Hobby King 1875mm B-17G Flying Fortress V2

[davegee]

Dave's on a roll!!
Go Dave!

It's actually a pretty good kit, very large size! There are some things I wish they had done differently, but some things I will change myself, and others, probably leave alone. It seems to have a pretty good rep flying. HUGE wing, light wing loading, and should work pretty well up here in Cody.

Cheers

Davegee

[F106DeltaDart]

Nice work on the tail retract! Agreed that there are a few things they could have improved, but it is a great model to have in the collection!

[davegee]

Nice work on the tail retract! Agreed that there are a few things they could have improved, but it is a great model to have in the collection!

You bet, F106DD! I have ordered some .005 styrene sheet that will be cut to the overall size that I will glue onto the bottom of the fuselage. I also ordered a 1/72 scale B-17G late mode plastic kit that I'll use as a pattern to scale up things like the cheek modded windows, the cutout on the bottom of the fuselage skin to accommodate passage of the tail wheel up and down, sorta looks like a keyhole of sorts, and also the Cheyenne turret mod for the tail. For the tailwheel, you won't be able to see any of the foam I cut out of the bottom of the fuse to install the tailwheel. All you'll see is the tailwheel coming up and down through that scale keyhole cut in the styrene cover. If something happens, I'll use glue that is easy to remove the piece for repairs. I think it will work.

I was wondering what you did, if anything, with the forward bulkhead on the nose (painted black at the factory) to make it look a little better scale wise without going to a lot of pain and time to do so. For instance, on my old flightline B-24 that is no more, I found a photo or good drawing from someone that I printed up and glued on that flat bulkhead. When you put the clear plastic nose cone on, it looks much better than just a flat plate, if you know what I mean. At least it looks more 3-dimensional. I don't know if anyone has done that for the B-17, I haven't seen one yet. Thought I'd check with you for your thoughts.

I found some free STLs online to print up some pilot busts. They're wearing their officer's caps instead of a leather helmet, but that's ok. I also printed up several O2 masks that I'll put on several figures I plan to add. Besides the pilot busts, I'll have one up in the top turret, one in the tail turret, and maybe one on the guns in the waist. At this point in the war, with most of the enemy fighter threat taken care of, more or less, they reduced the waist positions to just one crewmember. He was responsible for using both guns, as needed for enemy fighters. Also, on B-24s, when they were ferried from USA to England at that time of the war, one of the first things that mechanics did was remove the ball turret. It was heavy, and pretty much not needed as much now due to reduced fighters. And, it allowed for more bombs to be dropped on the enemy!

Cheers

Davegee

[F106DeltaDart]

You bet, F106DD! I have ordered some .005 styrene sheet that will be cut to the overall size that I will glue onto the bottom of the fuselage. I also ordered a 1/72 scale B-17G late mode plastic kit that I'll use as a pattern to scale up things like the cheek modded windows, the cutout on the bottom of the fuselage skin to accommodate passage of the tail wheel up and down, sorta looks like a keyhole of sorts, and also the Cheyenne turret mod for the tail. For the tailwheel, you won't be able to see any of the foam I cut out of the bottom of the fuse to install the tailwheel. All you'll see is the tailwheel coming up and down through that scale keyhole cut in the styrene cover. If something happens, I'll use glue that is easy to remove the piece for repairs. I think it will work.

I was wondering what you did, if anything, with the forward bulkhead on the nose (painted black at the factory) to make it look a little better scale wise without going to a lot of pain and time to do so. For instance, on my old flightline B-24 that is no more, I found a photo or good drawing from someone that I printed up and glued on that flat bulkhead. When you put the clear plastic nose cone on, it looks much better than just a flat plate, if you know what I mean. At least it looks more 3-dimensional. I don't know if anyone has done that for the B-17, I haven't seen one yet. Thought I'd check with you for your thoughts.

I found some free STLs online to print up some pilot busts. They're wearing their officer's caps instead of a leather helmet, but that's ok. I also printed up several O2 masks that I'll put on several figures I plan to add. Besides the pilot busts, I'll have one up in the top turret, one in the tail turret, and maybe one on the guns in the waist. At this point in the war, with most of the enemy fighter threat taken care of, more or less, they reduced the waist positions to just one crewmember. He was responsible for using both guns, as needed for enemy fighters. Also, on B-24s, when they were ferried from USA to England at that time of the war, one of the first things that mechanics did was remove the ball turret. It was heavy, and pretty much not needed as much now due to reduced fighters. And, it allowed for more bombs to be dropped on the enemy!

Cheers

Davegee

Sounds like a good plan. You can get the nose photo here. I used it on mine and works great! https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...postcount=6651

[davegee]

Sounds like a good plan. You can get the nose photo here. I used it on mine and works great! https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...postcount=6651

Hi F106DD: that worked great! I made a copy at 3.5"x5" cut it out and it fit nicely. I had already printed up a 3D Norden bombsight that I glued onto that flat plate but also scratchbuilt the little wood floor board that goes underneath it. That's about as much as I can get in scale detail in the nose area for this project. The photo of the nose area really helps it.

I have a bunch of materials coming from the East coast, so they won't be here for several days. I might find some other things to work on in the interim. Really appreciate your help on this!

Cheers

Davegee

[Grossman56]

Great to hear Dave, I remember Tired Iron doing that same thing with the pic, I thought it was a great idea, good to know it's stood the test of time. Any thoughts toward the L/G struts? To me, that was the only funky thing about the overall looks, aside from the oversized panel lines on V1, is V2 any better?

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[davegee]

Great to hear Dave, I remember Tired Iron doing that same thing with the pic, I thought it was a great idea, good to know it's stood the test of time. Any thoughts toward the L/G struts? To me, that was the only funky thing about the overall looks, aside from the oversized panel lines on V1, is V2 any better?

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

Hi Dan: I never saw V1 up close, but everything I've read about V2 is better, especially the panel lines. Although deeper than I'd prefer, they are still fine for this kit. I will add some details here and there, but mostly it will be a tribute airplane for Fred, my father in law who passed away last spring.I will plan to fly it quite a bit, though.

Regarding the L/G struts, yes, they need some work. I'd like to make some secondary struts that come from the inside of the nacelle and then straighten out at a hinged point when the gear is down. Even better, I'd like to get a hold of some Freewing main gear struts if someone has a couple to sell. I'll have to look into that.

I am thinking of making or printing up the Cheyenne turret that the later models like this one had. Do you think you'd be interested in drawing an STL for this little part that could be used in place of the earlier version of the B-17?

I'm attaching a couple of pics of some enhancements I'm making to the control surfaces of this airplane. Some, or many scale afficionados of WWII airplanes already know that some of them had fabric flight control surfaces back then. To get that look, I sprayed the surfaces with Tamiya grey primer/surfacer, masking around the trim tabs that were metal and I wanted to remain shiny. I then painted over with aluminum paint, and then a flat clear.

Back then, on almost all American built planes, the aileron trim tab was limited to the left aileron only, for both fighters and bombers. I made the trim tabs to look a bit articulated from neutral, mainly for the visual effect. I used a razor saw and exacto and gently pried them up to the desired position.

With a retractable tailwheel installed, I found that it was in the way of the molded block of foam on the horizontal elavators and had to carve that out a bit to give the tailwheel enough room to fit when the gear was retracted. Not a big deal.

The "tail feathers" aren't screwed on, but you have to glue them in place. I don't really like that, but will use as little glue as possible to keep them in place, yet allow them to be removed for replacement should that ever become necessary.

[davegee]

I started in on making a scratchbuilt Cheyenne turret for my Heaven Can Wait B-17G. At this point it is pretty much flying by the seat of my pants, so to speak, using whatever drawings and photos I can find to make a reasonable facsimile. It's drying up for the night, and tomorow I'll get back to sanding priming, and painting the structure. I'm hoping to have it (the Cheyenne turret) all done next week sometime. Then, on to the cheek window mods in the nose.

Cheers

Davegee

[F106DeltaDart]

Looking good! There's some references on this page for another builder that did a Cheyenne turret, as well as a bit of his build process on the previous pages: https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...7#post47493417.

[davegee]

Looking good! There's some references on this page for another builder that did a Cheyenne turret, as well as a bit of his build process on the previous pages: https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...7#post47493417.

Thanks, F106DD! He did a fantastic job on that! I have the framework set up for now, it's pretty solid. I'm going to make a semi-scale K3 gunsight that the later models had. I installed some armored glass that the real ones had. I have several 21st Century P-51 pilot figures that I used in my dear departed Freewing B-24 years ago. They've been collecting dust in a toolbox but a few of them will be called back to duty for this model.

I glued in the gunner yesterday, and this week will be putting the plastic panels to look as close to possible as I can to the real thing. I do like that he made a vacxuformed plastic piece of the whole glazing. That was well played.

Cheers

Davegee

[Grossman56]

Don't know if these will help, but here they are.

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[davegee]

Don't know if these will help, but here they are.

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

Yes they do, Dan. Thanks!

Question: do you think you could come up with an STL just for the domelike gun cover and the two slots that the guns go up and down to stick on the end of the tail? I think if I give you just a couple of dimensions, I can play with the STL to make it work. Let me know if this is doable, on your end.

So far, I think I have a path to comletion on the rest of the Cheyenne turret. Next couple of days will tell if this idea will work or not.

Thanks,

Davegee

[jetfool]

Davegee,

Looking great. I heard on the news your state has a bad snowstorm, hope you and Dan are safe and warm. Could be a cold long winter.
Best Regards, Rex

[davegee]

Davegee,

Looking great. I heard on the news your state has a bad snowstorm, hope you and Dan are safe and warm. Could be a cold long winter.
Best Regards, Rex

Thanks, Rex. I got all the window panels in for the Cheyenne Turret, but goobered up a bit with CA on two of the windows. I am going to replace them with some new ones and then things should be better.

No snow yet for us, at least where we live in the "banana belt" of Wyoming! It's going to be sunny and in the upper 50s all week, so that's good. Have had some hellatious winds, though, that have caused a little damage here and there. But nothing unexpected for Wyoming.

Hope you are doing well. I look forward to reports if you enter one or two of your airplanes in the contest yearly next year. I wish we had something like that in this neck of the woods. Must be a lot of fun.

Cheers

Davegee

[davegee]

Yes they do, Dan. Thanks!

Question: do you think you could come up with an STL just for the domelike gun cover and the two slots that the guns go up and down to stick on the end of the tail? I think if I give you just a couple of dimensions, I can play with the STL to make it work. Let me know if this is doable, on your end.

So far, I think I have a path to comletion on the rest of the Cheyenne turret. Next couple of days will tell if this idea will work or not.

Thanks,

Davegee

Got some more work done on the Cheyenne turret yesterday. All the plexi panels are glued in now with canopy glue, still have some trimming and adding metal tape to seal in all the edges of that glass work. After that, I need to make a dome that fits in the tail that the two .50s will stick out of and then move on to the next stage of the model. One pic in "bandages" after I glued in the panels last night, and this morning when I removed them. A 3D print of this or vacuform of the glass would be the preferred way to go, but I think this will work for this model.

Cheers

davegee

[Grossman56]

It would be a matter of the shape of the ellipse shape , for instance, this piece

starts from way up under the tail and starts to taper at the first panel line, if I knew the diameter of that piece, it would (supposedly) be fairly simple to produce that. From that first panel line aft would be the interesting part. Knowing the length of that piece and the starting diameter, I could probably come up with something. Hmmmm....

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[davegee]

It would be a matter of the shape of the ellipse shape , for instance, this piece

starts from way up under the tail and starts to taper at the first panel line, if I knew the diameter of that piece, it would (supposedly) be fairly simple to produce that. From that first panel line aft would be the interesting part. Knowing the length of that piece and the starting diameter, I could probably come up with something. Hmmmm....

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

Hi Dan: I have been playing around with this idea some today. We went over to Walmart and found some ping pong balls. I cut an angled secant slice off the ping pong ball and then fashioned it to look like the guns on a Cheyenne turret. This might be good enough, at least for now. We might still visit this a bit later.

Cheers

Davegee

[Grossman56]

It looks pretty good Dave, my only thought is that, at least from this angle, it looks a little long.



I think you're pretty dang close, I'll study it some more. You can see by this pic that the window/body ratio is somewhere around 2/3 to 3/4, the window being that vertically to the fuse.

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[Grossman56]

Doing some more research, this might interest you, conversion/restoration video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9j98R3_rbg

[Grossman56]