Search the Community
Showing results for tags 'Fonderie Miniatures'.
Found 3 results
-
This build has been on and off (more off than on to be fair) the bench for the last 7 years! It finally crossed the finish line earlier this week and thank Christ for that! Fonderie kits have a poor reputation but when I first bought this and fellow modellers imparted their horror stores I didn't think it could be that bad. I was wrong. It was worse. It didn't look too bad in the box to be fair - lots of flash but nothing a good clean up with a new blade and a sanding stick couldn't put right. It was when I started building the thing that the true horrors emerged. The fuselage was badly warped, the interior parts simply didn't fit, wings were different thicknesses, one stabiliser was positioned higher on the fuselage than the other, the vacformed canopy and tail turret were hopelessly inaccurate and not worth using, the rear fuselage had the turret faring missing and it was too narrow, props were completely the wrong shape, most white metal parts, including the undercarriage legs, were badly warped and mis-shaped, dropped flaps fouled the bomb bay doors and the decals, probably due to age, had yellowed and broke up when I tested them in water. In short, it was a nightmare and was a resident on the Shelf of Doom for long periods as I plucked up the courage to do some more work to it. 7 years later and it was finally done. Work completed is summarised here: - Interior mostly made from scratch - Scratch-built bomb-bay and wing bomb cells - Bomb load from the Tamiya Lancaster - New vacformed canopy (thanks Neil!) - Rear fuselage widened and new turret fairings made - Sanger vac rear turret transparency used - Prop blades slimmed down and rounded (I'm still not happy with the shape!) - 100 Group aerials added - Xtracolor enamels - DK decals Anyway, it was fun I suppose and she's not come out too badly. My model represents Handley Page Halifax B Mk III MZ913, Z5-N of 462 Squadron RAAF, Foulsham (100 Group), April 1945. All the best, Tom- 55 replies
-
- 126
-
-
-
.thumb.jpg.87669a5ffb8b13672a3d675087a46d42.jpg)
Hi there Here's my tweenie. No, not the quick vodka between pints.....It's the monster I'd spend a week or two progressing between other builds. I'd also have a crack at it when a seemingly simple build would get a bit off course.......it would make me appreciate the simplicity of the other build. Planning my 1/48 WWII subjects I obviously needed a British heavy, but I was torn. Everyone's got a Lancaster and they're not cheap. The Halifax is ugly and there's only one very criticised kit available, so not an option I thought until one popped up for a good price on Trademe (local Ebay). I was up for the challenge........ So here she is, my interpretation of Friday the 13th, 2 years or so in the making. It's not perfect, and It's not as heavily weathered as I'd like but I'm scared to touch it again in case I stuff something up. I might dull it down a bit one day but for now, it's finished. Ice cream tub plastic to 1/48 Halifax.......what a journey. And now I quite like the Halibag. I hope you like it. Cheers Gaz Here it is with the recipient of it's spare tail turret. -
This is something I shall plod away at. My father gave it to me years ago but like many of these kits it has just sat there. Everyone knows they need a lot of work but that's what modelling is all about - or rather I think the reason I didn't enjoy the Eduard Hellcat kit very much was because it was boring and unrewarding just slotting bits of plastic together - much like Tamiya kits. They're fine to just throw something together, but I personally get little out of them otherwise. I do however like the sense of achievement from building a tougher kit of an unusual subject. The Fonderie Miniatures Handley Page Hampden The parts are fairly rough: ...and the instructions rather "home made" looking: Still, it's a Hampden and I like working with tools and materials. The parts don't look that bad. If considering this as "an injection moulded kit" and by that most people really mean "something very easy to slap together" then it's a horror. Unlike that massive waste-of-money Sanger Short Sunderland though, the parts are more or less Hampden shaped so this should actually be buildable with the right mindset. The mindset I am adopting is to treat it as a chunky vacuum formed kit. Absolutely everything needs clean up and mating surfaces wet sanded - so it's more like a vacform than a mass-produced injection kit. I happen to like vacuum formed kits. With an hour or two with sanding sticks and a sheet of 240grit wet and dry paper laid on a work surface and kept wet, we get something that kinda fits together. It's not warped and the wings are the same shape as each other, so I think we're in business. I haven't bothered with the window cutouts yet because I want to check they're all in the right place and symmetrical etc. I expect to have to pack and shim with styrene so there's no point in filing them out until I know what dimensions to open them out to. The wings need a little more sanding at the root ends to reduce the thickness by another 0.5mm or so to match the fuselage's aerofoils.
