WIP: Eurocopter BK-117 "Space Design" D-HBKS

1
June 24, 2024
The Kit
2
June 24, 2024
Sprue "1"
3
June 24, 2024
Sprue"2"
4
June 24, 2024
Clearsprue
5
June 24, 2024
Decals
6
June 24, 2024
Instructions
7
June 24, 2024
Details Exterior
8
June 24, 2024
Details Inside
9
June 24, 2024
Detail Seats
10
July 7, 2024
I started by removing the ejector pin marks on the cabin inside...
11
July 7, 2024
... and assembling the tail.
12
July 7, 2024
The seats gor open backrests...
13
July 7, 2024
wich I closed for the first 2 rows.
14
July 7, 2024
I don't like tail-sitters -> some lead inside of the pedestal
15
July 7, 2024
The step in the roof section is closed with sheet, the gaps filled with putty.
16
July 7, 2024
OOB the rotorshaft would go down inside the cabin, so I had to modify it a bit. The rotor control also looks quite monolithic.
17
July 7, 2024
So I removed some unnessasary material and replaced the shaft with a 0.8 mm hypodermic needle
18
July 7, 2024
While I was at it I started assembling the main Rotor.
19
July 7, 2024
Dry-fitting showed some problems between the tail and the cowling (the angel between the cowling rear face and the tail-boom front part is about 8°). I hope matching the build groups is easier than the seperat parts.
20
July 8, 2024
The passanger seats are installed, a hot behind the last sets fabricated and fitted to the fuselage sides.
21
July 8, 2024
The forward hole in the sealing is closed, a air chanel for the ventilation installed. I could just see a little bit of this chanel on one photo, so most of it is based on my imagination.
22
July 8, 2024
The cowling ond rear sections are joint. The angle of the kontact surfaces seams to be the correct one, so I had to modify the fixing points.
23
July 8, 2024
for a 1988 tool the fit is quite good. With the modifications I made the model snaps together quite nice and one can even lift it on the tail.
24
July 8, 2024
One can see at least a bit of the improofments through the windows.
25
July 9, 2024
I made blinds out of aluminum foil and installed them.
26
July 12, 2024
Interiour nearly finisched.
27
July 12, 2024
I did some improvements on the exteriour.
28
July 12, 2024
Some Styrenstrips & sheet and some aluminium tape.
29
July 12, 2024
I hope this will come out much better with paint. If not I can use putty and try something else to ad the forgotten openings & grills.
30
July 19, 2024
I started painting the interiour.
31
August 4, 2024
Some details are painted,
32
August 4, 2024
decals on the panel and the buckles of the seatbelts scratched from alutape. With the litle bit one can see when the fuselage is closed that should be enough.
33
August 4, 2024
Most of the wIndows are installed. There are no frames, so ist very difficult to glue them in without getting the glue on the window. So when possible I masked them from both sides, if not just from the outside.
34
August 11, 2024
The Inside of the widows are cleaned, the fuselage closed. Next step: Filler & sanding.
35
August 24, 2024
A lot of sanding and filling. Most dissapointing is the fact, that the glareshild is part of the fuselage halves, so sanding inside the allmost closed fuselage in nessecary. Cross your fingers, I can blow our all the dust.
36
September 8, 2024
Sanding on most of the fuselage seams succsessful, ...
37
September 8, 2024
but not on the glareschield. Here I used a 3rd layer of putty. Priming the fuselage and checking the seams will have to wait till the front window is installed after the glareshield is done..
38
September 16, 2024
The bid hole in the glareshield is finaly closed and painted. now I can install the windshield. I also worked on the new installation of the rotorshaft, as the original ends inside the cabin.
39
September 16, 2024
There is a shorter shaft made from steel tube, extra mounting points at the top and bottom of the engine compartment and the schaft will get fixed at the top.
40
October 3, 2024
The main rotor is painted dark gray.
41
October 3, 2024
At sunday I installed the engine compartment, the rotorshaft and the tail, so today i could prime everything. As you can see ther are still imperfections, so back to puttying and sanding.
42
October 5, 2024
The figures for the project: The pilots and the already painted pair are from 2 sets from Preiser, the 3D printed figures from the sets from FC Model Trend.
43
October 5, 2024
The figures for the project: The pilots and the already painted pair are from 2 sets from Preiser, the 3D printed figures from the sets from FC Model Trend.
44
October 5, 2024
The figure of the woman unfortunately broke out of the printing frame during transportation and lost the heels of her shoes. This is the first time I will be using 3d printed parts.
45
October 5, 2024
Before I try to remove the paint from the figures, I have already cleaned up the mold parting seams, filled the ejector holes and exposed undercuts with the Dremel and 0.5 mm drill bit (e.g. under the solid cast skirt).
46
October 5, 2024
Unfortunately, I only got the figures from Preiser pre-painted. Not only are they many times more expensive, I also have more work to do to remove the paint. Unfortunately, this is not even usable as a base coat, as the figures were not cleaned up before painting.
47
October 6, 2024
The printed figures got a very thin layer of primer, just enogh that one can see where work is nessesary. That wasn't possible with the semi transperant meterial.
48
October 6, 2024
After 24 houres for the oven cleaner and nearly 3 houresof scraping and brushing most of the paint is removed from the Preiser figures. There were up to 4 paint layers on top of each other and it lookd like some of them they were aplied by dipping.
49
October 27, 2024
I started with the base. I glued a piece of styrofoam to a wooden board and covered it with polystyrene sheets.
50
October 27, 2024
The excess length was cut off so that I can glue on matching trim after painting the sides of the house. The transitions between the panels have been filled.
51
October 27, 2024
I sprayed the skin areas with colors from Vallejo.
52
October 27, 2024
Everything else is Aqueous Hobby Colors applied with a brush.
53
October 31, 2024
I worked a bit on the building, but I have to buy some meterial tomorow.
54
October 31, 2024
I build the roof exit. Here need some profiles I dont have here too.
55
October 31, 2024
Internal construction
56
October 31, 2024
This is roughly how the finished roof exit is installed.
57
October 31, 2024
During the week I found a few minutes in the evening to continue painting the figures.

Commentaires

29 24 June, 19:12

Nicolas
As soon as I finish one of my 3 current projects (2 of them ar nearly done) I will start with this little helicopter.

24 June, 19:17

Nicolas
The build startet this weekend.

7 July, 18:28

Nicolas
As I am covid positive (fortunately only with very mild syntomas) I had some time to build again today. So far I am positively surprised by the accuracy of fit. There are no locator pins, but I can now click the fuselage and cockpit together and even the tail section holds without glue.

8 July, 19:15

Nicolas
I would like to do some rivets on the exteriour, but I couldn't find some good drawings. If somebody has a hint I would be grateful.

8 July, 19:56

Nicolas
Today I started installing the controls. Doing so I noticed, the collectiv controls are missinh in the kit. So I started scratchbuilding them after photos. Also fabricated and installed blinds for the paxes.

9 July, 19:06

Nicolas
Started some work on the exteriour.

12 July, 14:37

Freak
Interesting project! Love the WIP pics and demo of various detailing techniques.

12 July, 20:14

Nicolas
Hi Freak, welcome on board.

13 July, 04:36

Shar Dipree
I have the same kit too. I'm really looking forward to your results. Following. 🙂

13 July, 05:27

Nicolas
Hi Shar, welcome.

14 July, 04:28

Łukasz Gliński
Cool, will watch. Still afraid to start mine 😄

15 July, 09:59

Nicolas
Welcome Łukasz, there is no reason to be afraid. The fit seams quite good, and the missing details is somthin one can improve. 😉

15 July, 16:33

Qwertzel
Sieht gut aus! Nehme auch mal Platz

19 July, 18:15

Nicolas
Moin Quertzel, Danke für das Lob. Noch sind Sitze im Hubschrauber frei. 😉

19 July, 18:34

bughunter
The Colani design is cool 👍 Have fun!
And I hope your covid is gone without bad effects!

19 July, 18:39

Nicolas
Hi Bughunter, thanks.
Covid wasn't to bad, I got 3 day with mild syntomas and 5 days waiting for a negativ test. 😉

19 July, 19:38

Mr D
Done some nice improvements Nicolas... Be worth it, it's good to do this as puts a nice personal touch on it, l need to pick up some card like you have used ( what is it l need to look for ?)
The 2 Revell models l built ...l found the decals took a bit more softening than others models l have done!? the decals said made in Italy....no company name.
Looking good 👍 be nice bright unusual one this 😁

8 August, 19:53

Nicolas
Hallo Mr D and thanks.

You can look for plastic sheets and profiles (tubes, chanels, I-beams, etc,) from various manufacturers like AK or Evergreen or use packing material eg. most blisterpacks. 😉

9 August, 05:02

Guy Rump
Looking good Nicolas, following. 👍

23 August, 21:26

Mr D
Hi Nicolas, doing a good job on the extra detail bits.
Be worth it, you only get to build it once...so worth getting it how you want it.
Nice 👍👍👍

24 August, 10:45

Nicolas
Hallo Guy & Mr D, welcome, have a seat.
Thanks for your compliments.

24 August, 18:32

Kesa Tiho
Very nice build. Ive always been curious though, how do you get such a precise paint job. Especially with the interior.

16 September, 19:01

Nicolas
Hi Kesa, I do most of the interior freehand with a small brush (mostly size 000, but details sometimes with size 10/0) and well diluted paint. You kan put your brushhand onto the hand holding the part to reduce shaking.

16 September, 19:11

Mr D
Looking good Nicolas 👍
Taking good shape now.
What do you use for a primer??
😃👍

3 October, 18:56

Nicolas
Thanks Mr. D. I used Mr. Hobbys Aqueous white surfacer 1000.

3 October, 19:15

Nicolas
After sanding, priming and repainting the helicopter several times today, there's not much new here, but I used the drying time as much as possible to start on the first figures for the diorama.

5 October, 19:06

Nicolas
The helicopter was sanded, primed, filled and primed again today. In the meantime, I'm almost satisfied with the result. Visible progress has only been made on the figures.

6 October, 19:19

Finn
Following

8 October, 14:45

Mr D
Like the window shade's 👍

24 October, 09:47

Nicolas
Welcome Finn, thanks Mr D.
After 2 weekends without crafting (1x at an exhibition, 1x food poisoning) the work continues here. I have started painting the figures. I was also able to start on the diorama base plate. This represents the windowless top floor of a high-rise building in which the technology such as elevators, fire water supply or air conditioning is located. A subsequently mounted helipad is then installed on the roof.

27 October, 20:15

Patrick Hagelstein
Hi Nicolas! Sorry to hear that you were ill... Hopefully things are getting better now! I'm also sorry you had to scrub those Preiser figures as Preiser offers these exact figures in 1/72 in bare white plastic as well. I had my local hobby shop (in Aachen) order them for me from the Preiser catalogue. Maybe something for a next project?

27 October, 20:26

Michael Kohl
Some work is going into this. Keep it up.

27 October, 21:34

Mr D
Hi Nicolas 👋 glad your getting back to a bit of modeling... Diorama sounds interesting 👍

27 October, 21:39

Nicolas
Welcome Michael & Patrick
@ Patrick: I know, I have already used the unpainted figures in another project. But unfortunately I couldn't get them from the local dealer or on ebay or similar.

28 October, 05:32

Cuajete
Well done so far 👍

28 October, 19:09

Nicolas
Thanks

29 October, 05:09

Patrick Hagelstein
Ah, Ok! But luckily, you are aware of their existence. ☺️👍🏼

29 October, 22:45

Album info

Build proces for my 1/72 Eurocopter BK-117 in Stunning Space Design colours designed by Luigi Colani. The Kit is based on a 1988 Matchbok kit and there is no detail set or a kit from better moulds that I know of. So I'll try to improve this oldie a little bit.
I'm going to present the helicopter on a helipad in a city with 2 pilots waiting for some VIPs.

BK 117 "SPACE DESIGN"

57 images

1:72

En cours

1:72 Eurocopter BK117 "Space Design" (Revell 04833)

1:72 Ziv. Angestellte Flughafen,stehend (Preiser 72411)

No Tamiya Extra Thin Cement (Tamiya 87038)

15+

MBB BK 117 A-3

MBB
D-HBKS
VIP Transport, representative helicopter
Luigi Colani, Space Ship

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