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You know how it is when you get a kit that just fights you till the end, well this is one of those. I had reasons for getting this done besides having it next to my Whitley and Wellington (that is being worked on next). Originally this was to be the Valom boxing. That got so far, but I messed up the wing joints and the legendary fit of the clear parts defeated me (even tried the Airfix and falcon versions to see if some combination would work). Then the AZ version with new clear parts came into my possession . This time it would work! There would be no duff wing/fuselage joints! The glazing would fit! ebay provided the torpedo upgrade set! I had the Authentic Decals decal sheet! What could possibly go wrong? Yeh, well, the wings had to come off as I mucked that up again. Chucked a load of filler at it, and called it a fit. After ignoring it for a while I decided it was time to just finish it and be damned. It will grace the collection until airfix or someone does a better version. Even now as I look at the photos I realise I have a) missed the aerial lines off b) not fitted the exhausts! Life............... comments welcome. Tim

It has taken me more than a few years, but with the completion of the Meng F-102 Delta Dagger, I have managed to finish all six jets of the century series. All models are in 1/72 scale. The kits are: Italeri F-100D Super Sabre Hasegawa RF-101C Voodoo Meng F-102 Delta Dagger Hasegawa F-104S/F-104G Starfighter Trumpeter F-105D Thunderchief Hasegawa F-106 Delta Dart Mark Family Portrait

Hurricane IIc trop - 34 squadron RAF - SEAC Burma Hasegawa with master barrels, CMK resin, Eduard fishtail exhaust, some scratch details and riveting. I invite you to the photos

Hello ! My new AFV Club's 88mm with Stalingrad miniatures figures See you ! Fabrice

An old, and sometimes rather crude kit. But still a fun and enjoyable build. Air brakes are in open position since I was a bit lazy. Having made them closed on the Su-17 sister model I knew the effort that was neccessary for this... I used Master pitot tubes and guns. Painted freehand with Mr. Paint. Decals are from my decal spares box (roundels from Eduard's MiG-21bis). Weathered with my airbrush and dry pastels. The kit seat is horrible, so I intended to use a Pavla resin seat. But this was far too wide, so I made a seat on my own, using Trumpeter's Su-9 seat, the kit's headrest and some additional detailing. A little more extra detailing was made in the cockpit... ...but not much of this is visible... Some additional detailing was made in the wheel wells and on the landing gears. Panel lines are almost Matchbox style. But I like them, in a way they suit this heavy and larger-than-you-think aircraft well. As mentioned, a really enjoyable build that didn't take that long time as I expected. And I have already bought another old OEZ, KP's Su-25.

I must confess that I am missing a pair of nosewheel doors (promise to add them) but back in May I assembled the Airfix 1/48 TSR.2. This includes resin cockpit and bomb bay / undercarriage bays, while I adjusted the undercarriage to remove the unintentional splay. It was quite a challenging build and as with all others I learned a few lessons, not least that to have done a really great job I should have filled all the panel lines and rescribed them. Trouble is, I'd still be building it now... A full set of images here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/26690797@N02/albums/72157715123102207/with/49792162117/ I hope you enjoy these. Just a little bonus: WIP next to my still WIP after 35 years Contrail 1/72 TSR.2! Thanks for looking. Kind regards, Neil

my last built , enjoy :

These two kits were built together, the Siebel Si204 using aftermarket i.e. Eduard 'Big Ed' etched and masks plus CMK resin wheels, seats and spinners. Where as the Bucker Bu181 was built virtually otb, both kits were Special Hobby 1/48 scale. The Si204 wasn't the easiest of kits to build, some of the parts not fitting together too well. The canopies were a bit of a trial to get a decent fit but was successful in the end. I also re-scribed all the panel lines as I found the kit ones to be rather shallow. On the plus side the interior detail was excellent, unfortunately mostly lost when fuselage halves are joined! Not a shake and bake kit but worth the effort put into it, Special Hobby certainly give us replicas of aircraft mostly ignored by other manufacturers and are to be congratulated for their choices. Aircraft was finished using AK True Colours, decals from kit and spares box. This particular machine was taken from a colour photo found on the 'net' the code only showed 3 letters L,Q & D so first letter is a guess B!!! These last 3 photos show the interior detail :- The Bucker Bu181 was built otb without any modification except cutting out and deflecting the control surfaces. Again a Special Hobby kit this one with no surprises and finished quite rapidly for me!!!! Machine is finished as per photo found in a Flugzeug Special on the Bu181, it appears the codes had been painted out except the one on the yellow bands the S is speculative. Unit badge is home made decal, finished again, with AK True Colours. Now S.H. where is the 1/48 Focke Wulf Fw58 😉 Cheers Andy

Dear fellow Britmodellers, here's my 1/72 Airfix C-47 Dakota, built with the addition of Eduard photo etch, Airwaves Boarding ladder and Xtradecal markings for an aircraft of 89th TCS, 438th TCG, based at Greenham Common in August 1944. At that time the b/w D-Day stripes were already overpainted on the upper surfaces. I painted the model with Gunze/Mr.Hobby acrylics. All photographs by Wolfgang Rabel. Thanks for your interest in this topic, best greetings from Vienna! Roman

All, Showing pictures of my latest completed build of ICM's 72nd scale kit of the Heinkel HE-51 interwar biplane fighter. What appeared as a straight forward kit (only one sprue in kit box) actually turned out to be a fairly demanding build. Certainly not a bad kit though. Apologies if there are too many pictures Regards Dave

As Obi Wan Kenobe (would no doubt have) described these refined and shapely planes “An elegant weapon, for a more civilized age.” A couple of lockdown builds. I had grander, more detailed plans for things to do with these kits but needed something to occupy a couple of days of low hassle, low stress. These geriatric Novo kits fit the bill nicely. Made out of the box with a little bit of tidying up cockpit innards, pilots from spares. As the kit decals were missing (Canberra) or beyond use (Sea Hawk) and to try and add a little colour variety to my collection I tried to come up with different from the norm schemes that I could achieve (or get somewhere close to) from spares (with some much appreciated help from @speedy where spares came up slightly short) I know there are loads of flaws with these builds but they made & make me happy so they’ve achieved their purpose

Indeed - I wouldn't mind so much if it wasn't for the fact that I'm sure they moved the jobs because they can pay them less. Globalisation? Tricky… Kids are so unkind aren't they Dennis? I share your feelings - with a name like 'Cedric' I was open to all sorts of taunts from the 'less evolved' in our community. I like to be called 'Ced' - mainly because I was only called Cedric at home when I was in trouble! Thanks Chris ICL's 2900 Series was the last colourful computer IMHO - 'Hot Orange' it was called. After that everything went grey and beige. With some stylish brown highlights. Hi Phil! Both kits are great once you know the slight 'pitfalls' - I think you'll enjoy them. Some progress this morning as I de-stress from daily harassment by text (still waiting for one… fingers crossed). Catching up the Arma 'kit' to the others. I realised, perhaps too late, how the fuselage internals fit the floor in the wing - look, the frame goes into slots: I made sure the bottoms of the frames were really clean this time. The i/p went in without problems, just glued to one side: As PC recommended I've made sure the ends of the 'V' frame are sanded flat and had a bit of a fiddle trying to fit it (and the seat) through the bottom but no joy. I'll fit them as instructed to one side just before close up. With that extra care the join is much better: Not glued yet, of course. I've also fitted to the controls to the floor:

Back in April when I posted my Doyusha Countach, a very kind lad, called 'Dieselweasel' here, posted this within: 'Codger the Countach looks brilliant , would like to see all of yours together, bet it would make an awesome display. ATB Jim' Well sorry to neglect this so long but here it is. Most here are sick of seeing these from their features but one here is previously unseen - for - really- 50 years: It's the Porsche 910 from the original box of 1968. It was my sort of 'training wheels' Tamiya big kit which although simplified compared to today's sophisticated kits, holds up amazingly well. Only the screen wiper has gone MIA. Remember Pactra enamel paints? Here they are. And honestly it's not a bad paintjob considering I was in my yout as a modeler and a person. Amazing too is that all the cars are in the same scale, and accurately sized, and seeing them together reveals stark size differences. The GT-40 prototype of 1966 looks tiny compared to the production-based 1976 Porsche 935. But the 910 of 1968 looks even smaller and more refined for small bore endurance racing just two years later. The size contrast continues with the mid-70's Countach and the modern Caterham 7. These all live in glass cages now and they will easily outlive me. Indeed, only the oldest (910) suffers from a sagged tire. Amazing work from Tamiya, Trumpeter and Doyusha, that last kit from the late '70's but just built this year. Still tucked away in plastic bins are four of the very early Tamiya F-1's, which also were built in the '60's and '70's. No aftermarket stuff and barebones detailing by me. These were advanced in their day and it was a satisfactory accomplishment completing them as a kid. Lotus, Matra, Ferrari and Brabham: These were all stepping stones to more complex stuff which I wandered into over succeeding decades including my venture into 1:1 car building/racing/scaring old ladies. Before these were hundreds of smaller car/fighter plane/boat kits, a stint of scale R/C aero flying, visible human beings, paddle-wheel riverboats and Lord knows what else my mercifully lost memory can't recall. So I hope it was worth the wait Jim and thanks for asking. / C

Herewith the aforementioned desultory development hitherto not posted herein.... Yesterday, or perhaps it was last Christmas - it was in any event the previous page - the fuselage strakes had acquired some lateral flanges. The nextstep required these here resin rivets. And they found themselves here: I wasn’t that impressed with the Archer domed rivets actually; a bit too much uneven blobbery and not enough identical domed rivetry. But good enough for the medial surfaces of the strakes. I couldn’t think of a good reason not to stick the tailerons on after that. So I did. And then it occurred to me that the just-drooped airbrakes could go on. I glued slivers of tube on the inside of the airbrake to fix the angle and provide a decent surface for the adhesive: And so we have tastefully drooping airbakes. If a droop can ever properly be described thus of course. The tailerons then needed a few of these of various design: To approximate the flat plates that do something or other at the pivot point of the tailerons: Upper: Lower: After that; more resin rivets were required. So back onto the stage crept this bunch (PS, for hints and tips on applying such rivets apply to Crisp - who has as much experience of the same as the rest of the modelling community combined ) Thankfully I only needed a few double rows on this occasion. To add a bit of character to the tailerons. And there they rest for the present. Although if you half close your eyes and squint, there are least outlines of aeroplanes now: There, I said there weren’t much

A bit of a top up for the thread is in order. All builds recently finished, all done as straight out the box ones as well, as befits a nostalgia thread. 😁 They appear in the GB threads and elsewhere, but they really belong here, so please forgive the repeat postings. First up, a few builds done for the Kits you built as a Kid Group Build, the Classic Airfix Sterling. No additions other than paint and the base. I've wanted one for the collection for ages, now I've got one! Then there's another Airfix gem, the Johnny Johnson Spitfire. Building this one took me straight back to 1966. Spitfires need something to shoot down, and what's better than a '109 for that? Revells '60's Bf 109 got called into play here. The green build isn't mine but it's exactly as I built it as a kid. Sat next to it is my current take on the same thing, done as the instructions call out, with grey instead of green. The opening canopy was state of the art to me when I first built the model. It's a bit basic these days! Here's the first Airfix Spitfire along with the first 109. Both leave a bit to be desired in the accuracy department, but still make nice period pieces. Both have been restored from old builds by me. Both versions of the Airfix Blenheim... And to finish todays instalment, another Airfix Spitfire. This time it's the MK1 from 1978. It seems a bit new to me but then I did the sums and realised it belongs in a nostalgia thread now! The pictures were taken a couple of days ago. I sat a card base on a car roof, facing into the setting sun here in the Fenns, added the model and here's the results. I took this one the following morning... That's all folks, more will be added as they come along. Tony.

Handley Page HP 67 Hastings C.1 of 99 Squadron RAF Transport Command 1956 S&M Models resin hollow cast kit. 1/72 scale. Notes on the build appear in the Cold War section.

I substituted the styrene exhaust stubs for thin-walled brass tube. The prop assembly was a head-scratcher. There are options in the kit to make parts for Finnish G.50s, plus options for the spinner. I think I’ve made a best effort that looks about right. Just the undercarriage to sort out, then ready for primer. Time to think about the CR.42 again.

I completed the stringers on the second bomb bay this morning and began work on the bomb beam. This is little more than assorted lengths of plastic strip cut to the required lengths using the Albion Alloys' cutter. I did mention that I might swap the bomb bay assemblies round if one was turning out better than the other and am now thinking that I will fit the second one to the T4 model as much more will be seen in that model as I am given to understand that the bomb bay on this mark was only ever used for carrying luggage. I would love to know what a luggage pannier looked like. The bomb beam is about 50% finished at the moment and when the glue on it is properly dry, most likely this evening, I should be able to get it finished during the next session. Anyhow, the bay involves little more than accurately measuring and cutting plastic strip to length and carefully gluing it into place so hopefully the process is now demystified. Thanks for looking. And just to prove I didn't cheat and have really made two bomb bays:

Well folks, although I haven't been able to devote much time to modelling recently I have made a bit of progress on the Gurnard. Unfortunately I'm at the stage where I seem to have to put in a lot of effort - which generally consists of filling and sanding! - without actually seeing any major progress, but I know that I'm getting there. Firstly the upper wing had a couple of slots cut in its upper surface with a razor saw, then each wing was bent at this cut and reglued with a 5 thou strip in the cuts to form the appropriate dihedral outboard of the centre section: Plenty of work still to do there, including cutting ailerons and adding quite a lot of surface detailing. The lower wing was shaped from laminated plastic card using a cabinet scraper and a variety of abrasives. it also had dihedral added in an identical manner to the upper wing and a first set of rib tape lines added with my Edding paint pen. The lower fuselage was marked out, cut and fettled, and the wing was cemented in place: Again, there's a lot of work still to do there, especially filling and smoothing around the underside joint. The main float is a pain, but I'm persevering. I've added 2 or 3 applications of P38 but more are needed to define the shape that I need to make vacforming male masters. The two halves have been tacked together with CA to assist in getting halves that actually match! I considered modifying or combining floats from my spares box (top: Novo/Frog Blackburn Shark, middle: Matchbox Fairey Seafox) but the shapes really don't lend themselves to it, especially aft of the step. I'll persevere with the moulds for now. By temporarily bodging the parts together with Blu-tac the overall configuration can be seen: Back to the filling and sanding! Jon

Evening everybody... I was able to take care of the small issues today with my hone brew PPP. A little re-scribing to restore the depth in the panel lines and should be all good. Please feel free to ask questions, post comments, and or add thoughts. Dennis

Hi, finished this after a good few months work. My first post as well so please be gentle. In short a fun and challenging build that generated every emotion known to man along the way.😀🤯😫 I find it best with these kits to complete sub assemblies before attempting to assemble the main parts as there is always a lot of dry fitting and sanding to be done. Also because of the size it all becomes a bit unwieldy in the old shed! It was re scribed where necessary to give the lining wash a bit more purchase. The rear windows are Crystal Clear. Landing lights are Little Lenses sealed in flush with Crystal Clear on the sides of the nose. The undercarriage was drilled and pinned with brass. Some aerials are photo etch and its finished in shades of my trusty Humbrol 27002 / 27003. Incidentally there's half a church roofs worth of lead in the front end to keep the nose down. Alas as I already have a Bear, Il-20 Coot and Madge completed with a Candid to do, I fear I may need a bigger shed. Hope you like it Cheers Pete To show the size of the beast

Another update,...... got some black on the Suez stripes,...... might do another coat yet,..... but hopefully it i untidy enough without looking too obvious? I still need to add tape over the door hinges etc and paint it silver to replicate the doped fabric which was applied to stop the static lines of the parachutes snagging, Cheers Tony

Hello, Here's my Kinetic 1/48 NF-5A in Royal Dutch Air Force markings. I started this kit in november last year, but it was put on hold for a while because I was waiting for some rocketpods that I wanted to put on the wings. Sadly, fate wouldn't let me have these, so I opted for some recycled Hasegawa Mk.82 Snakeyes instead, that I turned into inert ones. These kits came with a mold flaw in the clear parts, and the wingtip fueltanks are identical, not mirrored like the real ones. I emailed to Luckymodel, and they provided me with correct parts for a small fee. The instrument panel is not correct for a NF-5A, but who's going to notice. I did change the leading edge flap a bit, to make it more like the NF-5 ones. I used MR Paint on it, and Dutch Decal markings to make it like a 314 Squadron one, based at Eindhoven AB. The big E was applied for the 1978 Tactical Air Meet at Wildenrath. The real K-3047 later went to the Hellenic Air Force. Thanks for looking, I hope you like it.

There aren’t many details left to add, aside from the main undercarriage and prop. Venturi tube attached to the starboard fuselage, gun humps on the nose (barrels will be brass rod as I don’t think I can clean the plastic ones up convincingly), and brass rod pitot tubes on the wings.

Hi, I’m having a little rest from big aeroplanes with red stars, and as I’m in the Asian Air Arms Sig and this Trumpeter Gannet was lurking in my stash, thought Id give it a go. Found a picture of an Indonesian Navy Gannet so tried to find some markings the right size but to no avail. In the end I decided to make my own with Visio and Crafty Paper. The result is shown in the photo. I have the FAA resin bomb bay, Eduard colour cockpit detail set, and the CMR resin wing fold set to play with as well. So in we go! The first stage was to clean up the resin bomb bay and then assemble the fuselage to the end of stage 1 of the kit instructions incorporating the cockpit detail set. This also involves cutting away the nose u/c bay rear mount, bomb bay doors and centre section of the wing spar. Once done the bomb bay was slotted in and with a bit more scraping it fitted nicely. Just a bit of a gap at each end. A bit of filling next and some sanding to remove my bloodied finger prints that the super glue ripped off while I was fitting the bomb bay! The transparencies distort quite a bit so I don't think much of this will be visible in any clear detail! Bit of a gap front and back

Good evening, dears. It's my next model from exellent Tamiya's kit.

small but beautifully formed. Nice update Steve. I'm with you on the Archers decals. I've only used them a couple of times but not been over impressed with either the form or the ability to adhere to the substrate FYI - Social distancing doesn't apply to forums you know - you can update as often as you like. Though it would be preferable if you'd update as often as we'd like!

Not only kids Ced. My Full name is Benedikt Maria Budde. Some of the authorities forgot to underline my second prename in my documents. So it's also not underlined elsewhere in my Id card passport etc.. I like that name nowadays., but as you can imagine my school fellows called me Maria, Marry, Benedikte and so on. Not enough, I get official posts/mails to Frau Budde, Frau Benedict (french female name) Maria... from time to time. Last year I phoned with one of my dentists crew for a meeting and they asked me, if it would be ok, when my wife could make the appointment at that date and if she doesn't mind, that I make that for her. I said no. I don't explain these things anymore.. I introduce myself personally normally then with a slight pejorative look and it works mostly. Cheers

Hello lads, Here is the latest release from the workbench : the White 10 Mystère IV of Israel's Heyl Ha Avir, from Azur/FRROM in 1/72. The model was built straight from the box, so with all shape issues (mainly the nose which is too thin and conical, and the too hefty aft fuselage). The resin and PE included in the box are a nice addition. Except for the nose intake veins, the build was pretty straightforward (the modeller's mistake notwithstanding 🤣). Vallejo/Modelcolor paints, with oil paint weathering, kit's decals and Pébéo mat varnish. Update on July, 18th : Edited photographs to fix the contrast. Should looks better now!

More venom shenanigans. 🤩 I need to do the inside of the wing flaps Silver so I tried out some steel paste. I know @CedB loves this stuff so I thought I’d try it out on a mule. Wowa! That works really well. 😇 I think I need o do another silver bird soon. So flaps. I popped some paste on and did a little buffing. Not too much mind. I did add a top coat after I tried it out on the mule. it does knock back the sine but that’s what I wanted this time around but hell it still looks good. Tip of the wing is Tamiya gloss. TS13 and on the left is Vallejo gloss for metallics. Ced has said he has weathered directly on the base paste so I’ll try that too. But later. 🥳 Any how the task in hand. Tools of the trade. Grey and dark dirt Flory. Aaand a wide brush. 🤩 Splat! splurgggee. The top got a good bast. As did the bottom. Looks like I just slapped it on. But I did mix and choose where I slapped it on. 🤪🤣. also went with a mix of black glory on the top too. We shall see how it dries and if it all goes well. 🤔 next up is all the bits. Flaps, air brakes and UC doors. Wheels, legs, arrestor hook and bits and pieces. Oh and remember those? They need all the trimmings before being lowered in place. 😇 that strip is for Over the Ghost. 👻 Some surgery next. The front UC is put together in the kit in two halves with the wheel sandwiched in the middle. This won’t do for painting. So chop, chop. Drilled and brass rod. That will be nice and strong. I can glue that now and fit the wheel later. 🙌 I almost forgot these. They go together like this. Now I might need some help from the BM hive mind. Should the rockets and pilon really be silver? Seems odd to me. 🤷 Thanks for any help. 😇😍 she’s dry now. So the BIG clean up can commence. 🕺 More soon. Thanks for taking the time to come see this silly old bird come together. Take care and all the best. Hope you’re all having a splendid week. Johnny. 🦈

Cheers Gent's it has been a slow week another 3 layers of the still water and more cotton wool and made a start on the main deck railings I think the water now has the depth and shine I was after Stay Safe beefy

Hasegawa Fuji T-1A, 1971. John

Well, I have sorted the join and it didn't take too long. I used some green putty as a start and then , after sanding that back, I went across anything that was still visible with superglue and sanded that back. After adding the tail and tailwheel I gave it a coat of Halfords Plastic Primer. by John L, on Flickr by John L, on Flickr

This is the way things stand now after a few spray sessions. Most all of the actual plane is now sprayed and just needs a bit more for final assembly.........just have to do the armourment/loadout. Enjoy.............

Interior work has begun, radar/FLIR console awaits paint and refinements Internal panels with fillets of glue to set and remain flexible ready to refine them OK let that all dry out and look for the little chopter. Where did I put it?

Spit almost ready to the gallery ...

Dried out and damp sanded That'll do for me, now to sort the innards Ciao baby

Thanks for all the interest, kind words and pointers towards helpful information, especially the other builds of this kit. Talking of the kit, here's a quick look at it: The rather nifty Box art: Intimidating amounts of plastic: Still more intimidating amounts of plastic: If you're thinking "He's in trouble, there's only one propellor in that lot", then fear not, there's a duplicated sprue and I didn't think you needed to see both of them. The paperwork: I looked at the other PE sets Eduard do for this kit but realised that as a PE tyro, tackling any of that stuff would have killed stone dead any chance of finishing this by the end of October. I had been intending to use Tamiya acrylics since they were what the instructions specified but having read some of the articles on this site and others about the accuracy of various manufacturers hues, particularly some of the arcane mixtures of Tamiya paint recommended, I decided to go with Xtracrylic instead. I'm no Luftwaffe expert so this will probably be close enough for me. Having looked at all the glazing in the kit, and heeding the advice from you all, I've also ordered up the Montex masking set, another first for me. I have to say, I'm a little intimidated by the task ahead of me. I don't think I've tackled something this big since I completely mucked up an Airfix 1/24 Spitfire 45 years ago. I've also no idea where I'm going to put it when it's finished. I would have preferred a 1/72 kit but H-3s seem to be few and far between in that scale (or any scale for that matter). I did find a suggestion that one could buy the new mould Airfix P-2 and H-6 kits and combine them to produce a H-3 but I feared that would be pushing my skills to the limit, not to mention more expensive than the ICM kit. As is probably obvious by now, not much is known about 1H+FT, other than it was a H-3. The kit comes which a fair amount of alternative weaponry but which to use? One of the marking options is for an aircraft from II.KG26 but it's a 1941 aircraft which, I assume would have been tooled up considerable after the Luftwaffe's experiences the previous year. In the end, I'll probably go for the weapon fit of the early 1940 marking option and wait for someone to prove me wrong. I have a couple of days off coming up soon so glue may well be applied to plastic soon! Thanks for reading, Craig.

Over the last few weeks, I've had a bit of a Harrier binge. It started off with an unplanned purchase of the Airfix Hawker Siddeley Harrier GR.1, which I saw in Hobbycraft. I was really impressed with this little kit, and I liked the vintage look. I hadn't really done many camouflage paints, the only others being the 1:72 Spitfire and 1:48 Lightning. I also saw the GR9A, which looked nice and modern, and then I was intrigued to see the versions in between. So after browsing ebay, I ended up with a collection... All Airfix 1:72 kits, here are: Hawker Siddeley Harrier GR.1 Hawker Siddeley Harrier GR.3 BAe Sea Harrier FRS1 BAe Sea Harrier FA2 BAe Harrier GR9A All of these kits are really enjoyable to build, and although they have a skill level of 2, they each took a while to build. They're also pretty nicely detailed, and I'm impressed with how they turned out. I've also discovered that I can donate the Flying Hours of these kits to the Models for Heroes charity, and I'm sad that I've thrown away so many boxes with the stamps because the Airfix club was not accepting new accounts for such a long time.

A further dry fit for the nose. Looks good to me. I’ve also fitted the cockpit door/side screens. I’m still able to fit basic representations of belts at this point. I had a really rough night, with very little sleep. I think it’s fair to say I’m not firing on all cylinders today, so I’m avoiding the brass thing as the risk of badly breaking something is quite high. In between domestic duties, I shall peck away at this model. I really need to work out the jig scheme for the Falco, and then I might be able to get some primer squirted about.

A bit of a catch up required here, modelling has been a bit hit and miss here recently with building getting squeezed in where and when I can. The plane is all one bit now as a few choices have been made regarding how far I'm going to take the build. ] Interior detail is out. Looking into the cockpit of the Frankensunderland sees next to nothing visible inside. Once the interior is painted black, the eye ignores it and focuses on the framing instead. That does mean the framing has to be decent, but that's a fair trade. I'll be opening up the fuselage gun positions but the holes will get figures filling them, so my need to detail inside is very much reduced. The props need replacing. The Airfix ones have grossly oversized spinners that the early planes didn't have. I'll be digging around the parts boxes for suitable replacements. The fuselage needs a few portholes adding both to the sides and the spine. I'm in two minds as to how to display the plane, so I'm going to cover both options to remove the need to decide! A land base or a seascape would both suit the plane. The land side of things got started by ruling off a sheet of greystock card and giving it a good dirtyup. I'm after the look of a dockyard service and repair type thing. Crates, oil drums, chains and lines, tarp's and various other suitable extras dotted about should give the right feel. I'll also be building a sea base like the one below, but bigger. Here's a few pictures taken as it went together. [/url There's a bit of a gap in the build sequence now as the plane got paint applied while the camera was elsewhere. It's currently in cammo and some of the decals are on. There's a ton of paintwork yet to come but I like seeing the plane appearing out of the parts as soon as possible. An odd way of building, but it's worked for me so far. I've also bought a few Dart Castings to use in the dockyard. Really nice poses, very casual and restrained. The poses are just about spot on for Brit workers, man with hands in pockets, man leaning on broom, that type of thing. A few of these added to the plane should give a nice sense of scale and purpose to the whole thing. The ones in overalls look suitably military. The others can be civvy types. I'll add pins to the feet so I can use them on other bases. More as it happens.

I blame myself. This is what happens when a chap let’s his attention briefly wander...... As it happens, I have been gently browsing the BM pages recently with a view to unobtrusively reacquainting myself with its comings and goings...And I have to say that the work of the various contributors I have been wont to follow has now reached such levels of skill, ingenuity and sophistication that I think an industrial revolution must’ve occurred whilst I was looking the other way For my part, I’m presently grappling with the tricky issue of what photo hosting provider to use. I have an old “legacy” account with Photobucket, which costs me a couple of pounds a month, and which I expect I need to keep paying for just so that all of the photos of this build so far I don’t disappear overnight… But I’m not inclined to trust Photobucket to have any more of my photos. I’ve got a free Flickr account, which I’m not entirely comfortable with – perhaps because I’ve not used it much – but I’ve just had to go back and re-create links to the photographs on flickr I posted here at about Christmas time; and I seem to have lost half a dozen – as Sven pointed out. The answer for me may be to use my Microsoft Onedrive account which has 1TB of storage and which includes the facility to embed stored photographs. I believe... I do have a few photographs of some (very) desultory work on the Hawks which I’ll see if I can post. It bain’t be much mind.

If I tell you how many hours I spent on this detail on the door and the body, you will don't believe me! And it's not really completed! Dan.

Hi everyone, It's been just about a week into the group build now and I'm loving following everyone's progress. There's some fabulous modelling going on out there! I have some progress of my own to report: I've finished the cockpit, glued the fuselage together and added the top wing for good measure. When dry-fitting I found it easier to install the top half of the wing followed by the bottom for some reason rather than both together, so will add the bottom half later. It's starting to look suspiciously like a Blenheim. By the way, that image on the table is an actual photo of the docks at Dunquerque on 19th September (an enlargement is also below courtesy of the IWM), so would fit in with the time period R3816 would have raided the invasion ports. That's all for now, I expect to progress this some more over the weekend. Matt

All fine here Mike A quick test, he's almost done just the mic to add. Enjoy

Thanks Jamie, Bill, forgive me, I had no idea we'd met, small world at this scale, isn't it Thanks very much Neil, was that from a squadron diary? I got the rudder pedals and lower IP fitted and painted up the oxygen unit: Which was then fitted, along with the paired trim-wheels/tailplane incidence adjuster or whatever-that-thing-is: Nothing to report here, really, the holes for the sub-assemblies in the cockpit floor are pretty tight especially if you are painting before adding the sub-assemblies but of course we all test-fit before applying any glue so it won't be us who gets caught out, oh no, no chance of that here But if, purely theoretically and just for the sake of argument, you do find yourself in that position, just scrape off the paint and try again. A, er, friend of mine had to cut a fair bit off the peg at the bottom of the oxygen unit to enable it to fit snugly onto the cockpit floor. Next, onto the cockpit side walls. I've got the day off work today, and a large fried breakfast at the newly re-opened Tartan Cafe, a long-awaited and equally long overdue haircut and perhaps even a bit of modelling time are on the cards... Cheers, Stew

Hello everyone... was able to get the gaps and seams taken care of with my homemade PPP. Some basic re-scribing to restore lines to proper depth and it should be all good. Please feel free to ask questions, post comments, and or add thoughts. Dennis

Hiya Folks,.... another update,........... while measuring the stripes up I realised that I had to add another window,...... so this was carefully cut out; Then I started to apply the masking for the stripes,..... I didn`t make it too accurate as they appear quite rough on the real thing; Then I applied Xtracolor enamel Light Stone,...... with some rough black stripes added on top of the masking to see what the finished stripes would look like,.... and to be honest,..... I thought the Light Stone would look more yellowy,....... so I might just repaint them yellow instead? Cheers Tony

The masks of the Uruguayan model are off. Fortunately all looks good. The Canadian model did not have the light on the fuselage nose (where I am inserting now the handling stick), so before I apply the new color that has to be filled and blended-in:

Gidday All, this is me in November 1974, just finished my last year of High School, and with a model of USS North Carolina BB55 I'd built that year. The model was scratch-built from balsa, matches, tooth picks and wood shavings. My sole reference for the build was a plastic model that I scaled up. And nearly 46 years later, here's me again with the same model. As you can see, 46 years of cobwebs, dust and neglect, and looking the worst for wear. And so is the model. SWMBO says I need a haircut. "Which one? 😀" "All of them! 😠" I've probably shocked you all enough, now. Regards to all, and stay safe, Jeff.