Lublin R-XIII ter/hydro

First order of business will be to remove that horrible texture from all the major parts. 

Proxxon pen sander came in very helpful here, but I had to design and 3D print a specially shaped bit to fit between the ribs. 

Putting the wing together took some reshaping and scratch building. Especially hard was the dynamo on top of the wing, which was not included in the kit. 

Got the wing sorted and primed. Only thing missing are the little winglets that should be mounted on the ailerons and navigation lights. 

I have also done some work on the fuselage. Rescribed the panel lines and added missing access panel 

Time to deal with the interior. The details inside are horrible so everything has to go. Again the pen sander and 3d printer help make the job quick and easy. 

Elements of the steel truss fuselage were recreated with .6 and .8 mm plastic rods. More details will follow.
 

3d printed (on a FDM printer) fuel tank with added styrene details, that will go inside the cockpit. 

Before continuing with the interior I need to deal with the absolute lack of details at the bottom of the fuselage. The patient is strapped in and ready for surgery. 

There was a sort of trapdoors at the bottom for emergency jettison of the fuel tank. 

I've corrected the carburettor cover, scribed panel lines and installed pe grilles.  

PE parts treated with blackening fluid. Greatly improves paint adhesion. 

The interior is almost done. A lot of work went into this. Most parts were glued with an acrylic glue. It's elastic, solvable in water and dries slow enough to allow for adjustments. Much better then CA glue. 

Comfy cushions made with Green Stuff and 3d printed extra radio equipment. 

Engine and rudder control lines made with elastic nylon thread.
 

Final interior shots before closing. 

Removing layers from a 3dp part. Serious details should be done with a DLP resin printer that offer higher resolution, but you can still do something useful with a FDM one pushed to it's limits. Plus resin is messy. 

Back to adding details to the bottom. Cover for the control mechanism. Kit part vs 3dp part.  

The good, there's a Wright J-5 Whirlwind replica. The bad, it's very basic and empty in the center. 

Engine cover had to be shortened. 

Some details added. 

Leather cockpit bumpers made from green stuff. 

Tail control surfaces were separated, so they can be nicely reattached and repositioned. The styrene rod was suppose to mimic the rudder axle, but I'm unsure if it was such a great idea. Will see how it goes. 

Not that bad. Some extra sculpting work was needed to make sure the profiles match. 

Gaps filled with styrene strips glued and sanded. 

Attempt at recreating lacing of the fabric on the tail. It allowed the crew to look inside and check the truss for signs of rust.  

Missing struts and other details. 

Massive amount of work to get the turret and MG looking good. 

Primer finally. Used Ammo One Shot Primer. 

Home made masks. 

Testing on the rudder. Markings will be painted on before cammo.  

Not bad, the small bars are 0.5mm thick. 

I'm replacing the plastic struts with brass, hoping that this will make the whole model more rigid and secure. Plastic seemed too soft and flexible. Had to 3d print a special fixture to keep those tubes at the right angle while soldering. 

I've run into many problems while working on the bottom of the wing. I thought that I had the surface smooth, but the silver paint revealed many imperfections, it forced me to remove the paint and apply more primer and sanding. Actually I had to go back and forth with it a couple of time. Plus I've also had problems with lifting paint while airbrushing checkerboards. Key lessons here, metallic paint require perfectly smooth base. 

After months of battling the underside of the wing. I could finally move over to the top. The Idea here was to recreate the ribs of the construction with paint and mask. I've designed a mask with 0.6mm lines and cut it on a plotter. Application was a tedious task, as the thin strips of vinyl bended and dit not cooperate. Eventually, I had to cut it into small sections and apply 3 - 5 lines at the time. 

I've used very thin NATO black, airbrushed with low pressure (~10psi) to paint the shadows.  

Here's the final effect. The quality of the photo does not reveal all the details, but I'm quite happy with it. The colour is my own blend of blue-gray (Soviet AMT-11) with a drop of vivid green and some white based on the colour illustration from the reference book.