Working on the Italeri iteration of the AM B 25 and I have a question regarding the nav dome behind the cockpit.
The plane I’m modeling had the smaller dome the kit only has the larger dome. Is there a vacuform or some other replacement out there?
Thanks
That would be a very simple piece to thermo-form. Just round off a piece of dowel or find a rounded pen cap, basically anything that is about the size you want (a fuel tank from the spares box maybe???) Just heat up a piece of clear acetate over a candle and press it down over the “blank”. I get my clear plastic from blister packs, some works great, some…not so much(pop bottle plastic does NOT work).
Yeah, what Fermis said… That’d the easiest (and cheapest) solution… AND… It’ll break you out into the scratch-builder’s domain, lol…
Best thing about thermo-forming small parts like those is that you can screw it up a hundred times and it still don’t cost a nickel, lol…
Dude save the pop bottles and use them to buy clear Acetate sheets at the local Office supply store. Though saving enough of them could buy you a model.
Hmmmm … I’m going to rummage in the spares bin tonight and see if one of those was included in the clear sprue for my Doolittle Raider’s B-25. If so I will let you know.
If you don’t have a part in the other Mitchell, and you don’t want to thermo-form, you might check the blister-packs that stuff like Benadryll tabs and the like come in… They’re usually rounded, although some meds are in flat-bottomed packs, so yougotta check before you buy them… Those things are multi-purpose, BTW… They make great paint-mixing pallete-cups for small amounts of oils (or other paints) when you’re painting faces and hands of figures, or other details that require custom color-mixing… You just put a dab of the base color in one cup, then next to that, add a dab of white, another of black (or whatever dark color you need), and then near those, a couple-three drops of thinner…
It’s hard to make suggestions though, since you don’t have a picture with something for a scale-reference near it… I’d really like to see the fuselage opening and the kit’s astrodome you have, then I can make a better suggestion on what to use…
If the astrodome you need is less than a 1/4 inch, you’ll probably HAVE to thermo-form though… Also… If push comes to shove, I can vac-form one for ya, no strings attached… Just need the hight and diameter…
Fermis, Hammer: Making the clear bubble was easy (fairly, only got small blobs of melted plastic on the floor). Now I got to make a panel that conforms to the top of the fuselage… must have some maleable plastic around here somewhere.
Thanks for the advice.
Try softening some ABS or Styrene in VERY hot water (close to but not boiling) and then quickly pulling it down around the fuselagefrom top to sides…( It’s called “Draw-Forming”)… Then just trim/sand to shape… It won’t be hot enough to damage the fuselage, but it’ll draw nicely if it’s the right thickness…
Or you can draw-form it over a similarly-shaped object as well… Water’s easier to control than flame…
well if you have access to hot water and sheet styrene. You can bend the sheet styrene after soaking it in boiling water for a few seconds dip it then place it on the fuselage so you can set it’s shape. this technique also works for bending resin tank tracks.
Dude that is really scary man we posted with similar answers at the same time.
Great minds think alike, man…