AFCBGeorge

FAO Everyone; if you're not keeping up with this over at the aerodrome, I advise you take a peek. It's quite astonishing.

Airfix have had this problem with the Red arrows decals for years, & recent new releases have included some pretty appalling decals, so this shouldn't come as much of a surprise! It's important to use warm water to have any chance of getting them off the backing paper in good nick. Another tip I've picked up for these kits is to apply the replacement decals directly over the first ones, I've seen it done on one of these sites & it works brilliantly.

I'd love to know how you did the weathering, normally I think weathering on white finishes almost automtically looks overdone but this looks cracking!

Good thread, I have to say, I think you should compare some of the sizes of these to an old prop or two. Having only ever built WW2 props before I was astonished when I saw the size of the Nighthawk kit I recently completed.

Hi Pierre, I don't think there's anything I can say that hasn't been said already, you're leagues above anything else I've ever seen. couple of questions though, 1. How on earth did you manage to produce such a tiny curly wire?! 2. Do you think those callipers are a little too big? 3. How will you be able to see this amazing detail when it's finished?

so much for being a speedbuilder! For the 4th model in a row I've fallen at the last hurdle & ruined a model at the decal stage. The decals silvered heavily despite Microset/sol Klear anything else I put on them. I was given a tip on another forum to 'flood' any gaps with klear/satincote so the bubbles of air underneath didn't show. This failed miserably & led to a hasty coat of satincote which dried to give a very poor finish. I tried to rescue the decals by painting over them very carefullybut by this time I was so demoralised & frustrated I made a complete hash of it... I'll get some pictures up tomorrow of the 'finish' of the model. It's so demoralising to repeatedly spend hours & hours on a model & then ruin it at the very last stage. I also realised today I was better at applying decals when I was 5 than I am now. All very depressing. I'm going to have to strip the model down & start over again with the paint. Peebeep has kindly provided me with a replacement set of decals so I'll update later when the photos have been taken.

need to strip a whole kit with this- how would you go about it? just apply it in small doses & rub with a toothbrush?

HI everyone, I'm still new here & have only been back modelling about a month so I'd appreciate your comments. Bought this as I think the subject is fascinating and at £8.50 it's a lot of kit for your money, an absolute bargaing IMO The shopkeeper at my LMS reckons it could be an old Heller mold. He might well be right because I've never seen so much flash in my life! (OK I've only built 3 models since I started!) but still, There are no locator pins in places, & for some components I've even had to fold the plastic myself... it reminded me a bit of how I imagine a vac form kit would be. But all's well so far. Started off by breaking the first piece I assembled- you can see the Tamiya tape in the cockpit around the control stick. Am hoping when this is painted over it won't be noticeable. Apart from that it was plain sailing to this pont, although the difficulty level is far higher than anything I've done before. AM thinking of using Clearfix to glaze the front windows, although I've never used it for that before. All those little windows would be a nightmare, especially if I lost one inside. got any advice people? What would you do? All gone well so far- Fuselage sides are a pig to get to stay in place, resorted to rubber bands in the end. Things are already quite advanced & I've got the tail on & the wings are also drying as I type this. the flimsy looking undercart glued in place. I'll be leaving it to dry for a loooong time as to me it looks a bit weak for a model this size, & I want to get it right first time. I'll update you shortly!

Right, hello again everyone- much progress to report. Found the under carriage on this kit massively overcomplicated & ridiculously hard to get right- even the kit's wrong, on two sides t gives a plug where there should be a hole- bearing in mind it's the hole where the 2mm of sprue go that's fairly crucial to holding the plane upright I think it's pretty important... Eventually struggled through both wings (not very enjoyable at all.) & attached them Then masked them up for painting. Maskol on the landing lights... & the canopy- until it seeped into the cockpit so I had to prise the cockpit off & start over- in the end settled for Tamiya tape. Then improvised a bit & used cling film on the undercart to stop me painting it again post spraying. Then sprayed it with a Humbrol Rattle can of Hu33 Waited for it to dry & voila! Then went back to the nightmare that is the undercart on this kit & realised there's a monster seam visible in the wheel wells. again, blagged it, cut some foil out & glued into the hole actually worked! I'm now onto the finishing touches, undercarriage doors, etc etc, one thing I would like to ask you lot, is why did I get a finish like below on the whole model, almost like dust, which just rubs off on my finger to leave it perfectly smooth? Found it very strange. hmm, any ideas?

Balls, It was covered in flash & there's no mention of it in the instructions (or box art!) which was why I assumed it was an error in the mouldings. Oh well, I'll fill it with clearfix next time. How annoying. Thanks for the comments. Progress today was assembly of both wings. I found the undercarriage extremely fiddly & hard to get to fit together properly, I'll post the pictures when scrubs has finished.

OK, so I've decided to enter this build to get some constructive criticism & advice, as some of you may already know from my welcome post this is only my 4th model since returning to the hobby, and I am trying a lot of techniques that you all do day in day out for the first time, so If I'm doing something wrong please let me know. When I was little & started modelling No-one else in my family had ever done models- It's led me to quickly realise that the fact that I taught myself when I was 6 has put me well behind all you guys who've been reading these forums! ANyway, I'm waffling, I apologise. For the build I chose the Airfix Mosquito, firstly because I love the design of the plane, but also as I've always wanted to do a Night fighter model. Awesome box art IMO. Here's the finish I've picked: You join me at quite a late stage of construction as I've been at it for a couple of days & a friend was borrowing my camera, so no 'making the cockpit' shots but You've probably seen a good few before. Here's the state of play tonight Painted the figures as best I could, I think I did a pretty good job as they're hard to see through the canopy when it's all together, Biggest problem was a rather large & random hole in the nose cone Which I've just about managed to fill with a combination of Humbrol Filler & liquid paper, it's in a really awkward position & if I wasn't realy, really looking forward to completing this I probably would have written to airfix for a replacement part- It was really hard to get the camera to focus on it but I've circled it. Have also masked the canopy & painted it. It's the first time I've done a canopy with tamiya tape & a craft knife so I daren't take the tape off, yet, but I'm expecting major seepage. Last thing I've done before bed is Assembled the main part of the wings & dry fitted them to check the fit, which I have to say is superb & painted the main undercart components for the morning. That's it for tonight, let me know how I'm doing so far. Last thing I'm going to do is say I've never, ever seen such a random collection of smileys for use in a forum. So I'm going to use this one as I can't see who else will!

Thanks a lot, I made a post in the welcome section. I'll start tomorrow evening, am going to a football match tonight.

HI guys, this is my first post on this forum, although I've made a couple of hundred posts between a few other forums so Peebeep might recognise the user name. Although I will be at Telford I'm 100% confident my build won't be anywhere near good enough to display as this is my 4th model back in the hobby. Therefore can I build the Night fighter mosquito from the Airfix kit to get some constructive criticism/advice? I've been looking to join a group build for this reason for a while. Thanks George