Geoffers - Italeri 1/72 Wessex UH.5 - Royal Navy Rescue helicopter

[Geoffers]

Great start Geoff, love that quilting.
Oh do have a go at the yellow suit,it doesn't have to be a work of art but it will really pop through the windows, :blow-kiss:

Thanks Neil, I’ll have a play and see what I can come up with

Geoff.

[Geoffers]

Hello chaps,

Bit of progress to report :smiling:

It’s been slow progress as I’ve been sorting out all the fiddly interior details.

After gluing various pieces of lead wire and plastic rod to recreate some of the interior plumbing, heating ducts etc the cabin was firstly primed with Mr Surface 1500 black primer which was followed up with a coat of Vallejo Model Air 71.273 Ocean aGrey which seemed a reasonable match.

Once this had dried I started to carefully pick out all the details using various colours.

The seat were also painted, the pilot / co-pilots seat had a small pad of milliput added to try and recreate sheep skin cushions.

The control panels had the various buttons picked out in white, not very realistic but not much will be visible once the cockpit is complete.



The PE seat belts were painted and added and I also made a couple of bags from air dried clay and Tamiya tape to hang up in the cabin to replicate this reference photo.



And by popular request I had a go at recreating the yellow suit from wine bottle foil :smiling4: It’s very basic, just the general shape cut out and painted.

Here are all the small parts before they were added to the model.



These were then added to the interior using CA glue.



The windows were then added before the fuselage halves were cemented together.

Unfortunately not a lot of the interior detail is visible now it’s all been buttoned up :sad-face:



Undercarriage and lots of lumps and bumps to be added next.

Another update soon, thanks for looking :thumb2:

Geoff.

[Mini Me]

Cool!! :thumb2:

[rtfoe]

Late in Geoff, nice progress and a good addition of the yellow suit. Did the UH-34 a few years back and loved it. I guess the details would be just as good on this. I modified mine with cockpit windows slid back, pilots heads turned and the heli hovering over a rice paddy.
You'd be surprised how much is revealed when you peek in even if thinking very little is seen. Looking forward to the rescue color scheme.

Cheers,
Wabble

[scottie3158]

Geoff,
Some really nice additions and love the yellow suit.

[Guest]

That suit really will make the model, if you ask me

[yak face]

Great work geoff , love the quilting and the yellow suit , cheers tony

[Tim Marlow]

Love it :thumb2:

[Geoffers]

Cool!! :thumb2:

Love it :thumb2:

Thanks Rick and thank you Tim :smiling4:

Geoff,
Some really nice additions and love the yellow suit.

That suit really will make the model, if you ask me :smiling3:

Great work geoff , love the quilting and the yellow suit , cheers tony

Thank you guys, I didn’t intend to include the suit but was am glad I persuaded to do it now :thumb2:

Late in Geoff, nice progress and a good addition of the yellow suit. Did the UH-34 a few years back and loved it. I guess the details would be just as good on this. I modified mine with cockpit windows slid back, pilots heads turned and the heli hovering over a rice paddy.
You'd be surprised how much is revealed when you peek in even if thinking very little is seen. Looking forward to the rescue color scheme.

Cheers,
Wabble

Thanks Richard, that sounds like an impressive diorama :smiling:

Geoff.

[Geoffers]

Hello chaps,

All ready for primer/paint now :smiling4:






Got to be extra careful now so I don’t knock any of the many lumps and bumps off :cold-sweat:

Thanks for looking :thumb2:

Geoff.

[Neil Merryweather]

OOh so sorry I missed the yellow suit!
thanks so much it looks great!

[Geoffers]

No probs Neil, glad you like it :smiling4:

Geoff.

[Geoffers]

Update time :smiling4:

First up after the last update was priming. This was done with my usual choice of black Mr Surfacer 1500.

Went down nicely but revealed a few seams that needed a bit further work.

I used Mr Surfacer 500 on these sanded back until I was happy with the results.

A bit of panel line scribing later and these areas were then touched up with a bit more primer.

Unfortunately I seem to have lost the pictures I took of this stage but it wasn’t anything too exciting.

Once the primer had been given sufficient time to cure it was time for the top coats.

When I first decided to build a RN SAR Wessex I was picturing a classic RAF blue-grey / fluorescent red scheme. However the decal set I managed to find were for an early Hu.5 used for SAR work and these were painted in olive green / gloss red.

So first up was a coat of Hataka A146 BS Olive Drab (bs381C:298)

This left a lovely smooth finish which once dry was masked up ready for the red.



Before spaying the red I decided to give the unmasked areas a coat of white primer. I thought spaying the red over black primer would take too many coats to give a good coverage.

The red used was Hataka A291 BS Cherry Red (bs381 c:538) from their public service set.

Unmasking this morning after been left over night to dry revealed this.





I’m very pleased with how it’s looking so far, it doesn’t look quite so bright in the flesh

Its clear coat and decals next.

I’ve also got the rotor blades to finish and tyres to paint before final assembly.



Hopefully another update soon.

Thanks for looking :thumb2:

Geoff.

[Mark1]

Nice job with the paint,looking good.

[minitnkr]

Excellent details & finish.