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 Rank: Super-Elite       Groups: Registered
Joined: 19/06/2013 Posts: 4,588 Points: 13,553 Location: West Yorkshire
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Just caught up on this build, these look realy good Robin  AL
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Some very nice work Robin.  Regards Mark
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Many thanks there to Tony, Ian, AL and Mark! You're right about that card Tony, its not the easiest thing to cut through. That rubber padded knife is excellent though, provided the blade is nice and sharp. I've found that using my really old and worn fine sandpaper to re-hone the tip of the blade works wonders! I developed the technique keeping the Japanese Skiving knife sharp during Frederick's leather work. With a razor sharp blade you can cut through in one pass but even then I've found that multiple light passes produces a neater end cut. This is also the only way to cut out the curved or circular pieces which will be appearing later! Sometimes cutting right through in one go can tear the underside of the backing card. I use a steel rule for long straight cuts but for anything less than about an inch and a half that knife works fine producing straight cuts freehand. On we go! Following on from the last installment, Photo 13 shows that fuselage top placed in position with the port side panel still just clipped in place. On the printed lower surface you can just make out a long rectangle marked ‘11’. This is for part number 11 – the rear transverse bulkhead incorporating the landing skid, the parts for which are shown after cutting out in Photo 14. The skid and bulkhead is already glued to the backing card as is the little ‘rear end’ plate to its right. The three ‘wood brown’ bits are the wrap around ‘skin’ of the skid which, as you can see are pre-printed with the iron re-enforcing plates. The black rectangle and ‘H’ on the right are some of those optional additional details, in this case another set of iron plates to glue over the printed ones as shown in Photo 15. The Skid/Bulkead is shown glued into the rear fuselage in Photo 16 with that ‘rear end’ piece now in position. This completes the basic internal structure of the rear fuselage, the next step is to add in the front fuselage bracing together with the engine cowling spacer and fillets. The two cut outs at the front are for the square plate No. 8 to drop in to, as shown in Photos 17 and 18. This will strengthen the upper nose bay before the circular engine ‘Firewall’ is added in. In the next instalment, adding the engine firewall (together with the first big 'blooper' of the build  and the external shaping fillets to complete the first stage of Pup Number 1. Until then, Happy Modelling to you All! Robin. Plymouth57 attached the following image(s): First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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Looking really good, I'm surprised how much detail there is. Mark
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Rank: Super-Elite   Groups: Registered
Joined: 31/05/2010 Posts: 5,679 Points: 17,011 Location: Wiltshire
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Another great update. Some vey skilful building going on here - looking very nice. Happy Modelling
BUILDING: Hachette Spitfire Mk 1A, Constructo Mayflower
SUBSCRIPTION COMPLETE (Awaiting building): USS Constitution, Sovereign of the Seas, 1:200 Bismarck (Hachette)
COMPLETED: Porsche 911, E-Type Jaguar, Lam Countach
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Great to see this one coming together Robin, looking good.... Regards Alan
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Rank: Super-Elite Groups: Registered
Joined: 19/06/2013 Posts: 4,588 Points: 13,553 Location: West Yorkshire
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Nice update Robin they look fairly sturdy as well. Al
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Many thanks again to Mark, Tony, Alan and AL! There certainly is a lot of detail included in even the basic kit and as you'll see later, this is very easy to incorporate into an upgraded version. The construction techniques used by the kit designers does result in a very sturdy contsruction, especially in the 'box' which makes up the main fuselage, the only 'flimsy' parts come later with the joining together of the wings with the struts but even then, I have bad childhood memories of trying to fit biplane wings together on the good old Airfix kits too!  In this installment we finish off the first part of Number 1 ready to begin the same sections on Number 2 to follow on. The engine bay firewall (part number 7*) is the first part pre-glued on to the 1mm backing card that is circular in shape and, by definition, much harder to cut out cleanly. Up until now all the major ‘thick’ sections have been pretty much straight edged – apart from the seat of course but even that part can be cut out with the ‘nipping off’ method (cutting off lots of tiny straight cuts all around the edge of the curve). This part however is big enough to have the room to slice around the edge. The secret is not to force the blade. Just go slowly and carefully scribing a clean slot into the card, repeating the action around and around until the blade goes through the 1mm thickness. The initial cutting is taking place in Photo 19 and the cut out piece is shown in Photo 20. Personally I found it easiest to begin cutting at the 12 o’clock position and cut carefully down to 3 o’clock, and then rotate the piece back around until the blade is at 12 o’clock again etc, etc. The slots were cut out with the safety razor blade in its handle, lined up with the marking for the slot and pushed straight down. The end of the slot was then cut with the craft knife tip pressed in from both sides until the waste card dropped out. The four tabs on the front of the fuselage then slip in to the slots and the firewall was glued in as seen in Photo 21. At this point I should point out the slight ‘omission’ in the build. In the centre of the firewall you can see a small white disc with an ‘x’ in the middle. This means… REMOVE! Guess what I forgot to do! Fortunately, it’s not a big problem, as there is a second firewall piece to be added later which doubles the thickness of this area, half is for the fuselage skin to attach to and the front half is for the engine cowling. As long as I remember to put the hole in the second layer, that will give me the point at which to punch through the inner one! Phew! The last part to complete the basic fuselage carcase was to fit and glue the spacer fillets which support the outer skin of the fuselage to finish it off. These are composed of the triangular Part 16 which slopes the fuselage back from the circular metal cowling, to its corresponding curved spacer, this marks the point where the last curved wooden upright is found in the cockpit frame, shown in Photo 22. Note in this shot, Pup No.1 is also being used to test fit the new scratch built three dimensional instrument panel for Pup No.2! (I can’t fit No.2’s side panel on until all the cockpit instruments and mechanics have been made up). On the rear fuselage we have Parts 14 and 15 to glue on as illustrated in Photo 23. These support the curved top to the fuselage which runs from behind the cockpit back to the tail plane. No.1 will be taking a rest for a little while now so that I can begin the much more complicated No.2 and bring that one up to the same point. Then they will both begin to get their ‘clothes’ on! Until then, Happy Modelling to you All! Robin. Plymouth57 attached the following image(s): First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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Another great update Robin, coming together very nicely.... Regards Alan
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Rank: Super-Elite Groups: Registered
Joined: 31/05/2010 Posts: 5,679 Points: 17,011 Location: Wiltshire
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Robin Very impressed with your blade skills, all the parts are so neatly cut. Looks really good. Happy Modelling
BUILDING: Hachette Spitfire Mk 1A, Constructo Mayflower
SUBSCRIPTION COMPLETE (Awaiting building): USS Constitution, Sovereign of the Seas, 1:200 Bismarck (Hachette)
COMPLETED: Porsche 911, E-Type Jaguar, Lam Countach
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Thanks again Alan and Tony! The cutting out is probably the most important part of the paper modelling - rushing that job is like having a plastic kit with lots of flash and not trimming it off! But thanks for noticing! Well, here goes the 'new and improved' Number Two ... Construction: Pup Number Two:So now the real thinking and planning (and the fun) begins! This kit was designed by a real genius, Pawel Mistewicz not only designed a ‘Build from the Book’ model but also created a kit to be taken as far as the builder wants to go. If you look back at the construction of No.1 so far, you can see that printed inside the fuselage, are some areas that will never be seen when completed – so why bother printing the details in there? The answer is that the designer has included as much extra detail as he could just to encourage the builder to go that extra mile. And also, if you look right back to the beginning of this diary, to the photos of the two pages of parts you can see down at the bottom a large tri-coloured rectangle. This is another aid to scratch build, as the three hues represent the main colours of the aircraft – the doped linen in brown and cream and the silver of the aluminium cowling, all printed off to either effect a repair if something went wrong or to allow alterations to the basic build! Making full use of these ‘freebies’ its time to start the second cockpit. Photo 1 illustrates the same cockpit floor piece as the first Pup, but this time given a second skin made from the cream doped linen paper ‘spares’. You see, although the basic floor is printed in a dark colour with the foot rests and metal tubing, in actual fact the bottom of the cockpit is the clear doped belly of the aircraft – miss your footing and your boot goes through the fuselage! You can just make out the two thin pencil lines drawn on the new floor, this marks the positions of the two wooden cross members which are made from strips of Victory’s Sapele wood veneer shown glued in place in Photo 2. Also seen here are the first of the internal wire braceings together with a length of the wire itself. This is the same highly adaptable 0.2mm electric wire strands which so far have provided barbed wire in the Messines model, aircraft antennas in Scramble and Frederick’s ring mail in last year’s model Knight diorama – it also makes good electrical wire! This time the individual strand is gripped between pliers and stretched for about an inch. The resulting wire is slightly thinner and more importantly, dead straight, ready to be cut to length with the razor blade and glued in position with the Roket card glue, using just a tiny spot at each end applied with a cocktail stick. In Photo 3 we have the four components of the starboard fuselage just as in the first model. In this build however as you can see on the far right, the rear bulkhead has been ‘modified’ as mentioned earlier. In this instance the full height original has been cut back to just the portion which attaches to the cockpit floor, the black centre piece with the crossed bracing wires and the semi circular ‘wooden’ panel having been removed. My original intention was to drop the floor level down to the fuselage bottom but this is impossible to achieve because of the construction of the lower wings much later on. If you look closely at Photo 3 and also Photo 6, you will see a slot cut out of the fuselage side beneath the level of the kit cockpit floor. This position will be eventually filled by the main lower wing spar which is glued into that slot – hence I can’t drop the floor down! What I have to try and achieve therefore is the ‘ appearance’ of the floor extending all the way down to the fuselage bottom. The forward bulkhead and the bottom part of the rearward are still required for the ‘box girder’ construction of the fuselage itself as we’ll see shortly. In Photo 4 the cockpit floor and bulkheads are glued in place into the fuselage side and I am now cutting the Victory’s wooden veneer planking into very thin strips to provide the horizontal framework of the cockpit area. On the actual aircraft these strips are incredibly thin – about ¾” by ¼”, they are only there to fair the fabric out from the flat fuselage to the rounded engine cowling. Now we come to that helpfully provided coloured paper stock, which is used here to fill in the missing background which had the rear bulkhead location printed over it. Photo 5 shows the port side fill-in whilst Photo 6 has the more complicated starboard piece, which has to fit around the previously glued in cockpit. And yes, gluing them in before the cockpit went in would have been easier – but you have to remember, I’m making this up as I go along! This fiddly section of paper is shown glued in position in Photo 7, and this pic also shows up the next little item which needs altering. As you can see, the ‘false’ cockpit floor section only extends half way back between the two wooden frame uprights. In the basic model, this is the point where the rear bulkhead came but all that remains of that piece is the little ‘step’ under the floor (seen sticking up on the top left as the plane is upside down here!) In order to give the impression of the fuselage floor continuing back to the tail, it was necessary to extend the cockpit section back to marry up with the next upright. The fact that the two bottoms are at different levels shouldn’t be too apparent once the fuselage sides and top go on. The extension is shown fitted on in Photo 8. That notch in the top of the fuselage side again marks where the old bulkhead fitted. This is the wooden printed semicircle at the top of the bulkhead and later on I’ll be replacing that part with a real wood piece to fit into those slots. Although you can’t see it in the photos of Pup No. 1, that bulkhead has a printed pair of bracing wires like a large ‘X’, so they’ll be going on later in ‘proper’ wire (and with all the control cables passing back through the same space, that’ll be interesting!  Photo 9 is one of the comparison shots illustrating the difference between the basic fuselage construction and the up-grading ‘in progress’, whilst Photo 10 shows the separate port side fuselage panels for the same reason. In the next instalment, we get down to a little metal work and carpentry as the altered cockpit begins its fitting out with new controls! Until then, Happy Modelling to you All! Robin. Plymouth57 attached the following image(s): First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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Rank: Super-Elite Groups: Registered
Joined: 31/05/2010 Posts: 5,679 Points: 17,011 Location: Wiltshire
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Robin And very well done they look as well. Some fiddley work getting all those bracing wires in place but really looks good. Happy Modelling
BUILDING: Hachette Spitfire Mk 1A, Constructo Mayflower
SUBSCRIPTION COMPLETE (Awaiting building): USS Constitution, Sovereign of the Seas, 1:200 Bismarck (Hachette)
COMPLETED: Porsche 911, E-Type Jaguar, Lam Countach
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Rank: Super-Elite  Groups: Registered
Joined: 27/01/2014 Posts: 5,060 Points: 14,980
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Stunning work Robin, very neat and precise
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Looking good, very nice progress being made.... Regards Alan
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That's some modelling at its best, from the pictures it looks fiddly in places. Excellent work. I look forward to the cockpit detail next time. 
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Many thanks to Tony, Dave, Alan and Mark! You're right- its IS fiddly at times, and in the installment after this one it gets  fiddlier! As mentioned last time, the first part of the cockpit layout to be replaced was the Control Column or ‘Joystick’ as it was later called. The original rolled paper cylinder was replaced with a length of 2mm diameter aluminium tubing as shown in Photo 11. The column is about 1cm in length but I first cut it a little longer so that I could insert it into the chuck of my Mantua Mini Wood Lathe. Although this is designed expressly for wood, it is quite capable of handling small sections of soft aluminium or even brass. Using the lathe together with a couple of diamond dust rat tail files I was able to reduce the diameter of the lower section of the column as seen here. The tubing is shaped with a reduction in the diameter part way up from the lower edge, which then ‘bows’ back out to the full width at the bottom. With the shaping completed, I then used the rotary tool with a diamond dust cylinder head to grind a curved depression into the bottom of the tube. This ‘cup’ shape will then sit on the 1mm tubing, which will form the column axle (see Photo 13). The next step was to form the actual hand grip complete with ‘corded’ grips and the machine gun firing button. This was formed from a length of 1mm brass rod, with a triangular ‘shepherd’s crook’ bent into one end using flat long nosed pliers. Then, using exactly the same method as I employed to make Frederick’s ring mail, I tightly coiled the single wire strand around the brass rod, and once securely in place, cut the coil into three short lengths using the razor blade and carefully slid each section along the rod, round the bends and into position on the handle. Once satisfied with the placement I could then secure each one with a drop of watery super glue at each end. After a few minutes to set I then snipped off the triangle from the rest of the rod with mini wire clippers and then ground down the inside edges of the open bottom until it would just fit over the top of the aluminium tube. Another couple of drops of super glue secured the handle to the tube, followed by another tiny drop in the centre of the top grip to add the firing button made from a miniscule sliver of stretched sprue. The final result is illustrated in Photo 12. The next task was to actually fit the control column into its position in the floor of the cockpit. As shown in Photo 13, the metal tube onto which the column fits is passed through two of the wooden frame members. In this photo, the frames are made up from sanded down coffee stirrers but I soon removed them and started over again when I found a long lost section of donkey’s years old thin wood which had seasoned over the decades into a lovely ‘antique pine’ colour. This replaced the original pieces and also built up the pilot’s seat support frame as shown in the following Photo 14. The metal tubing was a length of Albion Alloys 1mm diameter aluminium tube, and the control column was simply super glued in place onto the protruding end. Also in this shot, are the two foot rests, cut out from a sheet of wood veneer. Before the rudder foot pedal bar can be made up, there is a small section to be added to the extreme front of the column support tube. This is a system of pulleys which feed the cables from the base of the control column back around in front of the pilot’s feet and then through the fuselage to the elevators (the moving flaps on the tailplane). There are two different versions of this set up. The one I am modelling here consists of a pair of small pulley wheels, one each side of the central column directly beneath the rudder pedal. There is another form however which moves everything through ninety degrees with two vertical pulleys on the same axle. In that set up the returning cables don’t come back over the foot rests but actually pass back through the hollow metal tube to which the joystick is attached. The more you look into the Sopwith Pup, the more you realise that each one was almost a unique hand built machine – the parts were standard but where and how they went in was anything but! The first step to create the horizontal version was to drill a 0.5mm hole through a length of the same tubing used for the control column as illustrated in Photo 15. Once this was done a length of brass rod of the same diameter was passed through the holes and the tube was then held in the mini vice, using the brass rod to hold it against the end so that half the tube could be filed away as seen in Photo 16. The flat ‘shelf’ thus created will sit flat against the forward wooden cross piece directly over the smaller metal tube, (as seen in Photo 19). The small length of brass rod sticking through the holes in the tube was then bent to shape and trimmed to size with long nosed flat pliers and the wire cutter to produce a pair of ‘arms’ which were then secured in place with a drop of thin super glue as shown in Photo 17 (perched on the tip of a cocktail stick). Two thin disks of a slightly smaller aluminium tube were then super glued onto the two arms to form the actual pulleys as seen in Photo 18. I’m not sure what the diameter of those is – they came from a one inch length of tube, the last remnant of a length purchased many years ago! Back to Photo 19 again, and here you can see the pulley assembly mounted over the small tube as mentioned earlier and also the pilot’s seat support and the two cross members now replaced with the ‘seasoned’ wood. Photo 20 shows that same piece of wood with the first stage of creating the rudder pedal. A fairly simple process – a strip was sawn off the main section and the paper pedal from the kit was used as a pattern to draw around. Because of the central ‘bump’ the rear face was ground to shape using the rotary tool with a drum sander bit, and once shaped, the pedal was sanded down to half its original thickness as shown here. Finally in Photo 21, a taste of what I’m trying to achieve from the real thing! There are some interesting points shown here, firstly, if you look right in the centre, you can see that this Pup actually has that other pulley arrangement, you can just make out the vertical pulley which feeds the elevator cable back down through the joystick support tube. Secondly note the light coloured ‘floor’ of the cockpit – a single layer of doped linen and thirdly, this particular Pup has a couple of parts here which mine doesn’t – this aircraft is armed with the single Vickers machine gun, not the lighter Lewis gun. My Pup (although not visible) has a single combined petrol and oil tank which took up all the space behind the instrument panel. This had to be altered to fit the larger Vickers and the two silver objects you can see at top left and right are the separate oil tank moved to the left and the ammunition tank for the belt of .303 cartridges on the right. The silver bent tube which kinks to the right behind the joystick passes right through the floor – this is the ejector chute for the spent cartridges, which fall away from under the cockpit. Unless the Lewis gun was fitted with a cartridge bag, their cartridges just went everywhere! In the next instalment – completing the rudder pedal and my first experiences with Uschi ‘Rig that thing’ elastic rigging thread! Until then, Happy Modelling to you All! Robin. Plymouth57 attached the following image(s): First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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Rank: Super-Elite Groups: Registered
Joined: 19/06/2013 Posts: 4,588 Points: 13,553 Location: West Yorkshire
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Lovely job Robin there's certainly a lot going into these builds. Al
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Lovely work Robin, your detail is spectacular.  Regards Mark
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Rank: Super-Elite Groups: Registered
Joined: 31/05/2010 Posts: 5,679 Points: 17,011 Location: Wiltshire
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Looking very smart Robin. Very interesting seeing this one come together. Happy Modelling
BUILDING: Hachette Spitfire Mk 1A, Constructo Mayflower
SUBSCRIPTION COMPLETE (Awaiting building): USS Constitution, Sovereign of the Seas, 1:200 Bismarck (Hachette)
COMPLETED: Porsche 911, E-Type Jaguar, Lam Countach
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Rank: Super-Elite  Groups: Registered
Joined: 28/07/2014 Posts: 4,269 Points: 12,713 Location: Scotland
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Thats really looking great Robin love those old planes all them wooden braces and wire regards Phil COMING SOON =1/72 Italeri diorama`s Battle for the Reichstag and Stalingrad battle at the tractor factory 1/16 Trumpeter King Tiger with loads of extras ON THE GO= refurbishment of 1/25 Tamiya tiger 1 , amt Star trek kits and space 1999 models
So Much to Build,But What a Hobby!
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