serial modeler

Perfect timing as I am just now working on the new Airfix Blenheim and have in the past done two Classic Airframes ones. I did both a Finnish Mk I and the long nose Mk IV. They were the best kits at the time but are light years behind the new Airfix kit now. Several times in the past I went through a major conversion, alteration of a version just to find out that the new kit is coming out soon, so perhaps you can do us all a favor by undertaking this project and thus triggering this "Murhpy's law of Modeling". Once you are done Airfix will announce the Mk IV. The conversion should be a challenging project. The Airfix is a fantastic kit and I am really enjoying it in comparison to the CA years ago. The biggest challenge will be to mate the clear plastic nose from CA to the Airfix body, the outlines could be way off making it impossible to match them. If there is a way for you to measure both kits and see before committing that would be the way to go before undertaking that project. Matching clear parts as in the case of the canopy is a lot harder them mating engines or wings where you can use putty liberally. Nonetheless I am curious of the effect so make sure to keep us posted.

Tomonaga's Kate is a fascinating build. I have done it several years ago and really enjoyed the experience. If you remember from the book "Shattered Sword" and also from the old 1976 movie "Battle of Midway" Tomonaga took part in the early attack on Midway Island. During that attack he was attacked by Major Park's Wildcats and Buffaloes and his right ( if I remember correctly ) fuel tank was holed. He had enough fuel to return to Hiryu but since the tank could not be filled he only had fuel to go one way to the US Fleet. I remembered that little detail and took some efforts to model some bullet holes through his wing and a few streaks on the bottom form escaping fuel to represent his Kate from between the two missions. You may want to look into that to add a little more historical detail to the kit and give it some "personality".

I want to model the F 15C in the markings ( or lack thereof ) of Operation "Wooden Leg", the strike against PLO terror camps in Tunisia on October 1st 1985. Supposedly all the national and squadron markings were painted out for this mission. I know they flew 6 D's and 2 C's. The C's were armed with the "centerline, multi ejection bomb rack" that held six 500lb mk 82 bombs. The D's carried the smart GBU 15 bombs, but I am not interested in those. I want to do the single seater F 15 C and # 840 in particular, an ace machine before it even flew the mission. I know they carried the conformal fuel tanks and AIM 7 Sparrow. The tanks were developed by Israel before the "E" version officially used them. In fact they were first used in combat in "Wooden Leg" mission. The dilemma I came across is that centerline multi ejection bomb rack. Does anyone know what this thing looked like? I cannot find any references online or on paper about that.

Tony, thank you so very much for those few pictures of the Fishingtons that I was not aware of till now. The only one, I was basing my project on was the head on shot with the two torpedoes being pushed back. I chose to model my "W for William" with the bomb doors open because in that picture I saw the open doors towards the back of the plane. Another question was how the torpedoes were carried? I have seen two interpretations. One was that they were staggered in the central bomb bay and another where they were fitted into the outer bays with perhaps some sort of a long range fuel tank taking up the center bay. Your pictures with the book text even refers to that as well. I chose the latter version of carrying the torpedoes by placing them into the outer bomb bays, but I did not remove the rear doors. Oh well, that will be an easy fix The Wimpy in its torpedo carrying role was such a significant contribution to victory in the MTO that is is a pity so little written and photographic evidence exists. What the Beauforts did by day the Fishingtons did by night. More convoys were trying to sneak through by night given that short distance between the two continents.

Torpedo bombers are my favorite subject and RAF Torpedo bombers in particular. In the case of Malta it comes down to four types. First and foremost the Beaufort. I have read both of Patrick Gibbs' books, one about UK operations and the other one about Malta. Fascinating individual and for years now I have been waiting for a decent release of a 1/48 kit of this beautiful plane. The second type or rather types are the Swordfish and the Albacore of mainly 830 squadron. There was a decent work about this "Night Strike from Malta" by Kenneth Poolman. They flew short range missions in the straights. They used those goofy barrel tanks in the observer's position just like at Taranto. The last type is the Wellington. They did fly night torpedo strikes in the Summer/Fall of 1942 and hunted the German convoys as far out as Greece. Unfortunately there is very little written about them and the one gem I was able to find is here http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/60/a2204560.shtml Ossie Evans mentions being trained on torpedo Wellingtons and sent out to Malta in July 1942. He flew dangerous night missions on Fishingtons, "Limey Ragships" a.k.a Wellingtons armed with two torpedos. In his text he mentions HX 604, which was an ASV equpped Wellington with the aerials on the fuselage. In Malta they were called Sticklebacks or Goofingtons. A good reference to that plane was also made by Tony Spooner, who wrote about his service in Malta in a book "In full Flight". I believe there is even a decals option in 1/48 available. The basic operation went like this. The Goofingtons went out towards where ULTRA had suspected Axis convoys of crossing the Med. They located the convoy and then sent out radio signals for Fishingtons such as those flown by Ossie Evans to home in on and find the convoy. Once located the Goofingtos would drop flares to illuminate the ships and the Fishingtons would drop their fish from the other side. Ossie mentions his first torpedo strike in September 1942, therefore right at the height of the African campaign at El Alamein. He was an inspiration for me to build my 1/48 Wellington Mk VIII with the front turret removed and the "rake" torpedo sight seen in pictures and also mentioned in his text. I made it "W" for William HX 565, but unfortunately cannot post it here because I can't figure out the posting of my pictures. I based it on the Trumpeter kit with modifications. One day I may attempt to make Tony Spooner's Goofington as well. If anyone knows more about the torpedo Wellingtons from Malta I would love to read up more on them.

I remember that book fondly as it was the first warbook I read in English way back in the 80's. It inspired me to make his Belgian Fiat CR42 in which he flew in May and I believe even evacuated to France after Belgium's demise. Great book and fond memories.

CT, thank you so much for all the details. Since my kit is definitely a car door Typhoon IB and I definitely want to model Jimmmy's OV X it seems my only option would be to do his replacement after the accident, that is JR201 with the whip aerial. I assume it was also coded OV X. Any thoughts if it was likely to carry the "X" on the leading edge, just like Jacko's aircraft? Would it have carried the RP's or still just the bomb pylons?

Wow, that is fantastic bit of news. So they were the leader's markings for easy identification on the ground? That makes sense and also makes it easier for me not to have to worry about those on OV X , James' favorite aircraft and the one he apparently flew on D Day. Also, I noticed that 197 squadron carried their own version of invasion stripes way before D Day, in fact it looks like they were carried way back in 1943 and were only on the undersides with those characteristic wide white and narrow black stripes. Do you know if for D Day they were carried over the tops of the wings and fuselage added or they just left them alone? In that book artwork below it portrays his OV X clearly flying over an invasion barge but no invasion stripes on tops or fuselage, just those undersides. Is that "artistic license" or fact? Also I am having a really hard time determining if his underside wing bomb pylons were actually black ( the black stripe would have been there ) or left in the original gray, the pictures on the internet are way too grainy to see this.

I just recently got done reading James Kyle's Typhoon Tale and of course got inspired to do a model of his Typhoon MkIB JP 682 OV X of 197 squadron. In his book he has several pictures of squadron machines and they all display these curious zigzags on the inside of the gear doors, both the big ones enclosing the wheel strut and the shorter, central ones enclosing the wheel itself. They show pretty prominent on all the pictures of at least the early Mk IB "car door" machines. Any ideas about the purpose of these things? Strangely I did not see those on machines of other squadrons. They look to be either white or silver as they stand out pretty prominently from the background interior green.

Several years ago I got some figures from this company Hecker and Goros, that produced two legion condor pilots.

Yes, Giorgio, while I cannot print them myself I many know somebody who could help me. Can you forward the drawing please? It looks like just black on white. perhaps a more "clean" white then the somewhat weathered white band on the fuselage. From the pictures it looks like it was freshly applied, probably a few weeks/days before Pedestal.

The Havoc inspired two of my great projects of last year. One was based on this article. http://lend-lease.airforce.ru/english/articles/demidov/demidov.htm It is an interview with the navigator of a Russian torpedo bomber crew which flew over the Baltic hunting German ( and Swedish! ) ships in 1944 and 1945. The fascinating story is that they originally got delivered in the G "gunship" version. The Russians started flying them with the navigator squeezed in on that flat shelf behind the pilot and the gunner in his usual position in the back. This was unworkable and since they insisted on using navigator machines were successively sent to a workshop in Leningrad ( today's Petrograd ) to get converted back into the glazed nose version and only retained the side, foward firing machine guns. The kit was a combination of B and G. I needed the glazed nose from the B and the turret from the G so I used both kits to make one. If you attempt this do not assume that the nose is the same as in the B version, since the Russians had a different window arrangement. I basically had to sand mine down and "reglaze" then mask the new windows and paint to match the pictures. Then I had to custom build the two torpedo racks. The attacks were carried out with single torpedoes but ferrying missions were flown from Leningrad carrying two at a time. Added to that goes the flavor of painting the whole nose "Russian Green" over the standard OD/Medium Green/Gray scheme as well as painting out the white stars with discs of Russian green and applying the red stars over them. If I could only figure out this photo posting business here I would gladly share but that goes beyond my IT expertise so just the link here. The other project was a standard G model used by an author of one of the best books I read recently. A great account of a ground attack pilot in love with his machine, kind of like Park's "Nanette". The kits needed for these are all made by the aforementioned AMT, a good kit that with the three different versions gives you flexibility to make anything you desire in 1/48. Good luck in your project.

Thank you Jure and Giorgio, With your information I could google up the rest and pretty much settled on the look of the machine. I will use MM 7226 as the serial since no other match is even possible. The colors are likely to be standard green/gray with the white band. The only challenge remains that pesky little pennant with Aldo Galimberti written on it. I will have to look through the net to see if there is anything in 1/48 and if not I guess I will have to produce it myself. Thanks again for great help in the matter.

For a long time a little bit of information about the famous convoy to save Malta has been bothering me. We all know the accounts of the various stages of the air battle recounted many times on various forums. I have even built "Dickie" Cork's Sea Hurricane myself many years ago. Let me set the stage. On August 12 HMS Victorious turns into wind to recover its Sea Hurricane. Two land successfully while two more are in the holding pattern with undercarriage down. Only one of those is a Sea Hurricane, the other two are Reggiane 2001 armed with fragmentation bombs that appear to approach for a landing and at the last moment release their ordinance to the shock and amazement of all the crews. Not a shot is fired, One bomb bounces off the sea while the other detonates claiming six lives of deckhands and crew. Both Reggianes get away with total surprise without a shot being fired. Supposedly they were "painted to match Sea Hurricanes" with distinct yellow markings that threw off Fulmars that instead of pursuing them broke off the engagement. Does anyone know what unit those Reggianes came from, any pictures? The only photograph I was able to find online is this, but this one supposedly has an armor piercing bomb, not the fragmentation bomb used in the attack. This one also looks like a typical Verde Oliva Scuro over Gray. Was the "Yellow Element" on the nose or tail like the Hurricanes of 880? Perhaps the leading edges, the crews would not see the tail surfaces but sure would notice yellow leading edges, but what about the Fulmars supposedly attacking from the rear? Questions, questions, questions...

It simply leaves me speechless. Great work on the detail and the dry brushing, a true work of art!