John B (Sc)

That upper wing section - and port fuselage setcion looks very like it has a gloss finish, unles itw a sarininbg - and the way the kids are standing suggests not. The aluminium window surround and Taifun logo do rather suggest no i=overpaint/repaint by the military. Given the early period of the war, it's not unreasonable that soenme varaitions may exist and that not all impressed or ex-civil machines had been repainted. The so called 'phoney war' appears to have been more relaxed than perhaps we imagine in hindsight, and probably less well organised too. What were they doing - I presume they were off course. If they expected to be, intended to be well behind the lines and flying towards their own territories, the lack of camouflage colour would be irrelevant. Dark blue is quite hard to spot from the air, and over confidence amongst pilots was/is not unknown !

Thank you very much indeed Juan, those comments of yours are most helpful. I have the most recent (I think) issue, which has some lovely decals, and a colourful US National Guard option. Nice surface detail in many places. Some of the internet comments I'd read made me wonder whether I could model a reasonable F16-C from this kit. It seems I can, for an early Block number- I had no idea the manufacturing options had become so manifold. Fascinating. I had noted the intake duct issue, something I am working on right now. Notably crude sides ! Quite a filling, smoothing and sanding job is in progress. I briefly played with soem very thin plasticard to provide a smooth curved base for theisdes, but have reverted to simple filling and shaping. As you said, the other option may well be to fita FOD guard, which is the nrrom when parked anyway. The outside sanding and blending is no major problem. I'm glad you feel the cockpit can be worked with; I felt something believable was possible. The canopy on mine will be raised, partly because it intrigued me, many years ago when I first saw an F-16. Shades of the old Folland Midge and early single seat Gnat - or even Mig-21 I think (?). That empty space behind the seat indeed needs something to busy it up. I shall also have a good think about wheel well details - which to an old style modeller looked not bad with fair internal ribbing etc. (I do go back - just - to the days of Frog and 'plug-in' undercarriage legs. Wheel bays, what are those?) I understand the undercarraige can be weak - though having successfully wrestled Zvezda 1/144 airliner model gear to some satisfactory conclusions, the Italeri parts look reasonable to my eye. Construction will tell ! The contrast between this kit and, say, the 1/32 F-104 series of kits surprised me, until I realised this is a thirty year old mould. Rather like their F/A-18E, which was chunky and very awkward to build in parts. Cheers, John B

Thansk, but actually it is not. There are some very generic comments like - 'it is badly moulded', but little that is specific. Yes, I realise it is a mould from ~30 years ago and yes I am aware that Italeri kits tend to veer to one extreme or the other - some being superb, some notably dubious and occasionally there are repops of notably out of date material. They are not alone in that variability, of course. What I hoped to find out is what SPECIFICALLY is so bad with this kit? What can a modeller of reasonable experience do to improve it? What doesn't fit, ort what is inappropriate to the machines depicted in the decal schemes? Is it worth building, if not why not? I have one, gifted to me. I don't often build modern jets and to the best of my knowledge I've never built an F-!6 before, so any information is useful. I can see the canopy is not as bulged as perhaps it ought to be, and of course is not tinted. The cockpit looks fairly basic. Are those fair comemnts, are there are other things I should note, please? (In the past two days I have learned a great deal more about F-16s and the extraordinarily wide range of variations around. And I had thought Spitfire and F-86 Sabre variants were confusing! )

As someone ignorant on the subject of F-16s, can I ask what is wrong with the kit?

Thanks Dave. I knew the gentleman's name was Harry, that was all. I have now made contact with him using that moniker you provided. I had also found the Facebook page - thanks also, Michael. Cheers, John B

Hello. This may or may not be the 'correct' place for this question - if not hopefully Mike of one of the other admin folk will help. Does anyone here have any contact with VFR Models, please? I have been trying to contact by e-mail and using the contact form on the website, with no luck so far. (after around two weeks total) I believe this is a one man show, so I quite understand there may be plenty other urgencies in life. Just wondering if anyone on here knows of anything helpful. Thanks, John B

Superb photos Iain, thanks - and thanks for the inside shots as well ! Are those two aircraft in the circuit Mirages F1s? They don't like 100% right to me, but I can't think what else looks like that. John B

Thank you 'Troy Smith'. I wasn't aware that Hawker Restorations had got so much material prepared. Superb. I was aware of Sir Sidney's views on welded strcutures and of his liking for progressive advances in engineering. An engineer/designer I much admire. As a Huriicane enthusiast, though not perhaps on your scale, I thoroughly approve of the idea of more Hurricanes. One of my friends has a share in a Hurricane; his father flew Huricanes during the Battle of Britain, and was most interesting to talk to about flyingthem and other machines.. He was one of the lucky few who survived the whole war. Having had some experience of negogiating with the CAA and its view of the relevant rules, to try to get some slightly anomalous machinery eairborne, I agree with 'Work In Progress' ' view - anything which makes it easier to achieve a legal approval is worth using, especially since the design rules have changed so much over the years.

I believe the biggest single challenge for a Hurricane rebuild will be the main spars, which were a multi sided nested set of tubes. Fabricating new items like that is a specialist task; one factory in Germany (ironically) did have the capability until recently, not sure if that is still true. The Hawker/Camm system of squared off bolted together tubes which provide the fuselage main structure won't be easy to produce either, thiugh I believe the Typhoon project has a process for that. For an aircraft which was so much faster and easier to build and maintain thatthe Spitfire, it is interesting to look at this. What were then simple options, presumably fairly readily availaible, are now hard to make. It would be superb to see more Hurricanes in the air, even if they are essentially replicas. I wonder if they woudl make better 'warbirds' for enthusiast pilots in future, given their rather more forgiving handling (allegedly - I've never flown one!) John B

"replaced the older toolimg which is probably older than most of us". Oy - sonny ! - some of us remember building the original when it first came out, in the old orange dayglo and silver of 4FTS at Valley. I had just been to Rhosneigr and had watcehd the Gnats including the Yellowjacks, so that first issue stayed vividly in my young mind. I think Airfix issued their F5 Freedom Fighter in Imperial Iranian AF colours at much the same time. For some strange reason the original issue had underwing rockets provided atached to a very draggy looking carrier, something I don't recall seeing on anything except a Midge mock up. Possibly the Finns used that on their single seaters. We thought that little Gnat kit was very fine, especially for two shillings - 10p in current money. However, I agree, this new moulding is very much better, even though just a tad pricier ! I guess I shan't buy so many of them... John B

Thanks tweeky, that's my memory too !

The recent ICM 1/32 kits are generally excellent, especially the biplanes and the Yak series. Hasegawa also have some excellent kits, some good WW2 machines - old releases but darn good generally. I agree Tamiya is generally superb, but is pricey !

A Sportavia Sperber RF-5B, ideally in 1/48th scale - and with folding wings option. Unlikely to happen, I admit ! And a decent Stampe SV4 in 1/32nd scale - which ICM might just do, one day. John B

Thank you Pete, most helpful. I wondered if there might be something like that. I never noticed it on any of myold photographs If the Airfix kit is accurate, your comment about the single seaters looks right. They have modelled closed nosebay doors with a triangular cut out. Most interesting. I wonder why that was required - and why it was a larger cut-out on the two seaters. John B

I cross kitted several old mould Airfix Lightning Ia & 3 kits to use the small belly tanks on the Matchbox two seaters. The Matchbox wings also got swapped with the Airfix ones I think, since I don't recall any RAF two seaters having the extended wings. The belly tanks from the Matchbox kits made my single seaters into later marks. A lot of cut and fit, but good fun !

I believe Mr Brown's wife fell ill and he abandoned further model developemnt to look after her. I don't know any more about him/her than that. I have copies of the Echelon Lightning and Hunter - including one two seat Hunter - and they are truly superb. If the moulds still exist that would be terrific, though I suspect they were intended for a short production run of mouldings only. The white metal parts provided in addition were magnificent. My overall impression was that Mr Brown was a perfectionist; he may have concluded the moulds had reached their limit. What I did find interseting was how closely the later Revell 1/32 single seat Hunter followed the parts breakdown and build process which Echelon used forthe quite awkward Hunter intake arrangement. Whether that was coincidence or a deliberate copy, perhaps with approval, I don;t know. A gerats hame there were no further kits. I had hoped for two seat Lightning and there was a rumour of studies being done for a Buccaneer. Wishful thinking? I don't know. I still have a couple of his kits to build; they deserve care and slow accurate building ! Expensive even when I bouht them in the early Nineties direct from Ecehelon/Mr. Brown, but well worth it ! John B

A couple of questions about Vampires. I notice that the sideways closing rear nosewheel door on Vampires has a slantwise cutaway front face. This is usually a full diagonal cutaway on (most) two seaters and a part cutaway on single seaters. The front door section folds straight back to close off the front of the bay and appears to be rectangular with a straight lower edge. None of the pictures I have seen suggest any gaps in the nosewheel doors once closed, so is there a folded away section which springs out to fill the gap as the gear comes up? Second question. Some Vampire FB5s and FB9s have an extended housing or fillet where the starboard intake meets the fuselage side. Is this for the Godfrey cooling system fitted for hot climate operations? My references suggest these were only fitted to FB9s, yet several of the photographs and drawings I’ve seen identify FB5s with the extended fillet, including some RAuxAF machines. Has some mis-identification or confusion occurred? It is quite possible I suppose that withdrawn FB9s may have been issued to Aux AF units after the Venom took over tropical strike duties in 1955. It doesn’t help that most photos of aircraft seem to be taken from the port side! Something else which intrigues me is why de Havilland and UK industry seemed to abandon the Nene powered Vampire Mk4, largely on the grounds of its extra weight and also failed to produce an ejector seat equipped single seat Vampire. The French Mistral, their development of the licence built Vampire not only used the Nene, but also the improved intakes developed by Hawker for the Seahawk, and added ejector seats. So what did they do differently? Adding the ejector seat would have helped the CG issues a bit, but did they also adjust undercarriage position or add fuselage forward length? Or just move equipment around to avoid adding ballast. Any answers or thoughts will be welcome. Thanks John B

I am intrigued at the comment about 'increased tail surface size. Why, and by how much, I wonder ? Having spent many happy hours in Super Cubs, mostly aerotowing, I found them nice handling aircraft. The180 HP conversions were rather short of elevator authority for a full three point round out, due presumably to the wight of the more powerful engine, but I woudln't have expected that to be an issue for a 150HP Cub. John B

This is fascinating. Like Sloegin57/Dennis I have a couple of original photographs, Kodak transparencies, which I took many years ago at RAF Leuchars. Haven't sorted them out since I moved; I do need to transfer them to electronic format sometime soon. The impression I recall was that the single seater colours looked almost identical to the roundel colour - very much as Dennis' picture shows - but the two seater main colour seemed just a touch lighter or 'brighter'. However the two seater was snapped in a slightly brighter patch of daylight. Personally I was content with my Blue Diamnond's models being essentially roundel blue - but then way back then I was using a modified Airfix 'Balck Arrows' Mk 6 with all that kit's inaccuracies anyway !

63 ! My word, - that's going to need a bunch of locking wire !

Thanks - 'turnbuckles' , not adjusters. It's been too long ago !

Now that's a thought! A 1/32nd two seat Lightning would be terrific. I'd think it might sell well too. It was a shame that Frank Brown stopped when he did (I think his wife was ill?). There were rumours of a two seat Lightning and a Buccaneer being thought of. I only bought one Lightning transparency for now- to my surprise when I checked my second kit canopy was fine. Stroke of luck, so I bought the 1/48 Hunter two seater conversion I'd looked at a while ago. A Lossiemouth FAA machine is planned of course. John B

Day before yesterday we had an unexpected drop in at our field. A 1935 DH Hornet Moth, in beautiful condition. After refuelling both aircraft and pilot it took off and flew a circuit right over our house before heading back to Yorkshire. Super sight and sound. John B

Yes, plenty of us around. I recall watching an early Lightning night launch at Leuchars; the way the lower afterburner flame spear bent as it hit the tarmac on rotation was impressive. Especially after the Javelins and, earlier, Hunters !

Blimey, 50 bracing wires with adjusters! I thought the number of adjusters in the old Slingsby T21 and T31 gliders were bad enough, but fifty ! Thanks for the explanation of the rudder blanking once the tail goes down. I should have thought of that. I seem to recall one airfield down South which insisted on having the local Tiger Moth land on the tarmac rather than grass, because of the grooves they claimed it dug. The tailskid spoon was constantly having to be reinforced with a sacrificial plate. John B