Airfix Messerschmitt Bf110C-2/C-4 - Part III

With most of construction phase completed, it was now time to have some fun with the airbrush. Notice the word "fun" - I am finally getting confident with airbrushing and even dared to do some freehand experimenting while doing the camouflage of upper surfaces. I figured it was as good opportunity as any to practice freehand painting and diffused edges. For a moment I even thought about trying to doing all of the camouflage without any masking, but I'm still not there yet. I am however happy to say that the airbrush is slowly becoming just another tool for me.

With painting of the airframe finished, the time came to perhaps the most difficult part of this model - assembly of the undercarriage. As I suspected after having a first glance at the instructions sheet, I wasn't able to get through this stage without some issues. The most serious of those occurred when I managed to dislodge entire undercarriage gondola while dryfitting one of the wheels. It was a potential deal-breaker, since the loose component was completely enclosed inside the gondola, making it impossible for me to re-glue it without ripping apart one of the wings. I finally resolved the issue by pulling the wheel housing into position with a bit of a blue-tack fastened on a stick. Once it was in place I was able to secure it in place with super-glue. A close call, to say the least.

Rest of the assembly was done relatively easily, although I have to say that the sequence suggested by instruction booklet (which I followed) is simply bonkers. According to the construction sequence suggested by Airfix, one is to put the wheel housing into place and then struggle with confined space and difficult access while putting together the undercarriage. It would be much easier to do the wheel assembly first and then put the entire sub-assembly into its enclosure. Note to self - never again accept the building sequence without investigating if there isn't a smarter way.

Getting experience with freehand airbrushing

Upper surfaces  painted -
the classic splinter pattern of Luftwaffe 

Belly side, painted in standard RLM65 Hellblau.
This time around I actually managed to preserve some of the preshading. :-)

The assembly of wheel carriage can just as well be done
before the wheel housing is enclosed into cramped wheel gondola

Airfix Messerschmitt Bf110C-2/C-4 - Part II

Work on Me-110 continues - I'm now done with most of construction phase and as far as I can see, Airfix managed to deliver to us another beauty. Unfortunately, there were some issues while putting this kit together. The main problem is the bad fit between the fuselage and the wings - the part of wing subsection that goes into the fuselage is simply too thick and requires a lot of work with sanding stick before getting an acceptable result. I've thinned it down by more than a millimeter and as can be seen in the pictures, that still wasn't quite enough. If I ever build this kit again (which in fact is quite probable, because it looks great and both alternatives for painting schemes and decals are very tempting), I will have to remember to thin down bottom plate of cockpit assembly to give the wing root section an additional bit of extra space.

It seems to me that if the bad fit between the fuselage and wing sub-assembly isn't properly taken care of, the next issue to deal with will be the gaps between upper wing surfaces and the fuselage. OK, not a dramatic problem - a bit of putty took instantly care of those gaps. However, it was still a bit of pain in the butt to deal with because there is a row of rivets just a fraction of a millimeter immediately by those gaps. Of course, no matter how careful you are, the putty will find its way into those engravings and additional time needs to be spent to clean up the mess. In other words, time spent on getting good fit between wings and fuselage will in the long run save you some time.

Putting the gun array into the nose is a bit fiddly. It's a very close fit, not much room to work in and those thin plastic components cannot be just forced in - if you'll get it wrong, you'll end up with bent or even worse, broken barrels. Make sure that there is no flash in the holes beforehand - even a tiny obstruction in one of the four openings can lead to a lot of frustration.

Airframe put together and primed.

The front edge of wing assembly still doesn't fit into the fuselage
despite substantial thinning down...

...which in turn results in problems with fit
between the wings and the fuselage.