My 2016 Production at Maddog Manufacturing

[KSaarni]

Wouh,

I think I have said it before, will probably say it in the future and I say it now.

Looking at the, not only the quality of the kits, but especially the quality of making, coloring, weathering these 1:72 scale vehicles by you just keeps on astonishing me. I still have difficulties to believe they are 1:72 scale, so great they are!

- Kari

[Duke Maddog]

This week I have a little bit more to show. I was able to get a lot more bench time than expected so I made the most of it.

I'll start with my aircraft. Only one update there; and it's a small one. I found the nose cone for the Me-110 and now I can move forward on this:




Next up are my ships. I got all the detail parts on and painted on almost all of them so far. Here's the USS Ingraham first:



Next is the USS Arthur Radford. The main mast isn't glued on yet, that'll come later:



The USS New York now has all her detail parts as well:




Finally, I got most of the photo-etch and other detail parts on the USS Forrest Sherman. I still have more parts to add to the photo-etch platforms:





After all this, I started the decals on all these ships, except the Radford. I still have to paint the white stripes and patterns on the deck first. The others are sporting their deck decals though:







Finally, it's amazing what I find on my workbench when I'm moving things around. This is Revell's Chris Craft fishing boat that I started some time ago. I decided to pull it out and start detailing it out. Here's where it is now with some additional paint work done and the masking removed from the windows:





That's all I have for all of that so far. Now here's my latest progress on my armor.


I'll start out with a couple trucks. The Canadian truck and the Japanese fuel truck now have a basecoat of green on them:





Then I decided to shoot another coat of Panzer Dunklegelb on the SS-100:



I also finished painting the mittraelerwagen with Panzer Schwartzgrau:





While it was sitting and drying, I had the misfortune of having the fan on my 'spraybooth' fall on this, breaking it up pretty good:



After some time, I re-assembled the wheel truck:



I then finished adding all the rest of the broken parts to the rest of it:



And now it is back in shape again! I also gave it a wash and a dry-brush of a lighter grey so now all this needs is dust and weathering to be done.


I also removed the window masking on my SS-100. All I have left to do is add the wheels and then weather this as well and I can call it done. Well, as done as I can get it since the decals went missing. They are only license plates so I can replace them with spares from my spares box:



Finally, I started a model for the APC campaign on the Modeler's Alliance. This is the Revell of Germany 1/72 scale Boxer. It's a neat little kit with some pretty good detailing. I started out building the lower hull:



After that, I added the floor plate inside:



Next it had me build the driver's compartment:



After that, I added it to the lower hull:



Next I started the rear troop compartment. Since the real vehicle is modularized, they made the model the same way. Here is the basic box:



I didn't worry about the huge sinkholes in this because the top covers them quite well:



Later, I slipped this into the rear compartment on the lower hull. I was very amazed at how well this fit! This is only dry-fit in place:



Well, that's about all I have for now so enjoy the tour. Thanks all for looking in, comments are welcome.

[Duke Maddog]

Okay, Hobby Day weekend is over and I have quite a bit to show. I hope I don't upset anyone with my long post.

I'll start with the one ship I worked on; or tried to. The USS Arthur Radford instructions called for me to paint the white stripes on the raised detail on the decks. Here are my very poor efforts...

First effort on the forecastle:



And the the helicopter landing pad:



Yeah, that's gonna take some serious touching up....




Moving on, I decided to focus on armor for awhile. They are relatively fast and easy compared to some of the aircraft and other models I've been working on.


I'll start with a model I began for a Group Build on the Missing Lynx Braille Scale Forums. This is a BRDM chassis with anti-tank rockets on it. I first assembled the chassis, which required me to add the two small wheels:



Later I added most of the detail parts and assembled the rocket launcher. Here they are all dry-fit together with the main wheels snapped on:





The next model I worked on was my German Boxer GTF. After I completed the suspension underneath; I only added the forward hull plate and front bumper/headlight bar, as well as assembled the machine gun turret:






After that, I decided to get the rest of the photo etch on one of the train cars that needs it. This thing has been sitting for far too long on the workbench:



This train is practically done with assembly. All it needs now is the quad Maxims and the last flatcar's photo etch and then I can paint this:




While I was on photo-etch 'duty'. I also decided to get the photo etch parts out of the way on the Modelcollect T-64BV model. The two side ERA panels have to be attached to the side fenders with these photo-etch parts:



Each one of those photo-etch parts was folded four times....

Here's the side ERA panel attached to the side skirt:



That puppy is just swinging in the wind, held on by those Photo-etch parts. Man what an ordeal that was!

Moving on, I finished adding all the detail parts to the turret of this tank to finish it:





That is an impressive looking turret!

After adding the extra parts to the main hull and snap-fitting the side skirts on the hull, I shot a couple pics of this tank ready for paint:






After all that, I needed a break from anything with photo etch. I pulled out the Japanese fuel truck and painted the interior and chassis:



I also painted the frames on the clear parts for this fuel truck:



Now I can start assembling this truck and get the decals on it.

The little Canadian truck was clearcoated in preparation for decals. It was also given a wash on the back bed sides:



After that, I wanted to start that newest T-90 tank I had so I pulled it out and started with step one, assembling the turret:



Later I completed the upper hull with all the detail parts. Here it is with the turret in place:



I just need to add the roadwheels and other parts to the lower metal hull and this will be ready for paint.

Finally, once I received the two buses that someone bought for me, I was very eager to get started on the VOMAG Bus. I was quite surprised how big this puppy is! The instructions called for assembling the engine first so I got it built up:



I added that and some of the suspension parts to the chassis:



Just to give you an idea of how long this bus is, here's a shot of this chassis next to my Exact Blade:



Next I assembled the interior and the hood for this bus, adding the side fenders on this as well:



You can see the first small issue I had; the two hood halves didn't cement together smoothly. I had to add a small strip of styrene to the center of the hood.

Moving on to assemble the body, I found my first 'major' issue. The two body halves when cemented together are too narrow to properly fit on the rear panel. When I pulled them apart and cemented them instead to the rear panel, flushing up the surfaces, I had a pretty serious gap in the center of the roof:



The only solution I could see was to add a strip of styrene to the gap, filling it in:



After this had dried a sufficient amount of time, I decided to dry-fit this to the main chassis and interior. This revealed the third 'major' issue:



This will be an easy fix once I'm ready to cement everything together, as you can see here. There will be some residual gaps to deal with, but nothing unmanageable:






Well, that's all the progress I have to show for now. Thanks for looking in, comments are welcome.

[mostrich]

In terms of kit quality those Russian tanks really stand out. Countless crisp details are teasing your eyes, especially when directly compared to more average kits on your bench.

Nice save on the bus!

[Duke Maddog]

Thanks Mostrich. I agree, Modelcollect does pack a ton of detail into these kits. Yet, with the exception of the T-64BV, they are fast and easy to build and go together so well. Thanks for the compliment on the bus, I hated that I had to resort to that; you'd think they would have gotten it figured out themselves and molded it to fit. Oh well. I am certainly looking forward to seeing this bus done.

Stay tuned, more to come.

[dogfish7]

Hopefully, the bus will slow you down to just a few hundred models completed this year Duke. Seriously, some awesome work guy.

[Duke Maddog]

Thanks Bruce! I don't know if the nus will slow me down. That work on the bus you saw was only about an hour and a half of time. It'll be interesting to get it painted.

[Duke Maddog]

I finally found some time to post something here. I have a lot to show, although it may seem like only a little was done to each model I'm going to show. I'd been fighting a deep depression over this past month and some of what kept me going was being able to sit in the hobby room and just work on something. Part of the issues I had was the hobby room was getting messy again. A friend offered to let me pack up and store a bunch of models at his place in his garage, so I went on another cleaning and packing spree. While pulling out everything in my stash and going through it; I found a number of models I had started some years ago, put aside and promptly forgot about for years. I figured it was time to get some of them done.

While I shall try to do well on these, I'm just going to get them finished. If they are less than contest quality, oh well. I just want them done so I can toss the boxes and clear some more space.

I'll start with a couple of my 'maritime' models I've been doing. I found this old Revell fishing boat that I'd started some long time ago. This past month I took some time to touch up the paint, repair a couple broken parts and add the fishing platform on the bow. Here is where it sits now:



Next I took some time to repaint the white on the decking of the USS Arthur Radford. It doesn't look perfect, but it's better than before. I might just go ahead and move on with this:




Moving on, I finally was able to progress further on the Airfix P-51 Mustang that had been languishing because the instruction sheet was gone and I had no way to apply any decals. So, I went to my local hobby shop and purchased another kit of the exact same Mustang, pulled out the instruction sheet and went to work. I painted some more of the details and then added the decals:



I'm hoping to be done with that one pretty soon.

During this past month, I'd been trying to smooth out the surface of the C-118; especially where the area had to be built up behind the cockpit. It kept revealing tiny pits whenever I tried to smooth it out. While spending a couple hours sanding down a re-fill of putty during a long distance call with a friend, the canopy popped off:



Later on, I re-glued the canopy back on and when it was dry; I then shot a bit of Tamiya putty from a spray can over the offending area (after masking the canopy windows again). I then spent the next three days sanding and buffing that plane. I still have a long way to go, that's why I didn't take any more pics of it yet.



Next up, I'm going to show you a couple cars that I had found which had been started and forgotten about. First is my Revell Corsair 'Rebel Racer'. I had painted this before, but the paint on the body was rough and uneven. I took some time to sand it down and smooth it out:



Now to get another coat of red on it.

I also painted the leather bucket seats inside:



I may have to re-think that interior somehow.

The other car I found was the old Revell Mach 5 from the old Speed Racer TV show. I had painted the upper body on this white and then promptly put this away some years ago:



It was time to get this back on track. I spent a few hours assembling the interior of the car, and dry-fitting it to the lower chassis:



This car has working steering on the model. How cool is that?!

The engine compartment fits under the upper body, trapping the engine cover in place so it could be opened to show the "engine" inside. Here it is only dry-fit in place again so I can pull it out and paint the engine and interior compartment:



Later on, I sprayed some red in the interior of the Mach 5:



That's as far as I'd gotten on that to date.



Now on to my small scale vehicles.


I started out by painting the interior of the Vomag bus. I couldn't find any references that showed or described the interior of this bus, so I winged it. The instructions said to paint the floor black, so I did that. Then I painted the seats leather, the rails chrome, and the backs of the seats and the front of the cab in a wood pattern. It ain't perfect, but then it won't really be able to be seen much anyway. I just wanted the suggestion of it when seen through the windows:



After setting that aside to dry, I decided to start my other bus, the Ludwig Areo. The first thing was the chassis:



Next I assembled the interior:



Finally, I assembled the body of this bus. There are a lot of places I'll need to fill and sand smooth:



Just for fun, here is an interesting pic showing the relative size between these two buses:



I didn't stop there. I shot paint on two other models, my BRDM with Konkurs ATGMs and my German Boxer. They both got a basecoat of Dark Green:





Back when I was putting decals on the Mustang, I also added them to two of the trucks I've been working on. My Canadian 15CWT truck got decals:





After this one, I added the windows to the cab of the Japanese 3-ton Fuel Truck:



Later I applied the decals to it:





The cab and the tank are only mocked up in the above pics, as you can see here below. This shows where I weathered the wheels and added them to the lower chassis:



I also weathered some more of the upper cab and tank, but not much. I wanted this truck to be lightly weathered. Here it is mocked up again after the weathering:



Later on, I also weathered the wheels to the Canadian truck and added them to the chassis. I finished weathering the rest of the truck as well, after gluing everything together:





Both these last two trucks still have a few little bits and bobs to add, as well as some touch-up painting and detailing to do. I should be able to finish them in another day or so, I hope.


Well, that completes my long tedious post showing everything I've been able to get done between down times over the last three weeks or so. Maybe sometime this week I'll be able to post some finished models.

Thanks all for looking in, and for your patience with my long post. Comments are always welcome.

[Stikpusher]

The other car I found was the old Revell Mach 5 from the old Speed Racer TV show. I had painted the upper body on this white and then promptly put this away some years ago:



It was time to get this back on track. I spent a few hours assembling the interior of the car, and dry-fitting it to the lower chassis:



This car has working steering on the model. How cool is that?!

The engine compartment fits under the upper body, trapping the engine cover in place so it could be opened to show the "engine" inside. Here it is only dry-fit in place again so I can pull it out and paint the engine and interior compartment:



Later on, I sprayed some red in the interior of the Mach 5:



That's as far as I'd gotten on that to date.

The Mach 5!!!!! Hell yes!!!

[Duke Maddog]

Ah the memories! LOL! Thanks Carlos! I'm really looking forward to getting this one done.