Wings of Intent: Percival Proctor, civil adaptation of vintage Air Lines (Frog, Novo) 1/72 kit

(The following is the construction article, for the completed model, please go here:
https://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2019/07/percival-proctor-modified-172nd-frog.html

I am ever looking for conversion projects in order to redeem boring and drab doom machines into colorful, joyful, useful and uplifting models.

Many times the suitable kit happens to be a very old and outdated one.

This one -for what I can tell- was originally a Frog mold, and it also more recently came out as a NOVO boxing (which already gives you the clue that you are communicating with the spirits of the departed kits...).

On the pro side: you can get them for an affordable price, they are abundant as most modelers have migrated to newer/better molds (and for good reasons), and if you botch one you just trash it mercilessly in the bin and forget about it, no stress ruining a good kit here.

So, I got this oldie and started to look for nice civil liveries, of which I found a lot. But soon I discovered that many of my potential subjects actually belonged to other variants of the type, and would require some modifications. Since a reasonable improvement and detailing of the kit already would consume certain time, and not wanting to get into a building quagmire, I discarded the subjects that belonged to other marks of the Proctor and centered on a few candidates that were more or less a direct adaptation of these machines into civil use.

Contents, observe pedestal...sigh....

My boxing -bought 334,677th hand- was missing a side window, no big deal:

The parts were liberated from the ever-present flash, cleaned up, and slightly refined:

This area needs to be opened up, so one hole and two razor cuts do the trick:

Vent drilled:

Another small intake drilled:

All locating pins were removed since invariably they actually dis-located the parts they were supposed to seamlessly align, and stabs and wing halves were shaved a bit, since they sinned of fatulence (yes, correct word, no typo, it describes a known kit malady that makes kit parts -especially flying surfaces- look excessively fat):

Parts ready to continue:

Some parts are added and/or fabricated for the interior:

The parts are masked to proceed with the base color:

Given that the parts that come in halves have a less than perfect fit, a liquid filler is run along all joints:

This old kit was missing a window, so new one is fabricated:

A painting guide is included! Phew! We are safe now!:

After an inordinate number of hours spent on research, I finally decanted for a subject that had an auxiliary underbelly tank to help with a very long ferry flight, thus the part is created:

Base color applied to the interior:

The leading edge lights are superglued and sanded to shape. On this plane the covers were slightly different, and thus they are masked accordingly:

The underbelly tank is ready:

The succinct interior is ready, windows to be added before joining halves:

A cylinder from the spares box is glued behind the nose air inlet to preclude the void effect:

The fuselage halves are united, ailerons glued on wings, stabs on fuselage, all parts ready:

Windows masked, canopy and nose glued on:

The landing gear is glued to the wings. The process of producing a good surface starts. Some paint is ready to be sampled on a piece of scrap. Do not fill the seam above the nose, there was a hinge line there in reality:

And as the Beatles used to say..all together now:

The ferry tank is glued on, as well as the little air intake on the left wing:

First coat of primer:

Since no aftermarket masks seem to be available, I used generic ones:

Choosing the bits that fitted:

And filling the spaces with liquid mask:

This plane had a number of antennas, so those are prepared:

Two discharges that go underneath the cowl seen in photos are fabricated:

The kit's Pitot is replaced with more to scale scratched items:

A white primer coat is applied before painting:

After some touch-ups, a coat of gloss white follows, in preparation for the aluminium Alclad:

Indispensable accessories:

The areas of aluminium color are airbrushed:

The aluminium color areas are masked and the next color is applied, also on the spinner. The prop was previously painted black, masked, and now received the polished aluminium paint:

Masks off, ready for clear coat before lifting canopy masks:

On the malignity of small parts:
We all know how tricky, sneaky and positively cheeky-monkey those very little bits are.
Days ago they performed on me one of their very best yet. After having looked long and wide for what I believed was a part that jumped to a parallel universe (or snatched -yet again- by the Martian's teleporting machine or mercilessly impacted by the Death Ray of my dear friend and Ebil Genius Sönke Schulz or Volkania), I realized that the said minute, teeny tiny , concentrated wickedness example of part was on the edge of the lens of my magnifier: