1/48 CH-53E Super Stallion

[adampolo13]

Good evening all,

I am currently building Academy's 1/48 CH-53E Super Stallion w/ Eduard's Big Ed set. Here are some progress pictures. I am a little into the build already so I am just going to post final pics of whats been done already.

Tail Section w/ PE mesh built and primed:




Rotor Head assembled:


Fues dry fit w/ and w/out the tail section:




Cargo door w/ PE construction:




I will do better about posting progress as I go along.

Thanks for taking a look!

[TRM]

There is a big girl!!! Looking great!!

[dupes]

Whoah...that thing is going to be HUGE even in 1/48th!

What markings are you going with?

[adampolo13]

I haven't exactly figured out what markings... The kit decals look pretty good to me so I may just go with them. Academy did a wonderful job with this kit so just OOB it will come out pretty great.

[adampolo13]

P.S. Thanks TRM for the kind words!!!

[Deleted]

This looks real nice , love the PE grilles
Last saw one of these flying in what appeared to be a 'lizard' 3 tone scheme but I could be wrong about which CH53 is was... Looked über cool though
Cheers
Steve

[adampolo13]

Alright, so I am going very slow on this build to make sure I get all the PE set up and in the right place. But first a quick pic of how nice the panel lines line up. I haven't found a seem point where they aren't lined up like this.



Now to the PE stuff.

You will see in this picture the call out for the mesh part 41 to go to the left hand side of the door opening.



Here is the part itself. (I hate my fuzzy pictures)


What I did to make sure I got it right, using a pencil I lightly marked the outside of the PE and then put a dot in the center area of the mesh.



I then drilled it out:



The really nice thing as that there is the cargo piece that gets glued onto the inside of the fuselage so you wont see right through the grill into the cabin. Drilling the hole has just added some depth to it.



Here is a fuzzy picture of what it will look like.



I copied this on the other side and then called it a night.

As always, thanks for looking!

[adampolo13]

Alright folks,
Sorry I didn't get pictures during the whole process but I have gotten a lot done. I got all the mesh areas drilled out. Then I re-scribed the panel lines, just made them a little deeper so they are more pronounced. I really want to work on my pre and post-shading and panel lines etc. (The real thing has rivets all over but I'm not ready to tackle that challenge just yet.)

From there I went ahead and put the glass in for the windows, got everything thing for the interior prepped and given a base coat of flat black. The idea is to add some shadows and depth. (I guess, I am just copying somebody's idea.)

Then I painted the cargo area a light gray while the rest got aircraft gray. I know the colors aren't exactly 100% but I'm okay with that, I really wanted to show some contrast between the cloth type material and the metal cargo area.

Here are some pics. I hope you like, and that my lack of accuracy doesn't bug you too much.

Oh yeah, the last two pics just show the other areas dry fit.

[adampolo13]

For those of you who were read my last post and shook their heads in disgust thinking to yourselves "Adam, what the hell are you doing, Aircraft Gray isn't just not accurate it is not even close to being anywhere in the same universe as the real thing! "

I give you my apologies. While extremely intense, my insanity was temporary and very short lived. I have since seen the errors in my ways and have gone back and corrected my mistake. I have painted the interior a dark gray which, while still contrasting the fabric nicely, gives a much more realistic feel to the aircraft.

Again, I apologize for my insanity.

Thanks for following!

[`Boots`]

Great work and attention too detail so far Adam....................don`t worry about those insane moments mate, i get them all the time.....................in fact i wouldn`t be without them..............adds to the fun!!!! ;D ;D

[adampolo13]

Thanks Boots! I'm looking forward to going home tonight and getting some PE added to the inside of this thing. ;D

[adampolo13]

Hey DickF,

Let's just say its HUGE!!!! ;D

[adampolo13]

She's a monster alright. ;D I still haven't really figured out where I'm going to put her but that's okay. I have plenty of work to do before I really have to worry.

Alrighty folks, I got a little more done to the interior tonight. PE added.





next on the agenda are the cargo seats, floor etc...

thanks for following!

[adampolo13]

Thanks Guys!!! I really appreciate the kind words!!!

[406 Silverado]

Some very nice work going into this bird. Looking forward to the painting stages.