lasermonkey

Sorry about the late reply. I've just got back from holiday in darkest Suffolk, where the internet was not much more than two paper cups and a length of string! Here's a picture of another No.92 Sqn Spifire, also flown by Allan Wright. This has the later QJ codes, the oversized 49" roundel and interestingly, the fin flash colours are reversed. I'll try to dig out my trusty copy of the November '82 issue of SAM, as that has some very useful info regarding upperwing roundel sizes. Cheers, Mark.

It was as gloomy as I've ever seen for mid May, with a low and thick overcast and constant rain. I did, however, see a Tiger Moth through a small gap in the clouds. Rather him than me, in this weather!

It looks like the Hurricane I've seen flying around for the past few days is newly restored P3717, which is the third Hurricane to live at Old Warden. What struck me most of all was that the Merlin in this one sounds like a contented cat! Spanky new Hurricane.

Ooh, a Ki-54! Now there's an attractive aeroplane!

Not quite over my house, but the Airlander was clearly visible over Cardington. Nice to see an airship in the sky again, especially on such a beautiful day.

Today we had two circuits by a Hurricane, shortly followed by a Dragon Rapide. The Rapide came back shortly after with a Chipmunk in formation. While I'm mostly fed up of living in Bedfordshire, there certainly are advantages to living so close to Old Warden!

Yesterday we had a pair of Apaches, which were heading west. This time they were considerably lower, I'm guessing maybe 300 ft. An impressive sight, for sure.

Just had three circuits by Shuttleworth's Lysander. Always welcome over these skies, especially as the neighbouring village is Tempsford! When I rushed outside to seem what was making all the noise, I had a nice, low flypast by a red kite.

Just saw a Spitfire heading north, probably following the A1. At least it won't have to queue at the Black Cat roundabout!

Many years ago, I was talked into doing a review/comparison between the 1/72 ICM Bf 109E and the Tamiya example. Whilst I was doing the research, I stumbled across the likely reason between the discrepancy in the length of the two kits. Several people had commented that they thought the Tamiya kit was too short. I took the most reliable measurements I could find at the time, converted into 1/72 and measured the Tamiya kit. It was spot-on! So why was it shorter than the other kit and the (highly regarded) drawings I was using? t was only when I looked at the drawing of the aircraft on its undercarriage that it dawned on me. When I took the measurements from the aircraft at rest (i.e. dropping a plumb line from the tip of the nose and the very end of the rudder) the measurements were again bang-on. The ICM kit fitted the drawing very well, while the Tamiya kit must have been scaled so the measurement was taken along the thrust line and consequently ended up being a bit short. Now, I'm pretty sure that the Tamiya kit is short, the main reason being that when you use markings of a known size and you position them referenced to the prominent fuselage panel lines, they end up going out of datum, due to the error being spread along the fuselage length. To me, it was one of those once you've seen it, you can't un-see it" moments. What this means is that we need to know exactly how the aircraft is measured. I suspect the plumb line method is easiest, since it is easily repeatable and consistent. Good ol' gravity! Cheers, Mark.

A Tipsy Trainer, G-AISA flew over this afternoon. I was quite pleased with my ID skills on this one. I'd only seen one before, which was in a brown and cream livery, and that was some time ago. Having noticed that this one was red overall, I suspected that it might be the same aeroplane, but repainted, but it seems that a few exist. A charming, little aeroplane.

Helicopters. Lots of Helicopters this week! Earlier today and on Monday, a pair of Lynxes flew overhead. I couldn't identify the version, except they had wheeled undercarriage. Around an hour ago, two Apaches flew low and slow, parallel to the road through our village. I suspect the pilot of the second one may have spotted me peering out of the window, as he gave a "waggle" before peeling off to the right.

If someone told me that was 1/24 scale I'd have been impressed. It's truly mind-boggling to think that level of perfection can be achieved in 1/72. inspirational! Cheers, Mark.

What I think is important is to ensure you've captured the nature of the required colour. Whether it's a little dark or light is neither here nor there, but, for instance, if the attempt at Dark Green is too blue , it will never look right. Put that next to a poor representation of Dark Earth which is too red and, well, it looks odd, to say the least! I totally agree with Jamie from Sovereign Models. There's just no excuse for manufacturers getting these colours wrong.

Weird, I visited the nearby nature reserve at around 3.30 on Saturday (and passed hoards of spotters in and around the viewing area, on the way) but saw and heard nothing of the F-35s. Maybe they're stealthier than I realised!

In my opinion, none of the Vallejo colours look like either Dark Green or Dark Earth straight from the bottle. I can pretty much tell if an RAF Temperate Land Scheme has been attempted with Vallejo paints by how odd it looks. I'd either go with Humbrol 29/116 or 163, or Colourcoats Dark Green/Dark Earth. Humbrol No.30 is too blue, and lacks the olive, brownish tint (for want of a better word). Cheers, Mark.

Oh no, what have I done?!!!!

I'd have thought more like C20H25N3O !

Lynn's a bloke, by the way!

Wow! There's no way you'd guess it started life as a Merlin kit! Exceptional work.

A Luscombe Silvair, an autogyro of some description (it looked quite modern) and Spitfire NH341, which was on its maiden flight. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-39529403

If you click the "previous" button on the link above it takes you to a photograph of that particular aircraft, showing that it does indeed have reversed markings. Hope this helps, Mark.

I decided to email Kitsworld yesterday, as I wanted to understand their reasoning behind the apparent pale grey of the decals. I received a reply quite quickly, which I will post here as I think it may be worth discussing: Hi Mark, Thank you for your email. We have been doing some research into the colour of code letters on RAF aircraft from 1938 until 1941. I have found that contrary to popular belief Medium Sea Grey was not commonly used during that period. The specified colour was stores 33B/157 Grey. This is not Medium Sea Grey but somewhat lighter. It appears on many photographs of Spitfires, Hurricanes and others in 1939-1940. Medium Sea Grey seems to have been more common on day fighters from early 1940 on until a change to Sky. The colour specified for nightfighters and night bombers was Sky Grey and for their serials too. Photographs of 1940-41 Wellingtons, Hampdens, Whitelys , Blenheim, Defiant, Hurricanes and Manchester all display very pale code letters and serials which are only just darker than the white in roundels. This has in the past been misinterpreted as both Medium Sea Grey since this is common belief or white due to the very pale appearance. White was only rarely used as a serial colour and usually in overseas service. In light of the above is it possible that you could manufacture Sky Grey code letters and serials please and do modellers a great service. You can check our comments if you consult the Ducimus series of 'Camouflage and Markings' books of the 1970s where there are numerous photographs. There are many other published sources for photographs too which I am sure that you know of. Regards, Kitsworld I can't help but think they've got the wrong end of the stick here! Thoughts, gentlemen? Cheers, Mark.

Thanks for the replies, gentlemen. My experience with paler representations of Medium Sea Grey decals is that they look even lighter on the model, so I'll give these decals a miss. I'm at a loss as to why many decal manufacturers get MSG so wrong. The colour is still in BS 381C, so not difficult to get reasonably close to. So very frustrating. Cheers, Mark.

Having spotted that Kits World had released a couple of sets of MSG squadron codes, one of which was 28", I became rather animated. Despite the official requirements for squadron code sizes, it's obvious from studying photographs that these were not always adhered to, and being something of a Battle Of Britain buff, there was a need for some 27"/28" codes (plus 32"/33", but that's another story). Imagine my confusion when confronted with this: That's not Medium Sea Grey! I was sure that squadron codes were Medium Sea Grey in this time frame? Certainly, that's what my references tell me. It has long been a bugbear of mine that many decal manufacturers get MSG so wrong, and and at first appearance, this seems to be yet another. However, I noticed that the decal title states that it's Stores Ref 33B/157 Grey and I have to confess, this is the first time I have encountered this term. Is it known what grey this is? Did it become Medium Sea Grey or was it another colour entirely? If so, which is the correct colour for 1939-40 squadron codes? So many questions! Cheers, a very confused Mark.