Dave W's Revell 1/72 Bell AH-1G Cobra

[Dave Ward]

Next step will be the canopy - this is a major feature & making a mess of it would be a disaster. I've thought about assembling first, on the model ( it has 5 parts ), then masking, but I'm not happy about removing masking from a fragile clear assembly ( if it was one piece, no problem ). I've decided to mask the clear bits on the sprue, paint the frames, remove the masking & assemble it to the model - with hopefully, just a few touch ups along the joins. You have the option of having two of the canopy sections open, but that would make things even more fragile. I've considered several ways of doing this, and all have pluses & minuses!
Dave

[peterairfix]

Just caught up with this some good work for a small scale.

[Dave Ward]

After about 20mins, I realised that masking the canopy sections was a non-starter ( if I had pre-cut masks, though.... ). I gave up & hand painted the frames........................

A bit wobbly in places, but some careful work with a chisel edged cocktail stick should improve things.
Meanwhile, a basecoat was added to the fuselage & the yellow bits carefully added. The rotor primed & the yellow tips roughly painted ( I'll mask them when I do the rotor topcoat )

One of those days that things went very well - I even had a Tesco Delivery whilst painting the canopy frames!! I'm limiting myself to an hour-and-a-half benchtime at the moment - I had a few twinges in the hand over the weekend, so I'm heeding the warning.
Next up. I'll detail paint the fuselage, then gloss varnish, in preparation for decals.
Dave

[Jim R]

Hi Dave
Coming on well.

I have added weight under the cockpit ( broken miniature drill bits - I have loads of them !

I think we have all been there :rolling:
I have only ever built one helicopter and the canopy was very difficult. Maybe helicopter canopies are prone to issues.
Glad the hand is OK but don't overdo things. It's easy to spent too much time without noticing.
Jim

[The Smythe Meister]

Looking very nice indeed Dave
Canopies sure are tricky I find too!!
Andy

[Dave Ward]

The canopy & the clear bits to add ( HUD & lights ), rotors.

The next pictures will be in the completed section.........................
Dave

[adt70hk]

Looking very good Dave!!!

[Dave Ward]

Finished here : https://www.scale-models.co.uk/threa...pter-gb.39147/