Official FMS 1500mm P-47D Razorback Thread

[vrosi1963]

I am hoping it will come out well as a bubbletop. I will be shipping the fuse out early next week. It will take him about a month or so to get it done, and then ship back to me. That will just be the beginning of the project.

You can judge from photos and my comments if you want to try one for an M model or something. I'll keep you posted with pics how it goes when I can get them. I would guess that would be in March sometime.

Regarding the Spitfire rear view mirror, I did a couple of different techniques. One plane I used the whole mirror base and glued the stand to the wind screen top glass. The other one I cut off the base mounting part from the mirror and just glued it on directly to the same place on the top of the windcreen. I'll include a couple of pics. This thing is REALLY easy to knock off transporting the airplane to/from the field! Stays on flying but getting it to/from the field intact is dicey, sometimes!

Cheers

Davegee

do you have a stl file for the Mirrors

[davegee]

Woo Hoo Davegee,
Getting the popcorn ready to enjoy this conversion. If your happy with the conversion parts I'd like to convert one to a P-47M also, after I finish my other projects.
Dave, How did you mount the Spitfire mirror on the canopy? Did you glue a small mount under the glass? Any close-up pictures?
Best Regards, Rex

I am hoping it will come out well as a bubbletop. I will be shipping the fuse out early next week. It will take him about a month or so to get it done, and then ship back to me. That will just be the beginning of the project.

You can judge from photos and my comments if you want to try one for an M model or something. I'll keep you posted with pics how it goes when I can get them. I would guess that would be in March sometime.

Regarding the Spitfire rear view mirror, I did a couple of different techniques. One plane I used the whole mirror base and glued the stand to the wind screen top glass. The other one I cut off the base mounting part from the mirror and just glued it on directly to the same place on the top of the windcreen. I'll include a couple of pics. This thing is REALLY easy to knock off transporting the airplane to/from the field! Stays on flying but getting it to/from the field intact is dicey, sometimes!

Cheers

Davegee

[jetfool]

Woo Hoo Davegee,
Getting the popcorn ready to enjoy this conversion. If your happy with the conversion parts I'd like to convert one to a P-47M also, after I finish my other projects.
Dave, How did you mount the Spitfire mirror on the canopy? Did you glue a small mount under the glass? Any close-up pictures?
Best Regards, Rex

[davegee]

I'm starting on a new project, taking a stock FMS P-47D razorback and converting it to a specific bubbletop aircraft that is fully detailed much like my other jugs that I fly. Specifically, it will be a foamie version of one of my favorite rc aircraft of all time, an old Aerotech 1/6 scale carbon fiber kit of Hairless Joe, flown by Col. David Schilling of the 56th Fighter Group during WWII. It competed in several shows, turns out it wasn't all that great of a flyer due to its weight, but it looked great, and won some awards on the contest circuit. That model was retired years ago to the Kalamazoo Air Zoo where it rests under a special domed cover today.

But this proposed foamie model will be a flyer and I look to finishing it sometime maybe this summer. So, this is the first step. I have a FMS P-47 fuselage that has been kept as a spare for a few years now. I am sending it to vrosi1963 in California where he will do the cut down on the fuselage to a bubbletop, and include a bubbletop canopy and windscreen for the project.

Below is a photo of the experimental FMS fuse before I ship it for the modification to a bubbletop, a photo of the real airplane in England in 1944, and my Aerotech model on the old runway at Boxted England in 2004 where the real one had flown from exactly 60 years before.
If I can make a go of it, I'll post more pics, maybe a separate build thread for this particular endeavor. If it comes out well, maybe others who love jugs will want to have him do a similar conversion to their models. It is a reasonable price for him to do this work, I think.

Cheers

davegee

[Grossman56]

Dave was over today and saw him, he was impressed that I actually got him to resemble Bob Johnson which is high praise!
I think what we are going to do is package everything up in one Big Beautiful Box and ship it all together. The pilot should be done in a few days if everything goes well. The hard work is over, painting the body is just a matter of layering, which you can see, I've got a good start on.
Just to pass it on, the best way to imitate leather that I've found is to start with a black base and use Vallejo leather and Mahogany, leather first, fairly thin, spread it on and wipe it off with a paper towel, dry and repeat then do the same with the Mahogany. When I spray it with a clear coat to seal it in, it leaves just enough shine to imitate leather, any more and it looks like rubber.



As you can see from the pic. Now tomorrow will be bringing out the highlights and possibly some wear do look like its distressed.

I have a lot of heads now to practice on as Dave dropped me off another load.
What a great hobby!

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[jetfool]

Grossman,
WOW! WOW! I'm speechless. Looking fabulous.
Best regards, Rex

[Grossman56]

Rex's pilot. Getting there!
Hard to get an accurate picture, he looks better in real life, at least to me!

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[Grossman56]

I hear you. My wife just had colon surgery three weeks ago and is still on the mend. We do what we gotta do.
Send her our best.
Sucks getting old.
Got the pics by going online and typing in Bob Johnson WWII pilot and went to 'images' on Chrome.
The original pic looks like this


I just cropped it.

Dan

[jetfool]

Dan,
He looks just like Bob. Thinking if I sent you a picture of Bob Johnson and four of his buddies walking arm in arm in front of their planes after a mission you could paint each life like and have them walking around arm in arm in front of my display by remote control, it would be the hit of the show. Wha- do- ya think? JUST KIDDING! My mind wanders sometimes.
Really you are creating a masterpiece.
Not getting much done on P-47 this week, wife has surgery tomorrow so will be running the household this week until see is back on her feet.
Best Regards, Rex

[davegee]

I have them Dave, I'll see what I can do.
Meanwhile, the Rex pilot's face is 90% done, hours of work on such a little surface!


He's coming along!

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

Excellent! Looks just like him! Where did you get that picture? I have never seen it before.

[f4u ausie]

Absolutely brilliant gross

[Grossman56]

I have them Dave, I'll see what I can do.
Meanwhile, the Rex pilot's face is 90% done, hours of work on such a little surface!


He's coming along!

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[davegee]

It says '65' on the body. If I can get the right head and the marine body at the same scale would be very cool!

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

I discovered there is a complication. All my parts that I have printed are on one zipdirive and all have been converted from STLs to GCodes. So, I can't change anything that is on the zip drive. I can only reprint what I have on the drive.

I just got a response from Elbee on a query I had to him if it was possible to switch a GCode back to a STL and back again. It is possible, but complicated, probably beyond my comprehension. I think whatever we have done so far can be reprinted, but as to doing what you were requesting, at thispoint, I think we are at a dead stop to do that. I would need a fresh STL to modify again. Where did we get these STL figures originally?

Sorry.



davegee

[Grossman56]

It says '65' on the body. If I can get the right head and the marine body at the same scale would be very cool!

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[jetfool]

Holy Moly Dan, He is looking great. Better than I ever could do. Those pictures also help in the canopy area framing.
Best Regards, Rex

[davegee]

Hi Dan: the pilot head is looking great, very realistic! I know the pilot in the openable canopy of the P-47 should go a long way to help scores by the judges this spring.

Regarding the head for the larger pilot I gave you, did I write anything on that pilot body denoting what per cent it was scaled up? That would be helpful to scale up the RAF head for the larger body. If not, I can make an educated guess. I might need to get that body back to help me scale up the head so it fits properly. I’m sure we can make it work.

Cheers

davegee

[Grossman56]

BTW, Bob Johnson.....





Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[Grossman56]

Hey guys, the latest on Rex's pilot, darned phone stopped showing up on my PC so there are some pics of the progress that I can't download. Anyway, here's the head so far...



For what its worth, he looks better live and in person. The face colors are about done, now its a matter of pupils, lips eye brows etc, then on to the helmet.
I had Dave print a head for the Big Guy, but its the marine head and not the RAF head. Could I get you to print an RAF head for him, and (pretty please) print me a marine pilot of the same scale?
I think I owe you a spool Dave, we'll talk.

Grossman56
(Dangerous Dan)

[davegee]

Just sent the address , i thought the cockpit / hatches were in stock from Horizon

I didn't try Horizon, but bought directly from FMS in Tallahassee, FL. It is in the pipeline now so I'm hoping it will be here at the end of the week, and once I get it regardless, I'll ship out the fuse and the cockpit part to you. I look forward to getting the completed bubbletop conversion from you someday and start on my first foamie P-47 bubbletop model. I like what you did with yours from the photos.

Cheers

Davegee

[vrosi1963]

Hi Vrosi1963: I have tried to send you a couple of PMs to set up sending my FMS P-47 fuselage and cockpit piece but I'm not sure it is working properly. I don't see any evidence that shows I sent the messages like I normally get. Did you receive anything from me as a PM?

Thanks,

davegee

Just sent the address , i thought the cockpit / hatches were in stock from Horizon