September 03 2009 | #7 photoetch

Now here it is halfway through, as you can see the acid already bit a lot into the brass..

September 03 2009 | #8 phototech

Here it is! Not too bad

September 04 2009 | How to do?

Now the photoetch is done it's all very well but how to create the circular shape of the ball turret? Photoetch won't save me at this stage. So this summer while in hollidays I had the time of thinking about it thrice and this is how I am going to try.

First, there is no way I am going to scratchbuild the 2 browning guns you have in the turret. I first intended to buy some barels only but I soion found out that the plane version is not the same as the ground one, so I had to search what was available with the plane guys. So i found out that of course everything was in that stoopid scale 1/32, so either I was about to get a bit oversized barrels or I would do the whole diorama in 1/32 -I choose the second solution because i am a rivet counter ;)

Actually the main reason why I choosed 1/32 is that a ball turret diameter is roughly 35mm in 1/32 which is the size of small plastic balls for kids

September 04 2009 | Figuring out the ball turret

Now it's time to consider the sources which are surprisingly scarce. Sure internet is loaded with ball turret pictures, but plans nope. I found some 1/72 drawings of the ball turret -but as put on the plane directly, not the whole ball turret -except a small thing I think on a Wartech book.

There were a minimum of 2 types of ball turrets with me choosing doing the earlier one.

I set up with doing a plaster form of one of the balls. I took a yoghourt plastic pot, put some pins on the toy ball and pouired plaster. I did this 2 times..

September 05 2009 | The parts that are for the form

Please consider the drawing for the photoetch will you, You will notice that there are essentially 2 sort of shapes; the first with the tiny holes are for the "windows" supports, the holes will sort of figure the rivets in the end.

But there are also some blank geometrical shapes too. Those are for the shape of the opening of the windows. the reason why they are pierced is because of that, the Magic Sculp putty will hold better. 

Indeed, the surface of the brass is flat while the openings will be on a circular shape, so i need to sort of glue those openings to the form but following the curve of the form (not very clear? it will be in a moment!)

September 05 2009 | Sanding the openings

So that's it, I have been putting some magic Sculp on one side of the form and let those dry so that they get a curved shape.

then I sand them carefully -rememeber that the reason I used photoetch for those is that i wanted some precise, strong shapes.

September 05 2009 | Gluing the photoetch to the form

Okay now it's going to be tricky as I must glue those tiny elements in the inside of the form following the plans, yuk, that was hard to get something symetrical!

September 08 2009 | Moulding materials..

Now I had my form ready, what to do with it? I hesitated quite a lot with this one. Should I pour resin in it? what?

In the end I opted to stick with what i knew, so I sealed the plaster with some superglue, greased the form carefully and pressed some Magic Sculp inside with a modeling knife, trying the whole not being too thick