Minicraft 1/144 Pan Am Stratocruiser

[kfutter]

Nice work there Kev. Man that's an awesome list of aircraft to choose from. Keep up the great work

Thanks Paul. One of the options on the Airway Graphics sheet is for "Clipper Australia", so that's an obvious candidate for this build. However, it uses the smaller Pan Am globe on the tail, which I'm not keen on, but is also not mentioned at all in the list of aircraft I posted, so I don't have a clear idea about which props would be called for in that case. I'm not sure the aircraft names will be readable on the model anyway, so it may not matter much. Decisions, decisions!

Kev

[hrtpaul]

That looks like a great sheet. I'd love to get hold of this 1/72 sheet for mine but it's rare as rocking horse shit
http://www.modelingmadness.com/scott/decals/agm7002.htm

[kfutter]

Yeah, that looks like a pretty cool sheet, Paul. Personally, I'm hoping to be able to replicate the livery I'm doing here on my 1/72 Academy kit. I vaguely recall seeing it available from one decal manufacturer, but I can't remember who now!

Kev

[kfutter]

Well, here's one set, but they're obviously OOP too:

http://modelingmadness.com/scott/decals/aga7015.htm

Kev

[kfutter]

I think these are the ones I was thinking of:

http://www.vintageflyerdecals.com/vfd00 ... final.html

At least now that I've posted the link here, I'll be able to find them again! Not cheap though...

Kev

[hrtpaul]

It's a bummer these sheets are available I might have to look into some 1/144 kits as 1/72 are just too big

[kfutter]

With regard to the props, one of the issues I thought I had was the lack of spinner caps, whichever style of prop blade ended up being appropriate. But somebody pointed out to me that, on their kit, such spinner caps were included on the sprues. Since they weren't mentioned in the instructions for my boxing, I didn't bother to look any closer, but my informant is correct!



They're tiny though, and won't be much fun to remove and clean up. Still, better than having to scratch-build them!

I've also started work on boxing in the main wheel bays:



It looks a bit grungy at the moment, but the top section will be faired in with Milliput, and then some styrene strip added for some faux structural detail.

Back when there's more!

Kev

[kfutter]

Very busy and tiring times for me at the moment, so not a lot of progress to report, unfortunately. Modelling at the Speed of Life, I call it. Here's what's happened since my last post, though. The main wheel bay bulkheads have been completed, though some small tidy-ups are still in order:





The structural detail is completely spurious, and just there to add interest. I also still have a bit of work to do on the seams around the nacelles:



Damn those panel lines are ugly!

Anyway, that's it for the moment!

Kev

[tor lives]

She is coming along nicely Kev. For what it is worth, I hear ya about life getting in the way of modelling .....I can't remember the last time I had quality time at the model desk.
TOR

[hrtpaul]

Keep up the great work mate