I’m enjoying watching your build. Interesting aircraft.
OT: Back on Friday the 13th of October 1972, as a young man (29 at that time) I moved from Manhattan (NYC) to live with a friend of the family’s in Rancho Santa Fe which, I believe, is about 30 miles from Ramona where I think your aircraft are residing. I never visited Ramona but I did drive to the airport in Carlsbad from time-to-time to feed my used, 1969 Mercury Marquis Brougham with a 429 some 100 octane high lead aircraft fuel since I’d advanced the spark to the point where it would run best on that gas [:D]. The price of the gas was outrageous but I used it a few times. ($.80/gallon)[:)]. I always tipped the guy who was kind enough to break the rules and pump it into my car.
Nice! Did you run that beast at the raceway? Im also a car guy. My 09 charger ran 11.5 at fontana. Since then ive done a new build on her. Forged motor, 1000 hp trans and lots of other fun stuff. Dyno said 760 rwhp on q16 and the race tune. Yet to get her on the track but should be in the low 10s.
Wow keavdog, rwhp at 760? That’s very cool. Back in the day I had a ‘66 Mustang 289 bored 30 over that I rebuilt with a friend. It was a classic! That was my first car. My second car was a ‘79 Mercury Zephyr straight six (Remember those) that I rebuilt to original specs. (It was my dads car purchased brand new in’79) two toned gray. It was a nice car to drive around as a daily driver. Both cars were nothing close to your car in terms of hp. But I learned a lot about cars from those rebuilds. Today I’m just driving around a 2008 Kia Sedona LX. lol!
Keavdog, No, I didn’t … LOL - that old Mercury was so heavy and I’m not a car guy - at that time …young, full of p__s and vinegar, and always broke … I just did the basic tune ups myself. I had some basic tools, bought a timing light and did the best I could just to keep it running. It was a monstrously heavy car with a large engine but a 2 barrel carb. No way would it ever race. I did burn rubber after leaving my favorite bar in Cardiff by the Sea … The Kraken. Oh what an idiot I was in those days [:D].
Difficult two piece canopy from the hasagawa kit is on. Shot primer and its coming along!
Last bit of surgery - cut off the bulb under the tail and inserted a bit of brass tube to represent the retardant tank fill hookup.
First time trying Alclad chrome and its impressive. I had painted these with testors chrome and I shot the Alclad over it just as an experiment - pretty impressive. Next time I’ll do the proper gloss black undercoat. These need a bit of polishing when they dry
Back on this build. I shot the gloss white tonight - turned out nice, really liking Mr Color paints. I’ll let this cure for a couple of days before the heavy masking starts. None of the red stripes are provided as decals [:|]
Spraying red on white requires perfect masking so I was hoping to use decals where possible. I ordered a set of red stripes from CAM decals which I’ve had great success with in the past. Not so tonight - they are breaking apart after soaking. 3 out of 4 sheets… bummer. This will test my masking skills for sure!
Its coming along nice. Your at the nail biting part where trying to get the paint on without any flaws and hope the masks hold. I’ve never had any luck with red stripe decals.
keavdog - maybe you’d like to try it the way I do it sometimes. You take a clear decal sheet and paint a portion of it red. THEN you cut the stripes of the width you need and then you apply the decal. For me that works very well and saves a lot of masking.
Hope it helps - good luck with your build and have a nice day
Don’t know if you still need them, but you might try contacting Mike West at Lone Star Models and see if the Red Gecko Decals have what you need. I think they come with stripes for the fuselage, but not the wings and tail.
The new issue of Aviation History has quite an article on water bombers.
Of particular interest to me is a shot of a B-18 Bolo as a water bomber. I have shelved a kit of that plane because the greenhouse nose was so poorly molded that I could not mask the frames. The water bomber has the greehouse replaced with a new, non transparent nose, a way for me to finish that kit. It will take inkjet decals, but I am fairly experienced with those, so that is not an issue. However, the single picture in the magazine is almost nose on, so I cannot see the markings well enough.
Does anyone know of more pictures of this plane, showing the livery better, so could make the decals?
