I took a couple of quick pics of my project to post for the forum. They came out fairly well but I am going to get some much better ones to replace in my gallery and the campaign gallery.
With these posted pics I am now offically DONE with my Double Take project and I really had fun with this one.

Updated 4/15/05 """ I have replaced my quick pics with my truely, offically, completely, done pics.

Without further ado... I would like to present my 'What-If' Afrika Korps Me-262 operating in the 'Blitztotenhand' (Lightning Hand of Death) Jet bomber squadron complete with sand filters on the front of the engines.

...Near the beginning of WWII, mid to late 1940, Germanys' jet technology was much further along than any one of the allied powers had ever thought possible. War was raging in North Afrika as Rommel and his Afrika Korps stormed across the continent. With the addition of the American forces landing in Africa the tide had very slowly startedturning in favor of the allies as Rommels forces were being out gunned and out maneuvered.
Rommel flew back to Berlin to discuss the situation with Hitler who was very eager to try out his new wonder weapon - the Me-262. North Africa was the perfect opportunity for the new jet.
Factories had been pumping out the Me-262s and soon there were squadrons of jet fighters wreaking havok on allied bomber and fighter squadrons. Jet bombers were laying their own devistation with an unstoppable force......
How will the allied powers regain the initiative ????

The last pic shows the scratch built sand filters the best



If I saw this coming at me in the sky, I don't know if I would be frighted or laugh. This front shot looks more like some weird, whacked out Disney cartoon character than it does a fierce jet :-)


Hope you all enjoy the pics and my twist on history
Good Modeling,
Wayne

Damn, that thing is sick. It was definatly worth the wait. I like the camo on the fueslage. Great job bro.

Wayne, I'm not an aircraft builder but that is sweet.I have always liked the 262.

Jim

Hey Wayne!
It's about freak'n time bud! :-) :-) :-)

She looks great! Wonderful scheme, and wonderful premise...

What did you end up building the sand filters out of? Inquiring minds want to know

Thanks for sharing-

-Scott

Wayne, I agree...it is definately worth the wait! That is sweet looking. The filters look really nice.

Was the paint scheme difficult to do? Did you do some type of soft mask or did you free hand the fuselage? How did the parafilm work out for you?

Anyway great work and glad to see it done.
Leon

Thanks guys I appreciate all the comments.
It took me a while to finally complete this but I sure had a lot of fun doing it.
The paint scheme, for my skills anyway, is the most advanced that I have tried so far. And this is also my first time at scratch building anything. And as far as scratch building goes, this was really simple and many of you guys could slap these things together with your eyes closed and hands tied behind your backs :-) It was a great entry level project in the scratch building area for me.

I have to give credit to Mal for the basic design for building these sand filters. This isn't quite the design he came up with for me, but my filters are a direct result and extension from his idea. Thanks Mal.

The sand filters were made out of .005 sheet styrene. I cut narrow strips about 1/2 inch wide and maybe about 2 1/2 long. I wrapped the styrene around a wooden dowel a few times to give the outer shell of the filter some thickness but not too big around so it would still slide into the jet engines. Then put a little drop of liquid glue to hold the shape. After that was set I slid the strene off of the dowel and had what looks like a very short straw.
After the glue set up on the styrene I sanded the little ridge of the edge of the styrene down so it was a smooth area.
The grills were made out of a very small brass mesh. A friend gave this to me at work but I think it is something you can pick up at probably any hardware store. The mesh was pretty small but for the scale of the jet I thought the holes in it seemed a little too big and too much light shone through so I used two layers of the mesh inside the filters.
I cut four small circles out of the mesh, two for each filter. I took one circle at a time and put it on the end of the same dowel that I used to wrap the styrene around.
I pushed the sides of the circles to form around the end of the dowel, basically to where they look like teenie tiny cups. I glued one cup inside the other cup to make a double layer of the mesh.
I took the dowel and shaved the end of it down so that it fit inside the backs of the mesh cups but comes out really easy. I then used this as a tool to push the mesh inside the styrene cylinders from the back up to the front, put in a couple of drops of liquid glue just to be sure things wouldn't slide around on me, and then they were done...except for the painting of course.
I did also sand down to fine tune the length of the filters so they would not stick out of the jet engines too far and look really dorky.

Good modeling all,
Wayne

Hi Leon and thanks,
You were posting your comment the same time I was working on my last reply.
The camo on the body of the jet was all free hand. I am really proud of the way it turned out. The camo on the wings was masked off to get that really nice sharp edge to the colors.
The parafilm worked out GREAT!
I always strugged in masking this, taping that, and the cockpit just always seemed to take me forever and I was never happy with any result I had previously. I dreaded doing the cockpits for I just couldn't come up with a way that I liked doing it.
The parafilm is so easy to work with and you can see right through it to trim at just the exact areas you want to trim. You have me converted over and thanks so much for sending me some to try out on my 262.
I now have a roll of it and can't wait to use it again on my next model.

Good modeling,
Wayne

Whoa, amazing dude!

Superb Wayne, the camo is very good and the sand filters look the part, nice job
Mal

Wouwa that's looking awesome!
I like really much the camo scheme.

Love the camo and the sand filters!
What RLM colours did you use?

cheers

Philip

Thanks again everyone
All the comments are appreciated.




It was all painted with MM Enamels. The underside is RLM 65 Hellblau. The camo was made with RLM 02 Grau as the light gray base coat and RLM 70 Schwarzgrun for the dark gray.

Good modeling,
Wayne