sunray

With the front part of the canopy attached I then moved on to the rear canopy. I lined the canopies up as best I could and again I used Tamiya tape to hold the rear canopy in place then I added spots of thin CA glue to hold the canopy in place. When they had cured I then added more CA glue until the canopy was firmly fixed. The problem with using vacuform canopies is that they are slightly over sized but they are more flexible so they can be manipulated into position. As you can see from the photos there is a gap between the rear and front canopies on each side of the canopy which believe it or not isn't too much of a problem due the thickness of the plastic. To fill the gaps I first used thin CA glue and ran it down the gap with just enough glue to fill the large part of the gaps. Once that has cured then I use watered down PVA glue to fill the smaller gaps. Once I was happy with the gaps I started masking the canopy, first using tape. Then the liquid masking fluid. Which I also used on the upper nav light. I then added the refuelling probe, pylons, wheels, etc. I then moved on to putting a primer coat on the Harrier but first I used and bit of packing foam to mask off the turbofan. That done I gave everything a coat of primer. I then sprayed the sidewinders yellow and brown for the colour bandings as the kit doesn't come with any weapons decals and I wanted to spray them anyway. When that was dry, using thin masking tape I masked the sidewinders. That done I moved back to the Harrier and I masked off inside the jet air intakes and then I sprayed on the base coat. When that had dried I removed the masks. I also sprayed the rest of the under-wing stores including the missiles. The jet nozzles I hand painted them using Vallejo's Metalizer and glued them in place. Then I painted one or two other things. I also removed the foam masks from the air intakes. That done I gave everything a few coats of Tamiya Clear X22. Including the missiles. Now for the decaling which was straight forward. This kit does come with many decals but I managed to get a stencil set off another kit from one of the lads off the forum (thanks Stu). I used Micro Sol to settle the decals down and gave it another coat of X22 clear. I left it over night to fully dry and then I made my wash from thinned down oil paint applied it to the model. I removed any excess with a cotton bud in the direction of flight. I also attached the stores.

It me again I am afraid, thanks chaps for all the kind comments and I thought you might like to know that Airfix have done an article on their Work Bench Blog about the Bus and the 1/32 Crusader tank I did. http://www.airfix.com/uk-en/news/workbench/new-b-17g-artwork-takes-inspiration-from-the-past/ Thanks again for all the support you gave me during the builds, now I'm off to get a drink and to chill as everything is well with the world, for the time being anyway.

Thanks Francis. Chris you are right about the tracks but I found leaving them on a radiator for about twenty minutes makes the job a bit easier. Also the instructions tell you to use plastic cement to attach the track but I thought no way would that hold them so I used thick CA glue which did the trick. I would definitely do another World War One tank again, what an excellent subject but I think I will save my money and get a Takom or Tamiya one. Anyway thanks Chris.

Thanks Francis. For the rust effect I decided to use Humbrol Rust Wash Enamel. I first used it on my Airfix 1/32 "Old Bill" Bus and I find it really easy to use. For the oil effects I am going to use AK's wash Shafts, Grease & Bearings Wash. I started with the rust first putting it where rust forms around rivets, bolts, etc. Just to let you now there are a lot of photo's as they tell the story better than me and I hate typing, so I do apologise. The good thing about the wash is when you add a drop on say a rivet head it just sits around the rivet head. If you add too much you can just take it off with a dry brush before it dries. I tried to put the rust in irregular places and not too much in the same places on each side of the tank. I didn't put any rust around the base of the 6 ponder guns or the machine gun mounts as I would think they would be protected from rust due to the oil and grease of the mounts themselves. For the front belly of the tank I would think this would take a bit of a battering from rocks and tree stumps. So I used a bit more of the graphite pencil slightly buffed up with my finger and then I added a touch of rust on the rivet heads. Before the wash had dried I lightly ran a dry brush from front to rear to streak the rust wash. For the oil wash I thought you would get oil running from the top of the tracks down the body. So I used a dry brush to streak it as with the rust. I also added the oil wash to the base of the 6 pounders. On top of the gun sponson I put a pond of oil off the track but I didn't put it near any of the rust. To do the tracks I just painted them brown and ran a dark Vallejo wash over them. Then I just coloured in the track plates with a graphite pencil and thats it. The point of the pencil is blunt so as it leaves a gap around the rivet head. Again I tried to not to do every track plate the same but to keep them irregular. And thats it you'll be glad to hear. All I have to do is the mortar and make a base. Thanks again for looking and I hope you didn't find it too boring.

Thanks chaps. I made up the mortar but I am not fixing it to the tank yet. With that done I moved on to prime the tank and add some pre-shading. Hopefully the final effect I am going for is a wet and really used look with the tank in need of so love and affect, if you know what I mean Not forgetting the mortar. I then added the base coat. The kit instructions don't really give you painting instructions and I had to pick from either khaki or olive drab. I decided on the olive drab because of a painting in the Imperial War Museum depicting a Tadpole from 1918. I also added the white stencil at the rear which I saw on an old photo of the Tadpole. All I did to add this was to use redundant side parts that came with the kit and I just drew around them with a white gel pen. I decided to brush paint the base coat for the tracks using Valejo's Panzer Ace Leather which give good coverage even with a brush. Once the paint had dried I gave the tank a few coats of Klear to seal in the paint. Now for the weathering. As I said early I am looking for a distressed, dirty look so here we go. I decided to use Vallejo washes, then a touch of dry brushing and then graphite pencil. Next I am going add a bit of rust but that will have to wait until tomorrow. Thanks for looking.

Thanks chaps, here are a few more you might like.

I went to the free Sunderland Airshow on the Friday night, Saturday and Sunday. So I had wind, sun and rain but what an airshow this year. I am working through my photo's now but here are a few I have done so far. As soon as I post them on my flickr page I will post up some more, thats if you want me too?

Thanks mate. The rear canopy has a seam line going down the centre which had to be removed and polished which was no problem but what I didn't like was the distortion at the sides of the front canopy if viewed from above so I decided to replace the canopy with a vacuform one. I have done this before so sorry about repeating myself, but usually with older kits but I thought would give this was ago to see how it looks and this is what I have done. First I am going to make a silicone mould of the original and to do this I made an enclosure to contain the liquid silicone mix out of Lego. You could use plasticard but my kids have grown out of Lego so I have got a bit knocking about. The size of the enclosure depends on the part so long as the original part or pattern is completely covered and a bit extra. Then using Plasticine, I made the base by rolling out the Plasticine with a craft knife handle (blade removed) and I used ice lolly sticks as a thickness guide. I cut the Plasticine to size using the Lego enclosure as a guide and placed it in. I have it all mounted on a flat Lego base piece. Using Plasticine again I filled the inside of the canopy for added strength but keeping the shape. Then I just placed the part on the Plasticine. Then I made up the silicone mixture as per the instructions which is basically a 1:10 ratio. I made the mistake of using a glass beaker because it had a spout but it a pain to clean. Anyway I slowly poured the silicone into the mound from one corner until it covers the part. Then I left it over night to cure. Because the canopy parts are 1/72 I decided to make a few that I might need in future builds for older kits. With the silicone fully cured its time to break the Lego open. Now I just removed the Plasticine. Now this is the easy and best part. You just pop the kit part out. I use a small pair of scissors to cut away any excess silicone. I use Crystacal R plaster to make the plug and I again pour it in the silicone mould very slowly to prevent bubbles. Once the plaster has gone off and hard I just popped them out and I the stick them on scrap bits of wood to raise them off the base of my vacuformer. I had three attempts to make the Harrier plugs but the others were spot on first time, just my luck. Now I am ready for the vacuformer. I cut a piece of PEG plastic to size to fit the former and I placed three plugs on the former and I let it do its stuff. Here are the plugs with the new canopies already formed. It is a bit awkward sometimes to remove the plugs but if you damage a plug you just make another. To remove the excess plastic around the canopy I use a fine skinny stick and sand at right angles to the canopy. The secret is to take your time and don't pull the plastic off when it gets thin and starts to fall off but cut it off. Here is a comparison between the kit canopies and the vacuformed ones. As it happened I stood on the front kit canopy (left) but now I have the mould I can just form another one. Then I test fitted as normal. The canopies are slightly over sized from the original but that is just the thickness of the PEG plastic but they are pretty flexible compared to the kit canopy. Before I attached the canopy I also added the head up display made from a blister pack off a memory card. All I did was to cut a rectangle from the plastic. I use the plastic from packing because it is cheap and clearer than clear sprue plastic. I then attached the HUD with Roket Card Glue. Now I glued the front canopy in place using thin CA glue. The canopy was held in place with Tamiya Tape.

This will be a OOB build and I hope its a fast one looking at the amount of parts in the kit. The only thing that worries me is the tracks which don't look as flexible as I would like. Anyway on with the adventure. To say this is a fast build would be a slight understatement for me anyway. The instructions aren't the best but I soldiered on. I decided to do the main body of the tank first. To give the joints extra strength and to keep them lined up and square I added a bit of extra plastic. Also to help keep the shape of the main body of the tank while the glue was curing and to keep the path of the track lined up I used a few clips and a piece of plastic rod (which isn't glued in). Once the glue had gone off i removed the clips and rod and used it on the other side to do the same job. While the body was gluing I made up the ammunition storage chest for the rear of the tank (I think thats what it is). Then came the sides and a few other things. I added so more plastic again to add strength and to keep the side square. The Lewis guns for the tank are a bit lean of detail but because you are only going to see the barrels all I did was to drill them out. There are only three. And in went the first gun. I then added the rear track extensions with strips of plastic to keep the sides the correct width for the track. I also added plastic inside this time where the rear sides join the main body for added strength again. I installed the rear mortar platform as per the instructions. I was going to fill in the gap but I decided against it. My next job was to install the exhaust pipe. I decided to change the plastic exhaust pipe to a stronger copper one, so first a bit of surgery. I am going to keep the silencers so I drilled the holes in the end ready to take the copper wire. I glued the second silencer to the tank in the rectangle enclosure lining it up with the holes in the walls of the enclosure. Then it was just a case of cutting the copper wire to size and bending it to the right shape. Then I glued the copper wire first in the second silencer using CA glue. Then I glued the wire in the first silencer. Once the CA glue had gone off I clamped the first silencer via the three cut holes to the tank then I just glued in place. I used the same copper wire for the end piece of the exhaust pipe. I was going to use brass tube but if you get the bend wrong it is a pain to re-bend so I thought I would give the copper ago. I haven't tried this before but what I planned to do was to drill out the end of the copper wire thinking it should work as copper being a soft metal and I was right. In fact it was easy to do with a hand pin drill. The end pipe was glued to the silencer using CA glue. Now the fun begins. As I have said earlier the track is a bit stiff. So to soften the track I cut it from the sprues and placed the long pieces that were going to go round the wheels on my oil radiator in my shed. Also the wheels don't allow for the thickness of the track so I filed them down to size. Then using gel CA glue I started at the front wheel and glued the track about an inch below the wheel and applied pressure. Then when the glue has cured I then added glue around the wheel and about an inch and a half past the wheel pushed the track down and kept up the tension so it was tight around the wheel but not too much as to stretch the track. Again waiting for the glue to go off. Then I just glued the rest of the piece of track down. I used a smaller piece of track as I wanted the next long piece to go around the rear wheel the same as the front one. You can see the joins in the photo as I used CA glue to fill any gaps with kicker that turns white. I then glued the remaining long piece of track from the front wheel to the back leaving a small gap to be filled with one of the small pieces of track cut to size. For the gun sponsons I didn't want them to move so I didn't all the parts from the kit. Again the construction was straightforward and I added extra plastic to strengthen and keep square. I also drilled out the Lewis gun and tidied up the 6 pounder barrel. The problem I had was trying to workout which side the gun sighting silts went? The instructions have the right sponson silt on the left so I thought I would keep both silts to the left of the gun. I have had a look at photo's on the web and they have the silts for both guns to the left, right and left and right; just to make it confusing. But being ex-Army I thought the Army would probably would go for the cheapest option and buy the same gun for both sides with the sighting on the left. That was my thinking anyway be it right, wrong or half right. The Lewis gun was then attached. Then I just glued the sponsons to the tank and now it looks the part.

I primed the jet nozzles to see if I managed to get read of the seam lines on the blades which don't look too bad. Then I decided to at a bit of weathering in the cockpit to tone it down a touch. I have attached the control stick which I have just painted black and added two red dots ti illustrate buttons. I didn't add any more detail to the stick as you won't see it due to the pilot and I have included a Tamiya glue bottle in the photo's to give you a better idea of scale. For the pilot I used Tamiya XF1 Black as primer, for the main coats I used Vallejo Model Color and Citadel paints. I also used Citadel washes on the uniform to add a bit of depth, if you know what I mean. When I was happy I glued the pilot and cockpit halves together and added the nose sensors. And then the nose assembly was glued to the main fuselage. I thought I would have trouble lining the nose up with the rest of the fuselage but it was a good fit and lined up perfectly without any help from me. I love this kit! On the shroud there was a recess below the HUD which I decided to cover as I am going to add a glass for the HUD so I just used a small piece of plasticard. Next was the air intakes. These did need a touch of filling but not much and I also filled and rubbed down the intake vents so they were flush with the fuselage body. Once the filler was cured and rock hard I lightly ran a scriber over these just to re-cut them a bit sharper. The front undercarriage door opening required sanding to square off the edges and the doors were attached.

This my next project which will hopefully fly together if you pardon the pun, Airfix's 1/72 BAe Harrier GR9A. I will being doing it wheels up with a full weapons load so lets see how I get on. The gift set paints will not be used nor the glue but the brush will. You get a lot of plastic with no flash but the join between the parts to the sprue is quite thick so I normally use a razor saw to remove small parts to prevent damage. The clear parts are no different with thick joints plus there is a centre seam along the centre of the rear canopy which will need sorting out. As with most kits the instructions start with the construction of the cockpit but because this is going to be an in-flight display I decided to start with the main fuselage to decide where I am going to attach the stand. Normally I would drill a hole in the kit where Airfix would mount their own stand but it always a good idea to check where the centre line stores locations are going to be, just to check they can be attached without any problems to them or the stand. On this one I will drill the hole for the stand just forward of Airfix's intended mount as to keep the detail of the rear undercarriage doors. The rear fuselage was stuck together without any problems and I glued small bits of plasticard on the inside of the jet nozzle housings to fill in the gaps. Then I drilled the hole to take the machine screw for the stand and I used a 2 part epoxy to give it a strong joint. While that was going off I turned my attention to the cockpit. The details on the parts is a big improvement to Airfix's old kits but the pilot isn't so I will use on of Revell's pilots from their NATO Pilot set. The Revell pilot requires a touch of surgery on his legs that needed cuts at the back of the knees to enable them to be bent in more to fit under the instrument panel and his backside required filing so he touched the back of the seat. The head is from a different torso so I attached by drilling holes and pining it with copper wire which enables you to move the head to different positions. This is a handy tip if you have two crew as they look more interesting if they are in different positions and it easy to do. I wanted the pilot to look up and slightly to the right as I hopefully will the aircraft banking to the right on the stand and he should be looking at you from the stand. Back to the fuselage and the wings are on and one or two other things. You can buy after-market jet nozzles but I decided to stick with the kit ones. I also assembled the under-wing stores. Some of the seams of the rocket pods and the GBU's were a bit awkward to get to so I covered the with plastic disc's using my old punch set. Now back to the cockpit to add a touch of paint and I test fitted to see how its looks. The Harrier cockpit is a little busy but all I used to paint the dials, switches, etc, was a cut down cocktail stick just dipped in the paint. I also added the fan and a touch of weathering. Now I have posted this I am off to my shed to do a bit more before the wife gives me a job.

I am still working my way through my photo's from Cosford and here are a few more you might like.

I was at RAF Cosford last weekend and here are a few shots I managed to take. I hope you like them.

Thanks again chaps.

Thanks again for the kind comments lads.

Thanks mate. Funny enough I was looking at the Frog kit last night on ebay and I was thinking about getting one and giving that one a bash. Would you recommend the kit? Good luck with your Javelin and I look forward to seeing it.

Thanks Bob. For an old Airfix kit it lends itself well for upgrading but as you can see from the build thread I didn't use any aftermarket parts simply because there aren't any. So I had to get my thinking cap on to make my own which wasn't as bad as I thought plus it was a lot cheaper and best of all it was really satisfying. Its definitely not the best fitting kit and all the parts need tidying up but I would recommend the kit as it was a fun build. I didn't use the figures from the kit as I didn't think the quality was very good and I couldn't find any 1/32 figures from World War One. But now I am glad I didn't use any figures when I read the post from Rikstom which stops and makes you think a bit "I find this quite moving actually, an old worn, empty buss with that graffiti. Makes me think about the guys who wrote it.."

Thanks again lads.

Thanks again lads, it is a little gem of a kit to do.

Thanks guys.

Thanks Sten and the good news is that MasterCraft are going to bring out a 1/72 Javelin FAW Mk.7. I have never made a MasterCraft kit so I don't know whats the quality will be like. As for the pitot tubes the T.3 only had one and I have seen photo's of the Mk.1, 2 & 4 with only one tube and to confuse matters I have seen the Mk.7 with one and two tubes.

Just to let you know that final reveal photo's can be found at http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235003970-172-airfix-gloster-javelin-t3-in-flight/ just to bore you with a few more.

I had a lot of fun with this old kit from rescribing to making a new canopy but as kits go for its age it gets my vote. You can find the full build at http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235000432-172-airfix-gloster-javelin-t3/page-1 Here are a few photo's of the finished article.

Thanks John and the answer to your questions: 1. I brought off ebay for around £60 The heating element is in the top cover and the sheet PEG plastic is held in the clamp (gold handle). The red lever on the right lowers the clamp when the plastic is at the right temp. The grill is where you place the canopy plug. So you clamp in your clear plastic, turn on the heater until the plastic sags. Then heater is turned off and the vacuum is turned on (model switch) and you lower the red lever. Thats it, it takes longer to type than to do. Its the plugs that take the time. Here is a video by Paul Budzik that you might find interesting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLReisIoXKg 2. I saw a photo of Javelin pilots in a book but don't ask me where as I can't remember but I know what you mean about the blue flying suits.

Thanks guys, I am glad you like it.