1/33 Tu-16 K26 papermodel project

[kapteenipirk]

 

 

 

Now that i have a few weeks of pretty-much nothing, i taught id take some time and immerse myself in the world of modelling with something huge and well detailed , like the massive German WW1 airship i showed you some time ago. Of-course this time i hope things don't end up so badly, and that i don't have to build a memorial for this weeks after completion .

 

For this project i decided to make this a "no desktop week", and basically keep myself away from video-games for this week so that i can get this done in one go instead of the usual, build a little bit of it, wait for months to get re-motivated, and then build some more...etc.

 

Since this is such a huge and well detailed model, i taught you guys would probably like to see the final product and what goes into making one. Plus, i wanted to get some WIP shots for myself as all the interior bits will likely be impossible to see in the end. Especially since i have decided that this model, like the Fiddlers Green Peacemaker bomber, will end up hanging from the other ceiling lamp, as there is simply nowhere else to put it.

 

For this project, i will be posting updates on progress daily. (my initial burst of energy is now gone, so progress will be a little more random now)

I will make a spoiler for each day of progress and put that days progress inside it.

 

As for why i chose this model. I have always loved the look of cold-war Russian bombers (Tu-16, Tu-22, Tu-160, M-4...etc), and have long wanted to make some models of them in some form. I did do some more simple papermodels of them a while ago, but they where a bit lacking, so i wanted to have a proper one.

The Tu-16 "badger" was a pretty solid first choise as it has inspired two of some of my most favorite designs in KSP.

Spoiler

The original Vulture bomber was a really amazingly capable design and was, and still is one of my favorite designs in terms of looks, so good in-fact, that i decided to recreate the old B9 parts built design in a more stock+BD-armory fashion, with a few added touches, to make it even more good looking.

 

 

Now, don't expect the most professional job on this one, as i still like to use scissors, crystal-tape and hot-glue to build stuff, instead of the usual hobby-knife and glue combo. But, i'll try my hardest to hide a lot of the tape and glue, and get the best finish i can .

The main reason i build stuff that way is time. As, it allows me to skip cutting all the millions of glue tabs, and removes the "waiting for glue to dry" portion of the build.

 

Progress for day 1

Spoiler

It's beginning to get a bit late, so for today it's mostly just prepping stuff so that i can properly begin the build tomorrow.

Mainly im planning on doing some organization of parts. My plan is to separate all the parts on the pages into smaller piles, with stuff for the interior being in one, the part's for wings in another...so on and so forth.

It may take a while as there are 56 pages of parts to go trough  (I had to print each page to PDF first, and then print them one by one , witch was a few hour job in itself). And yes, there is one page dedicated for the seats alone (6 crew members).

 

Progress for day 2

Spoiler

A lot of today went away while i searched for a bunch of 3D printable stuff for my diorama project.

 

Here is what i managed to build today.

 

I decided to start with the interior, mainly cause everything goes around it, but also to test my skills and see if i can actually make it somewhat well.

The pilots seat was a pretty good point to start with as it is probably the most complex part of the cockpit.

 

Here is a shot showing all the interior parts.

 

Id say the pilots seat turned out quite well.

 

The cockpit is almost done, it just needs a few extra instruments between the instrument panels.

Im gonna continue from here by building the nose interior and then moving on to behind the cockpit. Then it's on to the tail section.

 

Progress for day 3

Spoiler

Progress on the interior continues. Sadly i had a bunch of places to be today, so time was cut a bit short, but i feel like i got to a pretty good pause-point.

 

I got the cockpit complete, tough not as planned, as i had to do some semi destructive mod work to get it complete. Basically i had to remove the main instrument panels and move them sightly more inward.

 

With that, i also got the nose interior done.

It was quite the test of patience assembling those instrument panels, as there where a dozen separate instruments to be assembled and attached across the two panels. thankfully ive come up with a good way of assembling those tiny boxes, i basically put a large blob of hot glue in the middle that sticks to each wall.

 

Next up it's the area behind the cockpit, that has a seat on a rail that can move up and down (there's a dome window in the upper fuselage above it).

The it's the tail interior, witch i should be able to also get done tomorrow, as tomorrow is completely free.

Still, it's pretty amazing to think that ive been spending this long on just the interior. But, after the interior is done, result should come a little faster as the parts become a whole lot bigger and the overall complexity drops.

 

I really just hope that my motivation/determination can last the length of the project.

 

 

Progress for day 4

Spoiler

It's been three days since we properly started, but i no happy to say that the intricate portion of the build is now done, as i was able to finish the last interior bits.

I think the bit's i built today where probably the hardest of all to build, but i think they turned out pretty great.

 

I mean, you know it's gonna be a challenge when you have to attach a ton of small panels into this,

Not exactly a lot of surface area, but, with the power of tape, i was able to turn the small panels into a single large one that was way easier to attach.

 

 

 

Progress for days 5-9

Spoiler

Sorry for the lack of updates, but very little has been done in these few days, as i have been battling with the inevitable decline of motivation.

Plus, i kinda also forgot.

 

Anyways, here's whats been done in these past few days.

 

 

 

 

And that is pretty-much the nose of the aircraft complete (minus some tiny antennae and pitot-tubes that get attached later).

To save some space, i plan on separating the aircraft into modules that i will bring together at the end:

Nose/cockpit

Mid fuselage with engines.

Rear fuselage with rudder and elevators.

Wings.

Cruise-missiles and their pylons.

 

Separating the wing and mid-fuselage modules might be a little hard as the supports for the wings go inside the mid-fuselage.

 

Progress for day 10

Spoiler

It's been a while, but progress finally continues. This time in form of the mid fuselage.

 

Sorry boys, but Imgur is a bit drunk right now, so no image yet.

 

Next up will be adding the engines, then the next module is done. It's gonna be a real pain tough, you'll get to see why when i get to that part of the build.

 

 

And there it is for you, a crazy little paper-model project of mine. I hope you enjoy watching the progress .

Edited March 26, 2019 by kapteenipirk
finally some more progress

[kapteenipirk]

Alright, we have now hit our first major milestone. The interior is now done, and we can move on to building the fuselage, at witch point we should see some real progress.

 

So far im really happy with the results, and hope the rest of the aircraft will turn out even better, so we can get a nice strong clean result .

[Exploro]

Splendid job you have done so far. Can't wait to see your next update on the Badger build.

[kapteenipirk]

6 hours ago, Exploro said:

Splendid job you have done so far. Can't wait to see your next update on the Badger build.

Thanks .

Unfortunately that may take a while, as is usual with these giant builds of mine, tough thankfully i still have a good amount of free time left.

[Kerbinchaser]

Ooh what a massive and cool project! I'll be following this.  

[johnmorris]

On 2/8/2019 at 8:34 PM, kapteenipirk said:

Alright, we have now hit our first major milestone. The interior is now done, and we can move on to building the fuselage, at witch point we should see some real progress.

 

So far im really happy with the results, and hope the rest of the aircraft will turn out even better, so we can get a nice strong clean result .

Great job! I can't even imagine how much patience you need to do this.

Edited March 18, 2019 by johnmorris

[qzgy]

14 hours ago, johnmorris said:

Great job! I can't even imagine how much patience you need to do this.

Lots.

[kapteenipirk]

23 hours ago, johnmorris said:

Great job! I can't even imagine how much patience you need to do this.

Thanks .

9 hours ago, qzgy said:

Lots.

Not just lots, but a stupid amount, especially when we are talking about a project of this size.

 

Huge thanks to all of you for the likes and nice comment's these past few days , it really helps repair my diminishing energy/motivation, now i feel ready to continue again, sadly that will have to wait til next week tough.

[Cynthia]

Is there a pic of the result? I'd love to see it. 

[kapteenipirk]

27 minutes ago, Cynthia said:

Is there a pic of the result? I'd love to see it. 

Unfortunately no, this is all the progress i made before i ran out of motivation/energy.

Dunno when im gonna continue the build, but it has been on the back of my mind for the longest time.

[Cynthia]

On 12/10/2020 at 4:35 PM, kapteenipirk said:

Unfortunately no, this is all the progress i made before i ran out of motivation/energy.

Dunno when im gonna continue the build, but it has been on the back of my mind for the longest time.

I hope you will do it. Wish you luck! 

[HyperDraco]

Great job so far, as a fellow model creator I can confirm you're already better than me when handling glue as evidently you haven't glued your hands shut.

I use the plastic hobby model kits however, I have this age-old enmity with paper and white glue which still persists. Some of them (like my Bismarck kit from Tamiya and certain Airfix kits) are pretty difficult and take a loooong (yes, with 4 o's) time.