Aero Vintage Books

I tried to post model photos, but the BBC code is apparently not working, and there are no editing tools appearing in this particular new forum! I made a first post (to be moderated) in the Warbirds forum, did not have missing editing controls. There is only a "quick post" window here in this forum, and editing controls do not appear with "Preview"!

I will try to post a BBC code for linked image here to demonstrate the problem:

[url=http://www.scale-models.co.uk/gallery/g ... faire.html][img]http://www.scale-models.co.uk/gallery/d ... CF2270.JPG[/img][/url]

Regards, John Meshkoff
johnpipe108

I will double check permissions later today on this forum and make sure they are set properly.

Thanks Scott!

Here we go!



AOK! Here is a 47% scale-model of the E-8 mounted M-2 .50 cal BAM gun as used on the B-17E & F aircraft. The stand is not, of course, representative. The barrel-jacket is 7/8" aluminum-tubing, muzzle/bushing hand-turned from scrap maple, "barrel" is 1/2" hardware-store dowel, "E-10" is two pieces of telescoping PVC tubing over a PVC pipe coupling. M-2 is 1/4" MDF sides, 1/8" Hardboard (alias "brown clip-board") bottom, rear & top plates, Baltic Birch, clip-board and Honduras Mahogany top-cover, old 3/4" inter-drawer poplar separators for bottom spacers.

The E-8 side-bars are old furniture laminate, oak over poplar, trunions are FPS facing, 1/4-ply cores, hand-turned maple bushings; "recoil adapter" is the old, familiar brown clip-board! The trigger needs re-work. Spade-grips are hand-turned real California walnut. Re-built several times, from the "Hollywood" version to the detail-accurate version seen here taken from photos in T.O. No. 11-10-9, with help from the E-12 manual, 11-10-12.

Boeing side-gun box 15-7469, 100-rounds cap, made from 1/4 MDF and 0.010" craft-brass, "rivets" are 16ga linoleum nails; handle is K&S hobby-brass (I don't have the means to curve the top). This box (and the adaptor) were both made before I knew they were B-17 equipment, and it took me about a year after that to get the ID and the plans (recieved from NASM archives photocopy service, this past Jan 22). "Cartridges" are mix of .223 Remington fired-brass, and hobby-tubing from scratch; "bullets" are from wood-dowels glued into the "shells" and the whole asm inserted in the 1/2" Jacobs-chuck on my Jet-Mini wood-lathe, turned and colored with metallic-bronze acrylic. "M2 links" are faux, hand-made (what a tedious job!) from thin sheet brass, and using a "brass-black' chemical color.



The box was made from the Hollywood images in Destination Tokyo:



That is what brought me to B-17 land to begin with! From there to Air Force, thence to NASM, and the rest, is ongoing. One little gotcha; the Hollywood boxes are replicas, near-perfect except for lack of latch for the top cover, and a clever mount in place of the actual Boeing "Holder Assembly 3-15168" namely a pair of "U" clips riveted to the lower front of the box, and the box clips onto the E-8 sidebars, very neat and realistic from a strictly motion-picture point of view. And, the actors don't actually have to load the belt into the action, just mount the box and charge the gun! Of course one can see in Air Force especially that the "cartridges" don't move when the "gun" is fired.


Hope you like it!

Regards, John