In spite of the fact that
I have a large stack of Mpm kits waiting to be built, this is actually the first
one I've tackled and I must say I was very pleasantly surprised. Normally, building
a limited run biplane kit is about as much fun as bobbing for apples in your
neighbour's septic tank, but this went together very well. In fact, I had so
much fun building it that the doctors were convinced I didn't need restraints
at night anymore and my medication could be reduced. That unfortunate incident
with the monkey and the superglue soon changed their minds of course.
Still, it wasn't all smooth
sailing. If it was I'd probably be building ship models. After gluing on the
horizontal stabilizers for instance, I discovered to my immense displeasure
that the elevator hinge lines had a decidedly forward slant to them.
Foolishly thinking I could
live with this I left them as is. My resolve crumbled after about two days.
The stabilizers were then unceremoniously ripped off, a thin wedge of plastic
added to the root and then they were re-glued in place. I also took the opportunity
to cut off the elevators so they could be re-attached later in a slightly more
candid position.
A similar problem was encountered
with the landing gear, which turned out to have far too wide a track to it.
Again I figured I could live with it (will I ever learn?!) but of course I couldn't
- it just spoiled the "sit" of the airplane. One of the characteristics of these
dumpy little Grumman biplanes is the narrow track landing gear with the wheels
canted in at a silly angle. At this point in the build however, I had already
lost all remaining sanity in the rigging process (more on that anon) and I was
extremely reluctant to start snapping bits off to rebuild the gear, which I
don't think is unreasonable. Nontheless, I eventually gave in, gingerly ripped
(if such a thing is possible) the gear apart and rebuilt it correctly. The nightmares
have almost stopped now.
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I tried a new (to me, anyway)
method when it came time to rig and, as I mentioned before, it very nearly had
me testing the flight characteristics of this model in frustration.
Normally I would use stretched
sprue for rigging. It's easy to do and it tightens up beautifully with a bit
of heat from an incense stick. It's fine for WWI aircraft but I thought something
a bit shinier would be better to simulate the highly polished flying wires of
a peacetime biplane.
In this case I had a tube
of .004" stainless steel wire that I got from 4Plus UK at the IPMS Nats a few
years ago and inspired by a friend's expert use of this stuff I figured I'd
give it a go. Silly me. At the end of several highly frustrating hours I had
a lovely pile of nice, shiny and hopelessly bent stainless steel wire and one
biplane model with nice, shiny and mostly straight rigging. I also had a fancy
new jacket with arms that tie in the back and an unhealthy fascination with
Prozac. Amazingly enough, I probably will use the wire again for between the
wars bipes having gained some experience with it but I will definitely stick
with stretched sprue for WWI aircraft.
This was also my first experience
with Propagteam decals and knowing their reputation for refusing to budge once
applied I approached them with a great deal of trepidation.
In fact they
went on just fine as long as they were plonked on top of a big puddle of water.
I made the mistake of putting Micro Set down before applying one of the rudder
decals and it promptly stuck fast in the wrong position. All attempts to move
it ended with a completely destroyed decal and I couldn't find any suitable
replacement so there is now nothing on the right side of the rudder - conveniently
and purposely hidden by the wing in the picture!
All masking was done with Bare Metal
Foil including the wheel hubs and black wing roots. The handles on the lower
wing tips are CAF 8" 'O' decals with the centres filled in with black paint.
Horizontal canopy frames are painted
decal strips, the canopy itself being dipped in Johnson's Klear beforehand and
another coat applied on top to seal the strips in. I left off the bombsight
as it only seems to have been fitted when the bomb racks were installed, which
has a certain amount of logic to it I think.
The canopy had a lovely big ejector pin
mark on the inside which needed to be sanded and polished out. It is also not
quite right in that it is too short and the vertical frames are not - they are
canted to the rear. It looks suspiciously like the drawings in Squadron/Signal's
"Grumman Biplane Fighters In Action"; inaccurate drawings and colour profiles
being two of my many pet peeves with that - in my opinion - somewhat over-rated
series of books. Still, I'm not concerned enough about the inaccuracy to lose
sleep over it or, heaven forbid, fix it.
Locations for the exhausts are scribed
in the bottom of the resin cowling but none are supplied nor are they mentioned
in the instructions. I made them from thin slices of Contrail tubing flattened
to an oval shape.
Antenna is good ol' stretched sprue with
the bungee cords and insulators built up from blobs of flat black and white
paint respectively and I used the photo etched bits supplied for the tiny masts.
The truly masochistic of you can view
more of my models at www.andybann.com
Andy
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