ICM Do 17Z-2

[deafpanzer]

Dig the rivets!!!

[thug626]

PJ2, As always, thank you for the compliment my good man.
Dierk, Thank you kindly mate.
Andrew, Thank you very much my good man. The rivet lines were a pretty easy addition.
Andy, Thank you my friend. I am looking forward to seeing your application of rivets when you tackle the B-24.

There has been progress of late. Just not a lot of time to post updates. Today was the exception. It's just me and the dogs today. Even after cleaning the house and various and sundry chore, I got bench time in today.

Here we have the starboard engine. I am planning on buttoning up this side.

The port engine and its detail. This side will be opened up. The band around the engine was scratched from flat brass stock. The actual BMW engines had this. the kit did not.

Opening up the exhaust stacks was easy and a nice visual addition.

Here is the forward cowl and lower panel mounted for the starboard engine. You can see the braces that will hold the access panels up. This is pretty much how it was on the actual aircraft.

The first gun mounted is the ventral station. All of the clear parts for this kit mate right up where they are supposed to. No gaps, overhangs or poor fits. I have not treated the clear styrene with Future. They are quite clear OOB.

This was the best pic I could get looking down onto the ventral gun station.

[M1Carbine]

As George Takei would say "Ohhhhhhhhh Myyyyyyy"

Awesome work brother

Bob

[Leon]

Dave,seems i've missed a lot lately! This is progressing nicely.

[thug626]

Brother Bob, LMFAO! Thank you for the high praise. Currently I have four of the six MGs mounted. The dorsal rear gun stations are going to get a re-working.
Leon, Nah! Ya haven't missed anything. You're here now. Thank you kindly my friend.

Here is the pic I failed to post. It's from a barrel kit by Master Model. There are two MG 15s per pack. The instructions call for seven pieces per barrel assembly. I opted to leave two pieces off...it was starting to turn into a "Hulk SMASH" moment. So, there are five pieces assembled in the pic below.....
the nice thing about the barrel sets is that there are two types of ring sights included in the PE fret. With the extra, I'll be able to set up the ring sight for the pilot.

[panzerjager2]

I'll say it again and keep saying it till I'm blue in the face............ "frick'n awesome" 
PJ2

[thug626]

PJ2, Please do not turn blue....or you may end up at my place of work. If you wake up with me leaning over you, your day has gone to ***t prior to my seeing you. That being said, thank you.

A goodly bit of progress today. All of the glass is mounted. The epoxy putty around the gun mounts is there to represent the canvas boots.

Before the epoxy boot...

After the boot... I sheared the ring sight off....but, I retrieved it from the jaws of the concrete floor monster.

All of the control surfaces are now mounted as well and, are deflected to some degree.

Prepping for paint. Anymore, I'll make my own masks. On this beastie, with all of its various glass panels...Oh Heck NO!

[TRM]

Rockin' that interior!! Great job on this so far Dave! Fine work on the PE shooty thing!

[thug626]

Good morning T
Thank you kindly my good man for the compliment and for having a gander. My waking thought this am was, "Damn! I used the wrong CA glue last night to attach the clear parts!" Indeed I had done that. I failed to grab the "Foam Safe" CA which will not fog the clear styrene. Not much to be done about it now. I'll find out the damage when all the painting is done and the masks come off.

Anywho....here is last nights progress before I called it a day. I shot RLM 02 for the interior color first. Then I laid down some flat black to give the interior color opacity, since the RLM 02 was shot on clear styrene.

[thug626]

Good afternoon everyone. Last night was spent tidying up some wee loose ends on this to ready it for priming and paint.
The aerials were placed using EZ Line fine. Insulators were made up with Gator Glue thick. The deflector (I'm guessing that's what it is) was punched from wine bottle foil.

With the Master barrel sets, there were two types of ring sights. Of the left over ones, I was able to mount the pilots ring sight.

The beastie was primed with Vallejo flat black with, Vallejo Grey to allow for some paint "splotchiness".  


The base coat of Vallejo RLM 65 is done. I am going to let this dry for a bit, as I will need to mask the sides of the fuselage and nacelles. The camo scheme is a hard edged one. The "splotchiness" is there. I am not able to adequately capture it with the camera.

[panzerjager2]

Looking real good....She'll be over London any day now............ 
PJ2

[deafpanzer]

Great marbling job... a new procedure for wingy builds that I want to try on my B-24 one day. Looking forward to the result!

[wing_nut]

Can't wait to see the money shot on this one.

[thug626]

PJ2, Thank you my good man. That flight over London will be delayed on account of work.
Andy, I had been wanting to try the effect as I have seen it done with great results.
Marc, Here in the next day or two I should be able to lay down the RLM 70/71 for the upper colors.

[Leon]

Primer and base coat look good Dave!

[thug626]

Thank you kindly Leon. Now all of the primer is covered!

A lot of requisite masking was applied today to pull off the splinter scheme. I laid down the RLM 71 first.

Here is the splinter scheme finished. The base coat at least. To follow is the satin coat in preparation for the decals.

[dierk]

Racing along! Or am I just slow in checking on your progress?
Hope the CA hasn't done your clear parts in, it would be a shame as this is a cracking build. Recently read somewhere that you can stop clear parts fogging by drying the CA with a hair dryer - I'll be trying it out on my PE-2 soon.

[plasticjunkie]

I'm really impressed by the level of detail from your scratch building! You are doing an incredible job.

[thug626]

Good morning everyone.
Dierk, This one is actually moving along at a fairly good clip. Usually when I do any scratch building the length of time for the build goes up by a magnitude. Today may be the moment of truth for the question of fogging. The hair dryer stands to reason. The out gassings of the CA as it cures cannot linger around the clear styrene.
Plasticjunkie, Thank you kindly for the compliment. Standing of the shoulders of giants here.

Another one of those milestone bench days.....DECALS!
Well....and painted markings. The red "Nicht betreten" lines and the white unit marking band were masked and, airbrushed. There was no good way to apply the white band decal around the fuselage. There are far to many complex curves, tapered fuselage...with a straight decal? Oh heck no.



All of the landing gear doors and bomb bay doors are mounted.

The belly of the beast. With early huge balkenkreuze markings. This is about the best pic I can get to show the marbled primer effect with the RLM 65 base coat.

I utilized the EZ Line again for the final rigging of the doors. The small pulley is rigged to the doors. One side is crossed over as one pulley activates both doors simultaneously.

[Leon]

Nice progress Dave! This is looking great.

[joelsmith]

Cannot wait for the final unveiling, oops, unmasking.

[panzerjager2]

Really, REALLY looking good. I wish I had the "touch" for winged things........... Best I ever mustered was a Super Frelon form Heller  
PJ2

[thug626]

Good evening everyone.
Leon, Thank you very much.
Joelsmith, Well, a good bit got unveiled today.
PJ2, Thank you kindly my good man. Fuselage and wing joins can be unforgiving with wingy thingies. I found a couple of spots on this one after the camo was laid down.

A fair bit of progress today. The canopy and nose were unmasked. I does look as though I have some touch up on the nose to contend with.

Pretty much all of the detail I put into the CP is visible. Now, I kind of wishing I had scratch built the pilots seat mount. C'est la vie.

The start of the nacelle weathering/staining. I've come across some B&W pics of some heavy oil staining on these beasties.

The start of the exhaust staining. I heavily thinned some MIG OIF Sand and shot it at about 5-8psi, making multiple passes.

More exhaust effects. Using some MIG again but, this time RLM66 heavily thinned and shot at the same psi. I sprayed it inside the border of the Sand color.

There will be more weathering/staining to be built up in layers.

[Leon]

Nice view of the cockpit and the weathering is looking good!

[thug626]

Thank you Leon. Once I finally realized that there was no fogging, I noticed the cockpit detail. :-)

[dierk]

Superb!

[thug626]

Dierk, thank you very much buddy.

Well, I am calling this one done. All in all, I would say it is a rather nice kit. Would I unleash a neophyte on it....no. Someone with a couple of kits under their belt should be able to build it up rather well. As for myself, I had a lot of fun building this one. Yes, I finally did snap off the cranked pitot tube. Into multiple pieces no less.
This is going to be rather image intensive.



The swastikas were out sourced as, ICM does not provide them with the kit. Not a big deal really.

It was nice to get all of the Master Model barrels mounted.

It's difficult to see in the picture prior to this one but, there is a travel limiting device mounted on both rear lateral guns. These were mounted on the actual aircraft, so as to keep the overburdened rear gunners from shooting bits off their planes. Pieces such as the engines and propellers.

Much of the detail in the CP is visible.




The bomb sight aperture was even included in the masks set. Not a big thing but, one of those nice details. If you wanted to represent it closed just paint over it. The actual aircraft has a door that would slide open or closed.

Unfortunately, some crazing is visible to the left of the gun. I had tried as gently as possible to enlarge the opening when it came time to place the canopy. The good news is that the pilots sight never got knocked off.

Even with the panels open, the engine is fairly obscured. Maintenance on these must have been a hoot.

The scratch built cranked pitot tube. It was made from stainless steel tubing and bent stainless steel wire. It will never get knocked off again.

Here we have the underside. The weathering on the horizontal stabilizers and control surfaces was a wash airbrushed at about 5-8 psi.


Hahahaha....I just realized with this pic, that I still need to remove three window masks. Now done...just no pic of it.



Thank you everyone for you comments and, taking the time to have a gander at this build.

Next up....

[TRM]

Beautifully done Dave! Great looking wingy if you ask me! I was playing catch up through the painting stages leading up to the finals...solid work my friend! Looking forward to seeing you crack into the 109.

[Leon]

Excellent work Dave! You did an awesome job on this.

[thug626]

Good evening gentlemen.
T, Thank you kindly my friend. The 109 was supposed to be a dual build. I have the Profi kit and an overtree kit. The OT kit is a great deal but, I opted to go all out on it. So, I placed an order for some goodies for it at the LHS.
Leon, Thank you very much my good man.

Now....out the bench and get cracking on the kit at hand.