Maddog Manufacturing Open for 2024

[Duke Maddog]

Even though I have a number of projects going from last year, I'm going to skip posting them and just start this with this latest tour.

Well, despite having a lot of time to work on my hobby thanks to Hobby Days; I have had no real time to start a new tour. Because of that, this will be another two part post so all my projects can be viewed.


So, all aboard the trams everyone, it's time to start our tour!




As always, we start in the Hangar. We only worked on one aircraft this past week. It's the old Italeri kit of the 1/72 scale B-66 Destroyer. The cockpit had been built already so it finally got painted. Yes, it might look a bit sloppy, but it won't be seen once this gets closed up inside the fuselage:








Later that is what we did, we closed this up, cemented it and allowed it to dry:





It was so surprising how well this fuselage.wings and tail fit together! As you can see here, half the cockpit can't even be seen:





The canopy was added and masked off for paint next:





...which came later. We hit this with a black primer to see what issues we had:





We found a considerable number of small issues, (all of which I brought on myself!) so some filler, sanding and more filler and sanding happened:





We had started out with Tamiya putty, then moved to Mr. Surfacer 500. Later we shot a gloss black coat on this to see if everything got fixed. It didn't so another round of sanding and filling will be happening.... not that you can see here:





Finally, the little AS-15 Kent had it's trailer painted up. Not too much longer before that one gets done:








That completes the tour of the Hangar for now, our tour continues in the Shipyards....


​Here in the Shipyards, we tried to mask off the main deck of the 1/600 scale USS Enterprise. It started out pretty good:





However, we found out that the flexible Tamiya tape doesn't play well with the cold and humidity we had that night. Expensive lesson to learn:





The regular Tamiya tape seemed to stick well, unless it was on the flexible stuff, so everything will be replaced with Tamiya tape later.


In the next slipway, we have the Tamiya British Vospers Perkasa. The main bridge was painted and detailed before being closed up inside the cabin:





Meanwhile, the barrel broke on the 40mm Bofors so we had to fabricate a new one and replace the broken one. I can hear the comments now, but this was the best way to make sure it glued straight:





The crew at least showed up to prepare for training:





We started adding some of the detail parts to the main deck; the Bofors is only dry fit right now, that is why it's cocked. There isn't much to see here:





More parts went on....





....and still more. The torpedoes are only dry fit to see how well they place, we still need to touch them up. The hand rail stanchions are installed, they just need to be rigged:





That is as far as we got on that one, so we move on to the next slipway where the Robert E Lee has been fighting me. In this shot, you can see the incredible warp of the rear railings that required us to glue, clamp; wait for it to dry. Then move a little further, glue and clamp, etc. You get the idea:





Later the rear deck got added. Because of a mistake made earlier, I had to compensate for it by shaving a section of one side of this so that the paddle wheel housing would fit where it's supposed to... or close enough:





Once that was dry enough, we added the upper cabin walls to the deck. These too needed to be finessed into place. The curved section next to the housing needed to be shaped to fit:





Later we added the front portion of that deck after prepping the upper parts of the cabins and pylons below. This also needed to be shaved on the one side so it would sit straight and not have a huge gap. You can see here how much persuasion it needed to hold in place:





When the tape came off, it looked pretty good:





While all that had been drying, we went to work on the Grand Staircase:





Again it took some serious finagling to get that staircase installed. We had to fix the railings three times before everything stayed in place as it supposed to do:





Here's the look over all so far. It's starting to look like a riverboat:





Later the forward cabin went on the deck. This was slightly easier to build, but we still had some issues with some gaps, too-long pieces, and other issues. After dealing with them and getting everything cemented down, I'm happy with the results:





Just for fun, we test fit the upper deck on top of all this. It's going to be a bit easier than the previous two decks:





That concludes this tour of the Shipyards for now; as we head on over to the Motor Pool, you can see some damaged buildings and sandbag emplacements we are working on for another project:





I found a whole mess of Matchbox bases that they used to include in all their armor models, some were even duplicates. My idea is to find a way to arrange them all on a board in some manner, add these ruin pieces, fill in the area between them with putty or something and create some kind of scene/base. It'll be interesting.....




The Motor Pool tour will continue in the next post due to the large quantity of pics for that tour.......

[Duke Maddog]

And now for our tour of the Motor Pool. There's a lot going on here that also includes a couple of started models as well. So without further ado, let's visit this first bay here.
In this first bay we have the M103A2 Marine tank getting it's base coat:


After that dried, we added the decals and some detail painting. This one is very close to being done:


Speaking of almost done, in the next bay we have this Russian SCUD C that has been a bit of a challenge all this time. It finally got the correct launcher arms on it:


Then all of the new parts were painted up:


Later on we weathered the wheels and tires; put them together and installed them on this model. Some additional weathering was applied to the vehicle as well:


On this model, they had no call outs for decals, even though there was a full sheet of them included. Well, I had to add something, so this beastie now sports a Guards emblem on the doors:


Final weathering was added and the missile was sent out to be painted:


Yeah, that beastie is almost done too.
Moving on, in this next bay is the Stryker engineering vehicle. It's got it's basecoat of green, now we just need to find the decals so we can finish this one too:


In this next bay is a model we previously started, it's one of two GAZ AAA trucks that has been slowly worked on between other projects. Here we have the cab half built and the bed installed:


Only a few additional parts were added to this:


In the interest of working on something fast and easy, we pulled out this M109A7 from Foreart and got started on it. Hull was done first:



While that was drying, we completed the basic upper turret assembly by adding many of the detail parts to it. We had been having difficulty with the gun mount so that is why we went this route:


The hull was indeed fast and easy, we got wheels and tracks, detail parts and everything else installed that wouldn't break with handling:


Finally we got the gun mount sorted and were able to finish the turret almost completely:


Yes, that turned metal barrel and 3-D printed muzzle brake came in the kit, not aftermarket. It's coming togfether nicely:


Next we assembled the turret baskets and then added all the photo etch to this vehicle:


Moving on to the next bay, we have this long-term shelf queen. It's the Modelcollect 1/72 scale BMP-3 with full cage armor! It has to have been close to nine years since I picked this up again. First thing that we needed to do was to try and assemble the turret cage armor. This was the result of trying to get the main parts at least completed:


Here's our first attempt to mount it on the turret. I figured it would be easier putting the straight lengths of the rear cage on after the main parts had dried:


It got done, but still looks like crap! Even then something was off on it:


Our attempt to fix it resulted in the loss of a strut:


While that was drying, we went ahead and installed the tracks on the wheels and sprockets. These tracks will be covered in deep skirts so we only did the lower runs of track:


In testing this in the hull, we found numerous protrusions on the bottom of the cage armor that kept snagging on hull parts... and I hadn't even put in all the hatches and such:


Eventually, we attached all the hatches and other additional detail parts to the main hull. Some filing had been done on the bar armor, but it only helped a little:


I originally had hoped to paint this with the three tone camouflage, but that ain't gonna happen. Now that the turret is mostly completed, it got a coat of the base color that I'll be painting it:


After all that, we wanted to get back to a simple build, so out came this Academy 1/72 scale French Le Clerc tank. Upper and lower hull got assembled first:


Then the wheels and sprockets were added, later the tracks went on:


Finally, the turret was completed, the tracks added and the side skirts installed:


And that quickly, this was ready for paint:


Finally, in this last bay, I decided that the last Roden bus I needed to build should be done. Out it came and the main body and chassis were assembled:


We then added the interior and painted it:


The underside got the suspension installed afterward:


While that was drying, the pigeon loft was mostly built:


It made for a pretty good fit. This is only dry fit too, I want to keep it separate until everything was done before it gets cemented in place permanently:


After that,the lower part got painted, the wheels and fenders got installed and the main window covers went on:


Once that was sufficiently dry, the remaining headlights, steering wheel, and other detail parts were added:


The top pigeon loft was also painted and for fun, here it is dry fit again on the bus:


While that was drying, we went to work detailing the pigeon loft. Pigeons like to nest in straw, so we added some to the pigeon loft interior:


We used this rough twine cut into 1/8th to 1/16th inch lengths:


Then we slathered the floor with Gator Grip glue and poured the straw inside, pressed it down and then shook the loose straw out:

Now that the straw was in place, we started adding the screen material on all the sections we could before closing it up:


Once again the loft was dry fit in place, and the pigeons came home to roost:


I expect that in a day or so, we might have this bus finished!
And that concludes this latest tour of Maddog Manufacturing! I do hope you enjoyed the latest progress we've made here. As always, comments are welcome, thanks to all who came in to take this tour!

[keavdog]

Busy as usual Mark. That type B w/pigeon loft sent me googling. I know homing pigeons were used but never thought how they were cared for. Interesting subject.



Did you ever finish the A-400?

[BlackSheep214]

Mark! I have the same pigeon loft bus in my stash. Looks like you gave me some good ideas on the straw.

As far as the screen goes, I had thought about using some scrap pieces of window screen. Not sure if it’ll work as to scale but we’ll see.

[Stuart]

bloody heck as like Mark, that's a massive pile of work - which all looks superb!

[Medicman71]

Some really nice builds Mark!

[Duke Maddog]

Busy as usual Mark. That type B w/pigeon loft sent me googling. I know homing pigeons were used but never thought how they were cared for. Interesting subject.



Did you ever finish the A-400?

Thank you John! Yes, the pigeon bus was a very interesting subject. It ls also the final bus in the entire 1/72 scale Roden line that I needed to build and now I have it done.

Yes, I did finish the A-400 at the beginning of last year:




That is so cool Steve! I look forward to seeing yours done! As for the screen, scrap window screen is far too large for e 1/72 scale model like this. The kit comes with a plastic mesh material, but in my opinion, it is still slightly too large. Still, it looks good when painted, and is probably the closest you'll come to screen material.

Thank you Stuart! Now to get going on more of these to bring them over the finish line.

Thank you Mike!

[jeaton01]

Enjoyed the tour, Mark. Always fun to see the wide range of subjects.

[LyleW]

The pigeon palace has to be a favorite! All of these are well done!

[Duke Maddog]

Thank you John! Stay tuned, I got more!

Thank you Lyle! I do love that pigeon palace!