Adrian Hills

Dave, I get your point. THANK YOU for being the host. Its going to be a good GB 🙂

Not sure if this subject has been raised but wondering if we could have a list of all kits produced by Frog and then try and build the lot between us. This worked well for the Matchbox GB.

IPMS Mid-Sussex friend Paul Janicki gave me a May 1979 copy of Scale Aircraft Modelling. In it is an excellent article of a ‘how to’ as well as drawings for the Twin Hotspur. I have checked my inventory and in my loft are two Novo Hotspur kits. I am therefore nailing my colours to the mast and as well as doing both Mk I Blenheims will do a Twin Hotspur !! And why not 😊

TonyW, for your He177 why not pimp up your HS293s to the D version with a television camera in the nose. 😊

Adrian, sorry to hear you have a spinal problem - hope it can be satisfactorily attended to. I look forward to seeing some imagery of your further work. And in future hopefully we can meet up. Cheers Adrian 🙂

I have just looked up The Royal Airforce Museum which has a short video about the FLRM. Their information is actually quite inaccurate as their spoken words and imagery blithely mix up the two aircraft. The model they show has the earlier aircraft's upper undercarriage but wheel spats like the second aircraft. Interestingly the anti-dazzle panel is blue and not black. A further reference I have, "Aircraft Illustrated" December 1972, article "1933 Record Breaker" by Christine Riley is interesting. It has an image labelled as "First of the two...at Cranwell for an attempt on the long distance record". This shows J8479 with the lozenge tail and a dark anti-dazzle panel on the nose. I'm getting the impression that these two features were added later. The tail of the second aircraft matches the 'early' version of the first. "Aeroplane Monthly", Feb 1982 has a photograph of J9479 labelled as 15th June 1929 on return to Cranwell after the flight to Karachi. J9479 is seen with a lozenge tail and anti-dazzle panel.

On further I note that there were two aircraft built, K1991 and J9479. The first constructed one, J9… had different engines and different fin/rudder configurations. Most pictures of J9.. show a square division between these two tail components, however the Putnam Fairey book has a general arrangement drawing of a lozenge style demarcation. “Aeroplane Fairey company profile” has a good photograph of the lozenge rudder equipped aircraft. can anyone shed more light as to when and why this tail arrangement was changed? cheers Adrian

Aaagh Help Me! I’ve just discovered on Fleabay a Replikits kit of a B24 kit in 1/188 scale. Dribbling 🤤

Any more progress on this kit? And has AdrianMF done any more on his scratchbuild? I’m just starting the Airframe kit (It’s Canadian and so am I), so any pointers would be useful. I bought the kit about 30 years ago for $5:00 Canadian dollars and it even came with the correct Williams brothers wheels. Am tossing up which aircraft to do - I try not to make models of aircraft that killed people, as the first one did. I’m going to Scale Model World this year and looking forward to meeting those people in person I communicate with on BM - especially Adrian 😊

I couldn’t find my other Blenheim (1/72) so bought one off Fleabay. I have taken a photo of its fuselage alongside the 1/79 scale one. The build will be an interesting comparison between the kits released in 1969 and 1959. Both will be hand painted in Humbrol in a ‘ traditional’ build. Now sorting my Flickr account to put photos up 😊

Just found my Meng kit (egg plane style cutesy thing) and the nose section of a Matchbox B17. Has anyone ever done this conversion ? The dimensions would work - just needs a bit of Milliput !

Klr, if you have a Frog Vimy you could always give it a nice airliner fuselage for the attractive blue Instone Airlines Vimy Commercial as seen Croydon airport. There are various aftermarket fuselages available - originally as a Vac form, perhaps Contrail 😊

There is a wide variety of Unmanned aerial vehicles. Some had pilots to get them into the air such as Queen Bees and even 'Aphrodite' B17s (RIP Mr Kennedy). Perhaps the sexiest one I've seen were the American TDRs -1,2 and 3. Blue and white twin engine jobs (video available online). I'm of the impression that the British WWII investigation into television reconnaissance mixed these attack killer drones with those gathering information (need to spend a bit of time in the National Archive and re-assess some of the files I have read.) I can recommend one book for the very interested, "Unmanned systems of World Wars I and II" by H R Everett, MIT Press, 2015 ISBN 978-0-262-02922-3. At 757 pages long it is not light reading but certainly a good place to start

If you want weird then perhaps I could put in my Bartini Beriev VVA-14. I have two kits including the latest one with sponsons. I'm sure you are all familiar with this aircraft 😉

If this one gets through the Bunfight and doesn't happen in the summer when I'm out cycling - then maybe 🙂 I have a couple of 72nd kits, a Privateer and a Meng 'egg plane style'. Some Liberators had good formation schemes but I also remember seeing a picture of a Liberator with a B17 nose - just the kind of ugliness that appeals to me

Cheers Guys, A list of the previous builds is really helpful. My previous builds include the little Wellington and Hampden. Am seduced by the markings engraved into the fuselage which need to be painted accurately - not a skill I possess ! But looking at my previous builds the result is acceptable - to me. My only other engraved marking Frog kit is a Spitfire so might have to do that one

I have been through my kit collection twice and I just can't find my 1/72 kit of the Blenheim Mk I. I remember it in its original box and dark blue plastic as I was reserving it to do 'Britain First'. In my search I found some gems like the 1/119 scale Wellington with markings engraved in fuselage as well as a similar era 1/72 scale Spitfire with similar features. Am wondering if someone would fancy swapping a Frog (not Novo) Blenheim for another original Frog kit such as a Baltimore or Southern Cross. I realise that horse trading like this should be done in the correct place on the BM forum but am just trying here to see if there is interest. Other 'surplus' Novo kits in my stash include a Skua and Maryland. Perhaps like the previous Matchbox GB perhaps we could have a list of which kits Frog produced ?!

Hmm, I haven’t done a group build in a while so could do this one. Maybe I’ll tell the tale of two Blenheims - the first from 1959 in 1/79th scale and the second from 1969 in 1/72. I have both in the stash and this would be a good excuse to build them 😊

Hi Troy, have you done any more work on the Ryan ? 😊

Troy, I can’t help noticing that your Ryan is a bit on the glossy side. I am just completing an Airfix starter kit of a Tomahawk. This was done for an afternoon group build with a couple of young lads but I didn’t get around to completing it. Decals on, including the shark mouth and have just matted it down with Winsor & Newton matt varnish. As the whole thing is done with a hairy stick that is what was used for the dull coat. Very successful. Why not try it 😊

Troy, What I do to speed things up is keep blocks of cured Milliput. I always seem to have bits left over. They don’t take five minutes to carve to shape and I then pull mould over the shape. any bit of solid stuff that you can carve will do. last used that technique to finish a windscreen for a Junkers G24 film prop. If that’s all it needs I’m sure you get it over the line by midnight tonight 😊

Interesting point for all of us. Pre-curved plastic packaging might work better than pull moulding same over profiles we have laboriously made out of Milliput !

Looping this discussion back into plastic modelling, the one kit I am looking for is an Eldon Match kit, listed on Scalemates as a De Tomaso Pantera. I have unsuccessfully tried to get their listing changed because the kit is actually of a De Tomaso Mangusta. The Scalemates date for kit release predates the production of the Pantera and besides it looks like a Mangusta and not a Pantera. If anyone has one for sale please contact me. I live on Eldon Road in Eastbourne!

The splash of colour is really bringing this to life. I believe soon IPMS Mid-Sussex has a competition for “anything but injection” 😊

Really beginning to take shape 😊