DeHavilland DH.88 Comet 'Grosvenor House'

1
December 4, 2024
Cockpit is straightforward. I deviated from the instructions and painted the office black - or better to say: dark gray - as it appeared black and not wood colored in one of the ol pics I happened to come across.
2
December 4, 2024
For the floor I sticked to wood. The PE fret contains minuscle parts to detail invisible stuff - which I used, of course. I payed for it after all.
3
December 4, 2024
With the wings in place it resembles a plane already
4
December 4, 2024
Areas to adress.
5
December 5, 2024
The landing gear is beautifully rendered and appears to be pretty much to scale. This of course makes separation from the spues and cleaning a bit of a challenge but the result when treated with care is quite convincing.
6
December 5, 2024
The front part of the engine cowlings require an insert with a basic representation of the first cylinder of the engine. Everything was primed black and the cylinderrelief received a drybrushing with Vallejo aluminum.
7
December 5, 2024
Wheels need some touch ups and I didn't realise the necessity of central holes on both sides of the hubs. Will have to drill those too.
8
December 5, 2024
ClearProp suggests some grey for the inside of the engine nacelles. I went with lightened XF-53 and used the same color for the rear surfaces of the wheel covers in the absence of other information.
9
December 6, 2024
I didn't like the kit's spinner tip and replaced it with a 0.3 mm syringe piece and a brass disc from my PE spares.
10
December 6, 2024
Prop parts painted. Most of them the second time as merciless silver revealed even the smallest blemishes. Now you have to look realllly hard. 🙂
11
December 6, 2024
With the installation of the shoulder belts assembly of the cockpit is complete.
Behind the cockpit is an access panel of some kind, or maybe even the nozzle for a rear fuel tank. Anyway I tried ro engrave it but ended up off center. So it was filled again with black superglue and sanded flush again. Will have to redo this.
There have been rather big oil tanks at the rear of the engine/landing gear nacelles. Their locks have been replicated with PE spares.
12
December 6, 2024
Same for the fuel cells at the fuselage. To achieve a plain surface for the PE parts I drilled a hole and inserted a rod of corresponding diameter with a flat top. Like this the PE parts are flush with the surface and don't protrude.
13
December 7, 2024
The whole front ofvthe engine nacelle up to the oblique engraving (arrow) was a single piece. So the seam after attaching the front had to go. I filled it with black superglue and sanded it flush
14
December 7, 2024
I followed the instructions and glued the part outlined in red to the wings at an early stage ( see pic 3) In a next build I would delay that and align it together with the nacelles as I had to close a bigger gap with pieces of styrene and superglue.
15
December 7, 2024
The outlets for the exhausts were opened.
16
December 7, 2024
Let's hope that my homemade masks are up to the job.
17
December 7, 2024
Canopy colored with the interior color of the cockpit.
Silver at critical areas revealed some sloppy work on my part.
Detention.
18
December 8, 2024
Wheels done after some drybrushing and washing. There are decals for the Dunlop-Text but I think it will be too prominent. But maybe I should bring it out a bit more still.
19
December 8, 2024
Props assembled.
20
December 8, 2024
Final go with Tamiya sanding sponge superfine, cleaning up with IPA and I decided it's time for primer.
21
December 8, 2024
22
December 8, 2024
Highly diluted Mr. Surfacer 1500 white
23
December 8, 2024
Not entirely surprising but still be a bit frustrating, as I had been in coloring mood, was the detection of some areas that needed a bit more attention. Most problematic are the right inner vents of the engine nacelle. I thinned the walls to open them up but that didn't work and I skipped it. Here I perforated it and repaired it with superglue. Should have put a piece of Styrene behind. Should have...
Was thinking hard how to repair this.
24
December 8, 2024
I chose gluegue to have similar properties between the kits plastic and my repair material which - I hope - will make sanding and particularly rescribing easier afterwards.
25
December 8, 2024
Some more filling, sanding and (re-)scribing done. Let's wait for the gue to dry...
26
December 12, 2024
Reprimed.
27
December 12, 2024
Masking? For a plane all red?
Wanna try something...
28
December 18, 2024
Masking done
29
December 18, 2024
By using pink as base color in certain areas I want to achieve different hues of the red top coat. At the top I limited that to the control areas.
30
December 18, 2024
The bottom was covered with pink all over
31
December 18, 2024
The control areas have been covered with doped linen over a wooden frame. The texture of this has been nicely replicated in the kits parts. I wanted to emphasise this and carefully sanded the pink down again to show the white primer.
32
December 18, 2024
33
December 18, 2024
I more or less managed to bring out the texture without sanding down through the white primer and onto the grey plastic.
34
December 18, 2024
Unmasked. Has it's own appeal.
35
December 18, 2024
Anxious to see how my strategy will fare when the red is applied.
Tamiyas LP-7 will be my choice.
36
December 21, 2024
Deniz' comment let me test various base colors to find a good match to my imagination. Here I tested Silver (S), White (W), Pink (P) and Yellow 👍. I don't like the hue with a yellow base, it being too orange. Will try lighter yellows. Contrast between pink and white is either nonexistent or the red looks too pinkish on a white base. Not there yet.
37
December 21, 2024
Tested now various yellow and grey tones.
38
December 21, 2024
Everything grey darkend red considerably. The only yellowish color that led to a nice shade was H413 from Mr. Hobbycolor. Unfortunately it appeared darker with a yellow base rather than lighter as I would like to have it.
39
December 21, 2024
Another series. Grey, yellow and pink were lightened 1:3 and 1:5 with white.
40
December 21, 2024
This attempt didn't show the desired result either. Either contrast was lost or it appeared the other way round.
Running out of ideas and not wanting to repaint the whole plane I decided to cover the white/pink base with red - and expect to loose the desired contrast.
41
December 21, 2024
As expected. But looks nice nevertheless.
42
December 21, 2024
Let's slash on a gloss coat and then onto the decals.

Comments

32 4 December, 11:33

Łukasz Gliński
Following

4 December, 15:38

Christoph Kunz
Da schau ich Dir mal über die Schulter.

4 December, 16:24

Robert Podkoński
Taking a seat, for sure!

4 December, 17:25

Alex K
... sure!

4 December, 20:37

Michael Kohl
Welcome mates. Happy to have you around.

5 December, 17:40

Michael Kohl
Those familiar with the kit might have noticed the absence of the firewall. I simply lost it and decided that I will just omit it as it is invisible anyway.

5 December, 17:42

bughunter
A very interesting plane! You made a good progress with another (parallel?) project 👍

5 December, 18:39

Michael Kohl
Parallllllel, alternating. You name it. 😉

5 December, 18:47

J35J
Great start!👀

5 December, 19:55

Cuajete
Well done so far 👍

7 December, 19:41

Michael Kohl
Thanks and welcome.

7 December, 20:44

Nicolas
Great start.

7 December, 20:48

Thomas Haberl - TH SCALE MODELS
Interesting build and very promising start - I´m in for this 🙂

9 December, 09:13

Jennifer Franklin
Following

12 December, 12:52

Michael Kohl
Moin zusammen Thomas und Nicolas.

1 12 December, 13:39

Michael Kohl
...and Jennifer too, of course. 🙂

1 13 December, 15:16

Nicolas
Interesting approach to simply sand the control surface structure in the primer. I'll keep my fingers crossed for a good result.

18 December, 13:53

Denis Dogadov
As a base for the red color, you need to use yellow, then the red will be bright.If you put red on white, you will get just pink.

18 December, 14:08

bughunter
Michael, using different primers for one top coat is my idea! The usage of my idea is geBIERenpflichtig! 🙂

18 December, 15:38

Łukasz Gliński
Looks like you're the partial member of The Infanous Order of The Pink Primer 😋

18 December, 18:19

Guy Rump
Looking good, following. 👍

18 December, 22:02

Michael Kohl
@ Nicolas: I cross my fingers too. But looks like I have to do some homework before the final coat (see below 🙂 )

@ Denis: thanks for your input. I tested your suggestion on a scrab wing. With LP-7 I get a nice hue as well over white primer and pink base alike. Problem is that there is almost no difference between them. Over yellow (XF-3) the red receives a rather orange hue which I do not like for this project. But I am optimistic to finetune that and use lighter yellow or buff as base coat and see how that turns out. I'll keep you posted.

@Frank: So, se wollen erheben ne kleene GeBIER?!
Da trifft es sich ja gut, dass mein diesjähriger Adventskalender aus 24 Flaschen feinem fränkischen Bier aus 24 verschiedenen Brauereien besteht. Es wird mir eine Freude sein, ein-zwei-drei mit Dir zu teilen - in N?! In M?! Gruß 🙂

@Lukasz: I applied, but as PartPrimerer I am only allowed into the Entree so far. Full membetship pending. 🙂

Welcome Guy

19 December, 09:52

Denis Dogadov
Yes, I will be interested in what your red color will turn out to be. I recently painted small parts red, but there was a noticeable difference in color, depending on the color of the soil. Perhaps your LP-7 is better.

19 December, 10:09

Michael Kohl
I tested a couple of base coat variations for LP-7. A nice combination in my eyes is achieved when using Mr. Hobbycolor H413 yellow as base for the darker areas and pink (Tamiya X-17) for the lighter ones. But that would have meant to redo the whole base paint. So I stuck to my combination and mourned the loss of contrast.

21 December, 23:27

Project info

DeHavilland DH.88 Comet Crosvenor House

42 images

1:72

In progress

De Havilland DH 88 Comet

MacRobertson Air Race
G-ACSS / 34 Grosvenor House (C.W.A. Scott & Tom Campbell Black)
1934 1934 MacRobertson Air Race (London - Melbourne) - Melbourne, VIC

(Result: Winner)
Red

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