Boeing 307 Stratoliner

Roland Sachsenhofer
A few first pictures of the 'Stratoliner': in contrast to Academy's B-17B, this kit shows a love of detail, but the accuracy of fit has gone to hell. The parts are also very roughly moulded and all have to be shaped with a scalpel and sandpaper. Nevertheless, the whole thing is great fun - the Boeing 307 not only seems to be big, but also quite voluminous thanks to the shape of the fuselage!

Robert Podkoński
Taking a seat, of course!

Roland Sachsenhofer
Feel welcome, Robert!

Cuajete
Great! I have the military version, so I can't miss this one.

Roland, I'm sure that after the Mil Mi twins you'll be able to do this without so much effort.

Good start! 👍

Pietro De Angelis
Double effort, double satisfaction, this too will not disappoint expectations!

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you, mates, for these encouraging words!
Cuajete, a C-75 version will follow in a few days as a contract build. I'm glad to have already had some experience with this not entirely un-tricky kit.

Roland Sachsenhofer
A little filling here, a little sanding there.... and everything will be fine.

Marco Gallmann
A lot of filling indeed, i take a seat too

Cuajete
Roland, I'll be happy to see that C-75 🙂
The cracks between the pieces in this kit are huge. But you are a great, experienced tamer of crowding plastics. Cheer up!

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thanks for the encouragement - I'll take that literally: off to the putty rodeo!

Ben M
I'll join the putty rodeo, lol

Cuajete
😄 😄 😄

Nicolas
Count me in as well.

Zbynek Honzik
It's gonna be a ride again, Roland! Taking a seat!

Ben M
Wow. This may be the worst fitting kit I've ever seen.

Łukasz Gliński
Oh man, what a lovely fit 😄

Roland Sachsenhofer
Yeehah!! Thank you all for these appreciated comments, mates! 🙂

Finn
Hope you make it to the other side (Lord, Give Me Patience, and Give It to Me Right Now!)

Guy Rump
Looking good, following. 👍

Roland Sachsenhofer
Good prayers are welcome!
Something is happening here too: wings and fuselage have found each other - now I have to find the tube of filler!

Juergen Klinglhuber
🙂 - one tube enough?

Cuajete
Roland, this seems much worse than the Mil Mi. It should be a crime to sell these sufferings with all the money they cost and a monument should be made for you for what you are capable of doing by transforming the beast into beauty.
Cheer up!

Skyhiker
How did I skip this?

David Taylor
Looks hmm, challenging.

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you all mates!
I like the thing with the monument.... I can already see the plaque on it: 'donated by the grateful putty industry'.
But what can I say: the C-75 arrived today.... and will soon be joining its civilian sister on the workbench.

There are a few things that I would like to do completely differently on this second run. For example, the fuselage windows: I'm going to make them from scratch out of clear film I cut myself..... that will - must!- simply look better!

Skyhiker
Well it's not a Bandai... It's more like a Bandaid kit. Nothing a lot of super glue can't fix!

Skyhiker
I just saw the price for this kit... Holy sh*t Batman that's nuts.

Ben M
Gotta wonder if the 1977 amodel vacform is better

Hans-Jürgen Haag
O you are addicted to pleasure! 😉

Bernd Grün
Modeling the hard way, Roland. Admire your persistence with that kit. 👌

Roland Sachsenhofer
I take your words and your interest in this building as strong motivation and encouragement! Thank you for your feedback!

Roland Sachsenhofer
Putty queen! But the whole thing is actually half as bad, I'm already looking forward to the wet sanding.

Gordon Sørensen
Great work towards making this kit. I thought Starfix kits had a bad reputation for fit - seems Batkits wants to de-throne them…

Michael Kohl
Oh, an overweight looking putty queen I've missed here. But not any more. 😉

Consider clear resin for the windows of your second build. Just cover the outside of the windows thoroughly with Cela-Tape and pour the resin in (jep, bubbles are a pain). The glue residue from the tape which tends to stick to the outside of the windows after removal of the tape can easily be removed with IPA.

Roland Sachsenhofer
Michael, that sounds very appealing - a technique I've heard of but never tried. I have two questions: Can you give me a tip on where I could get the clear resin? Do you have any idea how dangerous it can be to my health and how best to protect myself? Thank you in any case for the inspiration!

Ben M
I found clear resin on amazon. It is epoxy based, so standard precautions apply - wear gloves, do not expose your skin to uncured resin, over time you can gain a severe allergy. Use in a ventilated space, I do it in my garage.

Łukasz Gliński
For the first trials I bought a cheap small bottle via the internets sold as "jewellery resin". It's about 25g.
Or you can try this one: UV Resin 17ml (Green Stuff World 8436574503784, No)

Roland Sachsenhofer
So, mates, after some quick thinking I have ordered a bottle of UV Resin and will use it on the C-75 - somewhere I should try it out first! 🙂 Many thanks for the ''push'' and the advice - I'm looking forward to it!

Łukasz Gliński
Just remember not to use it in a sunny room - it can cure before you spread it 🙂

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you for the tip! I will also keep my sunny disposition in check

Roland Sachsenhofer
I need a lot of patience with this project: the road to a result that I will be happy with is proving to be a long one! So it's only after a long time that there are a few new pictures here again: the roughest filling and sanding orgy is over, but the first layers of Alclad are still in need of touching up. Slowly, however, the end seems to be in sight, so that I can already work on building up several aluminium tones during the final sanding work. The last three pictures of this new series show such a working state.
Since I want to depict the 'luxury yacht' of the legendary Howard Hughes, the surface will be kept in shimmering and polished aluminium tones, similar to what I have seen in pictures. By the way, I'm going to completely rebuild the fuselage windows - so don't worry about their rather wild appearance! 🙂

István Szücs
Everything fits well, I don't know, what is your problem 😉

You did a great job!

Michael Kohl
I see that you resumed your studies in Gap-ology with an intesive F&S-course (filling&sanding). We expect your defence of the final result any time soon. 😉

Ben M
Great work carving an airplane out of putty.

Cuajete
Great (hard) job so far with this huge mass of plastic, Roland.
Cheer-up!

Roland Sachsenhofer
I had a lovely time reading your comments! Gap-ology as a course of study, which all modellers will probably take at some point, meets with my fullest approval! 🙂 Well, the idea of 'getting' a model out of the filler probably also coincides with an experience that many modellers already have had....

Skyhiker
Wow, that fit is amazing. So crisp, so clean. No filler needed at all. Goes together like a perfect snap kit. Bandai's got some real competition there... Or NOT. Roland you're doing a great job. Gap-ology. Love it. You know your starting to get good when a model like this becomes normal. I truly find them the most satisfying because when they are finished and look great you know it made you work for those results.

Ben M
I agree. I am a member of the non aligned movement. I only build kits where the parts do not align.

Roland Sachsenhofer
NAM - the "Non Alignment Movement" - has a new disciple: it is indeed very satisfying when a roughly correct shape emerges from such a pile of polystyrene and putty- thank you Skyhiker and Ben! 🙂 However, I realise that this is not for perfectionists, a few compromises and acceptances have to be made....
I learned another lesson in modesty here: it's not a good idea to assume that you can optimise the sequence of building steps by being so cool. Then you can end up like me here: because I wanted to simplify the not very visible equipment of the landing gear bay by leaving out parts, I got myself into a bit of a mess. Now I have to improvise in order to mount the undercarriage in a stable and safe manner. One of the ways I did this was by drilling a piece of wire - and a similar piece of wire to get the resin tyres stable on the undercarriage leg.

Michael Kohl
But the landing gear looks surprisingly fine.

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you Michael, I'd like to hear that! The resin wheels are bought in - actually a B-17 part.
In the meantime, the fact that I've been working on the kit again for the last few days has borne fruit - I had to force myself to do it.... 🙂 But now it's almost done; tomorrow I want to apply one last coat of Alclad colour and then start rebuilding the windows. I'll show you a few -not quite up-to-date- pictures of Haoward Hughes Stratoliner

Jennifer Franklin
It's coming along nicely; Gapology -- love it.

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you very much, Jennifer! 🙂

Cuajete
Great, Roland! 👌
Happy Hollidays!

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you, happy Holidays to you as Well- and a merry time to you all, mates!

Robert Podkoński
You've done it, Roland! I admire your perseverance and skills!

Roland Sachsenhofer
Finished at last! A somewhat complex build with a result full of all kinds of compromises - but at least a nice big model 🙂 -and a legendary model at that: Howard Hughes had this aircraft converted into a 'Flying Penthouse' so that he could fly round the world in luxury in the summer of 1939. Unfortunately, due to circumstances, nothing came of it...
The (few) decals were a dream to work with - and I learnt a lot for number two: the Stratoliner as C-75 in the USAAF's livery is waiting in the stockpile!
Thanks for all your interest and motivating comments!

Dave
Glad to see it complete. Looks Good. Just sorry about the couple of tubs of putty needed to complete it. Give you credit for your patient and determination.

Guy Rump
Looks great. 👍

Nicolas
Great result from a challenging kit. 👍

David
Nice plane, but the model -horrible.., Congratulation you to finish - perfect result

Jennifer Franklin
The result is pleasing—the work to get there is admirable. Nice model!

David Taylor
Brill.

Skyhiker
I love builds like this because you learn so much from making them. You did a wonderful job on this one. It's really amazing how you are able to just whip them out like that.

Łukasz Gliński
Great to see it completed (the hangar too 😉 ) 👍 I know you know it for sure, but looking at the photos it's hard to find where all that putty went 👍

Nick Dragone
Looks fabulous. I'm still working on my bare metal painting skills and hopefully will reach this level. Very impressive

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you very much for all your feedback, mates! I'm sure you can imagine how happy that makes me! I feel motivated.... 🙂

Michael Kohl
Impressive result defying the shortcomings of the kit.

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you, Michael, for your words!

Cuajete
Roland, I admire the courage and skill you have had in fabulously finishing this mass of plastic into a period beauty with such a nice metallic finish.
Congrats!

Ben M
Is there light panel lining or just the grooves in the plastic? Looks just right, imo.

Roland Sachsenhofer
Thank you both, mates! No panel lining at all in this one- but a decent numbers of Alclad- Metal colour Shades.
Thank you Cuajete and Ben, I wish a Happy New Year! 🙂

Ekki
How did I miss this???
Wonderful build and enlightening comments!
Great work!

Zbynek Honzik
Great job, Roland! 👏👏👏