DHC-4A Caribou(RAAF)

Wings needed a bit of shaping to fit together, a few minor stress points in the pressings but in 1/144 scale they will be hard to see, and they are in the under wing sections anyway. 

Fill in some minor divots here and there, the wings will need a coat of primer surfacer 1000 to fill in various fine scratches and blemishes, the fuselage is in much better condition.  

Decided to make the cargo ramps movable by adding some hinges, will put in some mini magnets to hold the main cargo ramp onto the roof since the hinge moves so freely. 

So many greens to choose from, but its a toss up between AK Dark Olive Green, which I tried on the fuselage and is a bit too dark I think, or a RLM62 Grun, which is a bit lighter. 

Seat backrests should just be some orange webbing, if only I can find my scraps of flyscreen in my garage somewhere ? 

Needs a bit of weight in the nose to stop tail dragging . 

Assembly begins with the fuselage and putty along the seam. Dry fit of wings for final fitment as well 

Wings and tail planes attached and some rescribing. Onto the final coat of paint and fitment of the minor stuff. 

I used my XP-58 Chain Lightning bonus Anigrand kit (from XB-35 flying wing kit) to take up any waiting time during the Caribou build. Used XP-58 to try out some new AK Extreme Metallic paint (Polished Aluminium, Aluminium & Stainless Steel), and got some really nice results. But the nice shiny results also shows up every little missed scratch ! 

Undercarriage on, added more sturdy styrene rods to provide a bit more stability. 

Just barely enough room for lead weights to keep the nose down, might have to put some '44 gallon drums' in the cargo hold. 

Caribou with my 'downtime' XP-58 Chain Lightning,(which must have been a pretty big beast in real life !) 

Decals were a bit so-so as the kangaroo's tail was poorly printed (looked more like a kiwi). I should have some spares from when I do my Orion kit later. 

I'm pretty happy with my own blend of green. 

Final last details and matte coat applied. The matte coat comes up a lot shinier in the photo's than in real life. 

That's the end of this one! 

I made the cargo door and ramp movable. I had put a mini magnet in the roof and the main cargo door to hold it up, as it was quite loose in the build phase, but after assembly it got stiff enough not to fall down every time. 

The ramp is still removable, I was going to glue in place put my 'hinge' didn't provide as much clearance as I had hoped so its easier to have it slide on its pins as it closes and opens. 

I need to find out if my new camera can do manual focus, as sometimes the autofocus just won't listen !!