Fritag

Respect. Jealousy.

And of course applied (by everyone expect Leonardo - who thought he knew better,,,,,,) to wet plaster..... So maybe Giorgio is perfecting a wet on wet technique here?

Not surprised you're happy Giorgio; great looking landscaping - which allows me to segue into saying great looking update...........

And I used Albion 0.1mm and 0.2mm nickel rod for the aerials on the JP's - and I still didn't think to see if they did it in slide fit tubing...................

Did you see that everyone? The Hendiemeister might be tempted to deploy his skills in 1/72. All those in favour......... Funny you should say that Bill..... My original thought had been to use a length of sewing needle to get the chrome effect on the fescalised section- but I was then taken by the advantages of using the slide fit tubing - of which I already had some brass in stock. But you old devil - you've got me thinking. You're absolutely right that no amount of paint etc look as good. I've just looked on the Albion Alloy website - and they do do slide fit nickel silver micro tubing......free delivery.....shall I? Oh blow it - I'll have to now won't I.... ,,,,,,,,, Done. Great thought Bill - thanks Everyone needs a bit of direction and guidance now and then Further thought........And the best thing is - cos the leg is made from plastic tubing the fescalised portion gets slid into place from the top down. So I can airbrush the leg in Light Aircraft Grey - and after painting just slide the fescalised section in place and so I won't have to mask it to get a lovely crisp clean look. Brilliant Bill. Just brilliant. What am I so absurdly pleased with this? Little things/little minds etc........

I also call it great modelling result..............

Me too. Anticipating great things...........

When I got back from real life this afternoon I glued the yokes glued in to the lower castings - and this evening I've been mostly messing around with Albion Alloy tubing. On something of a whim I cut of the moulded lugs on the side of the lower castings - which represent what on the full size beast are actually hollow tube spindles - and replaced them with short lengths of brass tube cyano'd into 0.5mm drilled holes: Bit fiddly - but after a short tussle all 4 were done and looking ok: And then I played about with some slide fit tubing to represent the oleo. Thankfully it all lined up ok: And a comparison with the oversize Airfix original. Its not entirely clear to me that the nose wheel leg is a visible or important enough component to deserve such efforts But what the heck - it's made for an enjoyable few hours modelling

Are the main undercarriage bays deep enough Bill? Looking at the piccies I sometime think yes - I sometimes think no. There's a sort of happy innocence and optimism about this hacking bits off the kit phase. To be followed by the more weary realism of the effort of correcting it. Or maybe that says a bit too much about me

Must agree with that. Excellent lateral thinking and great result.

Not sure. I do have a 1/48 version languishing stored safely in the attic somewhere but I haven't looked at it for a long while. IIRC the mouldings do look very similar and so I wouldn't be surprised if they shared a common starting point - and had faults in common too. Oh - and I'm not saying which of the incorrect panel lines on the 1/72 version I haven't corrected.............. As it happens that has reminded me that my mum won the miss lovely legs competition at Pontins holiday camp when we were on holiday in the mid 70's. I also remember that for competition purposes the families in the camp were divided into houses named after cigarette brands! We were in Embassy Blue that year. I remember that because when my mum was announced as the winner - the compare asked what house she was in, and my Dad (who was bursting with pride) yelled 'Embassy' at full volume - more or less into my right lug-ole, temporarily deafening his young son........ Doesn't that tell you a lot about the 70's? Holiday camp holidays - sexist competitions - and smoking embedded in the culture? Oh and terrible haircuts - I have to laugh when I see my school photographs..... But there were compensations such as wonderful airshows. Memories of Lightnings (in particular) travelling at warp-factor-snot at nought-foot-six with the burners in over the heads of the crowd from behind the crowd line before rotating into the vertical and disappearing into the endless blue........(presumably shortly thereafter landing after declaring a fuel emergency!) Is it any wonder the RAF beckoned? You're too kind Tom (literally). The correct interpretation of events is 'slow and fitful' progress (I'll take the complement about the seats tho' ) and as for the nose gear - I am now on version 2........hopefully improved. After further thought (an exercise that I also indulge in only slowly and fitfully I'm afraid) I decided to junk the resin yokes and use the kit yokes suitably separated from the moulded in wheels and drilled and carved to shape. I think I cast resin copies (I say i think - it was after all a long time ago....) so I'd only have to do the task once - but after said further thought I decided (1) I had doubts about the strength of resin (2) I had doubts about the strength of the Cyano bond and (3) I thought the method of joining the yoke to the lower casting could be made to better replicate the real thing. So: New kit of parts The yokes have been separated from the wheels, opened out and shaped. The stem of these yokes is longer than the resin one so that it echoes the real thing and joins into the 'U' shaped cut out I've filed into the lower casting (see what I mean?). The fit is tight enough and the contact area large enough that I'm expecting Tamiya green cap to provide a strong enough bond: And some detailing to the yokes. Found this truly tiny PE representation of the towing link on the Eduard etch fret for the Swiss Hawks. Challenged my limited PE skills to put a bend into it I can tell you... And I've filed some 1mm plastic rod to a 'D' shaped cross section in order to represent the lug that the oleo connects to: And here are these little adornments glued to the yokes: Once I've finished real-life work today I'm hoping to get the yokes glued into the lower castings and then start on the oleos (for which i plan to use some Albion Alloys slide fit tubing). With a bit of luck this particular bit of fitful progress will move fast enough to let me post some more photo's later today.............

I've got one of them - had it for a couple of years and it works very well. I'm a Ced (b) category chap I guess - at least in spirit cos I've avoided Amazon Prime.......But I do feel less than a proper modeller......I still have the idea gained in boyhood that 'real, modellers fabricate such stuff for themselves - as exemplified by the Baronial and Perduish vac formers. My first airbrush compressor was made by a mate of my Dad out of a fridge compressor. Now he was a proper modeller. It didn't work as well as my later commercial ones (I secretly preferred to use cans of propellant) but that's beside the point.......

Absolutely Giorgio, but: Do invest in some pukka Lego first

Doesn't that fizz it all up and make it go everywhere?

Blimey I'm just about to attempt to vacform the canopies for my Hawks - I might will try and outsource the job to the Baronial mega-vacformer now