Rik

I intend to make this aircraft but with the number 8018 rather than 8019 as the aircraft is in the Military Museum in Beijing. You can see it by taking the subway to "Museum" station and across the road is a building with a big red star on top. You do need to show your passport to enter....no, I don't know why.

This is an Auster Antarctic as originally issued by Airfix, not an AOP6 but can be altered quite easily. The wheels and prop could do with replacement items too.

Wow!

Very nice effort. I intend to build a Rhodesian Allouette but cant find any useful pictures of them. Anyone got any ideas?

I have recently made this model and yes it is a battle! The real aircraft is in a village called Chkalovsk at the home of Valery Chkolov and I had great pleasure in clambering around it. Although no one there spoke English they made me welcome and seemed surprised to see anyone especially a mad foreigner. I would post photos but Britmodeller make it too hard. If anyone wants to see the photos maybe Britmodeller can put them in touch with me.

There are many strange errors concerning this aircraft. I know Ada's son and have done many years research trying to find facts and photos. A contact even searched the RN photo archives which are not open to the public but with no success. It is strange that no photos seem to be available as Revell, Classic Airframe and others (Profile Publications artwork) depict the aircraft. Where did they get their information? I suspect they just copied others as all make the same error in the kit as they make the profile of the four outer struts the same which they aren't In the official account of the last flight of "Darby" they get the position wrong and the reason for the loss wrong. It actually ran out of fuel which they knew it would. The NZ pilot was down in the sea close to the Japanese mainland and would have been captured so they sent "Darby" to pick him up and fly as far as they could away and get picked up by an American submarine. Rik Ada has actually spoken to the NZ pilot and he has confirmed the position and was being picked up by USS Peto when the crew saw a strange aircraft heading for them. Not knowing what it was they crash dived. So, they couldn't find the pilot and ran out of fuel, were picked up by a US destroyer which then sank Darby with gunfire.

Great job! Very ArtDeco aircraft. Now all we need is for Airfix to wake up and produce a new DH88 model in 1:72.....and 1:48. In the meantime at least we can go and admire the real thing at the Shuttleworth museum. By the way what happed to the DH88 they were restoring in USA (?)

Looks very nice. Just looking at it I would have thought it was 1:48 ! I have built this kit and enjoyed it and converted one into a DH4A and have a resin fuselage to make a DH4B.

Very nice! I wonder about Airfix's thinking back then. Why make a model of the less known "long nose" Freighter? Also why make the Heron but not the much better known Dove / Devon? They weren't the only ones. Dinky made in (1946 to 1949) a Messerschmitt 110 calling it a "twin engine fighter" but not a DH Mosquito

I have a photo of the remains of a Taiwan U2 in the Military Museum in Beijing. If you want a copy let me know.

Ha! I did exactly what you did. I made it to relax from some complicated models and managed to break off various bits but landed up pleased with the result.

or just sit back and wait tiill Airfix bring out a new DH88 in 1/72 and 1/48. It would make sense to do both as so much time money and effort would be done in the R + D. While Airfix is about it they could do the same for the Supermarine S6B

Nice one.

Interesting discussion. Further to it I am interested in the prototype which became "Black Magic". When it first flew it only had "E.1" on the fuselage in white. What was the airframe colour? It certainly not black. I suspect that being a prototype it was left in undercoat / primer but what colour? What colour primer did DH use in those days?

I can't see the method that Matchbox / Revell recommend building the top wing by making and fitting the centre section first then adding the outer wing panels. On top of that the struts are not right in length. The only way is to build up the entire wing then fit it in place using the inner struts then working out the outer struts. In the end I tossed them and used Contrail strut.