Bengalensis

There are quite a few, but this is so great: "DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA" "Hello Rabbit Leader. I thought you might come in from the sun." "Don't think, don't just glance! Look! Search for the sweethearts! OK, let's try it again..." xxxxx Edit: "sweethearts"??? Why does sweethearts become sweethearts?

What a fantastic project! Awesome work! Thanks for sharing this.

I think the lower floor section worked as it came out from the shortening cuts, I can't remember anything problematic there. If my memory is correct it was only on the upper floor the cut outs had to be adjusted.

Good work! Just be careful and plan well ahead when you attack the body sides, and just take your time during the work. Every bit of precision and extra care you put in here will very much reward you later on in the build.

Good progress! Just keep going, measure carefully and do your best to be as exact as you can when you cut and rejoin the parts, and I think it will work out well.

Great to see you're getting seriously started Steve! And thanks for the kind words, it's a joy to be able to help a little with projects like this, and it's great to know my build from back then has given you such inspiration. Makes it all worth writing it. I still remember it fondly as a very rewarding project, it was mostly a pleasure working on it, and I hope you will have the same experience. It will be a pleasure to follow your build. Don't hesitate to ask if there's something coming up. If I only remember what I did with mine I will be most happy to assist.

There was indeed a resin transkit for the Aoshima BTF available in the late 90's. It was made by a guy in US trading as "AAM", All American Models. I'm not sure he's active today; I think it's been gone for some time now. It might very well be knock-offs of that kit that Stuart has seen recently? The transkit included a new bodyshell and all parts to correct the exterior and interior. The casting quality was actually quite good, if not perfect. To deal with the guy was somewhat more problematic, it wasn't easy to get him to atutally send the stuff once he was paid if I say it like that... but eventually, after much time and hazzle, I got my kit. It built up pretty nicely though. Here are two old pics from 15+ years ago of my build using the AAM transkit. I should perhaps take some new with today's camera. I built it in -98 or -99 using SNJ paint and polishing powder, with a tint to make it look stainless. That's what we had available to work with back then when it came to metal paint. It looks better IRL, still does actually. As I side note I do have the VF 1/43 white metal kit as well, still unbuilt. It's a bit clumsy looking and somewhat oversized I'm afraid.

I haven't done much on the work bench for a good while now, the S-IC/SII interstage and S-IC aft skirt problems put me off a bit. It took a little time, but just before christmas Martin kindly sent me a replacement S-IC/SII interstage. It was a bit better in quality, but only slightly less conical, still too small at the bottom, so unfortunately I couldn't get it to fit either. After some hesitation I then fell back to my spare plan and used the resin as a template and recreated all the work using the Dragon part, lots of Evergreen strips and a good deal of patience. The last pieces were added tonight and I'm quite happy with the result. So here it's stacking up. Next will be the S-IC aft skirt and thrust structure, another very problematic area. The Dragon parts are just out of question in my project, and the replacement resin parts have issues that are not easy to fix, if possible. We'll see where that ends...

Awesome work, as always from you. Impossible for me to pick a single favourite, they all stand out as very impressive and very inspiring. The paint work is just mind blowing. Fantastic, very well done!

I had hope for more in 2017, but I only managed four finished and two more started. Again it's my 1/1 scale car projects that are mostly to blame, but still I'm quite happy with what I actually did finish. Let's see what we have then; The first model was started in December 2016 and finished only a few days into 2017, the special Citroen 16 cylindres Hot Rod, built for the somewhat local competition/group build called "Johnny's Christmas Jam". It's based on Heller's 1/24 Citroen 15CV Traction Avant. You can see and read a little more of the thing and the event here. To my surprise the model was actually voted the winner of the event. As I finished that Citroen the new 1/24 scale Ferguson TE-20 "Little Grey Fergie" kit from Heller arrived, and it looked so nice I actually bought a few of them. Two never made it to the stash, instead landing directly on my work bench to be built in parallel. They were lovely and a welcome break. The first was built more or less straight from the box with a few adjustments to the front axle track width. I finished it only very lightly weathered and put it on a simple vignette(?) base, to look like a reasonably restored but used tractor that I could see myself have today just for fun, but still doing some work around the place. The model was awarded second place in its class at this year's GGG scale model show in Sweden. The second one was built slightly different, using a white metal Rover 3,5 litre V8 and wider rear tyres, but still trying to make it look pretty much standard. I drew a lot of inspiration from a real TE-20 built up very tastefully with a 3500 V8, which I saw at a car meeting last year. The last I finished this year, still in the early summer, was this 1/24 scale Alpine A106 Mille Miles. It's built from a resin transkit (body shell with a few added parts) produced by a guy in France who sells them on ebay. That is used with the chassis and mechanics from a Heller 1/24 Renault 4CV, just as the real A106 was built. I did some corrections to the body, added some details and better defined wheels that were 3D-printed. I finished it as the car Jean Rédélé himself drove in the 1955 Mille Miglia race with my own printed decals. This one actually won the competition car class at the GGG-show. After that I only started things, but didn't finish anything. Must try to better that... I would also like to take this opportunity to wish you all a Happy New Year!

Not only did he have one hell of a voice, he was also one hell of a guy to tell a story in an exciting way, using that voice. Sadly missed indeed. Thanks for posting this one.

Very well done, beautiful painting! They make me happy every time I see them. Must do my own soon.

It's looking great! It's such a pleasure to look at well cleaned up and prepared resin parts being put together.

Lovely! Again a huge amount of my favourite material; Resin! It can only be great!

Thanks for all the comments. I've been a bit distracted in my 1/1 scale workshop as usual, and hit some problem on this workbench as well, but a little more progress at least. @Gimme Shelter Hehe, no, it's not the cheapest modelling project I've started, but mutual support and open cards both ways has worked well for many years together with my dear lady, so I'm lucky that I can just carry any(?) stuff through the door. @71chally@Eric Mc Yes, there is a surprising amount of inaccuracies and lack of details for a new tooling. It will certainly look like an impressive Saturn V if built OOB, but it is a bit disappointing. @Will Vale Thanks for your encouragement Will, it's good to be back on the bench with a WIP-thread, even if it won't be the fastest I've done. I do have a couple of 1/72 Star Wars models I would like to build before too long, so yes, there may well be some Sci-Fi again. Looking forward to it. I have done a bit of work on the top of the S-IC tank to ensure its round and that the resin LOX-dome and forward skirt will fit well. After also adding a bit of plastic in two places on the LOX-dome edge I was quite comfortable with the result. With some paint and the vent pipes added I think it will pass. Then I started with the S-IC/SII interstage, and hit more difficult problems. The resin part is conical in shape and much too small in diameter at the bottom. I think the mould may have given up, but I have already informed Martin and showed him this problem a few days ago, and he would look into it, so we'll see what happens. This is the Dragon part, fitting well and correct in length, but lacking a lot of detail and only half the number of stringers. My spare plan, if the resin fails, will be to use the Dragon part and then replicate all the work Martin did to create his master part using Evergreen strips, but with a bit of luck I may not have to. There is plenty of other work to do, so I'll wait a bit with this to see what Martin comes up with. In the mean time I will either climb upwards and start looking at the SII aft skirt, or go downwards and work on S-IC aft skirt and thrust structure, another area I expect problems and work with...