Tamiya 1/48 P-38 Lightning

[stillp]

I don't blame you Andy.
Pete

[papa 695]

That office looks great Andy.

[Guest]

Hi Andy bit late sorry, cracking job on cockpit area very neat and tidy:thumb2:.
Pete

[Guest]

Thanks Pete, I'm trying my best.

Cheers Ian. I don't suppose you have any reference shots of the cockpit / radio area do you? I've seen a few, including yourself, add wiring to that area and it seems a nice touch since it'll be quite visible. Could do with something to work off though and all the pictures I have are from ground level.

[stillp]

Andy, take your pick: https://www.google.com/search?q=p38+...#imgrc=_&vet=1

Pete

[Guest]

Thanks Pete. I've got plenty of the actual cockpit but it's the area behind the pilot where the radios are that I'm particularly interested in, so I can get an idea how the wiring should look.

[stillp]

OK Andy, I understand. It doesn't help that P38 is the designation of the radio in the Range Rover! There are some cutaways at http://p38assn.org/images/p38s/ that might help.
Pete

[Guest]

Thanks again Pete, will have a look through those when I get a minute.
Searching various combinations of P38 & radio was just giving me loads of R/C pictures!

[stillp]

Try here Andy https://www.google.com/search?q=p38+...wZsoLeSJSYdFuM:

[Guest]

Cheers Pete, a couple there that are useful thanks.

The gear looks very different to how tamiya has represented it anyway so I think I'll just use a bit of artistic licence.

[Guest]

My condition has flared up again so I'm on a liquid only diet for a while to give my gut a rest. This has made me a bit foggy headed so I've left the fiddly details of seat belts and wiring for now and moved on with construction.

Front gear bay was next on the list, which fits to a central spar that helps align and strengthen the fuselage and wing joints. All the parts were given a blast of silver before assembly and the khaki piece at the back (I've no idea what it is!) was masked and sprayed too. It'll get livened up with some weathering at a later stage, when I do the main landing gear bays.

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Flipping that over we add it to the lower fuselage. You can see the wheel hump that forms part of the cockpit floor, and one of the 3 ball bearing weights. The fit is so precise on these parts that glue is almost an afterthought. The BB had a few drops of CA to make sure it doesn't rattle around.

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Then everything was brought together with the top fuselage section/cockpit and the wing leading edge sections, ailerons, and wing tips were added. Again, fit is nigh on perfect with no ambiguity on positioning and some of the joints between parts become panel gaps that exactly match the ones already scribed in. Very impressive.

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I then moved on to the turbochargers. There are two different versions in the kit for the F or G, and of course the early ones I'm doing are slightly more difficult. Construction is easy enough but painting will be a challenge as some parts are body coloured, some not, and some both lol. It wouldn't be too bad if I were brush painting them in a straight colour but I'd like to add a bit of texture and wear to the turbo housings themselves so it will take a bit of faffing about. I've pretty much got a plan but will give it another coat of thinking once my head clears a bit.


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[yak face]

Great progress andy , i get the feeling that even though youre a bit under the weather at the moment ,youre really enjoying this kit . cheers tony

[Guest]

Absolutely Tony. I like the way everything just fits together so well, and how much thought must have gone into the design. Even down to some sprue gates which seem like they're in a weird position but you realise that it's been put there so if you're ham-fisted with cleaning it up it's going to be hidden by something else anyway. I can see why Barry W loves the big Tamiya birds so much.

[stillp]

That is looking good Andy. Hope you feel better soon.
Pete

[Lee Drennen]

Very nice Andy great updates and I like the box art