and the USAAC got together and unified the color schemes for exchange aircraft, the AAC decided on what they were going to do with input from the RAF with the RAF agreeing to accept the aircraft as produced to make the production and delivery of thousands of aircraft under wartime condition more efficient... The RAF was using black in the cockpit from the start of WWII and the reason the AAC went to it could very well have been the suggestion or requirements of the RAF, I've been unable to find the smoking gun on that one though it does appear that it was a mutual decision and when the RAF started taking delivery of F-86's they accepted the all black cockpit as well.... In essence it was to ease fighter aircraft production issues during the war was the reason and it wasn't a complete adoption of British practice, kinda a compromise... That's the story as I've been able to piece it together, not definitive at all in any manner, just my opinion based upon the research I've done over the last day and a half... (although there are still many peeps that will argue the hell out of it, the preponderance of evidence say it was so) I hope that answers all questions as best as can be done... {chuckle} (I love to do research into such esoteric subjects as well) EG

Yes Alan, it's a real disappointment I'm sad to say, not up to the quality of the rest of the kit unfortunately... The only parts that look useable are the compressor section and the exhaust section, the rest is going to need some serious re-working to come even close... I'm going over my options.. one of the things I do have is the complete T.O. 2J-J47-24 which is the complete illustrated parts breakdown updated to 1975 and Field Maintenance & Replacement, Turbojet Engines, covering the J-47-GE-23 to J-47-GE-27, essentially the USAF's Chilton's manual for the J-47 engine, T.O 2J-J47-26 updated to 1974 as references..... If I had an actual engine I could rebuild it using that info... For example... Component Exploded View.... Surface Accessory Systems Routing Wrap... (shows the routing of all exterior tubing & wiring and where they connect) I have complete details on every part, and how they are supposed to fit together... I'm mulling over in my head if I want to take this alternate path and use that 3D printer I have.... If I can draw up the basic parts in Solidworks, (don't know how long that will take) I should be able to print up a complete engine overnight, the parts won't be that big... I know it will look one heck of a lot more realistic than anything I do with bashing the kits plastic afterthought of an engine... So I'm asking for opinions, I'm pretty sure I can do it better, but I've never done this 3D work before in an actual model creation environment... I have all the materials and tools needed... Wanna take this detour along with me? (I pretty much figure the parts I have coming will all be here by the time I'm done) What do you think Brothers?

Ok, research update here.... GE J-47-27 Engine, as fitted to almost all F-86F's.... The kit engine.... Not glued together, just stacked to show what comes with the kit... The best thing I can say for it is that it resembles a J-47.... as you can easily see it is soft on detail and it's a bit out of scale on the larger side.... the real engine has a length of 145" (without tailpipe) and a diameter of 36.75" in scale that would be 4.53125" long (4&17/32nds inch) and 1.148" in diameter... So I'll have to work with what I got.. first off the real engine... (from TO 2J-J47-24 Illustrated Parts Breakdown J47-ST-25 to J47-GE-27 1969) And actual engine pics from a museum in Japan.... And finally the intake end... where the major issues are... Just several things noticeable... 1. The intake casing is too narrow should be about double it's length... 2. The intake has four flow vanes for the anti icing system which are completely missing... 3. The accessory drive cover is too short and starts angling downward almost immediately, it should protrude from the intake casing twice the true width of the casing before it starts angling downward... 4. The accessory drive cover has a flat nose with hole for cooling air flow to access the accessories.... 5. The eight burner cans do not taper and are woefully underscale... 6. The tailpipe is not part of the engine... It looks like I can save most of the compressor, at least I can work with it... (probably add some details as well... Now, working out how to go about fixing it.... Onwards Brothers...

Ahhhh, the master is at work again.... You still amaze me with your skills at replicating real life....

WOW! that is some transformation! Nicely done....

No Spanner in the works.... The SAAF flew two different versions of the Sabre in Korea, the F-86F on loan from the USAF and their own purchased Canadair Sabre 13 Mk. 6's (F-86F's built by NAA in Palmdale for the Canadian AF) those Mk. 6's had grey cockpits, the SAAF Sabre's of 2 sqd, on loan from the USAF had black cockpits.... Read here where where it is directly discussed... (By SAAF historians and modelers)

Yep, every single one of those, if owned by the USAF, is post November 1953... Postwar... I'll see if I can dig up the references and post them... Pretty much everyone restores them to the Black over Grey standard today, it's a pure flyability issue, but only historically accurate postwar when the Airforce converted to it... (also note that most of the flyable F-86's today were built postwar so a grey cockpit would be accurate for those as built) The wartime F-86's were transferred to other airforces or retired as the US airforce upgraded or replaced theirs... I understand that Taiwan got over 200 wartime F-86's just as one example... (Japan got around 100 as well before manufacturing them under license) In fact the aircraft I'm modeling wound up being wrote off by the Chinese (taiwanese) Airforce I believe in the 70's... (I believe my research shows that there is only one wartime F-86 in flying condition in the world today and it's an "A" model) Forgotten Warbird resource groups listing for 51-2910 Scroll down to 51-2910... Taken from official USAF records... Now, Airport Data claims that Yanks Air Museum is restoring 51-2910 but they aren't, and Wiki claims that 51-2910 is on display at the USAF 51st Fighter Wing area, Osan Air Base, South Korea, but it isn't... (they also list it as an F-86D which it wasn't) The USAF armaments museum has an F-86F in Capt. McConnell's livery and they acknowledge that it isn't 51-2910... UPDATE: the Yanks Air Museum F-86F has been identified as 52-5513.... That solves that mystery... You can research individual military aircraft and what is known about their fates, it's not complete but what they do have is very accurate all you need is their initial registration number...

Never said there weren't, the USAF had to get the idea from somewhere... Once the Aircraft were made available to the allied nations, they were free to do with them as they pleased.. Not everyone thought flying slow cookers were a good thing... {chuckle}

It's the primary rule of great modelers, whatever works, works...

Hey I heard somewhere that the Abrams engine runs on anything.... {chuckle} Chocolate would be perfect! Looking good brother, very impressive...

That's the million dollar question Andy, I won't know until the fuselage is almost completely assembled and the finish is applied... That's why this is another test build... And with needing the second fret of PE parts for the seat which is going to take at least two weeks to get here from eduard, I'm looking at moving forward on other things right now... the only image I have of a real life cockpit for an F-86F from the outside is this... And it's a Canadair Sabre Mk. 5, (in the Korean War configuration) So I'm flying by the seat of my pants/experience as to what to do and where to go with it... it's a nice clean look if I can pull it off.. Thank you, I think I'm on the right track and it is a good time to shift to something else right at the moment... I have other parts and alterations that need to be made to the fuselage first before I can assemble it and finish it... (like the ammo bay doors which are opened to double as the first step to climb into the cockpit, they need to be added to the model before I can close it up) The gun barrel ports need to be replaced as well cause as molded they don't represent anything of reality... There are some issues with this kit that need correcting... And I just learned about the engine... Normally the engine would go inside the aircraft and that is how it is usually built or they give the option of having the tail on a work stand with the engine hanging out the back... (not a good look for me) I'm gonna put it on an engine dolly to display it so I have the option of making it look like a real engine rather than something to just stick out it's tail... It's a nice kit, accurate if built as just the airplane sitting on the runway waiting to take off, but it can be made into something real special if one puts in the work... That's my aim here....

Welcome aboard Roger! It's one of mine as well, it's simply a strikingly beautiful airplane...

Though of that Ken when I started... Most modelers lighten the flat black by adding a couple of drops of white to it in a mixing cup then dry brushing all the edges to make them stand out before doing the decals and PE... Kinda like the technique used to highlight the nooks and crannies on ship models but in reverse... That was the point of the grime wash give the edges some definition so they don't get lost... It worked sufficiently to allow something to show in natural light.... The eduard set appears as black in natural light but obviously shows up as green under intense flash light... I'm sitting here looking at it from 3 feet away under natural light and it looks good... Under high flash, without the white background this is what I get... Much better although the panels still show as greenish... Under natural light without the white background... Now that looks like a cockpit... some of the green tinted panels do show but loosing the stark white background helped quite a bit... Looks much better... And with the Mk 1 eyeball it looks good.. Still need to finish some detailing before I set it aside to go on with the kit... I probably should have gone with Andy's suggestion and did the postwar cockpit easier to do and although not historically accurate, would have been simply easier... I have to set this aside for the moment, my eduard set when I opened it had an error, fret 2 was the wrong fret from another 1/48 scale model.. I've been in contact with eduard support showing them the packing error and they got back to me this morning... They will be sending me a correct fret 2 within the week... That will allow me to dress up the seat and radio shelf in the canopy.... (understanding that this set has been discontinued for over a year, they are making a fret up just for me, for free! That's great customer service) I think this will work once it is all said and done and out in the natural light it will look the part... Next step is the engine and it's scratch built dolly, and we run into a spot where the manufacturer got it wrong, the engine... More to follow....

It's been a pleasure my friend, Beautiful job!!! Well done...