S-3B Viking, with WIP pics

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April 23, 2018
Done!
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March 6, 2018
Brass tube socket for inserting the acrylic rod for the "in-flight" stand. Placement here meant omitting the MAD boom from the tailhook assembly.
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March 6, 2018
Bomb bay, with most of Eduard PE installed, some scratchbuilt pipes/wires, and sprayed Tamiya white primer.
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March 6, 2018
The other side. But now I wonder if I should make more lightening holes in the kit parts...
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March 6, 2018
Shims visible here (3 white, 1 black), plus there are more supporting the gear doors. The kit is not overly fit-friendly if you want to close things up. Also note added panel for circular light, which should be recessed in the panel as opposed to raised.
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March 6, 2018
With gear doors closed, there are gaps to fill after gluing the sonobuoy chute part. Should have shimmed this, but here you see me using melted sprue as putty. Will take some sanding work to look OK.
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March 22, 2018
Painted with Vallejo acrylics. Flag is painted, squadron patch is a decal from Hasegawa set.
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March 22, 2018
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March 22, 2018
I added very thin sheet-styrene for the formation lights and the flare/chaff dispensers, and sanded them down further once the glue was dry.
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March 22, 2018
Getting rid of the wing join seams is bedeviling me! This was the second or third attempt. The kit would benefit from more structural support inside the wings or a spar, to prevent flexing.
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March 28, 2018
Canopy and bomb bays masked, and sprayed the whole thing with Tamiya gray rattlecan, both as primer and basecoat.
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March 28, 2018
Sprayed the wing-walk areas with Tamiya Matt Black and then a spritz of Gunship Gray, using a cardboard cutout as a general mask. Then applied masks. Used the light gray kit decals as templates for cutting the masks.
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March 28, 2018
Masked the canopy using the decals that will edge the black area as a guide for masking. Sprayed Tamiya Satin Black rattlecan. Will be all airbrush from here on.
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April 3, 2018
After primary painting
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April 5, 2018
After gloss coat, decals, and gloss to seal
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April 5, 2018
After oil/turp weathering and Dullcoat to seal
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April 23, 2018
The finished model.
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018
Installing the torpedoes basically covers up all the nice PE detail!
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018
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April 23, 2018

2 6 March 2018, 20:27

John Hoffmann
Thanks, Thomas. The TD cockpit is nice and fits reasonably well. The ejection seats are so nice I decided to save them for another build without pilots, where the details will be on full display instead of mostly scraped off or invisible. I'll post some pics when I've got the pilots painted. For the stand I'm using a straight clear acrylic rod. I toyed with the idea of bending a rod and using the hole for the MAD as the socket, but despite how many opportunities that created for juvenile jokes about sticking rods into boom holes ultimately I didn't think that would work given the size rod needed to support the model.

7 March 2018, 17:30

Thomas T
Hmmm..., I never had this idea, to be honest, also never heard this kind ok 'joke'. However I can imagine you could be right. The other point you mention (stability) is also relevant, the rod would be far to thin to hold the weight. I put some resin into my Viking, and it is really heavy.

One of my future projects shall be two Swiss Mirage III RS (Black and White) inflight, the only reasonable and elegant place to stick acrylic rod in is the fan nozzle. There I will be able to use about 9 or 10mm rod (not sure yet), my (currently) only problem is how to bend them nicely. My idea is to have a wooden base with two horizontal, parallel holes on the small side to stick the rods. Then both should be in V-shape to hold one plane each.
I suspect I will find a solution.

7 March 2018, 19:16

John Thomas
Very nice

23 April 2018, 16:42

Patrick Hagelstein
Impressive!...

23 April 2018, 19:12

Spanjaard
very nice job!

24 April 2018, 07:12

John Hoffmann
Thank you! Tried some new things and learned a ton on this one. Good or bad, the finished model pretty much matches what I was hoping it would look like, which has been rare, so that's a fun build in my book.

24 April 2018, 21:39

Patrick Hagelstein
Something to be really proud of! It catches that used and abused Naval Aviation look!

25 April 2018, 05:03

Thomas T
Looks brilliant, John. I see you had the same kind of problem with the closed bay doors as I had. It's about time for a newly tooled Viking. However, it looks extremely good and realistic, what you made of the kit.

25 April 2018, 06:14

Soeren R.
Really nice work John!😉

25 April 2018, 06:21

Marko
Very nice.

25 April 2018, 06:24

John Hoffmann
More thanks. And yes, closing the doors adds work. The directions also have the location of the short and long main gear doors flipped, which of course I didn't notice until I was painting and decaling. Oh well.

25 April 2018, 18:54