Welcome to scene 10 as the climactic ending begins. I installed the skis and added the safety cables that assist in keeping the skis horizontal using EZ-Line. The engine bell housing and propellers were installed as well as the wing tip lights. One of the things not represented in the kit is the windscreen wipers. I took some spare photo etch pieces and made the blade and arms then installed them. I then added all the antenna wires both under the nose and on top using EZ-Line. There are two small “T” shaped antennas under the fuselage near the tail. I trimmed up some scrap photo etch to replicate them.
Next I used some scrap photo etch and made the cargo door hinges. With all the small details added I thought I had finished the aircraft. While uploading the photos to the computer I realized I forgot to paint on the wing walkways and the anti-glare area on the nose. I painted them as well as the fuel ports on the top of the wings. While the real aircraft has the de-icing panels painted black, none of the screen shots show these painted the typical matte black. I left them unpainted to match the aircraft in the movie. So now the aircraft is complete except the snow weathering which will be added when I mount the aircraft to the base.
For the final week of work I am building a snow base to display the aircraft. I bought an 18” wooden disk which came with a white washed stain on it as well as a Scene-O-Rama snow kit. I currently am still looking for 1/48 scale dog sled team and arctic crew figures. I have a friend who is looking to design files for the 3-D printer but these files may take a while. We went over some of the scenes from the movie (The Thing from another world – 1951) and he is going to pose them as they are returning to the aircraft with the frozen alien on the sled. When I build the base I will add in the footprints and sled marks so these can be added later. So the current display will be just the aircraft on the snow and assuming the crew is down by the buried flying saucer. Stay tuned for the conclusion of this project.
Check out all the photos and details from the start in my build log at https://davidsscalemodels.com/build-log/1-48-r4d-5-tropical-tilly/
10 attached images. Click to enlarge.
