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Hi folks Finally F-14!! Those modellers who followed my works know I have been building Iranian fighter jets models in past couple of years. This time is tomcat's turn! The kit is Hasegawa PT46 F-14A Tomcat in 1/48 scale built straight from the box with exception of AIM-54 phoenix and AIM-7 sparrow missiles which come from Hobby boss kit and AIM-9s from AFV Club F-5 kit. The kit is really nice but it has it's own famous complexities specially in intakes. colors are mixture of Mr.Color , Tamiya and Hataka colors. Hope you enjoy Pictures taken by my cell phone. Barzin 001 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 002 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 003 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 004 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 005 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 006 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 007 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 008 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 009 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 010 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 011 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 012 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 013 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 014 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 015 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 016 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 017 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 018 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 019 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr} 020 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 021 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 022 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 023 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 024 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 025 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 026 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 030 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 031 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr With his mates: 032 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 033 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr 034 by Freddy Pilot, on Flickr

hi everyone !😄 this is my FUJIMI 1/24 FERRARI 288GTO. build it almost out of box,just add some detail parts ..the kit is aged, but I think the shape is quite well, and no fitting issue..a easy kit to build! hope you guys like it!!🙂 and here is the video build if you are interested..🙂

Here's my latest build. Overall, it is a a good kit with some fit issues (engine nacelles and main landing gear). Freehand camo painted with MRP RLM 75 & 76 and Tamiya NATO black used on bottom. Added Eduard PE & wheels, brake lines/clamps from lead wire, and applied kit decals. Included a couple pics with my Hasegawa Me-262. This build was challenging and I need a beer! LOL! Rich

Hiya Folks, Well I`m very glad to see the new Airfix 1/72nd Mosquito B.XVI kit released at last and it looks very nice indeed,,...... I intend to build quite a few and want to start off with a conversion to a B.35 version operated post war from Celle in Germany by 14 Sqn, RAF. As others have said already,.....the bomb doors are incorrect for a bomber version,..... but they are correct for a target tug and as I intend to build one of these at some stage,.... I`m not complaining as the detail can easily be sanded smooth. The bulge behind the bomb doors looks like nothing I`ve seen on a Mossie though,.... maybe it is specific to a TT too,.... I`d have to research it more,..... but it is wrong for a B.35 and needs to go! Thankfully Freightdog Models are releasing a number of resin sets for this kit, which include a B.35, so I have oe of these on order,.... plus they do a decal sheet with the very Mosquito that I want to build,..... a overall silver 14 Sqn aircraft,..... so lets crack on! Here is the kit and the Freightdog decal sheet; A closer look at the sheet,..... I`m proud to say that I helped research this sheet and the option that I`m building, which is CX-B at the top of the sheet! Here are the parts, mostly pre painted on the sprue,.... ready to build; I did have a problem with the bomber canopy as it had some moulding problems, almost as if something had been draped over it while the plastic was still wet,....... but after a few e mails to and fro with Airfix and some proof that I had purchased the kit,..... they sent me a replacement which was fine; Personally I think the detail is just right and it certainly looks the part. Here are the parts from Freightdog,..... the photos are taken from their facebook page,..... because they have not arrived yet,.... having only been released today! ,... The first set shown is the B.35 set, seen dry fitted to a kit; And here is another view of the B.35 set along with the other set released today for a H2S equipped Mosquito B.XVI (H2S) with flat bomb bay doors; So,.. I`ll be having a whittle away tonight and crack on while awaiting the resin parts, Cheers Tony

In my opinion one of the most iconic Finnish Air Force fighters of WWII was the Brewster-239. Finland ordered 44 of them from the US and they saw action against the red army from the summer 1942 onwards. The pilots liked the Brewster very much and they achieved an incredible number of 460 victories with that fighter type. The nickname the pilots gave to the stubby BW was "Pylly Waltteri" or "Bum Walter"😆 One of the highest scoring aces of Finland during the whole war was major Eino Luukkanen. He scored a total of 56 victories. In his personal mount, the BW-393 he had a special way to mark the victories. He stuck a beer bottle label to the tail for each kill 😂 The Brewsters of his flight were painted in blue with white numbers. I built the 1/48 scale model of his plane from a very challenging Classic Airframes kit. The fit of the parts was poor and especially the clear parts of the cockpit caused a lot of trouble. After a long fight I managed to get them somehow in place. Building the kit was practically endless sanding and puttying. However, despite the difficulties I'm pretty satisfied with how the model turned out. Major Luukkanen with his BW-393 and 17 beer bottle labels to mark his victories

While I encountered more difficulty with this model than I had anticipated (so what’s new?) and, as with all large models, it took longer than a smaller airplane would, I feel that the result is impressive. There are better made examples of this kit on this forum (I see one beautiful example with motorized propellers) but I feel that my relatively 'quick and dirty' approach to model making has some merit too. To see more photos and description, click the link in my signature and then click Gunship: Spectre of death (indented under Vietnam war plastic models). (That hopefully complies with forum rules limiting links to personal web sites while avoiding duplicating content on different servers.)

Simple Shapes and Complex Processes. In the last post I talked about simple processes making complex shapes. This post is sort-of the opposite. Here the task of making a simple hole demands a few more steps than I anticipated. Plan 'A' looks fairly straightforward - just get a 25mm spade bit and drill out the rear-end as shown. When using a spade-bit always start by running the drill backwards to scribe a nice clean circle that will prevent the surrounding wood from chipping out. So far things are looking good. But a few seconds after starting the drill in earnest we see that things did not go well. Since the two halves of the fuselage are not yet glued together the two pieces slipped relative to one another causing an oval cut and the drill bit broke out of the bottom of the airframe. I was not a happy camper at this point and was not sure how to progress from here. Here's what I did; just drilled a series of smaller holes in the area that will need to be hollowed out and then... started digging out the unwanted volume with a chisel. The pre-drilled holes sped the process up and helped guide me but overall this was pretty ugly work. Eventually he chisels gave me a near semi-circular recess in each half of the fuselage that I could attack with a circular grinding tool. Fortunately at this start of this process I had intentionally left a few mm of surplus wood on the rear of the aircraft. When I sanded that off, the resulting hole was greatly tidied up. Of course once the tail was slotted into place the tail's root was still in the middle of the hole, so something had to be done. After a couple of minutes with the scroll saw we had this... Which after a bit of cleaning up with some rolled-up coarse sand-paper, left... this! Which I think looks OK despite the close call with disaster near the start of this post. Next up, the two halves of the rear fuselage will get glued together. Then I might start rounding off that very ugly square cross-section. Sorry about the cruddy photos folks - definitely time for a new shed camera. Best Regards, Bandsaw Steve

Hey all, Here's Eduard's 1/48 P-51D-5 from their profi-pack kit. Attracted to the colour schemes, I bought this kit a few months ago when it first came out but I've only just got round to it now. It was definitely hard to choose what colour scheme to do her in! Hence why I might've bought a few of Eduard's Overtrees to go with it... Overall it's a very nicely detailed kit and cleverly engineered, however it's still no Tamiya, as I found the fit lacking in a few areas and the tolerences didn't allow for much play with the parts, they had to be put in spot on otherwise the next bit wouldn't necessarily fit. Being this is my first attempt at an NMF, I tried to play it safe with Tamiya Laquers as they actually have quite a nice selection of metallic tones that have been released. I pre-shaded first in black then went in with the metallic colours. Handily, Eduard actually provide a guide to the various metallic finishes that Mustangs wore during their service, and denoted where the aircraft was lacquered or left bare-metal. The Tamiya laquers were also quite hardy so took the heavily weathered effect I was headed for without damaging the finish. Saying that though, I still varnished the bird with Tamiya Semi-Gloss to make it a bit more uniform in appearance. Thanks for looking guys! Sam

I hope not Bill. I don't want to have to do this over again anytime soon. the terms slapdash, haphazard, and making it up as I go along immediately spring to mind Terry thanks Giorgio I wonder if he would get a badge for that? My conscience is absolutely clear Crisp. thanks Ian. There are certainly times where it pays to sit back and try and think things through, and then try anything in desperation. thanks Tony. I'm impressed with the ease of assembly using this method. It certainly allows you all the time in the world to get things right before the light saber wreaks havoc thanks Wellsprop Just a short midweek update. It is midweek isn't it? I lose track of time these days working from home. In addition to being mega-impressed by the lightsaber and goo method, I was pleasantly surprised and impressed by how easily the joints cleaned up. This was only a few minutes work with some sanding sticks. They are by no means perfect, but I was trying my best not to lose the subtle detailing of the rib tapes. It was impossible at times but I did my best. In almost no time at all I had the cockpit interior assembled (again) and stuck the lower mainplane in place. A little bit of work will be required on the seams but I've seen much worse on professional kits. More stuff was shoved down the back end in preparation for the joining ceremony. There are a few more bits to go in there but I think I can those in from the gunners aperture later. Then it was joined. Flattening the end surfaces left a small gap but once again, noting to really worry about. Note to self - remember to mask that window before primer. And we now have something that is almost recognizable as a Wapiti I really want to hit this with primer to see how those seams look, but I'm reluctant to use my current batch of alclad given the history of problems I've had with it. I have another bottle on order, but it will likely take a week or so to arrive. Hopefully it will be from a decent batch otherwise I'm done with alclad primers. Full stop. It's surprising how big this aircraft is - and it's going to be much bigger once the tail surfaces and the other wing go on. In the meantime, I guess I should now start to work out the rigging and where to drill hundreds of little holes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PT0ay9u1gg4

Greetings Model Friends- Well I am still keeping up the progress and finished my 3rd Model in last Month! This one is a 1/48 Academy P-47N with some nice Nose Art! '2 Big and Too Heavy!' This flew out of Iwo Jima and is the 'Big' version of P47 with the larger wing and looks really 'different' compared to a standard wing P47. This one had a resin cockpit which was a bit of a challenge to get to fit in the fuselage! I also added the resin propeller so it would be the right type. NMF really scares me and I don't yet know how to weather it well, so leave it in nice shape. This bird was repainted with the tail stripes originally, so I pictured it just after that and is really clean. The original plane photos don't show much weathering, no gun soot, only some exhaust stain, so that's what I did. This time I tried the Gunsie Mr. Color super metallic paints and love them! The Main areas are painted in SM201 super fine silver, and as you can see is like a mirror. Then I did the flaps and ailerons in a SM204 stainless and the section of wing over the MLG also in the stainless which is a little more flat and darker as this was in photos. Then the Gun doors I painted in SM203 Super Iron to get them darker like in photos. I really liked the finish and it looks more interesting having different sections of fuselage and wings in different silver colors. The fuselage side panels and cowl flaps were also painted the darker stainless silver. Decals were a huge issue. The stencils came from the kit, and a zotz P47N sheet. The Main decals for insignias came from an Aeromaster P47N sheet. Then the Nose art came from the excellent Zotz decal sheet for this P47N. Unfortunately the zotz sheet had the cowl decals too large! I had to use Aeromaster which were correct size. All in all I needed 4 different sheets of decals to get the decals for the complete airplane all selected for different parts so they would look right. Some things I goofed were the tail stripes. I used the aeromaster sheet and they fit the Academy kit well, however the carrier film connected two stripes (narrower) and the third is separate. So the stripes are not quite right. Next time cut stripes apart and put them on individually. The other hard part was the underwing rocket mounts are molded into the lower wing! These needed to be removed for this airplane. Photos show them not installed. So that was really hard cutting them and sanding and filling the lower wing that had the remnants of the rocket mounts to remove. This was really hard to do. So don't look at underside of model! It was a fun build and I enjoyed it and it looks smashing on the Pacific TO shelf in the model case !

Wow…… 2nd from the bottom, guess I’d better start this one! Ok, the F-4EJ is like decal purgatory….. never ending, F-2 Digital scheme…. KUTA purgatory…. KUTA life after death?, F-4B, postal purgatory…. still waiting, Mythical Draken……. just plane purgatory! 🤣 So guess I’d better start of something that won’t send me to hell in a handbag…. ….so usual blah blah blah…. Not following instruction, jumping around all-over the place, forgetting to take photos….. a normal Rich build! But first up I did some extra research on the aircraft/time frame of this particular aircraft, I now have a pretty good matrix of what went where. She was a Block 85 series in the build, so an earlyish one, with a mix of early and new bits. Still had the early 7 hole style gun cover, later standard model Beaver tail, ALQ-100, solid nose tip. Luckily all except the gun port are supplied in the kit. Plus was able to find out her standard weapons loadout as well. That sorted, I just decided to prep lots of bits, glue stuff, add PE, glue fingers to PE/model….. but had lots of fun, so here’s where it’s at…. … flying surfaces together, the wings…. if I had been just a wee bit more careful, I wouldn’t have had to even clean up the edges, the fit is that good! Said now/old gun post cover added, just need to fill small gap, resin bit was not 100% perfect fit. I hate PE, especially this super thin stainless-steel stuff from Aumr Reaver! It’s really detailed but nearly 1/3 the thickness of the Eduard PE, so quite hard to handle. These were a absolute pain to fit, and theirs still a fan to go behind. All cockpit detail removed….. ….and new PE bit fitted. PE bits fitted into the wheel wells. All resiny bits given a good wash. This is the bag of leftovers so far, still few more bits to go. As mentioned I have the weapons load sorted, had though of fitting the AIM-54 Phoenix’s, but the more common mission profile was BARCAP, so Sparrows & Sidewinders it’ll be. Have made a good start, so can put her aside now and finish the F-4EJ……and maybe do something on the Draken……maybe! Plus in a moment of madness/Lockdown fever, I’ve bought another Tomcat (that’ll be 6 now), Tamiya’s updated F-14A, the late model, well it’s on pre-order. This one come with flaps-n-slats, “squat” position for launch, deck, deck dude, and other goodies, release date in November. 🥰

Hey y’all hope you’re well is going well. Mine is busy, busy, busy. I have found myself at the bench tonight for a brief hour or so however. So a mini update. 😍 The UC has had break lines added with lead wire. And I did some subtle filters. You can see them around the hard corners, and under the intake. See the brown marks? That’s them. 😀 A few small panels and on the main lines. Also around the vents and ports. The tanks got some love too. Almost forgot about the spinner. For some reason I thought it was just yellow. I was wrong. 😮😬 so out with tamiya for curves and some red paint. And with the masking off we have a stripy shnozzle. 😀 Cheeky test to see how it might look. Lovely. 🥰 Well a solid little update. Thanks for popping by. Take care and s always. Happy modelling. 🐎 Johnny

Wheel well shots of the mudguard as reference.

At the Moscow "Мир детства 2021" expo, ICM has announced a 1/72nd family of Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-23/-27 Flogger from 2022 Source: AlexGRD V.P.

G'day All Call me crazy, but Im about 2/3 of the way through a Kinetic multi build of the harriers in my stash. This is the first one off the block. I have added an eduard PE set to the cockpit, reskit wheels, and a Flightpath Practice Bomb Carrier. Model was completed using Mr Color paints and the kit decals. Things were going swimmingly until the glue wicked up the inside of the windscreen. It was all downhill after that. I managed to get the windscreen back off and polished, but Im not happy with how it refitted. After this, I kind of gave up, hence the shoddily fitted canopy and some smaller parts. The next one is just about finished as well, that being their new AV-8A All comments welcome Thanks for looking Bruce

Hello, Here's my just finished 1/72 Special Hobby AH-1S Cobra. I did mine as 71-21024 of the 503rd Aviation Company, based just outside Hanau in (West) Germany in around 1980. Lovely little kit, just a little fiddly. Painted with MRP's Helo Drab. Thanks for looking, Pete

Hi, We no longer present the Mirage IIIE, flagship of French aeronautics from the 60s to the 80s which equipped many air forces around the world. The plane presented here has a rather particular history because it is one of the two planes which took part in the operation Tamara in July 1973. This secret operation at the time consisted in dropping on the atoll of Mururoa on August 28, 1973 a 6KT nuclear bomb AN52. The decoration of the plane corresponds to the standard scheme of the time but with some markings specific to this event, in particular the pennant of the C46 on the left fin, emblem of the EM 85 "Loire" based in Mururoa. The model used is that of Modelsvit.. The decoration is also from the box. The model is excellent. Detailed in every nook and cranny with high quality engraving, even if some are skeptical about riveting. In addition to its extreme details, the model is also very precise with high quality of all the assemblies. The whole is at the price of a sometimes a little high complexity and an equally important number of parts. This is the brand's first Mirage III box. The few defects of this box (seal on the rudder, lower surface seal, fixed elevons, dimensions of some cans a bit too short) are all corrected in the following boxes. Well done to Modelsvit for this quality. Make way for photos. Complete set of photos can be find here and the work in progress there. Hope you will like it. Alain.

Finished the decals all except the formation lights and that red dot to the left of the rear bomb bay fairing. Microl Sol & Set but the starboard roundel & 'K' wouldn't conform over the strengthener strip so needed a slice with a razor blade and a bit X20A as a softener then it was conformal. The exhausts looked too dark, I think I might have used the wrong paint on them too. Could have used Alclad Jet exhaust by mistake. Masked around them and used Alclad 123 Exhaust manifold. Next I'll seal them in with some more gloss cote then probebly a Flory darkwash followed by a matt coat and a little weathering. Nearly there but as I write this I've just noticed the red circle behind the cockpit is still on the decal sheet. Looks like thats the next job then. CT

...are you mad! Oh, you are, service is resumed😄 Superb work going on Giorgio, and I really like the Hellanic jets. Really fancy the new FineMold Phantoms. Bit late, but hope these may help with the nose strakes. F-4E Phantom AUP 01618 by James Thomas, on Flickr F-4E Phantom AUP 01618 by James Thomas, on Flickr F-4E Phantom AUP 01508 by James Thomas, on Flickr

Plus the Magic Scale Modelling Light & sound kit. AOA decals, Quickboost pilot & RIO, painted Mig Ammo light gull grey. Link to video at the bottom showing the light & sound of engine start etc. (I know the open canopy position isn’t right but I’m delicately balancing best I can before I commit to glueing - the only minus point for Tamiya in this kit!) thanks for looking. jump to 2:55 if you want to skip my rambling

I got a bit burnt out doing the last details on my Airfix Vulcan so decided to do the only logical thing and build another Vulcan. I didn't have an XJ--- Vulcan and I hadn't done a white one in a few months, I'd also recent purchased a few Vulcan photos from eBay and one is of XJ783 in about 1962/63. So I went to the stash and retrieved a GWH Vulcan. I decided to just build and not do any WIP threads or anything, quite refreshing, and in only three days I had a completed model. But first some of the few WIP pictures I bothered to take. A few modifications were made for this one, because I do like to get my Vulcans right. First I removed the squared RWR from the fin and made it into the correct version for a white Vulcan. The TFR was removed from the nose and I blended in the seperate tip part, then scribed around the front of the nose to make it into the original smooth nose. I filled the hole for the IFR probe and removed some blisters from underneath. The tip of the tailcone was also reshaped to make it into Red Steer Mk1 instead of Mk2, I sanded through the plastic so half of it is built up from milliput. Primed out of a rattle can Very limited preshade by drybrushing It took a couple of layers to get the finish I wanted but Halfords Appliance Gloss White is great stuff. I had a masking disaster so had to paint the canopy panels. It looks fine in 1/144 and I actually prefer doing that in 1/200. Roundels and fin flashes are my own ones I printed. Serials were added from some spares from a Fündekal set she the sqn badge (83 Sqn) came from the same place. I forgot I hadn't printed a complete set of pale blue serials in this scale otherwise I'd have used my own. Details were painted with Hataka Blue Line paints (I'm quite impressed with them) and I gave it a Flory Dark Dirt wash Next to my Kiwi Vulcan from the ANZAC GB which is also the GWH kit. Four anti flash white Vulcans:

A short midweek update to keep things up to date. Looks like I'm going to have a busy weekend and may not get any time for modeling, and I'm also off on my travels again next week. I'm in one of those chicken and the egg situations. I don't want to put the roof on before I have the interior all fixed, and I can't fix anything in the interior until I have the canopy/windscreen in place as I need that to get the final location for the instrument panel. However, I still have a bunch of bits to be making up for the interior. Pedal boxes for instance. I've since decided that the left hand seat will have no flying controls so I shall remove the rubber pedals from that side and just leave the pedal box in situ. I spent a lovely hour or two getting sever eye strain painting up the dashboard. The kit part for the rear bench seat is woeful. Really. I had no alternative but to make one up and of course, there's nothing better for this type of job than brass. I had purchased a set of parallel jawed pliers the other week and they were perfect for holding 4 pieces of rod simultaneously so I could get all the bends equal don't know why I stopped painting to take this shot, but you can see that I used cigarette foil once again for the canvas seat. It really is a wonderful material for this type of part. A few more greebles added - the swing down legs, short stubby legs, and some straps to hold the legs up. That rod is 0.8mm and still looks a bit on the large side. I must order some finer brass rod for future work. There will be a little more detailing on the bench seat but not much, and I'm pleased with how it's turned out. Enjoyable to make, mainly because there's only one of them. When finished it will be attached to this bulkhead, though sitting higher up. Definitely needs some weathering there to take away the blandness. The canopy got dusting of transparent blue followed by a dusting of transparent smoke to darken it down as the blue was a bit bright. As it turns out the transparent smoke is not really all that transparent, but since the doors will be off to see inside it's not that bog a deal. After putting it off for a while and not being able to figure out a good plan, I just went for it and glued some plasticard on to the tail to make a start on the reshaping - which I am not looking forward to at all. In between all those little jobs I added some detailing to the instrument panel. I added some decals to the gauges. They are by no means airscale quality - they are some leftover italeri instruments from my Wessex build. The white box thing is decal strip and yes, it was a real pain to add. I can see one little rogue strip making the corner look untidy. With any luck I can disguise that with just a touch of paint. Then during the week, my long awaited order from Hannants came through. I finally have the roundels I need to finish off that Whirlwind . The fairing has been glossed in preparation for the final act of stickering. So I can at last get that airframe out of my dusty basement and into the display cabinet until next time folks.

Hi all, here's something a little different in the form of the slightly off-the-wall Lee-Richards Annular Monoplane. This model represents the third iteration of the aircraft which flew early 1914. An advanced design for it's time the aircraft actually flew pretty well. Unfortunately, due to the advanced concept and centre of gravity/fuel flow issues, all three prototypes crashed. Monoplane No.1 was taken for its maiden flight in November 1913 by Gordon England, who found it stable to fly but tail-heavy, resulting in a crash following an engine failure, the aircraft stalling shortly after take-off and falling some 150ft into telegraph wires. England survived to fly a second example, which was built with modified biplane tail surfaces. The design was easy to fly and control, with a good all-round view for the pilot, but this machine also crashed, England surviving yet again. The subject of this model, the third and final example, was modified further, being used regularly until the outbreak of World War One in 1914. Lee then tried to fly it himself but only succeeded in crashing into a lake, before safely swimming to shore. Two further examples were under construction in 1914 but neither were completed. Although a fun little model as supplied out of the box I decided to heavily modify it for better accuracy as there were a few errors in the kit (ie missing under nose slot to allow the Gnome Lambda engine to rotate, under fuselage wind driven pump, correctly shaped tail skid, undercarriage leg bungees etc). This involved adding a 3D printed Gnome engine and prop, replacement undercarriage structure and tail bumper, (all resin 3D printed by AIM), full scratch built interior (using wood veneer and Evergreen rod) a new fuel tank, the missing under-fuselage wind driven pump, scratch built upper rigging point pylon and a pair of lovely resin wicker seats, courtesy of Barracuda Studios. Uschi Van der Rostern 'Standard' elasticated line was used for the rigging. The model was painted using MRP lacquer paints and finished with AK weathering products. The model was built for the August issue of Airfix Model World. Thanks for looking, hope you approve. Melchie

This has been fun. Lot of firsts have been crossed off the list with this one. First resin kit First use of enamel paint First seascape base This will not be my last resin kit, I've ordered https://starling-models.co.uk/collections/1-350-resin-kits-1/products/hms-sir-gareth, looking forward to this one very much. The paint was supplied by https://www.sovereignhobbies.co.uk/, the paint was a joy to use, far better than the acrylics I'm used to and not too smelly, at least 'she who must be obeyed' didn't complain. The base, I made from crumpled up tin foil, flattened out and then a frame fitted to it and plaster of Paris poured over. Once set, I carved out the hull shape. This plaster of Paris method is, I think, bettered suited to waterline models, so I will investigate other methods. But having said that, I think it came out ok. I've put her at anchor, as I didn't fancy trying to form a wake. Perhaps next time. I have to say, resin kits are very different from your standard plastic, the detail was excellent and although you might think they are a bit expensive for their size. This one came with lots of PE and 3D printed parts. All of which I would usually add to a plastic kit, so the cost kind of evens out. And also of course, resin kits open up a whole different range of kits. She is not perfect, but if I fiddle any more I'll do more harm then good. So, here a few photos, which I hope you like. As always, please feel free to criticise.

Here is my 1/48 Airfix Bristol Blenheim Mk 1F, Depicted as ZK-A Flown by Mike Herrick RNZAF No. 25 Sqn RAF September 1940. Full build at my blog is here but here as some photos of the finished kit. More Pic's here

This is the ESCI F-100D, which is an old kit but still a very good one; Scalemates says it was first released in 1982, with this boxing dating from 1985. I’ve used some Eduard F-100D details (intended for the Italeri kit), Aires wheels, jet pipe and exhaust. The Esci cockpit is very basic but the Eduard etch and a little plastic card helped a lot. I was debating about dropping the leading edge slats until the superb Blackbird models replacement wing set came along and made the whole job a lot simpler! I cut the tabs off the elevators and attached some metal rod to position them at a more typical on-the-ground angle, and extended the intake inside with some paper and plastic card. The paints are Vallejo metallics, the national markings are from the kit (behaving surprisingly well despite their age) and the individual aircraft and squadron markings from Modeldecal sheet 69. I’m pretty pleased with this one.

This is my number 3 so I thought I'd go for a traditional RAF colour scheme this time. Decals are from sheet 4 of the new Xtracolor ones. Including all the dayglo markings. What made life a little easier this time was the new set of canopy masks from ArtScale. So its just a red white and grey one to go, plus G-BXGL off the forthcoming Xtradecal 'civil schemes' sheet. Thanks for looking again. 1 2 3 4 5

I`ve had a busy few hours but they have been fruitful,...... Started with the cockpit,..... unfortunately the radio from the rear decking has pinged off into the ether and I cannot find it,...... hopefully it will turn out somewhere silly! As we`ve all thought,.... Airfix must have other variants including a PR version on the cards at some point (years?) as there are flashed over holes etc in the lower rear fuselage for camera ports; Speaking of the rear fuselage,..... I`m quite bemused by the bulged area behind the bomb bay doors. I`m far from an expert on this,.... but I thought that it was the same width as the bomb bay and not narrower,... a depicted here by Airfix. I thought that it might be a feature of the TT,35, as per the bomb bay doors,..... but looking at the photos sent by Trevor I`m not sure now? Fuselage joined,... and onto the wings and engines; Tailplane on,..... which was simplicity itself,..... the engine nacelle parts are laid out,..... note the inserts for accepting the exhausts later on which need adding to the inside of the nacelles One down,.... one to go,..... And before you know it,..... the wings are on, with engines attached! Lastly for tonight,..... I have added the clear wing tips,... which will of course be painted later apart from the small ligt at the tip; So there we go,..... for now!! Cheers Tony

Thursdays update, only a short day today as things to do this afternoon. Most of the walls built, cutouts for doors and windows done and starting to take shape Hope your enjoying following along

Hello Dears, Some pics of the Tempests Wheel wells are done for the GB Tempest, it will depict a Mid- life one. This is definitely OOB, nothing added... Old Eduard kit, definitely not OOB, I used the PE set, modified the original seat plus some scratchbuilding... This new Tempest is a treat to build !! Assembled it is !! and almost no putty !! More to come soon, I hope that everything is going right for you all Gents !! Things start to settle down a bit on here !! Sincerely. CC

At blooming last I hear you say ! Yes finally my Azur Latecoere 298 is finished. It's a lovely looking aircraft, very sleek for its day, and with the exception of the struts joining the floats to the aircraft a very enjoyable one to build. Thanks for all the support and encouragement along the way Pictures below, I hope you like it. Cheers Pat

Greetings, comrades! Another Alexeyev fantasy plane has taken its place on the shelf. This is by far the last home-built of the series. There are only two pics of this machine, and not a correct drawing of the schematic. And the machine looks unattractive and mediocre on them. So, the panel effect with the strips and the strips came up to give it a more interesting look. Paint and varnish with brushes. Paint: GSI Mr.Color urethane acrylic, Tamiya varnish, futura, + simple pencil. Enjoy the view!

Some years ago I decided to build the very interesting looking Westland Wyvern S.4 which was a British carrier-based multi-role strike aircraft. The plane saw active service during the Suez crisis in 1956 in the Anglo-French Operation Musketeer whose aim was to capture the Suez canal from Egypt (who had nationalized that vital sea route). The Wyverns engaged in 82 missions, both in fighter-bomber as well as reconnaissance roles and black- yellow identification stripes were painted to the planes during the crisis. The Wyverns were powered by a turboprop engine driving eight large counter rotating propellers. Only a total of 127 Wyverns were built. I built my model from a 1/48 scale Classic Airframes kit which in my opinion was the best quality CA kit I have so far come across. The fit was very good and for instance the engraved panel lines were very fine and accurate. The model depicts the Westland Wyvern of the 830 Naval Air Squadron that operated from HMS Eagle in 1956 during the Suez crisis. Unfortunately I don't anymore remember the number of the paints but the colours were Extra Dark Sea Grey, Sky and Maroon.

So this build has been going on for 6 years on and off ( mainly off ) is finally coming to the close. In fact I started playing with the plastic and making plans 3 years before that! My intention with this build was to find the gem of a TSR2 kit that we saw in the original (resin?) pattern that appeared in the magazines of the time, that was hidden beneath some rather indifferent tooling. Made in the pre-CAD days the fit of the parts left a lot to be desired and often caused the details that were there to be obliterated by liberal applications of filler. I wanted to try and show that if the parts were properly prepped and fettled then the amount of filler and sanding could be dramatically reduced. In the meantime everyone else got on built the kit or fifteen! I'm not one for building whiff schemes usually as they often stretch reason to breaking point so but I had originally intended to build the Empire Test Pilot scheme in it's famous white, red and blue as I felt this was a plausible outcome where the production was still cancelled but the airframe was used for test and research work. I came across a build of this kit in this scheme ( admitted not well painted ) but the dark blue obscured all the detail in the underside making it look 2 dimensional and put me off it. I do love these scheme but will try it on a model with less time invested in it. So I decided to plump the early service scheme provided by Xtradecal (40 Sqn, RAF Coningsby, early 1968). In my mind though the saga of the TSR2 was just extended by a few years; a few service acceptance machines made were constructed and made it into the hands of the RAF who quickly repainted them from the factory anti-flash white to the camouflaged upper surfaces that was just starting to be applied to other service aircraft, the undersides with their low vis stencils were untouched. This was a vain attempt to make the TSR2 look like a part of the modern RAF arsenal. The airframes didn't even get fitted with the refuelling probe before the political rambling that had being going on for many years finally came to an end and cancelled the order for the production machines. Apart from the improvement to the fix of the main parts here is summary of the additional work done. Details added/replaced: Fin intake added Intake boundary layer guide vanes, replaced (vague moulding) Correct bogie retraction arm location Replaced pitot tube Nose and main leg cabling, nose steering jacks Accessories: The pre-painted Eduard "Zoom" PE had great details but poor colour choices, maybe try painting them MSG and using the kit decals Xtradecals were disappointing in that they broke up as well a the lack of stencils and other small decals for the camo schemes. The Model Alliance whiff sets look better but focus on RAF schemes. The Palva seats were lovely, and could be used to build a museum setting, they of cause need the inevitable trimming to fit. AIM ladders worked well too, though I replaced the poles with brass rod. Hind sight is a wonderful tool, however there things that I could have done better: Fixed the undersized bomb doors, before attaching Replaced and detail the ill fitting cockpit rear bulkheads Sanded the rear fuselage with the exhaust fairing in place so the contours match Better clear coats, I think the slight silvering places is down to the texture of my gloss coats As usual the final assembly threw up a few issues but I'm pleased I fought to get the cockpit canopies, probe, legs and tail all in alignment to be able to take the head on shot. I'm very happy with the camo and weathering and the overall look of the model, but at the moment mainly glad that it is finally finished. tl:dr here are the photos ( under dull, winter light unfortunately ) ... and here it is on the shelf with all my other pointy British jets.

It wouldn`t be a Tony O`Toole thread without some reference,...... so here we are! First off,.... here is the subject of my model,..... as depicted in this superb painting by Anthony Cowland GAvA,..... showing how low these aircraft flew, here it is seen over the UK during an exercise, flying from its German base to exercise Fighter Command; Ad here is the real VP202, CX-B a its home base at Wahn; And here are a mix of pics showing other 14 Sqn Mosquito B.35`s,...... they did operate a mix of camouflaged and silver aircraft, but I`m opting for a silver one,..... and maybe a camouflaged one from another of the BAFO Mossie Wing`s aircraft from Celle,.... possibly 98 Sqn; And a superb photo of 14 Sqn Mossies, Ex Dagger in 1948 when the majority of aircraft were still camouflaged,... most of these photos were sourced from the 14 Sqn Association, with thanks; The RAF Museum at Hendon have a Mosquito B.35 which served at Celle in Germany as part of BAFO with 98 Sqn; And here are some interior reference pics; Bomb Bay,.... this is the Mosquito Air Museum aircraft, I could not find those I took of the RAF Museum aircraft.....; And the bomb bay of the RAF Museum aircraft at Hendon; Bomb Stowage; Wheel Well; Cheers Tony

The enclosed photo, taken from a 1939 colour film inspired me to give the Classic Airframes kit a go. Apart from the main wheels being undersize the kit looks the part in spite of its age. Opening the sliding cockpit roof and adding two figures were the only additions to an otherwise straight forward build. Cheers, Etienne.

@Stew Dapple, @Cookenbacher, thanks gents! Vertical stabilisers painted and glued on - these got the same treatment as the fuselage with preshading and several thin coats building up the white. Masking the leading edges is a bit of a faff and as usual the photos show up little bits that need tidying up... Anyway, next up is the underside of the wings which are masked again and ready for some paint.

This is Monogram's venerable 1/48 Mossie done up as FB Mk. VI "Wolf" of 605 (County of Warwick) Squadron, 100 (Bomber Support) Group, flying from Bradwell Bay, Essex in late 1943. According to Aeromaster's 48-552 "Mosquito Raiders V" sheet, the squadron flew in support of the Main Force Lancasters to counter the threat of German nightfighters. Wikipedia adds mention of intruder missions and 'Doodlebug'-tipping over the Channel and Southern England. Paints are Tamiya acrylics. Hope you enjoy!

Giorgio, Here's that link to the Silhouette Hasegawa masks. Included is an SVG file for use in other cutters or manual cutting. Do the Phantoms you are modeling have the belly strap? Gene K

Winter is coming! Well George RR Martin seems to think so……. So 8 pages back and 6 months since the last post. Time for an update. I also discovered the purpose of the orange dot/star by the title of each thread. Who knew? Its so useful! So what have I been up to you might ask? Put new hip and ridge tiles on the roof on my parents house Put a new front road spring on the Mondeo, fixed the starter motor, then sold it. Put a new roof on my garden shed Made some new window frames Painted a lot of wood work inside the house Oh and some of this Micro steps, I was so close to putting the whole thing in paint stripper, but the thought of redoing all the filler was too daunting…… So a bit of sanding and spraying, more sanding and spraying, and more sanding and spraying and I’m calling it good enough! The airbox has been flatted back to represent the rough outer surface, Ken Tyrrell figured the inside should be smooth as possible for best air flow to the engine, so the part was made on a male mould and the outside left rough. Put the black on the front and sides in three separate jobs, it made the masking easier and left somewhere to hold the model while spraying it. Also added some BMF to the cockpit seat to represent the bare metal tub. Hopefully not so long before the next update! TTFN Malc.

A flat-chested young lady went to Dr.Rustom about enlarging her breasts. Dr Rustom advised her 'Every day after your shower, rub your chest and say, 'Scooby doobie doobies, I want bigger boobies!' She did this faithfully for several months! To her utter amazement she grew terrific D-cup boobs! One morning she was running late, got on the bus, and in a panic realized she had forgotten her morning ritual. Frightened she might lose her lovely boobs if she didn't recite the little rhyme, she stood right there in the middle aisle of the bus, closed her eyes and said, 'Scooby doobie, doobies, I want bigger boobies.' A guy sitting nearby looked at her and asked 'Oh! Are you a patient of Dr. 'Rustom 's?' 'Yes I am.. How did you know?' He winked and replied, "Hickory dickory dock...." Simon.

Annoyingly the clearcoat has pooled in the corner of the doors, and created a line/ridge. Some sanding and priming to get things back to normal. The front wings are now in place. They are fiddly and don't have a lot of glue contact points; the entire front end of the car requires more thought and test fitting than the rear. So far anyway. Mine is imperfect because of a mistake I'd made in the angle of the V shaped silver part right below the 3rd white circles wing joint, but it's nothing major. The fit of this area from how the car is moulded is I'm sure as perfect as the rest of the kit, but it's something to be learned rather than just dropping together. Meanwhile underneath the car, the two Titanium silver panels are in place. There's another 6 black panels yet to go on there but at least the car's underbody is not just one flat and boring entirely semi-gloss-black piece. The Front of the car get's the little "bonnet" thing down the middle. Most but not all Senna's have this as semi gloss black, but having seen photos of some real life examples like this, I think it looks better on body colour. Rear wing is assembled. Like several other parts, this has more silver than the original instructions intended and indeed evidence can be found for this on real-life versions too. In theory only the end plates here should be silver if I follow the instructions. Test fitting the rear wing.

Thanks guys! While waiting for the decal issue to get sorted, I decided to add some treads to the racing slicks which are provided in the box. Using a book to get the proper height for the saw blade, it was just a matter of running the wheels against it to get the grooves in. And we have treaded tyres. No need for aftermarket here! Mark

Right...further to my comments to Nick...I retrieved the cowl from the drying cupboard this morning...whilst still not perfect...a world of difference to the last update Although there is still a slight mottle/orange peel visible...in reality...it's far less visible to the naked eye...at least to my tired old eyes anyway! With all the panels now at this level of top coat finish or better...it's time to give it all a coat or three of clear in readiness for decals 😱 to be continued............

Hello Dears, 2021 has been so shaky, I'll not finish a great amount of kits.... And I must finish a Corsair this year !! Nose and engine added !! Look a bit like Cher or MJ getting out of an hospital but... Still if I finish 2 Jolly Rogers this year, it will be fine... Stay safe Gents !! CC

Hello there folks, a little up date on my tank, managed to get some time to do some more. I started to do a bit of weathering to the bottom part of the tank, I did some pin washes using oils. Then I did some pin washes on the top side of the tank to bring out a bit more detail, I will need to do more in some areas but will wait until later when more of the painting is done, as I do not wish to over do this at this stage. I also managed to start work again on the tracks. I used AK burnishing fluid. I have never done this before so it was a little bit of trial and error. But I think they have come out alright. Already I like the different variations in colour of the tracks. I have some spare which I have also burnished so I will experiment with applying "Lifecolors, Rain and dust washes" which will hopefully leave small bits of pigment in the little nooks and crannies of the tracks. Also the resin pins will need to be painted a rust colour to match. that's all for now, will be back soon thanks for looking Ed

In my first career I was lucky enough to work in a toy factory, and for my second career I got to play with real trains. Grow up - no chance.

The cockpit was tweaked in its design to fit inside the fuselage. After 3D printing the part again with the modifications, it appears to fit in reasonably well. I changed the colour of the filament to enable the camera to take better photos. I fitted the two halves of the kit main wheels together, sanded them smooth at the joint and painted them - Nato black for the tyres (my Revell Anthracite has set solid even thought the top was properly secured so I need a new pot), aluminium for the centres with a light wash to highlight the detail. Also the Pavla ejection Seat arrived today. It was sent in an oversize box which protected the rigours of the postal system. Hopefully it’ll fit nicely in the cockpit.

Having, quite unexpectedly, got one of these kits I drooled quietly over it before deciding to have a look to see what fellow modellers made of it. Hmm, interesting. Personally, since I go back to the original first issue Airfix Mosquito - the bagged 2/11d in Woolies kit, I think this is magnificent. I don't think I ever built the second moulding, though I may well have an unbuilt one deep in the older parts of he 'stash', possibly a Swedish variant? Certainly made the Matchbox kit, which came up well with some adjustment, in PR colours. I have built a few larger scale Mosquitos over the years as well. This is a great kit to tempt me back into more 72nd scale modelling. Sure there are minor 'oopses', mostly easily fixed with a bit of wet and dry and some Milliput or filler, or left as is for the inevitable TT35 variants. The provision of several canopy variants, the internal bomb bay detail and cockpit detail, the superb and well thought out exhausts, cast in separate parts for better detail, these are terrific. As also is the thinking behind the undercarriage assembly. Well done Airfix. Incidentally unlike some I'm not convinced the undercarriage is too thin or spindly. I think we get accustomed to somewhat overscale u/c gear in 72nd scale, because otherwise it is too delicate. This seems to me quite close to the look of the real thing - and certainly appears to build up to an impressively busy assembly. The mudguards need thinning at their edges, of course and yes the tyre detail is a touch too prominent. You will note some pages back on here that the designer specifically sked for more prominent detail because at first it was too faint. Easy to sand down, much simpler to remove excess than to build up more. As for the tailwheel, is it really that much too slim? It seems to me to have moulding in the tyre which hints at the anti-shimmy pattern. In this scale, probably enough to allow us to bring it out with some shading - tyres are seldom uniformly dark grey nor all black, especially with some runway dust around. Yes, the wing skin panel overlaps are a touch OTT, but again a little careful wet and dry sorts that - almost all recent 72nd scale models seem to have slightly too heavy surface detail, but for an old style modeller that is easier to reduce rather than having to add. Oh - and someone commented about the rather slim pilot and the lack of a navigator. Ignoring the obvious point that people were generally slimmer then and pilots often smaller - especially those flying a/c which were a tight squeeze - perhaps the crew here is intended to be one of those slim young ATA ferry lady pilots who flew without navigators in all sorts of complex aeroplanes. A terrific kit and one which I am going to enjoy taking my time over. My thanks to all of you who have pointed out minor glitches and hiccups. Like many I used to have to use balsa, talc and dope to modify my older kits, so this one looks a breeze. Whee ! (And at least one will have to be modified to look like the 633 Sqn Mosquitos I watched contour chasing up in the Highlands years ago)