Today was a rainy day here. So I took advantage of the chance to stay inside and work on the SBD.
I started off by finishing the decals. Once they had dried sufficiently, I gave the whole plane a coat of Future floor polish thinned down 50 percent with alcohol. This gave the plane a nice semi-gloss luster, which dried to more of a flat sheen.
Here the future is still wet... It really leveled out the finish.
Then it was time to paint and decal the 1,000 pound Mark 13 bomb... Once it had dried, I glued it into position on the center rack...
Here's how the underside looked then.
Next I removed the "Masking canopy". Here you can see how the future flattened out some...
Close up details of the cockpit after the radio direction finding loop was painted and installed, along with the hoisting cable and pilot's head rest...
Here's an overall rear 3/4 picture which shows even better the effects of the future after it dried. I tried to replicate the finish of a plane that was only a few weeks old...
I then masked off the actual canopy sections that I had planned on using in this build. I opted not to include the last rear most section. The instructions stated that this portion of the canopy was often left off on the actual planes.
I gave them a pre coat of interior green on the gunners sections, and flat black on the pilot's sections. This will give the illusion of interior frames being painted in the colors that were used on the Naval Aviation Museums SBD-3.
After cleaning out the air brush, I gave the canopy the final color of Blue Gray. I simply painted over the existing colors.
Then it was time to build the twin rear facing .030 caliber machine guns that were used by VB-6 on their SBD's during the Battle of Midway. After some detail painting, they look pretty decent.
Here's a picture of the cockpits just before I glued on the canopy sections. The details provided in this kit are simply amazing. I really don't see the need for anything after market here.
This is how it looks right now. All that is left to do is to install the stretched clear plastic antenna and do some minor touch up painting around the pilot's wind screen, where it connects to the fuselage.
It's almost done... Right now I'm waiting on the antennae to dry. Once it does then I can add the antennae wire.
I'm hoping to have it done tonight...
