Operation Vengeance - Part 3

Back in Oct. 2020 Brother Bob posted the Operation Vengeance (Part 1).

"We intend to create a vignette featuring the G4M1 "Bettys" of Admirals Yamamoto and Ugaki, the P-38s of Barber and Lanphier, and perhaps a Zero or two.

The aircraft will all be 1/200 scale and will end up in our Wings Of Glory inventory.

I ordered 2 aircraft from Armaments In Miniature, who have a wide selection of aircraft in this scale, a P-38 D/E (a lookalike for the  G models involved) and a G4M2, which will take some modifying to backdate to a G4M1."

If you go back to Oct. 16, 2020 you can review his work on the 1/200 scale AIM resin miniatures.  

I followed with O.V. part 2 on Dec. 13, 2020 with my resin miniatures.  I emulated Bob's procedure and techniques with the aircraft modifications and painting and the following photos are presented as recall.

Undercoat was the beginning of the conversion into G4M1 N0, 323 - Yamamoto's Betty and Miss Virginia, 147, the P-38 that Rex Barber borrowed for the mission.

Painting the P-38 was straight forward and the decals for Miss Virginia were readily available.

The more difficult conversion was the transformation of a G4M2 to a G4M1. Basically identical air frames the windows and other protuberances had to be modified (added and subtracted) using various bits and pieces on hand.

Glass modified and painted along with the IJN green. Decals did required some modification.

The 323 had to be applied number by number.

Time to add the bubbles using extra bits.

Fast forward to November 2022 and the delivery of my wife's Anna Griffin Create package.  The foam packing gave me the idea for the base to the diorama and precipitated my artist concept.

I needed materials for land and sea which I found at the local Hobby Lobby, in the model train section.  I knew how to do the water with my experience with ocean dioramas.  The base material allows building in two sections which is a plus as you will see.

Materials obtained.

Work begins with painting the base with acrylic greens, then applying a watered white glue and sprinkling on the base "grass" and sand.

Short and tall trees added to the "jungle" and used to hide the aircraft support rods glued into holes drilled in the fuselage(s).  The planes and trees are easily positioned and relocated by inserting into the foam base.

The ocean and shore line are created with the white glue and tissue layers, painted with acrylics and topped off with Vallejo Water Effects.  Then the sand beach is laid down and merged into the shore line waves.

Here is the Evans Design LED chip attached to the port nacelle and covered with the multi -colored smoke fibers from my Bolt Action stash.  The lead is wound on the support wire and into the base with the switch and battery holder - a prime reason for the two piece base.  The LED is a flicker which does a respectable job of fire simulation.

Here you can see the need for touch up of the seam between the base halves.

This is a near complete Dio.  Bob has to hand off P-38, 122 "Phoebe" and G4M, 326 which is headed out over the water, so stay tuned.

 

The 1/144 Wings of Glory Challenge - 3D print Shapeways Caudron G4

A rigging odyssey: looking for a good solution for WWI/I aircraft.

Since the dawn of flight until the jet age, aircraft feature exposed pieces of wire, taught or slack, alone or in a profusion of places, acting as structure, structural reinforcement, or radio antennae, or all 3. Done well it adds accuracy and realism.

(1/48 Halberstadt D.II using EZ Line)

My journey has led me to try a number of different materials, but only one I'll recommend going forward.

Early on, you usually use what the kit provided or recommended. All thread ends up, to my eye, looking both oversized and fuzzy. It doesn't stand up to closer inspection.  As a result of my high school shop classes on electricity and electronics,  I've always had a box of wire and bits lying around. Antennae were wire, so why not use wire? But getting wire to scale would be a challenge. Eureka! Unwind wire from a transformer. Its very thin yet strong and ductile. Pull a few feet off the coil, chuck it in a vise, grab the loose end with a pliers, and give it a tug, it straightens out nicely! Cut to length, secure with the glue of your choice. 

(1/48 Albatros D.V with transformer wire rigging)

Drawbacks: it doesn't take paint well; but the biggest issue is the same ductility that made ot easily straightened also means if you bump it even slightly....it stretches. Permanently.  And you will bump it eventually. 

Fast forward a few years, I find myself preparing to rig a vintage Aurora 1/48 Gotha. Lots and lots of rigging,  flying wires, control cables. I have a roll of fine gauge fishing line.

Perhaps?

By pre drilling strut ends before assembly,  I arrange it so I can use single long pieces of line, "sewn" through strut after strut.

I used ACC cement for all attach points. Glue the loose end down, wait to dry. Run the free end through the next attach point, weigh down the free end with a hemostat, dangled over something to maintain constant tension, glue, let dry, repeat. Tedious, but effective.  Mostly.

Advantages: reasonably scale appearance, great structural strength. You can pick up this large model by the outboard wingtip, no sag!

Drawbacks: takes paint less well than copper wire. And the structure that was tight when I completed becomes seasonally loose in warmer weather.

The search continues. 

A nicely detailed 1/48 Halberstadt kit for a bargain price falls into my hands. Time to try something new...

I got a recommendation for a product called EZ Line, an elastic material available in several colors and diameters. My approach to installing was the same as the Gotha: pre-drill, but in this case, after the initial end was glued down tight,  it could be threaded through all remaining  holes / attach points, put under slight tension, and all attach points glued. 

Advantages: withstands touches, bumps, etc. and springs back, remaining tight and straight. Will take paint, although I recommend acrylics, as solvents can soften it unpredictably.

Drawbacks: provides no structural benefit.

How well does it work on smaller scales?

The subject here is a 1/72 Pfalz D.IIIa, portraying the craft of the fictitious Bruno Stachel of Blue Max fame.

The kit struts were too thin for drilling out, I would need to attach point by point. Also, due to the covering of all surfaces with decal, drilling through and gluing would be impossible to hide.

For a start point, a hole was drilled to create an attach point, but not all the way through. A self-closing tweezers was propped up allowing the EZ Line to just touch the attach point, and glue added by the point of a pin.

Caution: with no tension on the line, ACC can cause the loose end to curl. I started to pre-glue the tip and let dry before attaching to the wing.

We then move from point to point, using the tweezer and tension method one at a time. In cases where the last point was on a flat surface (no strut or fixture), similar to the above, pre glue, dry then using a weight, stretch the line a small amount, but leaving the free end at the attach point. When dry, and the tweezer removed, there should be enough tension to straighten and remain taught.

I recommend EZ Line for all your rigging needs!