CURTISS CONDOR ANTARCTIC EXPEDITION FLOATPLANE

very old....so old the molds were "rediscovered" in 1988.....reissued by Glencoe and originally an ITC (Ideal Toy Co) piece....these models have been in the stash forever and always intimidated because of the age and rigging.... 

...rough and needing a lot of attention....but, this is not an attempt for modeling perfection so this is entirely a lark.... 

 

note the later instructions have float position wrong.... 

....not a bad fit.... 

....not many pieces to paint but that ORANGE and that BLUE need to stand out and a full bottle of both has been allocated....NO PAINT will be applied to the totally cool retro modeling deco art clear molded stand...worth the price of admission of you tackle one of these kits (they are out there for sale)

Note....yes, this stand means a big gash in the bottom of the aircraft....didn't worry much about the bottom of this one....

....the fuselage was already glued up so an interior was out of the question.... 

...this AIMS wire set for a 1/32 SE.5 has a great selection of dual rigging wires with good connections already created...holes are drilled into the engines where the dual wires go...the single wires are excellent as well and will be used everywhere they can...not worried about the connections UNDER wings so only the bottoms need to have a good look... 

...critical ORANGE may have been reached.....at least three coats maybe four.....for some reason, the top wing looks more color saturated here but to the unaided eye, its almost the opposite.... 

...back and forth with whether the horizontal stabilizers should be blue or orange...this settled it...clearly orange.... 

...the roughest part of this old kit is the cockpit window....its not much use to try the kit windows so they got filled in....the attempt will be to make a decal and cover the window area....that can be tough because a light color is needed and decals aren't great printed at home with light colors....the outline of the decal is seen here as a piece of tape laid across a kit window and then trimmed and removed...it will be the template for the decal.... 

...in the end, it was silver painted tape with blacklines added....perfection in modeling?... hardly...but this project was never about that....happy with this result...decals are next.... 

...old decals but they laid down well......the condor is getting close.... 

....the tail is rigged and the first float attached....it will sit for 24 hours to let the glue set.... 

a great drawing made in 1965....it shows detail of connections....one thing clearly shown is the fuel tank install in the top wing and the spouts and vents for that....none of that is molded on to the top wing of this old kit...some wires will be used to at least nod in that direction...photos show a variety of vent pipes and who knows what special connections were made for this Antarctic voyage...... 

...floats attached and struts to be installed on float two....the first strut turned out a bit askew and no photos will be taken to emphasize this effect....in addition, no expense was spared to create these two wright cyclone engine replicas......strictly OOB 

...in a complete jig operator error moment...all the center supports for the wings got pulled from their glued spots on the tops of the engines...its a mess....and the wing will have to come off and some kind of "repair" done with thin styrene to cover it up...ouch.... 

....trying to recover with a little help with wires in the struts and some bezels on the "mounts" to add texture, along with some riveting... 

....back to work....in the end, it actually looks better than stock so it was all worth it... 

...one side "rigged"....the double wires will be attached on the bottom of the top wing once it is finally installed....