Marie's trip to Calgary lasted longer than she expected. Her original plans were to leave Sunday the 4th and return Thursday the 9th. She had to delay her return to take her mother to a follow up eye appointment, so she didn't return until Tuesday the 14th. RIght in the midst of a heavy snow fall warning. The snow started late Monday evening and lasted well into Tuesday evening, with well over 20 cm falling at our house. The storm was very localized, so most of her trip home was pleasant. The problems started north of Wandering River, and got worse as she approached Marianna Lake. Two rolled semi trucks between Marianna and Fort McMurray, two cars being actively pulled from the ditch a half hour south of the city, and at least 5 cars in the ditch between the 881 turnoff and Fort McMurray. Needless to say it wasn't a pleasant drive.
I managed to get out for a bike ride on Thursday. The weather was fantastic, with bright sun and temperatures above freezing. Unfortunately, the warm weather made the recent heavy snow too soft to get good traction and the ride was a lot of work.
Yesterday, we were the warmest spot in the province at +9C. The snow started to melt, and the sump pump got very busy. An hour digging in the back created a trench to channel the water away from the house and all was good.
Ember is growing up at a rapid pace. The good news is that she is almost housebroken, and we are going several days in a row without a pee in the house. She is also sleeping thru the night without having to go out at 2am, a big plus for Marie and I. The bad news is that she is terrible at walks. She pulls ferociously, like she was trying to run the Iditarod, and lunges at any dog unfortunate enough to be within reach. More annoying, she has discovered the dogs on either side of us, and will run to each fence and bark to get a response. I have filled my shoes full of snow of several occasions, trying to grab her and stop her barking. She has also taken to chewing the door stop beside the garage door. We have had to take the stop off because she has gotten the little white plastic tip off several times and we are scared she will swallow it. The trials and tribulations of puppy parenthood.
Riley's ear and eye infections are healed. With his new collar, we are no longer using harness when walking him. He is very happy about this and will come to the front hall without being called. He is a happy boy!
The boys have now finished their mid terms. Nicholas completed his final Capstone project presentation, and felt it went really well. He and Jill also went to a Journey concert this week, and thoughtf they were some of the youngest people there! Christine submitted her final big project this week, and we are blown away with what she has done. She turned a school in McMurray, just east of the Hospital, into an Regional Oncology Center. Some screen grabs are attached below to show the quality of her work.
I finished the last of the main floor baseboards while Marie was away. Ember isn't the best helper, but unlike Copper, she did manage to stay out of the wet paint. I now have to decide if I will do wall repairs and touch ups, or start working on the 2nd floor baseboards. Always lots to do.
Lancaster
Here are some pictures of the finished Lancaster. I keep forgetting to look if it is supposed to have radio aerial wires so it may not be quite finished. Overall, I am very pleased with how this turned out.
Anson
The Anson was ready to install the clear parts, and there are a lot of them. The main greenhouse area consists of long sections of windows on each side that mate up with a large front windscreen section. Both side windows gave difficulties. The starboard side would either side nicely in the rear door, or nicely along the front, but not both. This was resolved by gluing the rear area and allowing it to dry overnight. Then the front section was taped into place and glued. The port side fit well along the bottom, but insisted on sitting recessed, rather than flush, along the top. Again, the bottom was glued first, allowed to dry overnight, before the top was set into position and glued. A day later I wasn't happy with the port side and had to break the top section out and reglue it.
The windscreen section fit well. It included the top of the canopy, the front windscreen, and a section of the front nose. The front joint needed some filler to close some small gaps. After priming, I realized that the front joint needed further sanding to eliminate some ridges.
The next challenge was masking the clear sections. Fortunately, an earlier build of an Anson, found on the Britmodeller forum, had created masks. A quick download and the masks were sent to the cutter. It must have been a tremendous amount of work to create these masks, and they fit well.
As mentioned in the last blog, I bought some pink primer. Much of the Anson is RAF Trainer Yellow, a notoriously difficult colour to spray. It can take multiple coats to get decent coverage, potentially obscuring detail. Strange as it sounds, pink is an effective primer under yellow. This was my first time using Mr. Surfacer as a primer, and it worked really well. One error I realized after priming was that I forgot spray the interior window frame colour first, so the "inside" frame colour will be light pink. Oops!
The primer turned up a number of areas that needed repairs. The previously mentioned area on the nose, where the windscreen blended into the fuselage needed additional filler and futher sanding. The joints along the bottom of the engines both needed further sanding. And the landing light cover proved too small, and needed filler to better blend into the wing leading edge.
The primer was sanded with a 1500 grit automotive sanding sponge to remove fuzz and blemishes. A quick primer touch up was applied to all the repair areas and then the yellow was sprayed. The pink primer worked really well, allowing the yellow to cover well in only a single coat. Once dry, it was lightly sanded to remove fuzz and blemishes, before a second yellow coat was applied to touch up some areas.
Most of the kit decals aren't applicable to the selected scheme. I have an aftermarket set from CanMilAir, that I intended to use on a Classic Airframes kit, that gave some useful information. The kit and aftermarket decals were scanned and then loaded into the cutter design program as the basis to create replacement masks. After 2 hours at the computer, new masks were done for all the major markings.
BCATP Ansons often have the registration in big black numbers on the underside of both wings. The CanMilAir decals, for a 6100 series serial number, included the large underwing numbers. I can't tell from my one reference picture if the chosen plane included them. The adjacent plane, which I assume is another Anson, shows roundels located out towards the wingtips. This placement suggests the roundels were pushed out towards the wingtips in order to give enough space for the large underwing registration numbers. But it isn't possible to tell what is under the wing of 6598. I like the look of the large numbers and so will include them on my plane.
Some progress pictures.
Photo 1 - Clear parts installed, masked and ready to prime
Photo 2 - Clear parts installed, masked and ready to prime
Photo 3 - Pink primer applied
Photo 4 - Pink primer applied
Photo 5 - Repairs complete and primer polished out.
Photos 6&7 - First coat of yellow applied
Next up will be to mask the yellow areas, then apply the dark earth and dark green camouflage colours.
MiG-21
The cockpit floor doubles as the front landing gear bay roof. The front landing gear bay is really tight, so the parts were painted and weathered before assembly.
Russia uses a bright turquoise for their cockpit interiors. It is supposed to be relaxing, but I think it hard on the eyes. The old bottle of Model Master paint didn't quite match the kit's coloured PE parts. The bottle of Mr Color I had ordered earlier had arrived and proved to be a better match. The various cockpit components were sprayed on the sprue before assembly.
The kit provides two different ways to build the instrument panel. The first option is a plastic part with raised dial details, to be covered by a decal. The second is a flat plastic part that serves as the base for the coloured PE layers. I chose the PE option, which consists of 8 parts in total - 3 plastic and 5 coloured PE. It looks very convincing once assembled.
If you look really hard at the third picture, you will see the silver rudder pedals, just behind the base of the instrument panel. Eduard include 4 very small PE parts to represent the leather rudder pedal straps. There are 4 in total, each about 4 mm long and about 2 hairs wide. Given how hard it is to see these pedals when e cockpit isn't even installed inside the fuselage, I decided to protect my sanity and leave them off.
Next up is to complete the cockpit side walls and the ejection seat, then begin engine assembly
Photo 1 - Initial painting of parts continues. Turquioise for the cockpit. Zinc chromate for landing gear bays. Bright green for the engine barrel.
Photo 2 - The completed front landing gear bay.
Photo 3 - The cockpit instrument panel and control stick.
CF-5D Freedom Fighter
Marie being away isn't good for modelling, as I have to key an eye on the puppy, but it certainly is good for internet research. After several days of reading and searching pictures, I have decided on the markings for the CF-5D. It will get started when the Anson is completed.
That's it for another blog. Looks like spring is finally on the way. Take care and stay safe!
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