Airfix 1/24 Hellcat Build

This post i am simply opening the box and taking a quick inventory before i start building tomorrow.


Because of the size of the kit and the sprues, i will not be washing the entire kit before working on it. Instead , i will wipe down all parts to be painted , as i go, with isopropyl alcohol to remove any release agents and also wipe out any oils left from my fingers before paint.


Lets take a look at what i will be working with.



You would figure that with such a huge box, there should be a lot of dead space in there.


hmmm... or not. All sprues bagged separately, canopy in its own bag. On a quick visual this looks like the detail is pretty great.

lets look a bit further into the box.










It also looks like a decently appointed decal sheet. I have not decided on a color scheme for the hellcat yet, but no matter what scheme i choose, i should have plenty of markings to make it look authentic.




I cant call this simply "instructions" lol.. this is a damned book. ( for those who say you don't have to wash your kits anymore.... it is still on the front page of most instruction sheets for a reason )



Now, since i am a glutton for punishment, and i have an awesome wife ( she snuck in the upgrades for Christmas ) there are 5 sheets of photo etch for this kit, 3 for the interior (in the pic it shows 2 but there is a 3rd on the backside of the divider in the packaging) 1 for the engine and one for the wheel bays. Then i have replacement brass gun barrels and canopy masks to play with. This should be a hoot.


When i called this a Book, i wasnt kidding. There are 72 pages of instructions for this monster.


Since i am working with so much photo etch in this kit, i am going to go through the instruction booklet and highlight any steps that contain parts containing photo etch replacement items.


This way, while i am building out of the booklet, i am reminded as i go, where the detail parts are called in.


Alright, i am gonna finish marking up my booklet and make sure my ducks are in a row to start building tomorrow. cya in a day or so.

Box is opened...now what? lol



The goal with this build is to use whatever means i can to produce what i would consider an above average rendition of the hellcat.


This will involve quite a bit of, what some would consider, nit pick fixes. ejection pin marks and mold seams will have to be minimal to non existent by the time i am done.


First off, these are the main tools you will see me using throughout the build. Regardless of anything else i use, these are the workhorses. A decent pair of flush cutters, a small flat file and a good Razor knife loaded with a new blade.


The 2 adhesives i will be using through most of this build are Tamiya extra thin and Revell Contacta. The Tamiya works by capillary action, hold 2 pieces together and touch the tip of the glue to the seam and it draws itself in between both parts and fuses them together. The Revell Contacta is a bit thicker and allows you a little more time to adjust and tweak things than the Tamiya does. the needle tip applicator comes in handy, but is prone to clogging frequently. to clear the clogs, simply use a lighter or a match and heat up the metal needle tip, this will burn up the excess glue causing the clog and let you continue using it.



Here you can see the results of me going through and referencing the photo etch instructions with the highlighter ahead of time. i will not have to look at photo etch until step 4 .



Step 1 wants me to build up the floor section of the cockpit.



That will require me to cut out all the flooring braces. The amount of ejection pin marks on these seems a bit excessive. i am sure they could have figured out a way to minimalize them.

Just means more work to do on this end....



the filler i will be using most during this build.( amended... didn't really care for this brand much ) Got this from the local Halfords. Basically its a spot putty/glazing putty. only thing i am not happy about is that it is single stage and if applied over large areas it can continue to cure and crack over time, where as a 2 part would not. It really should not matter with this build because i am not doing major bodywork and the applications will be very small and thin. I am applying it by squeezing a small dab on my Post it note palette and using the small silicone brush ( i think they call it a sculpting brush) to put it where i want it and smooth it out.



Because i have big ole sausage fingers, i thought it might be a good idea to leave the parts connected to the sprue for this part. less dropping this way lol. i filled all the ejection pin marks and set it aside for a bit to cure.



while that was curing, i used my nippers to cut the floor section off the sprue. even with decent flush cut nippers they can still leave remnants of plastic along the edges that would hinder assembly later. Small things like this can be the difference between a kit fitting together properly or being just out of whack enough where things are a nightmare later trying to line up panels because joints are not flush.



This is the same edge after a quick pass with the small flat file. with the cleaned up edge i will not have to worry about the joint not going together properly when the time comes.



Once the filler cured, took about 30 minutes, i used a medium grit sanding stick to sand things flush and clean up the parts. i had to remove them from the sprue to do this part.



When i had them all cleaned up, i dry fit everything in place to make sure things fit right. i will say..they dry fit perfectly. nice snug fit to the point i could have turned it upside down and not a piece would have dropped out and everything is square. good to see...




Since the ribs fit so nice to the floor, i am going to leave them in place and use the TET to glue things in. for each rib i just touch the tip of the brush to the contact area where the 2 parts join. The glue is drawn down the entire joint to make it a solid piece.



Step 2 has similar problems. these are the 2 support braces after filling and sanding them.
5 pieces comprise step 2


Step 3: I first glued the wiring into place using the Revell Contacta as it had attachment points underneath the part that cant be seen once installed. Then i glued down the shifter housing to the floorpan. everything fit together nicely aside from the front rod of the shifter. for some reason it was up a bit as you can see in the pic. Was not a difficult fix as i just had to apply a dab of glue to the cradle side of it and hold it in place while the glue dried.


The shifter and boot were installed next, once sanded to smooth the edges, it practically fell into place. i set it where it belonged and flowed in a bit of TET so it ran along the entire joint, and lightly squeezed the joint together until the plastic showed signs of oozing at the join line. this will make it so i just have to give it a quick pass with a sanding stick to make the seam disappear when it is time for finish painting.


This is the completed assembly ready for a coat of primer


I threw it over into the spray booth where it can wait till i get a bit more to prime and paint.


Step 4: This is where i also have to grab my auxiliary instructions for the interior photo etch set ( note the yellow highlighter to remind me) . In the mean time i snip all my parts that i will need for this step off of the sprues and clean up the edges with my small file


One small problem when dealing with Eduard photo etch, they never tell you what anything is. The instructions show this 2 piece part attaching to the bulkhead. dunno what it is, but i am gonna add it anyhow....


these are the 2 parts it is calling for, parts 55 and 56


The Master Tools photo etch bender is something i have had for a couple years now. it makes things quite a bit easier to get straight bends when needed. it works like a sharp edged clamp, holding the part in place while you bend it to the desired angle



once the bit is held in place, i slide a razor blade under the exposed piece of photo etch and lift it to create the bend.


now the instructions asked me to fold the first part over on itself and mount it to the face of part 56. which i did. still not sure what it is but maybe it will look better under a bit of primer lol


next stop will be the paint booth for this one, i am intentionally leaving off the cover for the lines on the bulkhead and part d39 which is a bottle of some kind. this way i can do some detail painting before putting them in place. thats enough for todays update...

Here is where i left off yesterday so today i will throw some primer around and then some color ( love my dehydrator )



I go back and forth between Vallejo and Stynylrez primer on my bench. a lot of people complain about adhesion problems. I find that if the primers are applied properly and built up in thin coats until you get even coverage, then allowed to dry fully, they both do anything i need. I build static models and have no plans to pick them up and play with them so durability is not something i have ever worried about.


The primer on deck today is Stynylrez Grey Primer. i spray this neat, as it comes out of the bottle, at about 20psi. ( i shoot almost everything at this pressure aside from metalizers and ultra thin paints like alclad ) 3 light coats of primer and the parts look like this...
I chuck then in the dehydrator for about an hour and a half just to make sure things are cured enough for me to overcoat without a problem.


Going to use up some of the enamels i have for the majority of the interior. I dont like working out of bottles so i am gonna just make these 2 bottles into a batch of ready to spray in a plastic dropper bottle. ( these i got off the web, they were 100ml vape juice bottles, but they work great for things like this.


I added both bottles of zinc chromate primer  to the dropper bottle, then i fill one of the bottles with my cheap lacquer thinner and empty that into the dropper bottle. this gives me a 2:1 paint/thinner ratio that works well for me when airbrushing.


3 coats of paint later and i can chuck it in the dehydrator for an hour. ( yes even enamel is able to be touched after an hour in the dehydrator, partially because i thin it with lacquer thinner and partially because of the dry warm curing environment )


While the bulkhead is in the dehydrator, i found another part that needs some attention. I am gonna say right on the onset...for a £100 kit, they could have made sure there was a bit more quality control on some of the parts. That is an actual hole in the tank that mounts to the bulkhead. time to get the filler out again....


this part is small enough i will use some of vallejos plastic putty on it. it has a needle tip so it allows me to put the filler exactly where i want it without wasting excess product.


when the filler is in place, i take the silicone brush, dip it in a bit of water and use that to smooth over the areas with filler to minimize what i will have to sand once it dries.


also have to get the fine sanding stick out and get rid of the mold seam on the side of the tank.


once that is sorted i am painting it carmine red, the instructions call for a different color name but i am not one that pays a lot of attention to color codes when building. i will 100% use what i think looks "right" compared to what a set of instructions calls out for me to use.


i hit the tank with 3 coats of paint and it will sit and chill while it dries.


now, if i look at a pic of an actual cockpit bulkhead ( pic sourced from the net ) compare that to what's in the kit....


The Leather cover on the cushion that comes down and attaches to the bulkhead looks way off on the kit. i think i can do a bit better.


out come the snips. i trim down the kit supplied tether of leather from the bulkhead. i am not worried about the scratching and scraping of the paint. the initial application is just a base for further painting. i am sure it will be back and forth in the paint booth 20x by the time i am finished and happy with it.


so when i removed the horrible rendition of the leather tether, i use my caliper to figure out the size i need to make the new tether,. looks like pretty much exactly 7mm


i grabbed a piece of tamiya masking tape, i leave it full width at the top and then about 17mm down i cut in to narrow it down to 7mm. using a sharp hobby blade i cut this out


Just double checking my measurement


i line up the lower part of the pad area with where i made the cut ins for the piece of "leather"


using a toothpick i started by pushing down the sides of the cushion area and using the sharp blade to trim the tape where the cushion meets the bulkhead. on the curves of the cushion, i used the blade to make relief cuts so i can wrap the cushion and finished trimming around it.


now i touch up the zinc chromate...into the dehydrator for a bit. lets find something else to mess with in the mean time.


where the control stick comes through the floor, there is a leather boot, seems like something small enough to mess with for now.


this paint says armour brown, but i am not worried about paint names. all i care about is that this will be my base coat for the leather boot around the control stick.


when dealing with small amounts of paint i either use tattoo ink pots ( will show ya later ) or if i am lazy, i will take one of my disposable shot glasses and flip it upside down. since i only need a drop or 2 of paint, this is good enough for now.


i use a 0 brush and apply the base coat, i am not worried about it being perfect as it is just a base. technically this is the darkest color that will be on the leather boot so it acts as the shadow color.


now i take a but of a dull yellow ( i didnt want anything real bright and could have probably gotten away with an ochre yellow, but on the fly i just use the first thing i find.)


i add a drop of the yellow to the brown that is already on the underside of the shot glass. once mixed, this creates my variances for the leather boot. there is a mid tone, and also a highlight color. ( same as painting a miniature shadow/base/highlight )


mid tone in place, once again not worrying a lot about it being perfect. i am working fairly quick here so while the mid is still wet i will grab some highlight color


with the colors still a bit wet, i do what is called wet blending to meld each color into each other and smooth things out. i used a bit of my craft acrylic black i pre thinned a month or so ago to hit the handle itself.


this is the dropper bottle that stays on my desk with the pre thinned black craft paint.


while i am at it i might as well paint the cushion on the bulkhead.


this is a step i could have skipped today as i plan to give it a full gloss coat so i can use some washes on the pipes and wires. but oh well. this here i applied with a brush.


after a coat of gloss its a bit too shiny lol.. not to worry, will sort it out tomorrow morning.


yay 2 days in and i am on step 3 lol... can you say...glutton for punishment.... i sure can lol

Continuing some work in the office, lets get some bits ready for some more painting


this is one of the lines that goes on the rear bulkhead, this is one of the few times i decided to skip the primer and go right to paint....this is exactly why i normally prime first lol... see the seam down the side of it? i didnt till it had a layer of paint on it. primer would have shown it so it could have been fixed before paint. now i will just have to sort it out and repaint again.


thie is the section of the interior that was below the pilots feet, this will have a little bit of wear added to it once its installed


i installed the floorboard ( for lack of a better term ) ..Tina brought to my attention that the interior color is a bit bright. i kinda agree. so i will tone it down with a thin wash a bit down the line. For now the bulkhead is glued and clamped to the floorboards and set aside to cure for a bit.

yeah it is a bit bright for me to look realistic. lets plod on a bit and see what we can do with it a little later.


first thing i tried in the floorboard was a bit of mild chipping. with a stiff brush just continually working over the same area trying to remove just the thin layer pf paint here and there. took 10 mins to do the right side rail you see below... time to find another method lol


if i cant add wear by removing material, lets see what i can do by adding some..


this is going to be a trial and error event..i grab my stack of post it notes, otherwise known as temporary palettes for anything from glues, fillers and even paints lol. i add a drop of gunmetal to the top sheet


i then grab a stubby brush ( was an older brush i trimmed stubby with some scissors) , dipped first in water and then dabbed off so most of the moisture is removed. now its time to mess around a bit.


i do not want to saturate the bristles, this is going to be a form of dry brushing. i pull just enough color into the bristles to leave a trace amount of color when i use it.


i picked a few areas on the floor board and used a back and fourth sweeping motion with the brush , following the panel lines to show where the paint was starting to wear through to the bare metal.


while that is set aside for a few minutes to dry ( acrylics really only take a few minutes ) i am going to work on some highlights for the bulkhead. this starts with a few drops of the zinc chromate base color.


i add to that 2-3 drops of flat white


when i mix i am not looking to have it all the same color. i want a gradient in the shot glass, some full strength zinc chromate, then a mid tone where some of the white mixed in and then a highlight color which has even more of the white in it. something like this.


now, using a similar technique as the floorboard. i add some to the brush and then dab most of it off on a paper towel. i then pay careful attention with the highlight color to add highlights across any area that would see more exposure to light. for example, the rear pipes i cane from the top down with the brush so the top of each pipe is lighter than the bottom. this helps enforce shadows while calling out details.


now because i am going to use a wash on the cockpit, i want to hit it with a coat of gloss clear. i am using an enamel wash so i use an acrylic clear. this is my normal rule of thumb. acrylic over enamel or enamel over acrylic. that way the wash does not effect the lower layers.


couple minutes later i hit it with 2 medium coats of the gloss varnish.


now it will go into the dehydrator for 20-30 mins to cure before i can move forward with it.


while that is curing, i might as well pick a color for the seatbelts. this i am playing by ear for 2 reasons. the instructions call for "buff" which is a light yellowish color. the actual pics i have seen of cockpits have varied from tanish to grey.


i am gonna use dunkelgelb , which translates to dark yellow, since its something i have close to hand


,i have big ole sausage fingers so i fond it easier to paint the smaller items by having them held by clamps of some sort.


2 coats by brush and i have the coverage i want on the belts.


still waiting on the clear to harden up a bit more so more pieces are going together. first order of business is the yellow highlighter telling me there are photo etch items to be used in this step.


so i look at the photo etch instructions and find that the footpads for the pedals have photo etch faces on them.


this is what i have to work with.


i have a tool i bought a while ago called a pic n stick, it was basically a blunted needle mounted into a pencil like handle with the tip dipped into a small bit of silicone. this silicone was slightly sticky and worked well for picking up the small photo etch pieces. the problem is that it did not last long at all. with minimal use the silicone wore off the tip very quickly. so now its time to do some tweaking and rework the tool. Tina does the 5D diamond painting and each one comes with a small piece of "wax" to help pick up the little plastic pieces and put them where they belong. she had a bunch of excess so i asked her for one to see if it would foot the bill. i peeled the protective cover off it and tore off a small amount, roller it in my fingers to make it into kind of a ball, and pushed it onto the tip of the tool.



just a light touch to the photo etch part and it picks it up like it was made to. once the photo etch is in place where it needs to be, you just twist it a bit and it releases the adhesion to the photo etch.


i filed the areas smooth where the photo etch was to be applied. i then used a toothpick to apply a small bit of superglue to each area and deposited the photo etch where it belongs ( crappy pic...sorry)


now this is the point that i an thinking airfix is taking the piss a bit. what is with all the ejector pin marks in this kit??? smh.. this is the point where halfway through filling i decided to change my position about ejector pin marks... i am not going to fill every mark on every piece ( a quick look at the rest of the kit shows that doing that could take a month on its own.)


before i decided against filling them all, i filled them all....bleh.. set them aside to cure a bit


switch gears, clear is dry, time for a dark wash to bring out detail and add shadow. i use the tamiya black panel liner for the interior wash. remember, this is not being used as just a pin wash, i am going to dull down the green a bit at the same time.


i used a wide brush and applied an even coat of the wash to the whole interior


i threw it in the dehydrator for 15 mins , i still have different bits of the interior i need to get into place. remember this thing? lol.. all scraped down and repainted now.


i added the line cover first and threw on a quick wash so it matched the rest of the bulkhead. i then added in the upper belts and the hose assembly


switch!! lets do a quick assemble on the foot pedal assembly so i can get that off to primer and paint before i wrap up today.


i am going to use the contacta for this assembly, i like it for the needle tip applicator and it gives a little more working time than the tamiya extra thin does.


alright i have it all together now. give it 10 mins to set up and it heads to primer and paint


since i am doing a paint session i might as well get one more part ready for the treatment. the highlighter on this part shows me there is photo etch to be used here..


Photo etch instructions show me how much photo etch is used on this piece and what i have to mod to use it.


this is how it looks right off the sprue


a small file takes care of the center panel and the 2 knobs


then a flat file removes the gauge face


and lastly i used the same flat file to get rid of the rest of the detail on the front panel


2 coats of stynylrez primer, 30 min wait in the dehydrator and then 2 coats of the zinc chromate and i am calling that enough for the day.


cya next update

picking up where i left off last time. after i hit the front bulkhead with zinc chromate i needed to protect it with a clearcoat so i could add a wash without it screwing up the initial layers of paint. this time i will use AK Interactive glossy varnish. i have had it on the bench for a while but do not have much experience at all with it yet.


i sprayed it neat, right out of the bottle with no thinning at 20psi. it flowed easy enough but to me it is more of a semi gloss than a gloss. will have to experiment more with it later, but for now the lower paint layers are protected.. off to the dehydrator they go.


one thing i will say with this compared to the vallejo gloss i used earlier.. this changes the tone of the zinc chromate a bit. it looks to have made things a bit darker than they were before the gloss coat.


once the parts are out of the dehydrator its time for a little tweaking. i grab one of my thin sanding sticks and cut off about 1/4 inch of a fine grit one.


i then hold that small piece of sanding stick with a pair of tweezers and sand the tops of the pedals where i had applied the photo etch plates so the brass shines through


does not take long to get the effect i was looking for, next up is a black wash like the rest of the cockpit had already


once again using the tamiya panel liner which is enamel ( hence why i glossed with acrylic first ) i apply it with a wide brush and cover the entire area to darken the whole thing a bit. this also leaves the desired deposits in all the recesses and areas like rivets to bring out the detail. back in the dehydrator it goes....


while that is drying its time to do a bit of seat work. the seat i am using is part of the photo etch interior set from eduard. it replaces parts D20, D21, D22 and D24. pic looks simple enough...lets try it out


part D29 is the kit supplied seat rail the seat mounts to. the rest of the brass is on one of the 3 interior photo etch frets


i carefully cut the items off of the brass fret with a sharp hobby blade. in this pic you can see that cutting parts off the fret can sometimes leave small tabs on the photo etch. these need to either be trimmed off with sharp nippers or filed off with a small jewelers file before use.


not a big fan of the design of this seat, the instructions do not give you any actual pertinent information as to where to start bending things. Be aware that the back of the seat is not meant to be flat, it is rounded. this i did by inserting a fattish blunt end of a marker along the backrest and gently coaxing the bend with my finger tips to get a gentle arc. also i doubt it would have been that difficult for them to add a small lip for each of the side wings so the seat base was not just a flush corner you had to try to align and glue _I


once i had the basic seat shape i needed to curve up the front of the seat base to match the two sides. it was about this point that i figured it was easier to just remove the seat bottom from being attached to the seat back ( all it took was flexing it back and forth twice and it fell off. at least this way i can work with just the lower panel without worrying about accidentally bending the side arm areas


this is what i am using to introduce the bend to the front portion of the seat base. it is a coil bending rod from one of my vape kits. i find it quite handy for working with photo etch because of the graduated barrel with different diameter areas on it for different sized bends.


took a little bit of massaging to to get the seat base this close. should just take a touch more and i should be in business


once i was happy with the bend, i set the base on the piece of black foam ( i like to use this working with photo etch as it makes it easier to see the small photo etch pieces and keep track of them as i work with them. ) then i add a small bead of superglue along the entire edge with the tip of a toothpick. this is where a bit of an overlap tab on the bottom of the side panels would have come in handy.


the seat after gluing


now to add the seat brace, this piece requires 2 bends in it before it can be fitted


first is the upper portion which gets folded over and gently curved to follow the top line of the brace. glued in place with superglue and a toothpick again


then the same with the bottom rivet area


instructions are once again very vague with no location marks at all i just have to set the brace where i thing it "looks" right. glued in place with a small dab of super glue along the bottom seam first


then followed by running a small bead of glue along the top of the brace with the toothpick again


not even sure what these square bits are called in each upper corner of the seat but it just took a dab of glue in each area to sort them out


i mounted the seat to the seat rail using a dab of thick super glue and let it set for a few minutes to harden


i bent up the side handles and glued them in place


i then used the tip of a hobby knife and slightly bent them out just a bit to look more convincing.


i mounted them onto one of my gator clip tipped paint sticks and it got sent to the booth for primer and paint


while i am in the photo etch mood, i might as well work on this part of the control panel


all pieces for this panel are on fret #1 of the interior set.


i cut the pieces off from the fret and pay them out on the black foam sheet to make life easier when looking for things. you can see the small tabs left on the pieces in this pic. some wont be seen in the final installations and others i will address with a small file before installing.


the photo etch instructions tell me i am supposed to get a piece of plastic rod 1.2mm in diameter and cut them to 1mm length so they look identical....meh...dont see that happening.


my alternative is 1.5mm crimp beads. slightly larger than what they call for but much easier to have 2 uniform pieces than trying to cut them free hand.


the revised lineup of pieces i am using now.


starting at the top of the panel , the landing gear emergency control lever panels are the first things installed. these have a slight bend to match the arc of the panel they are mounted to. once again i used the vape coil tool to get the arc before gluing them in place.


next i added the center gauge panel and then the one marked "gun chargers"?? the one with the 2 dials in it...


i mounted my 2 crimp beads in place with the super glue and then added the lower gauge panel


after adding the center control dials, i am happy with the way this looks.


now it is time to glue the front bulkhead to the floorboard assembly. to do this, the instructions tell you to use one of the fuselage halves as a "jig" to make sure all the angles are right before gluing things in place. this should make assembly later a lot easier than playing it by ear.


test fitting the rear bulkhead to the fuselage


i then removed the rear bulkhead, mated the 2 cockpit bulkhead sections together and reset them at the right angles in the fuselage to make sure things lined up as they should. when i was happy with the fit, i flipped the bits over and applied revell contacta to join the front bulkhead to the floorboard and clamped everything in place so it did not lose any of the angle i need to keep. ( note: i did not glue anything to the fuselage half at this time, it is just being used as a jig)


cya next update