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After my last build (SR-71 Blackbird, see here: http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235030457-gentlemen-start-your-engines-academy-sr-71a-blackbird-172/ ) I had hoped to finish off the year with Academy's 1/72 F-4J Phantom II, but I am still waiting on some aftermarket detail parts to arrive. So as an interim project, I have this project instead: Hopefully, being a 'quick build' I will be able to get this done promptly. All I need to do is control my appetite for adding extraneous detail LOL! Having just finished an all-black aircraft, I just don't feel up to another one, so this Black Widow will be in green garb, instead. I'm hoping to replicate the weathering seen in this photo: The specific paint scheme I'm looking at doing is "Borrowed Time", which was stationed in England to intercept German V-1 buzz-bombs: This is the kit's parts breakdown: and my progress after a couple of evenings' work: Pilot and Gunner's positions: Cockpit IP and sidewalls: and the Radar Operator's office in the rear (work in progress): My office is closed between the holidays (today was the last day of work) so I hope to finish this build quickly and begin my Phantom by New Year's.

Hiya Folks, All of this talk of Stirlings has brought an idea off the backburner and hopefully I`ll bring it to fruition soon! I built this old Airfix Stirling as a C.Mk.V transport almost 20 years ago so I thought that it was high time that I dug it out, rebuilt it and painted it in the Transport Command camouflage scheme of T.S.S. with Azure Blue undersides, there are some great colour photos on line which show them looking really weatherbeaten! Here is the starting point,...the old model; Wish Me Luck, Cheers Tony

The last few months have been a somewhat frustrating time as, despite my mojo having been the highest it has been for some time, heath issues have rather put the mockers on things. Still, over the last few days I have felt well enough to crack open one of the kits I picked up at Telford, namely the Fly 1/32 kit of the Hafner Rotachute. Things will probably proceed slowly as I am still a bit fragile at times but at least I am modelling again and that feels good. Thus far I have sanded down the mating surfaces of the fuselage a la vacform and thinned down the open ends. I have also made a start on drilling and pinning the tubular front of the aircraft in order to add some strength to the assembly. I will probably keep the front as a separate assembly in order to aid painting later on in the build. I am already liking this kit so much I feel I will be getting the kit of the Mk. 1 in the near future, Thanks for looking Martin

Some years ago I built an F-5 photo recce Lightning. On the same decal sheet from PYN-up decals was another option, that of the Skylark IV, a P-38H flown by Mark Shipman out of Nuthampstead during the winter of 1943/1944. The aircraft was lost on January 5th, 1944, near Kiel while being flown by 2/Lt. Herbert T. Winter, who was killed in action. This photo of the crash (sourced from station131.co.uk) reveals some interesting details: the code letters are solid, and the aircraft is fitted with the later, larger air intakes just in front of the national insignia. After using a large amount of sources for aftermarket products, combining different brands in my latest project with only little success I wanted something simple. I thought that Eduard's "Early Lightnings" would be perfect - with a detail set included in the box! There is of course the well-known debate about which 1/48 Lightning is better: Hasegawa or Academy. The consensus seems to be that the Hasegawa kit is more detailed, but that the Academy kit is more easy to build. I thought that the Eduard release of the Academy kit would solve that detail issue. However, what I didn't realize is that the Academy kit does not provide the correct air intakes on the tail booms, but Hasegawa does. In this photo below you can see the difference in configuration: Hasegawa (correct for early Lighnings) on the left, Academy (correct only for late Lightnings) on the right. Some modelers modify the Academy air intakes, but I decided to go a different route: I'm cutting off the tails of both kits, and swapping them so that the Academy front parts will have the Hasegawa rear parts. I honestly set out to build something straight forward this time... There are some shape differences I found, but they were relatively easy to solve by adding some strips of styrene to the slightly slimmer Academy parts, building them up gradually. A lot of sanding followed. For those of you who are interested, side by side it's clear that the Hasegawa kit is much more detailed and the surface detail is much, much nicer than the Academy kit. What's also an interesting difference is the shape of the centre fuselage. I compared the nose pieces and the Academy main fuselage is much rounder than Hasegawa. I don't know which one is more accurate, but there you have it. Next, I started with the wheel bays and undercarriage. The Eduard PE parts from the box are nice, but I added a little extra plumbing and added some rivets. I also added some parts from the Hasegawa kit. For the color I opted for neutral grey. The same was done to the front undercarriage. When the undercarriage bays were done, I glued the tail booms together Next, I added rivets to all the main surface areas And I modified the way the propellers are added. I used a poly cap from my spares box, which should in theory make the propellers removable. that's it for now; comments and feedback are welcome of course. thanks for looking!