1/32 Trumpeter SBD-5 Dauntless

[doogsatx/]

I've always liked the Dauntless...call it my weak spot for outdated workhorses that keep on proving themselves...and when my planned build for an upcoming issue of Weathering Aircraft (aircraft-specific spinoff of The Weathering Magazine) proved to be a hot mess of a kit, I turned my sights toward the venerable SBD.

I haven't settled on markings yet - but I don know that whatever I go with, it will be painted in Pacific tri-color camo. I'm anticipating using a mix of Gunze and Mr. Paint.

Anywho...the kit itself is pretty nice. Definitely one of Trumpeter's "good" kits. There's a gap in the wingroots that I think is part a width issue and part a "surface of mating parts" issue. Either way - easy enough to fix with some shimming if it comes to it.



Aftermarket will be extremely limited because...aftermarket is extremely limited. I won't be going for any aftermarket in the cockpit because I really don't think it needs it. Some wiring maybe, and some placards and a bit of scratch work, but the kit parts are quite nice. I'd love to add some fabric lap belts - but there aren't any. I may just scratch my own using some border material from an HGW or RB set.

On the outside of the plane...I'm probably going to replace the .30 cal barrels with Master brass barrels. And I'll be using Eduard's stunning dive flaps. And...that's about it.

[doogsatx/]

Initial work last night - some cockpit test-fitting.



And...acetate gauges! Yay!



And...Trumpeter's frustrating habit of clear IPs that make you mask off individual gauges. Not yay.

[Deleted]

[panzerjager2]

OUTSTANDING a "slow but deadly"  very cool..... will be dropping back by

[wbill76]

Always loved the Dauntless, will be watching this one with interest!

[wing_nut]

Mar 7, 2016 20:06:04 GMT -5 wbill76 said:

Always loved the Dauntless, will be watching this one with interest!

yeah, that!

[JimD]

Yummy. Can't wait.

[noname]

I have to say the Dauntless is an appealing aircraft. I think partly because it lends itself well to weathering. Maybe because it has a mild raw look to it. Cool, look forward to seeing this in paint.

[doogsatx/]

So last week I was railing about the sheer, abysmal awfulness of Kitty Hawk's Kingfisher and its engine assembly. Ambitious (and unnecessary) in terms of engineering complexity, and utterly unable to back it up in terms of fit.

Trumpeter's R-1820 is a breath of fresh air by comparison. Parts fit - and in such a way that for the most part you can paint them separately and assemble everything toward the end, greatly easing the detail work. I need to investigate, but I think it may even be totally possible to get the crankcase cover, ignition ring and pushrods together as their own assembly. Most pics I have of the engine show the ignition wires secured to the pushrods, so this subassembly would make that pre-wiring a lot easier.

Anywhoo, plastic!

[doogsatx/]

It's been rain all week, so last night I did more light construction and prep and test-fitting, making sure things will go together the way they need to when the time comes.

After my brief and horrifying experience with Kitty Hawk's awful front end engineering, this Dauntless is a breath of fresh air, for several reasons.

- Everything fits, and fits well. No problems with locating pins being too large for their holes or other stupid goofs.

- Parts have intelligent sprue attachment points. Particularly smaller, fragile parts. Yay.

- The firewall mounts are beefy and fit with authority. I've gone ahead and glued them to the "forward" firewall. The covering panels fit over them and fit very well with no weird gaps that I can see.

- The engine fits to the forward firewall with four nice alignment pins. Exhaust manifolds are designed to slot into the mount. Collector rings direct the exhaust toward the outlet holes in the cowl, but stop short of doing so. Instead, you get to add the final exhaust tips toward the end of the build. Thankfully.

- The cowl fits well and it seems like it should be totally possible to install it at the tail end of the build. But I'll have to wait and see how it fits after the valve covers are installed on the R-1820.

Anyway...a few pics. Only things that have been glued down here are 1) the front and back halves of the engine, 2) front half of the engine mounting part thing and 3) the mounting arms to the engine firewall (they're just press-fitted to the cockpit firewall).

[Deleted]

Kewel!

[nicely11b]

What's with the clear cowling? Trumpy giving the option of showing the engine?

[doogsatx/]

Mar 10, 2016 20:56:58 GMT -5 nicely11b said:

What's with the clear cowling? Trumpy giving the option of showing the engine?

It's a gimmicky thing that Trumpeter does with some of their kits. The Me 262 comes with one clear engine pod, for example. Personally, I hate it since the clear plastic is more brittle, but once it's cleaned up and painted it all looks the same.

[doogsatx/]

Further adventures in test-fitting and groundwork last night...getting a bit stuck til this rain moves out.

[Deleted]

Nice! Like your work stand. Did you make it or is it store bought?

[Rick]

It's hard not like the good 'ol SBD. Glad to hear this is one of the "good" trumps. I've picked it up and put it back on the shelf 3-4 times trying to decide if it would be worth it. Ended up with a 1/48 accurate miniatures SBD. From what I've seen so far, looks like one these entire get put back on the shelf next time. Looking forward to to your usual treatment and the article when it comes out.

Rick

[Deano]

Mar 7, 2016 14:33:15 GMT -5 @dogfish7 said:

Yup me too !

[doogsatx/]

Been bouncing between projects, but got some paint on the R-1820 last night. After my brief foray into the travesty that is the Kitty Hawk Kingfisher, Trumpeter's sensible engine design is like a breath of fresh air. For example - the crankcase cover, ignition ring and rods all form a little subassembly that can then just be dropped onto the cylinders. This will make so many things easier - already bearing out in painting.

Reference photos show a few different variances - but the biggest by far is the ignition ring. Sometimes it's a flat aluminum, sometimes it's painted in the heavy, gloss neutral gray that's also on the crankcase cover. Well...for some visual interest I decided to stick with the aluminum. Still have some detail stuff to attend to before I start in on the wiring, but overall I'm really digging this Wright radial.

Colors used - Mr. Paint Duraluminum on the cylinders, Alclad Dull Aluminum on the ignition ring, Gunze Neutral Gray + Gloss on the crankcase cover.

[doogsatx/]

More work on the R-1820. I wouldn't put it on a level with Tamiya's masterful R-2800 in the Corsair, but it's still a pretty nice radial.



And the cowl continues to fit very nicely on top of it! No awkward build-around session needed here!

[doogsatx/]

Moving into the cockpit in a big way over the last few days. Naval aircraft didn't typically have a lot of chipping due to corrosion control, but cockpits seemed to be a lower order of priority, and a lot of reference pics show chipping on the seat, around the sills and so on. So...time to do some chipping.

First up - some Alclad



Then some chipping fluid (Ammo Scratches Effects), followed by a thin coat of Tamiya XF-1 and then a custom mix for the interior green. The green really screws with the phone's image sensor, so apologies for any color fidelity issues in these shots.



Next, light chipping. Used warm water to reactivate the chipping fluid, then chipped primarily using an old brush that had some acrylic paint dried on its tip, plus an old airbrush needle for smaller bits. The aim here isn't to chip the whole cockpit to hell, just represent chipping on high traffic areas - the seat, sills, rudder tracks and so on.

The pics also show some of the rough molding of certain interior parts - like the seat - that just ultimately are't worth cleaning up because of the detail that would be lost in the process.

[nicely11b]

I was curious what paint you used that still allowed the chipping fluid to activate. This answered my question.

[doogsatx/]

The R-1820 is coming along. Got it wired up and I'm now in the process of adding some layers of paint to the ignition wires to make them a bit thicker/more prominent (the .2mm lead wire is a bit too thin for my liking, and the next size up I have on hand, .4mm, is too big). Also added a data plate for some visual interest. This one shows up in a ton of pictures - various resto jobs have even more, but I'm not seeing them in period pics, so this one is it.



Back in the cockpit, I've replaced the PE lap belts for the gunner's seat with microtextile - taken from the edge of a dollar bill. As of this writing, nobody makes a 1/32 fabric lap belt set, so I'm making due. Up front, I'll be using an HGW four point harness, as most naval aircraft (Kingfisher, Wildcat etc) that rocked lap belts early in the war had moved to full harnesses by 1943.

And I may still end up using just the bottom, lap portion of some HGW belts anyway...since the Trumpy parts seem way oversized (the belt is like half as wide as the seat!)



Detail painting is also underway, now that the interior green has been sealed to prevent further chipping.

[John Everett]

Great idea with the $1 bill! I can see this being good for all sorts of applications.

[martslay]

It is perfectly made! Remarkably looks!

[jsteinman]

[wbill76]

Can't beat the price tag of that lap belt solution!

[Deleted]

[doogsatx/]

Work continues! After taking Wednesday night off to do a quick video project, back at it last night. Got the pilot's harness squared away:



Wasn't entirely happy with the gunner's lap belts, even after the dollar fabric, so I cut up a few more strips and combined them with some Eduard PE lapbelts, using mostly the PE hardware and the dollar strips as the fabric.





Also got a very gentle start on weathering up the R-1820. So far using Ammo and AK stuff (engine wash, kerosene stains, fuel stains):

[John Everett]

Love the belts. Given that they're real fabric, adding some mild stains and "finger grubby" around the buckles should prove pretty easy.

[doogsatx/]

In the process of weathering the R-1820, including a nice gasket leak!



A quick look at the Write radial inside the cowl:



Back of the firewall, the cockpit is starting to come together. Looking forward to weathering it up!