Building Zoukei-Mura's 1/32 Bf-109 G4: Part 1

 

Most excellent box art! The kit comes with fuselage and wing
interior parts and I will be building it with much of the outer
skin removed to show all the interior details.

The kit is fairly complex and has lots of runners.

Parts removal from sprues. This is a trick I use to breakdown the
perceived complexity of a kit to make it easier to build.
The next order of business is to clean up the parts. 

Delicate parts remain on sprue "handles" for easier clean up.

Seam removal with ZM scraper tool.

0000 steel wool.

Wrap steel wool around bamboo skewer and chuck into a motor tool.

Additional seam removal.

Gets hard to reach areas easily.

Using Liquid cement to remove mold seams with a brush.

I will be building this without the other fuselage side so that the interior will be visible. This means that these pesky knock out
marks will need to be filled or removed.

I have a homemade punch, but not with a punch the size I need.
I drilled a new hole using a drill press. I then used the drill
bit as a punch by filing the shank end flat. 

I put a .005 styrene sheet in and punched a few. 

Basic instructions on making your own punch.

.005 thick by .150 diameter discs.

The discs are put in with liquid glue.

For me this process is less work than using putty.

Gluing the engine block together.

Another pesky mold seam.

Stretched sprue is used with liquid cement to fill the gap.

Once dry, the area is sanded.

I will be posting in-progress images regularly as the kit needs to get done quickly so that I can photograph it. I haven't built a military kit in a while and I will be building it as "skeleton" model. Everything will be pristine and not weathered, which is also a different way than I typically build. Having a lot of fun so far!

Pennsylvania Railroad MO Tower, LASERkit, HO Scale, Part 1

This is the second of two kits I had agreed to build a long time ago. So let's get started. It's from the same maker as the 50,000 gallon water tank, American Model Builders, which sadly went defunct earlier this year.

Nice presentation. I built the water tower first, because I thought it would be easier. Ha!

Asra Tamamonomae アスラ玉藻前

 

A Custom Kotobukiya Megami Device Asra Tamamonomae build up

カスタム コトブキヤ メガミデバイス アスラ タマモノマエ ビルドアップ

Wooden Water tank, 50,000 Gallons, Standard, LASERkit, HO Scale: Part 2

 Picking up where we left off:

Wooden Water tank, 50,000 Gallons, Standard, LASERkit, HO Scale: Part 1

I am building another kit for hire, this time it is a structure for an HO model train layout. Strangely it conjured up a past memory when my girlfriend (now wife) asked me to paint a portrait of her roommates cats.

Asra & Atreides: IPMS Stream of Consciousness #2

 Let's begin with the "exciting" stuff. Normally I will engage in binge building for an IPMS NatCon, which is now (checking) exactly 85 days, 11 hours and 18 minutes away. Sticky (my AMS demon) is always quite conflicted about this, but always councils me to give in and try and finish up some projects on this timeline, namely to enter into the competition and hopefully score some awards. Sticky's little black heart is in the right place, but demons are like children, they want what they want when they want it. I told myself I would never ever do this again....

I had thought, right up to the moment I started typing this that I was not binge building. So, as I explain what I am doing here, repeat to yourself, over and over, "Ro is not binge building, Ro is not binge building..." 

IPMS Stream of Consciousness #1

I have a plan. What I have done in the past is to present posts as a string of "build" articles. Instead, I will put up stuff in a more stream of consciousness way, show a few pics of what I am working on. "Build" articles will still get put together, but more and more these will simply end up in the IUJ (IPMS USA Journal). The purpose of the "the Joy" will be more to be a window into my world of model building and the stuff surrounding it.

A big part of this has to do with my (new) role in the IPMS. A couple of years ago I volunteered to be the Ad Manager. In that role I handle all the ads for the IUJ. A little over a year ago Jim Pearsall passed away and I took over his position as the publications director/historian for the IUJ. So my hobby experience has really changed in the last couple of years. So this blog will allow the curious to see what it looks like to volunteer for the IPMS. Let's just say it will make it easier for me to get posts out. This will be an interesting place to talk about all the texture which surrounds model building-spouses, the war in Europe, why I build what I build... I'll just dive in and see what comes of it.

Here is what I have been working on. This is a Kotobukiya kit SOL HORNET. There are a couple of things going on here. The first is the building of the kit itself, which is the orange mecha girl, who is 1:1 scale, btw.