SPA Modeler

love the weathering on the props.

Hmmm... pink as a base color for yellow. I'll have to try it next time.

BlackSheep214 wrote:Hmmm... pink as a base color for yellow. I'll have to try it next time.

Interesting… I’ve used white, yellow zinc Chromate, and even OD as a base where yellow on top turned out great. Pink is a new one…

You mentioned you used black CA. I’ve never heard of it and where would you find them? Are they used both as a glue and filler or either?

Thanks guys!

BlackSheep214 wrote:You mentioned you used black CA. I’ve never heard of it and where would you find them? Are they used both as a glue and filler or either?

I use rubberized black CA for my fill work and also as an adhesive. It's just like CA glue but I guess it has a bit of rubber in it. I find it a little easier to sand than regular CA but still hard enough to feather an edge.


I'm planning to use Eduard's brass flaps for this build and I think it would be wise to get these sorted before tackling the wheel well construction.


The upper wing components are first up. These will get glued into the inner surface of the upper wing. Before folding, there are some features that need to "scribed" with a ballpoint pen from the reverse side. I wish the result was a little sharper but oh well...



The necessary folds were made with an appropriately long photoetch bending tool. This one is a Small Shops 5.5 inch version that I got specifically for 1/32 scale brass flaps.


A couple of issues arose during the construction of these upper wing components. First of all is a little raised section that is hinged on the trailing edge. You're supposed to hinge this little rectangle up a tad and then connect everything together with this tiny sliver of folded brass. I couldn't even trim the attachment tabs from this part because even heavy breathing will bend it. Almost impossible to get a successful result.


The other issue is with the hinges. They are meant to be folded twice to build up the thickness of the part but there is not enough excess material between folding parts to allow an accurate second fold. This throws off the cross-section of the tabs that fit into small holes. My solution was to separate the hinge components and use three pieces to make up each hinge instead of four.


Anyways... a few hours of fiddling and I got both problem areas resolved.


Here are the assembled upper wing components of the flaps.

Wow.... those are some mad skills working with PE.

Regarding black CA, maybe it’s something I should look into. What do you use to clean up black CA?

Great work on the prop and the PE flaps.

BlackSheep214 wrote:Wow.... those are some mad skills working with PE.

Regarding black CA, maybe it’s something I should look into. What do you use to clean up black CA?

It's excellent as a filler because of that black color. Very easy to keep track of You can use the same debonder that you use for regular CA glue.

Here's where the completed upper wing flaps parts will go.


I'll have to level off that angle in the trailing edge cross section to accommodate the PE parts but that should be fairly simple.


The actual flaps are bit more challenging to fold. They are separated into two flaps for each wing so four total.


The individual spars have a flat attachment section that needs to be folded first. Thank goodness for this as this will create a much more secure bond than having the spars simply folding onto the flap as I've had to do on other Eduard flaps. The instructions call for each spar to be folded and placed into position before moving on to the next and that's how I went about it.



For these smaller folds, I switched to the Small Shops Bug.


Here is the flap after folding and a few more PE bits added. I still need to add a section of round plastic rod to complete the flap but I don't have the right size yet.


The plastic flaps on the lower wing need to be removed, which I am saving for a little later.


Here is the lower flap placed onto the appropriate section of upper wing flap assembly. One quarter of the way done. This should be a great visual enhancement on the finished model.

Great detail work! Looks great.

Thanks Lyle!

I was able to wrap up lower flap #2 last night.


I still need to add the plastic rod to serve as the hinge axis for the flaps but you can see what the starboard side flaps will look like...


I don't know what it is about brass but unpainted PE assemblies always look super impressive to me. More so than when it is painted.


One of the lights on the bottom of the wing after painting.