Jump to content

1/72 - Miles M.57 Aerovan by MikroMir - released


Homebee

Recommended Posts

Now available from Hannants!, have ordered mine and this will be my next build. Looks good in above pics from Homebee. Not cheap at nearly thirty pounds including postage but have been looking forward to this release!

Cheers, Paul

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Another great choice from MikroMir - Well done guys !  Will be building the one with Israel decals.

Any chance we could have a IM kit of a Breguet 19 and Potez 25 in 1/72 please MikroMir?  Multiple decal choice on these aircraft too,

Mine on way from Hannants too.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Mine arrived from http://modelsua.com/ this morning - $30 including airmail - looks like a lovely kit.Great service from these guys.  The finesse in some of the parts is truly incredible - the seat frames are about o.4mm in diameter! Should be fun seperating them from the sprues, though the gates are small. I'll be doing mine in the all-white Sieveright Airways scheme. Only caveat so far is that a couple of the schemes seem to have the incorrect colours - I'm pretty sure the RNAF aircraft were metal finished and not light grey as per the instructions, and the Israeli ones have incomplete colour notes. All over-comeable!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Horatio Gruntfuttock said:

Mine arrived from http://modelsua.com/ this morning - $30 including airmail - looks like a lovely kit.Great service from these guys.  The finesse in some of the parts is truly incredible - the seat frames are about o.4mm in diameter! Should be fun seperating them from the sprues, though the gates are small. I'll be doing mine in the all-white Sieveright Airways scheme. Only caveat so far is that a couple of the schemes seem to have the incorrect colours - I'm pretty sure the RNAF aircraft were metal finished and not light grey as per the instructions, and the Israeli ones have incomplete colour notes. All over-comeable!

 

Seconded!

 

modelsua does excellent customer service and also have excellent prices!

 

The Aerovan is also very nicely done.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 hours ago, Aeronut said:

Anyone considering re-winging it to make the Hurel-Dubois HDM-105?

I'd be tempted to leave out the seats, open the doors, build a couple of ramps and have a 1950 Ford Anglia being driven in! Cute lil' diorama idea.

Or doing a Merchantman Wottif - four engines!

And Hannants have it for £30 - cwikey Wodger!!

Edited by Horatio Gruntfuttock
added bit
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Warning... Will Robinson .. warning!

Have started mine and this is no Tamigawafix kit. Lots of dry-fitting and sanding and testing and I suspect its a Milliput eater in places. THe sprue gates are also a problem and every piece (on mine anyway) has a fine bead of a seam to clean up. Seats are a nightmare - five pieces EACH and there are eight of them ; carpet monster is currently digesting three of the forty teeny-wheeny bits. Strongly suggest cutting the parts off in a plastic bag. Will post some shots on the Aircraft forum when I get around to it.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi, am sure this will not be a straightforward build looking

at the sheer number of parts in the bag and the slightly

complex build sequence but very happy to have this!

See thread in Classic Civil section, I think the Sivewright

aircraft G-AJOI should be silver not white and the others

silver not light grey. 

Cheers, Paul

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, ptmvarsityfan said:

Hi, am sure this will not be a straightforward build looking

at the sheer number of parts in the bag and the slightly

complex build sequence but very happy to have this!

See thread in Classic Civil section, I think the Sivewright

aircraft G-AJOI should be silver not white and the others

silver not light grey. 

Cheers, Paul

Hi Paul, there are several colour images of the Sivewright aircraft and they are definitely white, or a creamy-white anyway, with red lightning stripes, but I agree that the others are silver, whether painted or 'au naturelle' is debatable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi, Horatio, there are no contemporary colour images of

the Sivewright Aerovan AFAIK. I have seen images in colour of models

or digital images. If you Google Sivewright Airways and I think the

fourth site down, Air Britain pics abpic there are contemporary

b &w images of all Sivewrights aircraft including three images of the

Aerovan. The in flight image appears whiteish but I think this is due to

light reflecting against a darkish background. The final image of the 

aircraft on the ground looks silver in tone to me. All the other aircraft

eg Ansons, Dakotas etc appear silver. There are no lightning stripes

either although these are present on the Culliford Airlines example and

were quite often seen on Aerovans

Cheers, Paul

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/16/2017 at 8:46 AM, Horatio Gruntfuttock said:

Warning... Will Robinson .. warning!

Have started mine and this is no Tamigawafix kit. Lots of dry-fitting and sanding and testing and I suspect its a Milliput eater in places. THe sprue gates are also a problem and every piece (on mine anyway) has a fine bead of a seam to clean up. Seats are a nightmare - five pieces EACH and there are eight of them ; carpet monster is currently digesting three of the forty teeny-wheeny bits. Strongly suggest cutting the parts off in a plastic bag. Will post some shots on the Aircraft forum when I get around to it.

Isn't that part of the fun of modelling ?  It is for me.  Re: the bead of seam I would tend to use wet n dry paper on that, a couple of swipes from that (use wet) should eliminate the seam - (not much of a seam on my copy), re: sprue gates I recommend using a razor saw to start with then cut the the remainder with a new blade on your hobby knife.  Re: detaching small parts from the sprue, I tend to place a piece of masking tape behind the small item that needs to be removed then cut, the small part should stick to the masking tape and not disappear into the carpet monster, then I put the small items into an old/used model kit box top.  The plastic looks soft and easy to work with, when I have finished my current project I will start on my copy.  Hope the above advice will help, regards Colin.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good advice all round Colin, thank you.

I used a brand new blade and just ran it around all parts as I had a seam on every bit!

The plastic is indeed easy to work and the reason I fed the carpet monster was that I knocked the wee box containing all the seat parts off the bench! Pure clumsiness on my behalf. Found all but 3 seat tops  but they are easy enough to reproduce with HSS. 

You finish one project before starting another! Amazing self control - I have 27 started kits which I wander between as the mood strikes. Many are close to painting but our climate is not conducive to spraying at the moment. While I was born just along the coast from you in Hastings, I have lived for forty years in a city 700m above sea level in central NSW, famous for its 1000km car race each October, and its monster fogs in winter. Morning temps are often well below zero for four months of the year ( like now) and fogs may not lift until late morning , humidity is higher than my spray-gun likes so I tend to build all winter and paint and finish in summer, although smaller stuff I don't mind hairy-stick painting.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, ptmvarsityfan said:

Hi, Horatio, there are no contemporary colour images of

the Sivewright Aerovan AFAIK. I have seen images in colour of models

or digital images. If you Google Sivewright Airways and I think the

fourth site down, Air Britain pics abpic there are contemporary

b &w images of all Sivewrights aircraft including three images of the

Aerovan. The in flight image appears whiteish but I think this is due to

light reflecting against a darkish background. The final image of the 

aircraft on the ground looks silver in tone to me. All the other aircraft

eg Ansons, Dakotas etc appear silver. There are no lightning stripes

either although these are present on the Culliford Airlines example and

were quite often seen on Aerovans

Cheers, Paul

 

Hi Paul - this is proving to be interesting!

Yup, the Siveright planes were certainly camera-shy andI agree that interpretation of colours from B&W images is fraught at the best of times, and then matching photos to airframes just as difficult!

I have the latest Peter Amos "Miles Aircraft - the Post-war Years" from Air Britain, some of the images appearing in their ABIX site and there are two images which certainly indicate a painted white or pale cream finish. One is on page 121 of G-AJZG on 24/9/47 a Culliford AIrlines in B&W and I reckon it is definitely white as the oleo and spinners are definitely metal and a different shade, and then on the accompanying image file CD there is a colour shot of G-AILC from above in a creamy-white finish with red lightning flash. Now this one went to Spain but proves that some were painted a white/cream colour. In the book itself on page 115 the same aircraft is shown in B&W and , while the fuselage looks pale , the underside of the wing could be painted silver - aarrgghh!

I might just 'bite the bullet' and do my Culliford one in white anyhoo.

Thanks for the correspondence, it all makes this hobby interesting!

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I would just like to put in a word of praise for Mikro-Mir's customer service.

 

I found a small transparency missing from one of my Beverley kits. I e-mailed Mikro-Mir on 5th June, got a response on the 11th that the part was sent, and it was in my mailbox today: the complete sprue, bubble-wrapped and in a small double-walled card box.

 

Undoubtedly the best customer service I've had from a kit manufacturer in recent years.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 hours ago, Horatio Gruntfuttock said:

Hi Paul - this is proving to be interesting!

Yup, the Siveright planes were certainly camera-shy andI agree that interpretation of colours from B&W images is fraught at the best of times, and then matching photos to airframes just as difficult!

I have the latest Peter Amos "Miles Aircraft - the Post-war Years" from Air Britain, some of the images appearing in their ABIX site and there are two images which certainly indicate a painted white or pale cream finish. One is on page 121 of G-AJZG on 24/9/47 a Culliford AIrlines in B&W and I reckon it is definitely white as the oleo and spinners are definitely metal and a different shade, and then on the accompanying image file CD there is a colour shot of G-AILC from above in a creamy-white finish with red lightning flash. Now this one went to Spain but proves that some were painted a white/cream colour. In the book itself on page 115 the same aircraft is shown in B&W and , while the fuselage looks pale , the underside of the wing could be painted silver - aarrgghh!

I might just 'bite the bullet' and do my Culliford one in white anyhoo.

Thanks for the correspondence, it all makes this hobby interesting!

 

Hi Horatio, interesting indeed! I have given my wallet a good bashing and ordered the third volume of Miles aircraft, I have the first two but think the early post war years the most interesting. In the meantime my refs have been the old Putnams on Miles aircraft and British Civil Aircraft so looking forward to a more modern and comprehensive book! I think the Aerovan would look good in white and am quite tempted by the Belgian option which survived into the early sixties but still think virtually all British civil aircraft of the late forties were metal or silver doped and not very colourful. If you google miles aerovan and go to videos there is an amusing clip in colour from a French or poss Italian film from 1957 with good shots of I-VALK, a Lycoming engined Aerovan!

Cheers, Paul

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, ptmvarsityfan said:

Hi Horatio, interesting indeed! I have given my wallet a good bashing and ordered the third volume of Miles aircraft, I have the first two but think the early post war years the most interesting. In the meantime my refs have been the old Putnams on Miles aircraft and British Civil Aircraft so looking forward to a more modern and comprehensive book! I think the Aerovan would look good in white and am quite tempted by the Belgian option which survived into the early sixties but still think virtually all British civil aircraft of the late forties were metal or silver doped and not very colourful. If you google miles aerovan and go to videos there is an amusing clip in colour from a French or poss Italian film from 1957 with good shots of I-VALK, a Lycoming engined Aerovan!

Cheers, Paul

I was going to refer you to that video clip - I think it is German from my limited language skills ( anything French and I am fine, but, German . . kaput!). I-VALK was a one-off Mk6 and no reference to her film 'career' is made in Peter Amos' book. The clip does contain a couple of interesting interior shots for the super detailer.

I also believe that the aircraft were painted silver as the fuselage was plywood, so no weathering chips! Must check the wing construction - might have been metal. When judging competitions containing chipped Mosquitos ( apart from the nacelles of course) I just love dressing down the ignorant modeller, gently anyway.

And if your wallet took a caning buying the Miles book, just spare a thought for us in the Antipodes where postage costs almost as much as the book - that one cost me $A92 which is about £55! and I am an Air Britain member! The Aerovan cost $A41 including postage from the Ukraine, about £26 - much cheaper than Hannants. I think the book weighed a bit more than the kit though - about a hundred times more I suspect - ha ha!

I know that the Aerovans were pretty boring, although the Dutch one is nice in dark blue and silver, but at least the Miles Hawks and Geminis were colourful.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/18/2017 at 0:14 AM, Horatio Gruntfuttock said:

Good advice all round Colin, thank you.

I used a brand new blade and just ran it around all parts as I had a seam on every bit!

The plastic is indeed easy to work and the reason I fed the carpet monster was that I knocked the wee box containing all the seat parts off the bench! Pure clumsiness on my behalf. Found all but 3 seat tops  but they are easy enough to reproduce with HSS. 

You finish one project before starting another! Amazing self control - I have 27 started kits which I wander between as the mood strikes. Many are close to painting but our climate is not conducive to spraying at the moment. While I was born just along the coast from you in Hastings, I have lived for forty years in a city 700m above sea level in central NSW, famous for its 1000km car race each October, and its monster fogs in winter. Morning temps are often well below zero for four months of the year ( like now) and fogs may not lift until late morning , humidity is higher than my spray-gun likes so I tend to build all winter and paint and finish in summer, although smaller stuff I don't mind hairy-stick painting.

Your welcome !  Probably why I have a large stash of unmade model kits to build..  Well it's a small world, I was in the Hastings area just the other week for work, still pleasant and popular on a nice day.  I forgot to mention about the use of model filler, this used to me my nemeses, not anymore, I use Squadron Signal white putty and have found that if you apply it and let it dry, you can sand/smooth it back using a piece of wet n dry paper (wet), it works a treat.  I refer to wet n dry paper being used wet as this virtually reduces any nasty dust particles flying around,  Good luck with your build.  Regards Colin. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 hours ago, Horatio Gruntfuttock said:

I was going to refer you to that video clip - I think it is German from my limited language skills ( anything French and I am fine, but, German . . kaput!). I-VALK was a one-off Mk6 and no reference to her film 'career' is made in Peter Amos' book. The clip does contain a couple of interesting interior shots for the super detailer.

I also believe that the aircraft were painted silver as the fuselage was plywood, so no weathering chips! Must check the wing construction - might have been metal. When judging competitions containing chipped Mosquitos ( apart from the nacelles of course) I just love dressing down the ignorant modeller, gently anyway.

And if your wallet took a caning buying the Miles book, just spare a thought for us in the Antipodes where postage costs almost as much as the book - that one cost me $A92 which is about £55! and I am an Air Britain member! The Aerovan cost $A41 including postage from the Ukraine, about £26 - much cheaper than Hannants. I think the book weighed a bit more than the kit though - about a hundred times more I suspect - ha ha!

I know that the Aerovans were pretty boring, although the Dutch one is nice in dark blue and silver, but at least the Miles Hawks and Geminis were colourful.

I have read that the whole structure was wooden  except for the metal tail boom. Have seen the fuselage

described as "plastic bonded plywood", not quite sure what that means but maybe one of Miles many

innovations! 

Cheers, paul

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...