First Annual Berny Memorial Group Build

Modeling Subjects Group Builds
1

Greetings fellow modelers,
As a few of you know, Berny, aka Berny13, passed away a few months ago. He was an avid modeler and a good friend. In his honor, I will be hosting a group build. At first, I tried to find out what planes he was associated with while he was in the United States Air Force and use that list as a theme. But as I started going through all of his posts, I realized that he had modeled almost every subject possible.
He started out with cars. At one point he modeled armor. And when he did model planes, he even modeled Migs, so it seemed that nothing was off limits. I also know that he had an attitude that you should at the very least enjoy building your model. So I finally decided that there would be no particular theme to this build except one. HAVE FUN!
So the rules to this build will be very short and simple. YOU HAVE TO PARTICIPATE! It is funny, I have only participated in one group build that lasted a full year, but I did notice something that bothered me. There were a number of people who it seemed rather obvious were only there to collect the stupid badge. A group build in my opinion is supposed to bring people together and share ideas, help each other with problems, answer questions, and even proudly show your accomplishments with.
There is just one more rule to this build. Berny was very particular to being authentic when building his models. I will not be the one checking each person’s model to see if the paint colors, squadron, years, etc. are correct for each model. I will leave that to each individual. (If I happen to know the answer I will be happy to respond!) For me, that is a big part of modeling, doing the research. It will be good though for participants to ask if anyone else in the build knows the answer, that is the great thing about a group build. Just do the best you can, there will be no firing squad if you get something wrong. After all, we are all human, and we all do make mistakes!
All I mean by “authentic” is, if you are going to build strictly “out-of-the-box” (OOB), simply state that. If you are going to make modifications, please either do research to back up the modification or simply state that you “like doing it that way”. I just don’t want someone making stuff up. I want to keep this build fun, not a chore.
I am going to start the build on Berny’s birthday, which is February 22. Anything and everything that you can build is acceptable (within the restrictions of this site of course!). It can be something you are building on another group build. You can build as many models as you like. Beginners and experts alike are welcome. This build will last one year, ending on February 21, 2013.
All finished builds will be entered on the first page of the build. This is not a contest of speed. It is a contest of fun.

Here is the badge, a big thank you to Rich for creating it for us! Feel free to pick one up if you are particpating, you do not have to wait until you have completed your build.

Ken

The following are the list of participants and their subjects:

Son Of Medicine Man: 1/48 Hasegawa F-4E Phantom II in Vietnam trim resembling Berny’s last plane he was a crew chief of; 69-260.

Bockscar: 1/32 Revell F-4F Phantom II

Sparrowhyperion: Aurora B-58 Hustler

Hans von Hammer: Monogram 1/48 USAF F-4C/D

TD4438: F-4

Scorpiomikey: Tamiya 1/48 F4U-1A/D, Revell 1/48 AH-64 Apache

castelnuovo: German AA gun mounted on a 8 ton truck

SuperB60ce: Scalecraft/ESCI 1/48 F-4E (w/AM parts & decals as F-4E-38-MC 67-362 “Paula 01” 58th TFS Gorillas, Udorn '72)

JailCop: Monogram F-86 Sabre

Gamera: 1/48 Revell Douglas A-20 G/J Havoc

jimbot58: 1/72 Hobby Boss A-7D Corsair II

kbuzz01: 1/48 TF-102 (C & H Aero Conversion Kit) tail No. 54048, Case X wings

Buffirn: F-4, (2) F-105s, MiG 17, MiG 21

Frightful6_7: 1/72 Italeri F-16 OOB with Venezuelan camo scheme

Striker8241: 1/72 Monogram B-52D

kaiyudsai: 1/32 Trumpeter Mig-21 Late model MF

mikeymize: 1/48 HobbyBoss MiG-17 in NMF

xradio: 1/48 Monogram F-4C/D in early Vietnam War trim

Honor Corner

Scorpiomikey’s Tamiya 1/48 F4U-1A/D


Sparrowhyperion’s B-58 Hustler


Kbuzz01’s TF-102


Scorpiomikey’s Revell AH-64 Apache


Mikeymize’s Panzer II

Mikeymize’s Junkers Ju87-B

Mikeymize’s MiG-21


Gamera’s A-20G/J Havoc


Jimbot58’s A-7D Corsair II

2

Guess ill be the first to put my start up.

3

Great start Scorpiomikey! I had to start the first night remoting into the servers at work! Ugh! I will make up for it tomorrow night.

Ken

4

Wow, Scorpio - you didn’t waste any time, nice start!

I’m trying to get another build finished for the Vets GBII before I dig into the TF-102, so here’s my starting point:

The main box -

DSC00533.jpg

And the conversion kit -

DSC01746.jpg C&H kit

Ken

5

BTW: Happy Birthday to Berny and Bocksdad! [hbday]

Mike: really nice work on the cockpit there. Built that kit some years ago and it went together like silk. Funny I picked up the ‘birdcage’ canopy version later to build as a New Zealand aircraft.

Kbuzz Ken: Very cool, always liked the looks of the F-102 and the conversion kit looks nicely detailed.

I put together a few parts of the Havoc last night. Everything seems to fit pretty well. I’ll probably build her mostly out-of-the-box. The bomb bay isn’t very well detaled so I’m leaning toward building it closed instead of trying to scratch-built all the innards.

PS: Looks like we’ve got multiple Ken’s here so I’m going to go with SoMM Ken and Kbuzz Ken if it’s ok with you guys. Better than Stikpusher’s Korean War GB where we have I think at last count three Andys and an Andrew. [:S]

Cliff

6

Hi Ken,

You have obviously done your homework and selected the correct kit for Case X wings for your TF-102. I am looking forward to seeing how this one goes.

Ken

7

Hi Cliff,

I am fine with SoMM Ken. Good to hear that the Revell Havoc has a good fit. One thing I did come across about that kit is the wheels. It was suggested to get aftermarket wheels which are relatively inexpensive and really make a difference on the authenticity.

Ken

8

Greetings Everyone,

Last night I was forced to work from home so I could not do little more than get the first page up. I had to work late so tonight I am really tired and will have to call it an early night. But I will post pictures of where my current build is at. I have the cockpit fairly close to finished. I am using an Aires resin aftermarket cockpit complete with the ejection seats, photo etch, and clear film. Here are pictures of what it looks like so far:

Assembling these pictures brought back my memories of working on this with Berny. Now it is time to get moving past this phase and finish this for him.

Ken

9

The F-4 pit looks an awful lot like the tomcat pit doesnt it?

Scret to my speed. I started a month ago (and stopped) since i knew i wasnt going to be able to model this week.

10

Looking good, Ken. Wish my C & H was as clean as that nice Aries package. [:(]

Ken

11

SoMM Ken: Looks great! The Aires cockpit really makes a difference. Did you grab the photo off the web or do you own the enjection seat?

BTW: Thanks for the tip, every build I saw of the Havoc complained about the wheels. Not sure what I’ll do yet though between picking up an aftermarket set or just sanding all the crazy tread pattern off them.

Cliff

12

Hi Scorpiomikey,

I can’t actually answer that question since I have never seen the Tomcat cockpit. That aircraft is too new for me. I don’t model anything past Vietnam era.

Ken

13

Hi Ken,

Thank you for the compliment! [:$]

Yes, I think that Aires makes outstanding resin products. I still can’t get over the level of detail and how crisp their products are.

Ken

14

Hi Cliff,

Thank you for the compliment! [:$] The photo of the ejection seat came from the web. The first time I saw it Berny had posted it but I found where he got it. Here is a link for anyone who is interested:

http://www.ejectionsite.com/f4seat.htm

I apologize for giving you advice about something you already knew about (wheels). Obviously you already did your homework. Cudos to you for that effort! [Y]

Ken

15

Hi Everyone,

Tonight I worked on one of the ejection seats trying to duplicate the upper seat belts. This was one area Berny was very particular of. Hence the reason why he posted the picture of an actual ejection seat showing how the upper seat belts were supposed to hang supported up out of the way for the pilot to enter the cockpit.

I fabricated the belts out of metal strips left over from photo etch parts. This is still in the preliminary stages. I am hoping to make it look a little better when I am finished. Here is a picture of what I have so far:

Ken

16

Greetings fellow modelers,

I will have to wait until Wednesday evening before I will be able to continue building. I have two final exams this week, one tomorrow morning and the second on Wednesday morning. They will require me to spend all my available time to prepare for so sadly I will not be building until then. But I will be back in full force!

Ken

17

Good luck with the exams Ken.

18

Oh… gee I was hoping you did own your own ejection seat. That would be really cool, if only I had the extra cash [H]

Please keep tossing your advice in. I’m happy I caught the issue about the wheels but I’m certain there are other things I’ve missed and will miss in the future.

And good luck on your exams [8-|]

Cliff

19

Thanks Scorpiomikey and Cliff for the well wishes on my exams! I will let you know how I do after the first one tomorrow. Have a good night!

Ken

20

Hi Everyone,

I think I did pretty good on the first exam yesterday. If I had to guess, I would say I got either a low “A” or a high “B”. The next one is tomorrow morning. After that I will be back here posting more progress pictures. I would like to get those ejection seats done tomorrow night. I look forward to hearing from everyone soon.

Ken