Fred's Gladiator

[fredk]

This has been sitting for some time, maybe just over a year, or two - I cant remember.
It wont take much to finish it off, just a couple of evenings I reckon,


Last I was doing to it was putting in some cockpit details. I had a thought of doing this one with the canopy open. I've taken a female mould of the canopy, to make a male mould then vac form a new one over that.

[AndrewR]

I like the Matchbox Gladiator, it builds very nicely

[Stuart]

Looks like it'll be a good build!

[Dazzled]

The Gladiator has always been one of my personal favourites. I'm looking forward to seeing this develop.

[VickersVandal]

Gladiator: FINISH HIM!






All the best. Look forward to seeing the done'd model.

[ShaunW]

Yes, this looks like it will be a good build Fred, but if it goes wrong you could always feed it to the lions

[Stuart]

Groan..

[splash]

Matchbox make good biplanes so I will look forward to seeing your build.

Regards Splash

[fredk]

I know I should come back with some comedic retorts but I'm too brain dead to do so.
ohhh, [groan] that film; ok as entertainment but they threw away the history books on that one.

Starting it tonite; after my curry dinner.

[Old_Tonto]

Curry dinner.....a Gladiators meal.

I remember this kit as being a good one so you should fettle it.

[fredk]

Assembled; not as simply as it might have been. Had to tape it up and leave for 48 hours to make sure the joints were solid.

Last night one coat of Humbrol 11 put on most of it; this evening a second coat on some of those places; when thats dry it'll get a coat of Klear to protect the silver and stop it coming off on my hands;


Then its rigging time.

[ShaunW]

Nice one. Metallic paints are a bit of a pain for coming off on the fingers or being damaged by masking tape. Nowadays I always apply a coat of varnish to protect them before any further handling or taping up.

[Dazzled]

Some great progress on this one Fred and a good idea with the varnish over the metallic finish. I think that's one for the notebook

[fredk]

Not much to show right now. I've been doing the rigging as I work on the Grant tank.
I'm using very fine fishing line through holes drilled through both wings. The line is superglued in place. Each set of 'wires' I glue in gets at least 20 minutes to set and harden. First one location is done, when thats set the line is pulled taut to the next hole and glued in whilst under tension. I use reverse action tweezers locked onto the line to keep the line tight. When that set is finished the excess line is sliced away with a very special razor blade I have. I do about 3 locations at a time, so it doesnt take as long as it sounds.
The glue helps to fill the hole, but it may need a small amount of filler as well, especially under the silver finish which shows up every wee fault.
I bought 10 small crocodile clips for doing my rigging, I only got them recently, but they've gone missing already, [grrrrr ] I haven't even used them yet, they're still in their plastic bag.

And one more thing: for this model I got myself together. I mixed a half tin of Humbrol 11 silver with one third tin of Humbrol 53 aluminium, with some light grey added in, to try and get a shiney aluminium for the fabric areas. Humbrol 11 is ok for the polished metal, too shiney for the fabric, but I find 53 aluminium too dull for the fabric. I think my mix looks ok. Not 'perfek'* but ok.

[* Darling Buds of May]



Shortly after taking this photo, whilst glueing some more lines I dropped it.
The top wing came loose, breaking some rigging lines. Some lines share one hole, so when one broke but the other didnt, both had to be cut away. Now the holes have to be drilled out again. Have to redo the 4 cabane wires, and most of the port wings' set.

This one is getting close to being put back on the 'to finish' shelf,

[ShaunW]

I'll make a note of the FredK mix for "silver" fabric surfaces, that sounds promising Bad luck you dropped her Fred as she was looking good and hopefully you'll be able to sum up the patience to effect repairs.