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MD's 2016 builds


maltadefender

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I've finished a few long-standing hangar queens this year and built a few from scratch. One or two more to complete before the year is out, but surprisingly productive!

 

First up is my Eduard 1/48 'Weekend Edition' Fokker Dr.I in the celebrated scheme of Leutnant Friedrich Kempf. It's an aeroplane I'd wanted to build for years and this kit is pretty stat-of-the-art so the mistakes were all mine to make! I think really it's just a couple of mis-glues on the rigging wires, which look a bit messy in close-up pics but it all looks nice enough on the shelf.

 

Camo was done with a base coat of Tamiya Buff, then dry brushing Tamiya Olive and finally deepening the scrubbed-in sections with Tamiya Olive Drab.

 

This was the kit that broke my modeller's block and got me back into the painting and gluing business. My other half is overjoyed (!?)

 

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Next up and one of my 'for Edgar' Spitfires.

 

This is a Mk.I from the 1/72 Airfix kit, built as one of the first arrivals with 610 Squadron at Hooton Park in 1939. I had to cut up and re-jig the code letters to match the slightly eccentric way in which they were applied on the real machines. The Spitfires were all from L1000 to L1049 in the Spitfire production run but no registrations could be seen in the pictures so I went without. All the Spitfires had three-blade props and bubble canopies but not the armoured glass on the windscreen. I bought a set of vac form canopies but was a bit uncertain of my ability to do them justice. In the end I cut the original kit windscreen down to better represent an un-armoured screen.

 

It's my intention to complete a full set of 610 Sqn Spitfires in their various appearances from 1939-40, from this first delivery to the end of their part in the Battle of Britain. Edgar was an enormous help in getting the required information together to do this, and so I humbly put this one forward as my first 'thank you' for his help.

 

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Back to WW1 and another triplane. This is the Eduard 1/48 Sopwith Triplane reposed by Smer and it fought me tooth and nail from start to finish. Aftermarket decals ordered from Australia. After the seismic battle to build it, she looks rather pretty on the shelf alongside her Fokker rival.

 

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A Malta Spitfire - in this case, AB262 as she appeared when flown off the deck of HMS Eagle, in factory-applied Desert finish (Mid Stone painted over the Dark Green sections of the camo) with Sky undersides and spinner.

 

Kit is the Italeri 1/72 Mk.Vb with the optional 90-gallon slipper tank fitted. Xtracolor enamels throughout.

 

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Another WW1 subject. I'd wanted to do the Ruston Procter 'Wings of Horus' for ages, and as a little experiment I downloaded a 'skin' of the colour scheme from a computer game and scaled it to fit the Revell 1/72 Sopwith Camel. Then I printed the decals onto clear paper and laid these on to the kit. I find this little Camel to be a truly horrid kit but it was a worthwhile experiment. I also think that the colours of the computer skin are off by some way... a bit too bright and vivid for available paints in period... but it sort of works.

 

I'll draw the eyes on the cowl soon. Maybe some rigging, although I'm inclined to leave it. I have painted the cowling red because Horus was a red disk with wings on it, and the logical thing to do would be to paint the cowl that way. In one or two photos it looks like this is what they did, but subsequent interpretations have differed.

 

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I finished off the old Airfix 1/72 Hurricane Mk.I in the VC winners' box set colours of 'Nick' Nicholson. Since the decals were made it has been discovered that Nicholson had his own emblem on the port cowling - a red devil figure with red and yellow rings around him. If I'd been sensible about it I'd have scaled down a proper drawing of the emblem and printed it on decal paper. As it was I painted the white centre and red and yellow rings, then drew the figure on top. I'm happy enough with it and still love the old Airfix Hurricane.

 

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Back to WW1 again, and here is the only S.E.5 that I've completed while writing the Haynes Manual for same. It's written with modellers in mind, and features the beautiful job that AndrewE made of his Wingnut Wings example. For my part, I contributed a 'bargain end of the spectrum' model build: the Revell 1/72 kit enlivened only by some lovely Pheon decals.

 

Here's a close-up of my little 'un, made without rigging to show the basic kit:

 

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And here is the picture of it that made it into the book, complete with a slice of Albert Ball's 'ripping cake' made to his sister's recipe as was sent out to him in France (and some suitable reading matter for model making and cake eating!)

 

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Edited by maltadefender
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Back to Malta and I finally finished off the two 1/48 Hurricanes that were my incomplete/out of time builds from the 2012 Malta GB.

 

Two Hobbycraft Hurricane Mk.IIs built as topicalised 'B's', one a 261 Sqn day fighter with a slightly off Tropical Land Scheme and one from the Malta Night Fighter Unit, both with Propblurs in place of static blades.

 

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I scratched the anti-glare panels from plasticard. Otherwise both kits are standard apart from the Aeromaeter decals.

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I think the cake was my best effort of the year. Be warned, though. It's laden with prunes and sultanas. I have no idea how Ball didn't blow himself out of the cockpit! 

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Thanks PlaStix.

 

Still to finish: Tamiya 1/72 Mossie with Paragon conversion to prototype W4050 (just decals now), Revell 1/72 S.E.5a x 2 (props and detailing), and my MTO GB entries. Seven more before the New Year!

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Here are my MTO GB entries so far. The 1/72 Tamiya Mosquito built as the NF.II of 23 Sqn CO Peter Wykeham-Barnes:

 

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And the 112 Sqn P-40B of Neville 'Bowks' Bowker in original Temperate Land Scheme:

 

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Thanks John. Rigging is a challenge no doubt. I tend to find mounting the top wing to be my biggest problem. Getting the struts in, straight and at the correct angle of stagger and then getting the top wing on while the struts are still malleable enough to locate them properly without then collapsing like a bad soufflé is a bit of a trial but well worth persevering with!

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