Large Scale AN-22 build...

[Saul Sheldon]

Hi all

It must be one of the biggest aircraft kits around and I have had one in my stash for a while now, and I have finally started it

Yes folks it's the A-Model 1/72 An-22 "Cock"

Dunno if I will do it in one go, but I will try and keep you all updated just in case some of you really have nothing better to do than to look at someone elses "Cock" (Who said NATO was a humourless organisation?)(the serbians, maybe)

Right, sorry about the jokes, but I have a childish sense of humour, a neccesity since i work in the biulding trade.

1st photo, the completed cockpit, no fuss, get it painted and slide into nose section.

2nd shows a page from the instructions showing a shedload of very small pieces which should keep me away from childcare duties for a bit...

3rd a general view the fuselage and one piece wing are fibreglass resin, the interior walls are vac form sheets folded to a tune and slid in very clever. The kit is nearly 600 pieces, and VERY big. I think at the time the An-22 was the largest aircraft in the world, and is still the largest propeller plane.

4th is a pic of the sprues for the four engines alone.

The idea is to keep you lucky folks regularly updated with this minor project, so lets hope this site is still going in 2013...

cheers, saul

















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[yak face]

hi saul,good luck with the an22(600 parts!!!!!) its going to be a monster,i bet its heavy too with that resin fuselage,good job its got loads of wheels to help distribute the weight! Nice to see some more obscure russian stuff too,ill be following this with interest. cheers tony

 

[Saul Sheldon]

Hi Tony (and everyone else)

Thanks for your comments!

Here are some more pics. If it seems I have made little progress, It's because I haven't

I have put two figures into the cockpit for a bit of fun. The sitting down bloke has been caught scratching his name into the flight engineers panel...

You can see how big the completed nosewheels are, considering it's a 1/72

I have still to add some clear pieces to the "canopy" they will need some rubbing and polishing to ged rid of builder induced scratches and superglue stains, but the overall fit is excellent, even considering this is a limited edition kit.

As you say Tony, the resin bits are very solid, especially the solid one piece wing. God knows what space there is in my house to sit this thing when finished. Maybe by the time I get there, the crazy Russians will have produced a naval version and I can do it with the wings folded!

Cheers all, Saul

















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[yak face]

hi saul, that is one BIG nosewheel!!it must be about 5ft in real life.loving the action in the cockpit btw,pic2 ... the guy with the pudding basin on his head looks like hes taking the drinks order......."im not flying this thing anywhere till you get me a proper size bottle of vodka!!" Im surprised you say it fits ok, ive got a yak 28 by amodel and its really pants ,i cant be arsed to sand every mating face flat to get rid of the flash or all the filling on EVERY SINGLE joint,the quality is like a very bad novo kit!!!heres to the next installment and hoping the table legs dont collapse!! cheers tony

 

[Saul Sheldon]

Hi Tony Actually I have that Yak-28 in my stash! Thanks for the warnings. Well, as I have only fitted four of the windows to the cockpit, it must be that A-model are trying to lull me into a false sense of stupidity - the rest of the kit will be pants. Bugger!

I will hace to think of an interesting load to put in the huge cargo bay - any ideas anyone? What about the Chelsea team coach being airlifted to one of Mr Abramoviches five personal zoos/medieval themed karaoke strip bars for a day out?

Cheers, Saul

 

[yak face]

Hi Tony Actually I have that Yak-28 in my stash! Thanks for the warnings. Well, as I have only fitted four of the windows to the cockpit, it must be that A-model are trying to lull me into a false sense of stupidity - the rest of the kit will be pants. Bugger!I will hace to think of an interesting load to put in the huge cargo bay - any ideas anyone? What about the Chelsea team coach being airlifted to one of Mr Abramoviches five personal zoos/medieval themed karaoke strip bars for a day out?

Cheers, Saul

I thought they were all closed down following the tragic "premiership footballer chokes on microphone during naked panda jousting " im sure i read that in the sunday sport ? cheers tony

 

[Bunkerbarge]

Saul, I've changed the title of this thread to prevent it attracting the wrong kind of interest and to ensure that we remain a family orientated forum.

 

[Saul Sheldon]

Saul, I've changed the title of this thread to prevent it attracting the wrong kind of interest and to ensure that we remain a family orientated forum.

Yes , fair enough Bunkerbarge. Sorry about that!

Saul

 

[Saul Sheldon]

Hi all

I've not done too much but here is the evidence anyway

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Ist pic is the vac form interior, roof, 2 sides and the floor. I still have to paint them, then join them together to form a sort of square tube, then slide the assembly into the fibreglass fuselage. These came as a single vac form sheet which I cut up with scissors, which was much easier to get a straight line with than the x-acto blade, even using a metal straight edge!

2nd pic is the canopy on, but with some more filling and sanding actioon to go yet... I had to really trim it to get it to sit closely enough to the nose section,which of course involved superglueing it on then ripping it off again etc, all accompanied by the required amount of swearing

3rd pic the ridiculously big fuselage. I have cut out the main undercarriage spaces, which blunted a few blades, and begun to assemble one of the wheel well inserts.

I still haven't a clue where I can put this thing...

Cheers all, saul













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[Saul Sheldon]

Hi all Here are a few more pics illustrating my (slow) progress towards completing Amodel's ridiculosly large 1/72 Antonov An-22.

It's a great kit, really enjoyable to build because it is not straightforward,you have to do lots and lots of dry fitting, cutting down, even making a few bits of insert etc so things will fit better, e.g i made a 1mm or so thick plastic ring insert to go between the glazed nose and the fuselage nose bit, so that the glazed bit fitted flushly to the nose. Also, the nosewheel strut needed shortening,and as for the mainwheels...Well, you can see fron the pics the problems I had getting them to fit so that they would all touch the ground (including the nosewheeels)

I had to tape on the nose section, which includes the nosewheels, and then dry fit the main wheeld bays, held in from the inside by sticking my hand and forearm up the rear end of the fuselage and holding it in place (what fun!)

I admit now that i had advance warning of this problem via the posts of Flankerman, aka Ken Duffey, who built this monster in 2004, and posted an excellent blog on his build, at Index of / so thanks to him

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You can see in the middle two pics that the right hand mainwheels touch the ground ok, but the left do not. This took a lot of fiddling, cutting and, of course, swearing, but I have now, I think, got it right, although I have not superglued anything into place yet

It's all fun though, isn't it!

Cheers all, Saul

















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[yak face]

looking good,saul! this baby is HUGE!! cant wait to see the next instalment(hope you get your arm out of the fuselage ,btw!!)keep up the kit bashing cheers tony

 

[Saul Sheldon]

Hi all

After what seems like an age,I have completed the An-22 fuselage.

The great thing about these limited edition or low pressure moulded kits, is that they really test your brain. There have been so many hurdles you come to that, at the beginning of the day you really donot know how you are going to solve it, but after a bit of application, swearing, pints etc, you get it done, although sometimes quite badly!

No, it's really satisfyng at the end of the day.

The pics show the problem of the join between the vac-form interior and the rear fuselage roof vac insert. Solution: cut up the wifes Moviebank card which, I was later informed still might have had a few quid on it, then insert into unsightly join, cut to shape so it looks like part of the structure.

Had to buy I-Beam sections locally to complete the crane rails, but they look good with the supplied block and tackle thingys

Also scratch built the inside of the corridor that leads from the outside door to inside. Loads of other little battles won, All very fiddly but all done!

Now taking a break from it to try and build the wife and little boy a christmas display scene with LED lights and a rotatong christmas tree and carousel! AAAArgh! will post photos if acceptable

Cheers all, keep up all the good work, Saul

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[yak face]

amazing!,looking good now saul,this is going to be one impressive beast. Its been a while since you posted,I was beginning to wonder if you were still trying to get the fuselage off your arm! I had visions of you going about your everyday business looking like some low budget transformer!!! cheers tony:beer:

 

[Saul Sheldon]

amazing!,looking good now saul,this is going to be one impressive beast. Its been a while since you posted,I was beginning to wonder if you were still trying to get the fuselage off your arm! I had visions of you going about your everyday business looking like some low budget transformer!!! cheers tony:beer:

Hi Tony...Well I eventually DID get it off my arm but it took some layers of skin with it, and maybe a couple of fingers.

Get round those, Chelsea team bus driver!

Cheers1 Saul

 

[Saul Sheldon]

Hi all

Well it's been ages since I've posted but things have been slowly and sporadically moving ahead...

You can seee what is done on the An-22 so far, the tail surfaces, all 4 engines and the fuselage of course. Fettling and grinding the wing centre section to get it to fit flush on top of the fuselage was a big pain alright. I cut away virtually all the plastic down to the resin gluey structure underneath, as well as the corresponding bit of the fuselage. It still sits very slighly proud but I dare not weaken it anymore.

Well I admit I have done b-all on it for about 3 monView attachment 12544ths now, but in the meantime I have been reducing the size of the stash. So recently added to the dust gathering aircraft parView attachment 12543k is the Hasegawa 1/48 Hellcat with some airies aftermarket gubbins in, which is the probably a bit too blue plane below

Well I've just added the pics and they have chosed their own random locations here....bloody computers eh!?

The blue on the Hellcat is Humbrol 25 matt, dunno if correct but I had awfultrouble trying to get the correct us navy midnight blue, in the end I looked at the paints I already had and the Hunbrol 25 looked adequate enogh. I,ve weathered the crate to bug*ery anyway so WTF?! I like it, and the missus has not complained (well not about the accuracy of the colour scheme)

I've a 1/48 Classic Airframes Blenheim Mk. 1 in the paintshop now, so hope fully pics 'soon'

Cheers all, keep bashing (the kits) , Saul

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[yak face]

hi saul , great hellcat , and the an22 is looking scarily big now, keep us updated , cheers tony

 

[Saul Sheldon]

Hi All

More pics to come SOOOON, I promise. Delays caused by other smaller, more manageable kits in the stash looking too good not to do instead of all the fiddly flaps and slats on a stupidly big Antonov wing.

So, once the wingg is completed, painting can commence!

I just have to do the rigging on this eduard 1/48 Bristol Fighter....

Cheers all, Saul

Photos to follow...

 

[Richard B]

Looks a beast! big piece of kit there Saul!

Looking fantastic so far mate and I'm looking forward to seeing the new pics

Cheers

Rich