1/144 Lockheed L-1011 Tristar, - PSA -

[TheChronicOne]

I'm graduating myself from twins to tri-jets. Other than outliers like the 1/200 HK1, the little F-4 I just did and my nutty four engined (prop) gunship, I have a BAC-111, 737-400, and ATR-72 that constitute "proper" passenger carrying airliners. I convinced myself that "starting small" was the best way to get into airliner building and having completed them now.... it uhhh.... it doesn't make a hill of beans. There's more work involved in larger stuff simply because there are more components and real-estate to deal with, naturally, but the difficulty level w/ regard to every other aspect means I didn't exactly achieve what I set out to, rather a trial by fire and I somehow think I'm better off for it. Stuff like the ATR-72, while small, were damn sure no walk in the park and I've picked up quite a few new methods and abilities as well as new tricks. Anyhow.. I'll build a Tri-Jet or two (I want to build a 727 soon, probably a 100 for the USPS) then move into four engine stuff. Probably an A-340 first.

But, back to now.... for now we're building Mother Grinning Bird.



Relevant reading: https://g-alyp.blogspot.com/2012/04/psa ... Yog-iYqRdM

I encourage everyone to hit that link and read the story of PSA's L-1011s. Fun read and the bit about the lounge is fascinating, especially the logic behind the decision.

Speaking of...... the lower deck lounge.




They sacrificed cargo room for this thing. As I said, there was a logic behind that was actually pretty sound, considering the overall "project" of having Tristars to begin with.

I am considering scratch building this thing as a separate piece. I considered also posing those stairs down on the model proper but decided against it. This is ambitious enough and I like my models buttoned up as possible. I don't really have much means to properly display something like that anyway. I need to make an "airport" thing to take pictures with. But..... the little lounge there would be fun.

Decals I haven't ordered yet:





So, I'm already well under way with this one. The 5,000 doors are glued in. All the windows and windscreens are glued in. I cut the wind screen and forward bulkheads both in half before I glued them in so they would make "cups" to hold weight.



Here I ran into the first "issue" with the kit, which you can see there. The roof over the stbd. side was short shot so I'll have to cut a strip of sheet styrene and plug it in there.

Today I'm puttying over all the windows and doors and will try to go ahead and add the weight.

Other things already done: engines are glued together... main gear and nose gear doors (that remain closed with gear extended) are glued in. All the gear itself is glued together and primed ready for paint. Gear doors that open are primed. Wings and tailplanes are together and at the first opportunity I'll do a bit of sanding on the edges.

[Graeme H]

OK, I've got my ticket to ride

[hrtpaul]

Nice work there mate

[F-27pax]

Looking good! I had the pleasure of flying in one of these in 1974. Don't remember much about it, a short hop from SFO to LAX.

[TheChronicOne]

Awesome. Had to have been a bit strange to hop on such a large thing for such a short trip.


Thanks everyone!!! Back to work on this one soon. Last work I did was to clean up and smooth all the edges on the wings. I was tired after work and didn't get much else done. Next up I'll either go ahead and do the nose weight or sand down the putty I've already put on.

[TheChronicOne]

Lots of work between updates. Tons of PSR... fillining in windows is my week spot. It always seems like it takes 15 rounds of sanding and putty to finaly not have them shining through in the end. Never mind that.... I've finally assembled the main event and have progressed into actual paint.



This is going to be interesting. I'm going to get the white upper half finished off then apply the cheatlines/windows so I can in turn mask below that to get the proper curves and borders to paint the metal finish. There's also the grey wing roots and other oddball stuff so it's likely going to be masking-hell as always.

[F-27pax]

It's looking good so far. This is another I must put on my TO DO' kist so I look forward to your progress.

[Graeme H]

looking good
my ride was from CDG to LHR with BA

[TheChronicOne]

Cheers, fellas!

Such a glorious airplane... I had always wanted to build one, naturally, but when I read that article linked above, I just had to. It's a pretty interesting story and consider what PSA was all about, the fact that they tried running this big wide body is such a novel thing.


Might build a PSA MD-80 soon, as well. It's in the updated scheme with the brown or whatever instead of pink.

[Uros]

Looking good. Be carefull when masking over decals.