Fine Molds 1/48 Nakajima ”Kikka” jet.

Started by Louis Gardner · 42 · 4 years ago
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    Spiros Pendedekas said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Splendid looking Kikka, Louis @lgardner.
    I love this green!

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    Robert Royes said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Looking good ,Louis! If you mean the mutt next to Felix? It's actually a brown shirt, the photos color has faded, I posted some more of this dog awhile back. Look under dog day. @lgardner.

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    Louis Gardner said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Thank you gentlemen for the very kind words.

    Up next is a new installment. Like Erik mentioned earlier with his foil comments, I decided to make an effort and apply some foil to various parts of the Kikka. One landing gear bay was done as a test to see if it was even possible.


    I am happy to say it was not only possible, but now it is completed as well.
    The landing gear bays were painted, but they looked too oxidized to me, especially since I wanted to model this one as it looked like during the second and final flight.

    Not being happy with the results, I applied foil to one side. I like how it looked, even though I used "Matt Aluminum" shade of BMF.
    Here you can see the main gear bay now has foil on one side.

    The wheels and landing gear doors were also given the same foil treatment.

    Our newly adopted cat wanted to help with the picture taking process. Here his paw is gently re arranging the parts for a better picture... Needless to say, my German Shepherd is now upset that she is not in the picture too. Her paws are too big though... This cat showed up about two months ago. We have looked around our neighborhood to find his owner, and finally after we did locate her, she agreed to allow us to keep the cat.

    I added some ultra bright chrome to the shock portions of the landing gear oleos. Once this was done, these parts were installed.


    Now the Kikka will rest inverted while the landing gear dries. This will also help with compressed spinal column discs. Decals are next...

    As usual comments are encouraged.

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    Erik Gjørup said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Nothing less than expected from the Iron Werks of Mr BMF. Great that you have some assistance in the shop too, I guess the bigger 4-legged resident is great help on the bigger items in the other shop 🙂

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    Spiros Pendedekas said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    I am deeply impressed by the BMF result, Louis @lgardner!
    Your Kikka looks fantastic.
    I always liked the phase of adding the landing gear to the model.
    Eagerly waiting for your next installment!

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    Louis Gardner said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Erik, @airbum
    Thank you for the compliments, and yes, my German Shepherd helps me out there in the shop routinely...

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    Louis Gardner said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Spiros, @fiveten
    Thank you for the comments on the foil work. Adding the landing gear on some models is quite fun, and easy as eating a slice of home made apple pie... on other kits it can be a major pain. This one fell in between the two ranges, and I rated my experience with this one a 5 out of 10.

    It was not the kit's fault, but instead it was mine. I failed to get the all of the paint removed adequately enough where the glue joints were. This in turn caused a much longer than usual drying time, and I had to be very careful with keeping these parts in alignment.

    Your wait is over ! The decals are done... so please stay tuned !

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    Louis Gardner said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Here is the final update.

    I added the decals...There was a little bit of silvering on the wing walkway area decals. To remedy this, I took a brand new #11 blade and lightly cut inside the red lines. I then cut around the stenciling of the Japanese characters. Once both areas had been carefully cut around, I simply pulled up all of the clear decal film, leaving the important stuff on the model. This took care of the problem.

    Once they had set up sufficiently I gave the air frame a coat of Future with some Tamiya flattening agent added to it to seal the decals. This picture was taken just after I sprayed it.


    Here's how it looks once it dried.

    I tried to mimic the box art. I think I came pretty close with this next photo.

    This has been a very fun model to build. I have enjoyed researching, building and painting it. I definitely will be building more of these "Fine Molds" models in the future. Fine Molds they are !

    Thank you very much for following along on this short little journey.

    As always, comments are encouraged.

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    George Henderson said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Looks great Louis

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    Spiros Pendedekas said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Congratulations Louis @lgardner!
    The Kikka has some distinctive beauty.
    I love her modelled in such an excellent way.
    Happy to be your passenger along this build journey.
    Looking forward to see your Kikka hitting the headlines!

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    Robert Royes said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Another fine build, Louis!

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    Marcus Vinicius Teixeira Borges said 4 years, 5 months ago:

    Great work on an unusual subject Louis,congrats!