air5

I have struggled over the last 20 odd years to make an AEW Gannet, Frog and Vac u form parts, Made bits and pieces. Last year, a spot of luck came my way and I ordered Alley Cats Resin AEW Gannet. I was capptivated when I opened the box, All that resin, wait ALL THAT RESIN!, Ah well I found a new glue to try out, So bang on to the job, cleaned up the radar ops section, played around with the fit a bit and came to the conclusion. Stop. Figure out how much weight to stuff in the nose to make this beast sit proper. Short answer. a lot. and lots of room for it under the cockpit and behind the prop mounting. Lots and lots and lots.. Fast forward about eight month and the cockpit is done, the paint work on the prop cover is going badly ( I painted it 8 times striped it 7), Final on that was very tiny strips of tape, carefully set side by side to get around the curves. 5 bloody minutes to paint. 2 hours to mask. Paints on the plane are xtra-colors, Testor's yellow, Decals are for Captain Winsors oriantaion rides for air intercepts, or so the instructions say. The Mk. IV Gannet it Revell Germany's issue Thanks for looking Glen

Frankie, thanks for asking, it is simple painters' paper tape. Low tack. The Yellow was painted 1st, The tape was applied and then "rolled" into the groves with my finger, as well as a small burnishing tool Then touched up in spots with a brush. Thanks for looking in Glen

Thank you for the comments, Glad you like them. Glen

Selwyn, Thank you for your comment, the bombs are 500 lb'rs When searching for a load out, I found several pictures of two 500 lb'rs and 6 100 lb'rs. But it was a drawing of three 500 lb'rs that caught my eye.. So this became the load out. Mind you of course, as depicted, the gun out and ammo feed attached the canopies open, the bomb aimers windows open. This must be a test. In this color scheme, one would almost surely never see live bombs, the gun armed, and one wing folded on an aircraft parked, unless someone was testing something. Thank you for looking, Although the reply is long winded. it is not meant to be snarky, just my thoughts of why I loaded it this way. Glen

I've had this kit in my stash for over 30 years, now with some detail items and a plan it was time to build. The cockpits and radio/gunners position were made up from an Airwaves detail set. Wheel wells from a WEM detail set, which also gave me a back up wing fold set. Airwaves' seemed stronger. The interior was painted flat aluminum, but mixed with a tad of black to darken is slightly, but not steel color. several areas needed supports add and backing up to keep the cockpit in line. When the major construction was done, I had to go back over many of the corrugations to repair them from the sanding damage.. The upper wing was painted with MM Chrome Yellow. but a bit more red was added to match a paint chip I have for this color. Yellow wings decals also give this advise in it's instructions. All other paints were Tamyia. except the Blue on the Chevrons and the cowling. Decals came from Yellow wings and help from a fellow modeler for the national insignia's. Thanks for looking in Comments welcomed Glen

A bit of a kit bash really. the fuselage, lower and partial upper wing from a DML Ta152C kit and the outer wings and prop from an old Revell kit.Using the DML kit a a base, I cut the wing outer panels to fit the outer wings of the Revell Kit so I would achieve the over all dimensions of the Big winged H. From there some sanding and re-scribing. Painting was with Xtra Color. Marvelous paint Xtral Color, air brush very nicely. Decals are from the spares tin.

Hi all, This TBM is from the original boxing, Accurate Miniature’s 1/48th scale, TBM -1C kit. I got this kit in a trade and am very glad I did. I started out using this as a pattern for at 1/72nd scale Avenger I had, with horrible detail (read NONE). I noticed things on the model did not look right… the gun for the turret, block with a rod! I replaced it with a cast resin one, I have also added barrels to the wing mounts. The model is a mixture of AM, Eduards cockpit, a little scratch building and fishing line (the wire antenna). Markings are from the kit and the spares box except for the white triangles, these were masked and painted. The kit National Insignias were too large for the indicated placements thankfully I had a sheet of 1/48th scale Stars and Bars in the spares box also. Exterior painting is Tamiya. The Sea Blue was toned down with white just a little, weathering, was kept to a minimum, light washes, some of the final semi-gloss had rubbed away, I think this helped the weathering in places. The wheels were weighted in the old traditional manner, an Iron and parchment paper( non sticking) The 1/72 scale turret was also assembled in the same manner as the AM kit’s but that is for another posting…nothing but the turret has been done. Thanks for looking

An old Skywaves Fletcher class destroyer kit,converted into a Catapult carrier destroyer, USS Halford DD480. One of three out of ten ordered that was complete, before reconverted back into 5 gun Fletchers’. I have added a 20mm gun position in front of the bridge, drilled out the bridge port holes and, two 20mm gun positions in place of the 40mm gun tubs on the forward 2nd level. The after 20mm position was relocated using brass sheet. Also new gun pit for the twin 40mm mount and director was added to the stern. Small items were also added like the practice 5in gun loader, a power winch, port side aft of the boat davit. From my USS San Francisco I took one of the catapults and added to the aft deck house behind the aft smoke stack. A crane was also made up on the port side near the aft stack also. Tom’s Modelworks Destroyer detail set, Deck hatch set and, various spares were used to detail the 5in gun director, radars, antennas and railing. Also used were Tom’s Railing net set for the forward deck rails. The paints are MM 36044 (lightened) for the vertical surfaces and Humbrol 104, for Deck Blue. The Kingfisher is from Trumpeter (any one need one or two I have a few extras) painted Tamiya Med Blue and Lt Grey. Decals for the ships numbers and the stars and bar, are from Midlands. I have yet to find a decal small enough for the jack staff on the aft stack Thanks for looking

Micheal, if you have come back to this. sorry for the delay in answering. I believe they are white per the decal sheer.. as to the tip Sq Signal Spitfire book. in the text of the Mk IX decription was where that came from .. I also recall that Almarks text also ref'd some did some did not.. I do model for my tastes. and I liked the look of the extended tips. If I find out SS was wrong and this was not accutate. I still wouldn't changing it.. Thanks for looking and the comments regards Glen

Hi Colin! hope also all is well, Spotted your build here and popped in the say, it looking good. You have a wealth of Wessex knowlege, I've benefited from some of it in the past. I noticed in an earlier thread you asked about using Model Decal's decals.. Most of my Wessexs' were done using them. Good decals, I'd prefer them to Micro Scale/Superscale decals, I have some spares if you need. I'll look in later to see how this is coming along. I had to stop the defection of my Mk9 to the Cypress Mk10 for for a while. Cheers Glen from CA.

to all thanks for looking and comments, johnd, the tail wheel area was cut out and due to the thinkness of the plastic the resulting hole was filled in. The doors were fashioned out of card stock then rolled and trimed. I had a long shaft tail wheel from an old detail set from many decades ago, it contained like 5 or 6 tail wheels and control wheels, plus other stuff. Had been very handy. Thanks again for looking.

This is a kit bash of ESCI and Hasagawa M-3's and a bunch of scratch building. The upper hull is ESCI for the cast apperence, the lower hull is Hasagawa's for the HVSS suspention ane the wider tracks. The rear engine access was scratch build with plastic card and bits of sprue. The front hull needed some work to make it match up. The rear deck and cargo box were scratch built. The intake cooling covers are 10 pieces. New side plates were made from Evergreen plastic pieces, the sptare wheels are cast resin. Then to the turret, the aft counter weight and gun mount extentions were done using Bondo, auto body filler, applied, filed, and finaly sanded to shape.. The gun mantel ( is that the right term?) was detailed with hex nut)s from, Model Rail Road Products ( I forgot who made them. All kinds of sizes). The top of the turret needed a lot of changes. the loader and commander coupila had to be changed, a sheel ejection port made, antenna mounts. A new gun barrel and muzzle brake was made from tubing and plasic card. As this was one of my at time favorite tanks, it just looked too kool.! And I wanted one, but not in that big 1/35th scale. This became one of those fun conversions, even with all of the scratch building and issues of reference, I had less then the amout I wanted. And of course I found a book for the tank, years later. Thanks for looking

This New Tooled Zero for me is sooooo way better then my old Hasagawa kit! The kit is from the box and I added seat belts and repopped the canopy, to show it open. Paint was Model Masters and Testors little bottles (Blue-Black cowling mix). Markings are from the Airfix kit, Painted strips and the Letters and numbers from the spares box. Thanks for looking

The Airfix Spitfire Mk IX, for me is a real nice kit, ingraved detail (a bit deep), a new canvas to play with. I had decals for Almark for a Mk VIII " Gray Nurses" just waiting for the right model to come along. With some added parts and a Eduards interior set (not for the Airfix kit) with a few tweeks here and there. This was done up a few months ago, just now able to post the pictures Thanks for looking

I was just reading an article in Int Def Reiew, from March 2012,The PM announced that the f-35B would no longer be the JCF air craft of choice, The F35C (CV) would operate from this class of carrier! Has any one seen any drawing of the new deck layout to handle the lanch and recovery of this aircraft type? A "cat and trap" arrangment to be sure.