Luft46's Blog

Just finished the first of the LOTR figures I got from my nieces and Adrian. Im quite pleased with this one and look forward to finishing a few more soon. Also working yet again on the AV Resins ME 334, not the best kit under the sun. Major mods on this were redoing the engine intake, fixing the exhausts and redoing the canopy as a Me 262 one, twice as I mucked up the first attempt. The U/c also required a bit of shortening to bring it within the bounds of reality as well as new thinner doors in card as the resin ones were way too thick. I will post a pic on that one later.

Got this last weekend for a friend, too late time period for me but is a bit luft46ish in design.

I actually finished this about a week ago. Thisis my first kit finished in over eighteen months. No major dramas that were not of my own making. Leaving the fiddly bits off till later is a lesson that i failed to remember is applicable even for armour. Mind you the last kit I finished back in Jan 2011 was a little Da Vinci tank from Retrokit. For a Luft46 modeller its a bit sad my last two finished kits are armour admittedly both are a little unusual.
The otyer thing that was needed to finish the Minenraumer was taking a Dremel to the bottom of each wheel to ensure three pads hit the ground unlike most built up kits I have seen. The sign is just gloss white plastic from the spares bin with some cyrillic warning notices from the Academy IL2 and a few other bits from another kit. The authentic bird poo is a mixture of some toothpaste spots and also some paint spots. My reference shows these and lots of dust as being corect for this example at the Kubinka museum. The reference was from Hylands Bookshop in Melbourne and was originally intended for a 1/72 resin kit I had which has since been ebayed.
Overall I’m happy with the reult and now need to raid the Cupboard of Doom for my next project.

I would just like to thank Channel Nine for bringing back Big Brother  this year but not for the usual reasons. Personally i find much of it mundane with a very narrow range of people selected for “performing ” on the show. i am happy to occasionally watch it with my family more just to keep involved with everyone but am equally happy to spend time in the shed modelling whilst they enjoy it, definitely a win win situation for all concerned. It is probably a major reason why I finished the Minenraumer last weekend.

i hope to post the pictures tomorrow.

Two photos, one illustrating how an anal retentive modeller plots out his construction sequence and the other for how to use Glad Wrap to shield already painted parts from Polyfilla whilst trying to get the whole thing bedded down to look like it has been concreted in by lazy Russians.

And lastly a photo of the base part way through adding  Polyfilla

First up is some detail sets from Airmodel destined for a variety of projects, some for Munchen 48

Next up is some stuff from Jadar in Poland, good service from them. The Plus Models office stuff is good except that nothing on the walls in the boxtop illustration is included which is a little dissapointing, this and the bricks are destined for my miniskip vignette but more on that later. The artificial water is for a mini sub dio still in the planning stages.

I have the miniskip from Spencer Pollard but will save that for another post

It has been a while, got caught up in other things so no writing done. First week was just having a week off work and doing a bit of modelling, second week was working but feeling crook and the last week just seems to have flown by. Footy season for the boys has finally finished with Thomas winning another premiership and Dylan doing boundary for the Sydney comp for second grade preceded by a visit to a bookshop in nearby Marrickville and picking up a really tacky comic. Pic to follow below, hey it was only $3!

Been slowly finishing off the Minenraumer. Biggest challenge has been the base, the first attempt just did not work. The current base is polystyrene with a very thin layer of polyfilla exterior over it. There are three major dents in it to accomodate the wheels and before you comment this is a mistake considerable study by two people of the reference photos of the one in the Kubinka Museum clearly shows that the Russians have parked this beast then cemented around it to lock it in place, very Russian. Adding to this is that when they have painted the floor around it they have also painted some of the treads!
The other problem that I have seen with this kit is that in real life three of the pads for each wheel rest on the ground, but very few built up examples of this kit do so. I am no JMN but this is fixable, as worked out with a mate dremeling the bottom of the wheel before fitting the pads will solve this in much the same way as tyres areflattened on aircraft models. It appears to be risky but really isnt and it looks a hell of a lot better.

Below is my current progress with the corrected wheels and some preliminary work on the wheel hubs. This was easily accomplished by prepainting a mixture of GW Chaos Black and a dark brown acrylic. Following that I jusy used maskol to mask off approximately the right amount of wear comparing to the photos I had, any extra scartches in getting this off after painting were ok anyway. IIRC the colour is rattle can Tamiya 16 grey.