The Unofficial Airfix Modellers' Forum

I'm currently building 7 Roden Sopwith Camels, so what's another Camel into the mix!

I'll be building the venerable Kiel Kraft 1/72 Camel, but it certainly won't be OOB (would that annoy a purist more or less I wonder?...)

I picked this up for $3, as you can see, at a club meet.



It's a very basic kit, so I am going to be tarting it up as much as possible with some of the many, many Roden spares I have accumulated (including a whole top wing). I did a similar thing with an Airfix kit to produce a Frankencamel previously. The kit parts are in yellow (including parts for a stand) and the Roden in grey.



I will be building it in Russian civil war markings, to be a bit different. This is one of the decal options from a Roden kit, hence the spare decals.
http://img.wp.scn.ru/camms/ar/117/pics/104_2_b1.jpg;

How can you make it any better, when you read on the top lid : "super detailed", and "perfection in miniature"?
(just kidding)

One question? Where exactly do you plan to attach the electrodes?

I am open to suggestions

Crashpilot wrote:How can you make it any better, when you read on the top lid : "super detailed", and "perfection in miniature"?
(just kidding)

Great Scott! You're right! What was I thinking trying to improve on that?!....

A certain saying about silk purses and sows ears springs to mind. Looking forward to watching this.

All the best.

Greg

So I've made a start.

From the kit I'll be using 3/4 of the fuselage, the lower wing, struts, rudder and tailplane (the yellow parts in pic). The rest will be Roden spares, resin repro or scratch built. There won't be all that much Kiel Kraft in it....

I cut one side of the fuselage down so I can add the Roden upper pieces. Next I'll lay down the wood framework.

That's a nice collection of bits and bobs you have there.

dollar19 wrote:That's a nice collection of bits and bobs you have there.

It comes of building all the Roden camels in the world...

OK, maybe a tiny exaggeration, but I do have 7 of them in progress at the moment and altogether I've bought ten Roden camel kits to date. Not enough camels, of course, but it is providing a good pool of spares!

I've done a bit more today. I needed to shim the fuselage out by about 1.5mm to make it match up to the Roden cowling. It's a balancing act though - the shape up the front is not right so if I shim it too far it won't mate up to the upper turtledeck.



I'm also putting some wood grain detail and framework/ribbing on the interior. Pics to follow once it has more work done.

Using the Roden kit as a guide, this is what I've come up with using stretched sprue and fine styrene rod:



I've joined the two fuselage halves (no pics right now) so now I need to drop the cockpit parts in from the top.

As a veteran of a bad Roden kit, I'm watching this one with interest. Looks good so far!

Looks really good

Thanks, chaps.

Cockpit details are in and top deck is on. I forgot to get a shot of the interior first but never mind. It's all there, trust me....

Some judicious use of clamps forced the fuselage to match up the the turtleneck. I'm surprised how well it came out.

This 'bitsa' is going to look very sweet. Following this for sure.

All the best.

Greg

Yes this is looking very nice.