Hasegawa 1/72 Beech T34 Mentor

[yak face]

Heres what i hope will be a quick build . Its the old Hasegawa beech mentor , dating from 1973 . Its a good little kit , quite detailed for its time with extemely finely done raised panel lines ( have to be careful I dont obliterate them with paint!) in 1970s silver plastic , even includes a display nameplate !
it comes with 5 decal options for JASDF or USAF. It also comes with a little towing tractor ,which is nice.
I made a start last night and its going together quite quickly .

 

[papa 695]

Nice one Tony.

 

[JayCee]

The kit looks nice. The chocolate digestives even better. .
John.

 

[adt70hk]

The chocolate digestives even better. .
John.

Well spotted that man!!

Something very different Tony!

Good luck with the build.

ATB.

Andrew

 

[yak face]

The kit looks nice. The chocolate digestives even better. .
John.

Even better than that john - two chocolate hobnobs and two chocolate digestives ! ( well there was when i started , )

 

[yak face]

Got the interior done and fuselage together. I used painted strips of tape for the belts and just painted everything else. I painted some shapes on the fuselage sides , these will give the impression of detail under the closed canopy . I added two control columns from fuse wire as strangely the kit didnt supply any. Ive also started assembling the tractor , adding some plastic card bits to the wheelarches to prevent seeing all the way through .

 

[papa 695]

Fantastic start Tony.

 

[yak face]

Bit more progress today until it just got too cold in the shed ( btw , had to dig a path to get in there , 12” of snow )
The wings have been glued together and fitted to the fuselage along with the tailplanes , so its looking like an aircraft now. The canopy has been masked up ( my absolute favourite job ) and glued on , taped down until its cured . I think I’m going to go for option 1 on the schemes , the all over orange JASDF machine .

 

[yak face]

Airframe now in primer , next up - orange and as the instruction sheet says — everywhere!

 

[papa 695]

Coming along very nicely Tony.

 

[Allen Dewire]

Damn Tony!!! Slow down, will ya.......I can't keep up with all this stuff you keep building!!! It appears you need to find a job, or maybe a second one to give this old guy a chance to keep up Sir..........

Prost
Allen

 

[yak face]

Damn Tony!!! Slow down, will ya.......I can't keep up with all this stuff you keep building!!! It appears you need to find a job, or maybe a second one to give this old guy a chance to keep up Sir..........

Prost
Allen

Cheers allen , you’re going to have to get the sunglasses out again once it gets painted

 

[flyjoe180]

Looking forward to the blinding scheme Tony

 

[yak face]

After experimenting with the orange on a piece of primed scrap plastic its become apparent ( or should that be transparent!) that the grey isnt suitable for a base .
The orange paint ,once thinned for spraying , is quite see through so a coat of vallejo model color matt white has been applied which will give a much better final colour . I also gave the little tow truck a coat while i was at it , a few more bits to add to this yet and still not sure if im going to use the driver figure .

 

[Waspie]

Looking good. (I must admit to liking your idea of seat straps! - I was wondering how I was going get round that one on my SK). Perks of being new!! Grab tips as you go along!!!

 

[yak face]

First thin coat of orange and it looks like this
Second coat and it looks like this I think I need a final coat just to get full opacity . I might add a touch of white to the last orange coat , firstly to give it a bit more body and secondly as the orange paint tended to fade to a paler colour with exposure to sunlight .

 

[Jakko]

In that case, I think I would spray only the top with a lightened paint but use the full-strength one on the underside. Not that most would spot this difference, but it’s one of those “I know it’s there …” things

 

[JR]

How on earth you guys work in 1/72 and produce detail like that in the cock pit ! Well done .

 

[yak face]

Its now had a third and final coat , this time mixed with a bit of yellow and white to give it a bit more body and tone it down a bit . As jakko said I tried to go easy on the underside to simulate the fading effect of the sun . I also finished assembling the main body of the tractor and got some paint on it .

 

[Jakko]

That’s going to draw attention