G.F. Reid

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Not doing rivets for the most part. Maybe a few of the more obvious ones. Don't have any ideas at the moment for making any. Maybe glue drops and a toothpick ?

DaleCS

Well, you could order from Mirce at NS Modelers, perhaps even the full detail kit. He scaled down his Hellcat kit panel details to 1/6 to fit my build. Or, just order rivets and/or screws ala carte. Or, check with ChadV - I saw on one of his pages that he made his own at one point, similar, I think, to what Mirce does. ChadV did post some comments here, fairly recently - but I don't know what he's up to.

Someone could probably put the NS Modelers rivets on faster than me. I get into a groove and then need a break, other things need attention....but that's been my whole build!

I had a company in EU interested in completing the cockpit details for me, but they wanted a complete set of cockpit drawings - the pictures I had were insufficient for them. I haven't found a set of such documents, yet.

DaleCS

A few years ago, I saw a P-51 with the glue drop method - several thousand. Nice looking rivets, but the wrong type for a P-51. They formed something like a button-head shape. Thousands of button heads on a plane which should have flush rivets - I said nothing, but it looked really, really wrong. Really. On the correct airplane they would have looked great, even professional grade. I don't know a method for creating flat rivets using glue. Maybe there's a way? Perhaps if the glue was thinned enough - mostly thinner, when it dries the remaining glue layer that is left behind could be very thin and almost flat?

Did you see my other comment on rivets from Mirce or checking with ChadV?

G.F. Reid

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I know exactly what you mean on the the glue drop rivets. I used that method on a Bearcat and it's more suitable for locomotive boiler plate than aircraft skin.
I'm planning to experiment with different glue and applicators to see how flat and small I can get them.

DaleCS

Only 116 rivets left in my supply - will run out tomorrow! More on the way. I've gone through 15,196.

Rivets are completed from the nose to the 6th panel line behind the cockpit. 116 rivets will complete maybe half of the 7th panel line and the lateral lines between 6 and 7. Hopefully, the next set of rivets arrives soon as I've been on a roll. There are some odds and ends I can work on in the meantime.

G.F. Reid

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I'm not going to do it on this plane, being that the plan is just for a 10-20 footer but they sure add a lot to the realism. Looks great!
By the way, I broke down and used chart tape for the panel lines. It was just much quicker for me than doing all of the sanding against the tape and sending the result down, so forth.
A P-47 is a real hodge podge of panel shapes!

DaleCS

The chart tape works well on butt joint panels. From my observations, most planes appear to be dominated by such joints. The Hellcat is unusual in having overlapping panels dominating the fuselage.

Have you seen the P-47 videos from Greg's Airplanes and Automobiles on YouTube? Here's the P-47 Playlist. He has several videos going into a lot of detail, including Bomber Command's resistance to drop tank development. After seeing all of his research, the P-51 doesn't look like the savior I was lead to believe that it was. Yes, the P-51 is still a great aircraft. But properly outfitted, the P-47 and P-38 could have led the bombers deep into Germany - because they were already covering greater distances in New Guinea in 1943. They had drop tanks in the South Pacific in 1943, because a general there took matters into his own hands and developed them with the Aussies and Ford Motor.

I always respected the P-47, but my level of respect increased dramatically after seeing Greg's research.

Maybe you've seen these already? If not, enjoy!

G.F. Reid

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No, I haven't seen those. Will definitely check that out.
The P-47 has long been on my favorites list but believe it or not this will be my first one...and 20 years plus in the making!

DaleCS

15,312 rivets and I'm out! Next batch not received, yet. In the meantime, I realized I put the foot holds in the wrong place. I'll be drawing another set of lines in prep for moving the foot holds to their correct locations. Doh! I don't like doing things twice, but at least I didn't paint them in place. While waiting for the next batch of rivet details, there are still some screw details that I could work on placing, and I could work on improving the curvature of the air/elec. panel access cover.

I could go ahead and order the paint, too. Getting close!