James' Karaya 1/72 Supermarine Sea Lion II **FINISHED**

[JamesPerrin]

I'm going to have a crack at this as it's the only flying boat in my stash and I'm on a bit of Schneider Cup bent at the moment having snapped up a few of Karaya other kits and completing their Gloster IIIA earlier this year.

I posted some "pics of the bits" only the old forum as the resin is just lush. I've reposted this below:

I picked this up at SMW08 after seeing a number of Karaya kits of interesting and attractive flying boats from the inter-war period.

At £25 punds it may seem a bit steep but on examining the quality of the parts its surpasses those CMR kits that I have. Check out that engine detail! and the tail plane has angled holes for the control cables to run through! Also the fuselage halves have location pins so no excuses about short run kits.

The instructions are adequate with some wonderfully blaise comments such as "replace some parts with plastic or metal" and "add spokes". Decal also supplied for a RAE machine.

[TomW]

That is indeed a gorgeous bit of resin kittery, hopefully you can make headway before your impending modelling hiatus . I may have to have a closer look at a few Karaya kits myself in the new year.

Regards

Tom

[VickersVandal]

Stoked!! It is a constant test of willpower not to buy one of these given I decided to limit my purchases to one theme only.

Really looking forward to seeing this built.

[JohnRatzenberger]

Karaya (and a couple others?) makes a number of these early one-off boats and racers. I have the Sea Gull II and have been resisting the urge to "Collect 'em All, Now!" .... Your build probably won't help my resistance factor ....

[PaulBradley]

This one should be really interesting.

So how are you going to do the spokes...?

[JohnRatzenberger]

So how are you going to do the spokes...?

Yes, all of them ....

[Barry]

Love it. Very evocative of the era.

[JamesPerrin]

I thought I might scratch some lines in a disk a of acetate or just not build the beaching gear

[AceSeafire]

This one looks like its going to be very interesting. Roll on next week so we can all make a start

[JamesPerrin]

I started with the engine. An early 450hp Napier Lion was used from which the aeroplane took it's name. When I first bought the kit I noticed that some additions to the engine were missing. I forgot to contact Karaya at the time but after studying some photos (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Napier_Lion_II.jpg;) of the engine along with the instructions it became clear what was needed. Some pipe works was made from stretched sprue. I left part of the pouring stub in place as if formed a handy hold.



As I wanted to get some primer on parts tonight I completed the simple cockpit.



There is some basic side wall detail in the fuselage halves and a nice IP, with the addition of some seat belts should be plenty to see through the small cockpit aperture. These along with the engine and a couple of other bits got a shot of Alclad grey primer.

[PaulBradley]

Nice work on the engine, James, but your cockpit photo has disappeared!

[TomW]

That's just what I was going to say but Paul beat me to it.....oh hang on

Seriously though that Lion is going to look stunning with some paint on.

Regards

Tom

[PaulBradley]

There we go...!

Rather Spartan, eh?

[JamesPerrin]

The majority of the interior was painted a pale base colour then had some "wood grain" added with a brown pencil. A coat of marmalade (clear orange) makes it look like varnished wood. Looks a little garish under the flash but in the dark of the cockpit hole very little can be seen. Pretty much on the seat is actually visible. We no clues I decided it should be wicker with a leather seat. I painted a pale yellow mesh over a dark brown base to approximate a woven back and then added a lap belt from tape.



The fuselage halves closed up around the cockpit parts without any need to trim, a perfect fit. Once minor gaps had been filled, mainly due to my inability to Superglue fuselages together without a fiasco, I added the lower wing. This has a couple of pins to aid alignment great! I spent 5 mins setting the fuselage square on my desk and making sure the wings were level. So I was right cheesed off when I looked down and saw they were rotated a few degrees around the vertical. The centre line of the wing matched the fuselage perfectly but there was a definite twist. I cut through the rear pin and used the grid on my cutting mat to make sure the wing was straight this time. As there are braces under the wing and plenty of flex I can probably easily correct if the wings are not quite horizontal.

[TomW]

The cockpit looks great James, really like the idea for simulating wicker Just shows how good Karaya kits are that the fuselage halves lined up so neatly and good save on the wings, alignment can be a real pain with biplanes!

Regards

Tom