OK, I had just finished working on my 1/24 Stuka’s fixed cockpit area last night (cutting, taping, painting, waiting, painting some more) when I went to shave my head (Army thing) and shower; I come out of the shower to find my cockpit piece in pieces!!! [:(!] (mind you, I have a cat…)
Silly me should have known better than to leave such a part as a clear cockpit piece unattended, but the inevitable happened…
THIS is what I was faced with…
Couldn’t be a colored part, nooooo… Hadda be a clear part from a 10 year old kit, friggin cat is down to 8 of 9 lives, and more than likely I’m out around $10 for a replacement canopy…
I HATE cats…
You could always try to contact them at Airfix:
BTW, don’t blaim the cat, it’s just doing cat things! Trust me, I know.
Sorry to hear of your misfortune, gunner…
All hope is not lost however, at least it isn’t chewed beyond recognition. Allow me to share a possible solution: carefully glue it back together and fill the interior with some clay or plaster for strength, then sand down the crack seam with progressively lighter grade sand paper. Fill any crack with putty and re-sand to get a smooth finish. Then you can “thermoform” a new one using the clear plastic top from a greeting card box, using the method outlined below:
The good thing about fixing it like this, there’s probably plenty of clear plastic available amongst things you have in your house, so you can practice, and you won’t have to wait around on one to turn up. If you want to mask off the “metal” strips, just lay it over the mold (original canopy) so you don’t have to worry about bending it while working it up.
I’ve used this method several times when the kit piece is too thick or there’s been an “accident”.
Hope this helps,
take care,
Frank
Thanks guys…
I’ve emailed Airfix, but haven’t gotten a reply yet; I suppose I could use a pin vise and slowly remove the clear parts, and rebuild/ reinforce the frame with some thin sheet styrene or even real thin brass strips, and redo the glass with clear acetate and some Testor’s window maker… I don’t have a lot of patience, and most likely it would take as long to redo the canopy (to my liking) as it would to build finish the rest of the kit.
However, it would be a cheap alternative, and I already have the materials; Maybe I should go with a Flak damaged version, although the markings for it are for a particular Luftwaffe pilot who’s plane never suffered such severe damage…
You won’t get a replyuntil at least Monday; they only work Monday to Friday.
However, their Parts replacement service is very good; Rita Anstee runs a very tight ship. First of all, she’ll see whether they have any in the old stck room. That way, I was able to obtain a paert for a Scharnhorst which had been out of production for a decade or more. If this fails, the’ll have to contact their production facilities in Trun , in France. Since the Kit has recently been in production, there should be the parts available. However, coming from France, the parts will take significantly longer to arrive
Some points regarding Airfix replacement services:
I had a canopy missing (in reality I blaim the floor monster) to my old MiG-23 kit. I sent an e-mail to airfixservice@ibcl.com on 07 April and today I had a new canopy in my letterbox here in Sweden. I think that is pretty good service! [tup]
Now I have a chance to finish this bird for the Foreign MiG GB …