jean

Hi Pat, you should not have any tail sitting problems, as you still have to add four engines (!!!) that will reach well forward of the main landing gear. Sue me if it looks at the sky when all has been glued and painted!!!!! Have fun JR

Good evening all, a quick update, because even snails make some progress, sometimes... The canopy-fuselage junction has been puttied and cleaned up, and I am quite happy with the result. A sanding pad left a small scratch on the canopy where it ate the masking tape, but hopefully a dab of Klir will sort that out! So I have actually no excuse left at all for not starting the paint job ... Terrible. I guess I could fiddle with the landing gear, but I receive enough hate mail as it is. Paint it shall be! Cheers. JR

Thanks for tip Steve. I guess I would have found out for myself... after trying to glue the whole mouth at once, of course! Cheers JR

That was fast!!! Looks good. JR

Hi Steve, your modelling abilities are becoming stellar! Congrats on a very tasty Widow! Keep them coming. Cheers JR PS: I can't remember when glue sniffing became a problem, but I have always been a sucker for bitter almond-smelling glues! The best one was a white gooey paste in a little plastic jar, and it had a small "spoon" fitted in the lid. I smelled it any occasion I could... So it kind of made me a junkie at a very tender age, although it never did anything weird to me... Then a couple of years ago in the DRC I bought a bunch of marker pens for my work... and they had exactly the same bitter almond smell... I had quite a bit of explaining to do, as I kept having black mustaches and black nose... Proust's madeleines were definitely far more user friendly... But I am sure they did not glue plastic kits worth a damn...

Hi Steve, this is music to my ears!!! Thank you! I am planning to do the Aleutian P-40, tiger face and all. Do you have any recollection on how the decals behaved? You will be forgiven if you cannot remember. I am not sure what I had for breakfast this morning myself... Cheers JR

Hi Chris, thanks for your uplifting comments. The mongoose has now got a 10 feet restraining order; she was served this morning! I live in the bush and people tend to think I spend my day in a chaise longue, drinking G and Ts while watching wildlife cavorting by the swimming pool... The truth is, I do not even know when it is Sunday and my modelling time has shrunk to precious little! So I am grateful for any minute I can have with a plastic model, as long as the feral mongoose is not around! Cheers JR

Hi Pat, I lied... only one photo to show... But it shows progress, however microscopic. Exhaust pre-painted roughly, as I believe it is easier to paint cleanly around them than having to paint the exhaust after the camo... But I still may stuff it all up anyway! Prop and spinner done and tomorrow I will sand paper the putty around the canopy. The ironic thing is that the "French blue grey" is pretty much the color of the grey primer!!! it will be interesting to see if this is the case, and if so, I may just use primer in the future! If the gods are kind, I may be able to finish the camouflage this week. Dreaming is a great hobby! JR

Hi guys, well here we are surfing from disaster to semi-disaster, so I guess life is smiling! After the mongoose terrorist attack of the other day, I have finally repainted prop and spinner and I am reasonably happy with the outcome. Photos later today! Then I filled in the gaps around the canopy with putty, and decided it was a good day to paint the underside of the 406. For that purposeI have the Lifecolor UA141, aka French blue grey, which is perfect for this purpose. So I open the little plastic tinlet to be met with a gooey mass!!! It took me about 10 minutes of stirring to realize that this mess would never be used as a paint in a million years... I am not an acrylic man, but the more I try acrylics, the less I like them. This is not going to make me change my mind! So... I did notice however that the paint is labelled as well FS 36473. This rang a loud bell, and I quickly found my ENAMEL (!!!) tinlet of Xtracolor Aircraft grey (FS 16473). I checked the paint, and it is perfect, and the color is pretty much spot on. So disaster averted! Except that I missed my modelling window, so no more painting today!!! A few photos later on. Cheers JR

Hi Michelle, the build is progressing nicely, and a build without some problems is nowhere near as interesting... Why don't you try Flickr? It works a charm and is a hell of a lot more user friendly and less stuck up than Photobucket! Have fun! JR

Hi Pat, it is looking impressive and great! You finished the shed to store it in, yet? I never thought you were the type who liked his models bound and defenseless... But hey, nobody is judging!!! Keep having fun! JR

Hi all, this is just a place marker for the time being. I am still floundering in the Frog GB and time is running out. I should not even be wasting precious minutes typing all this! Anyway, I will attempt to build the Academy 1/72 P-40E, which is a lovely kit. A few photos: And I am adding a couple of aftermarket goodies, as I cannot stand the shape of the Academy spinner, and the wheel wells are far too shallow for my liking! I am planning to start this build after October 6th, upon completion of the Frog GB. Actually looking forward to build a P-40. It has been a few decades since the last one I built. Cheers. JR

Hi Adrian, fauna is the problem. If they don't try to flatten you, eat you, poison you, they trash your plastic models!!! Having said that, our mongoose can do no wrong. You should have seen my nose a few days ago, when she decided to latch onto it... It looked like I had been close and personal with a Dobberman. And she is all of 500 grams. Naaaasty. My wife was just waiting for me to say something untoward. I did not dare. What a life... Cheers JR

Rather smashing old chap! And splendid too!!! JR

Hi Pat, this is moving along fast, or so I think! I love your flight crew sitting in front of their scrambled egg and ketchup breakfast!!! And I feel for you for having to paint all these props... But when all the nasty little comments are over, you are going to create another splendid model! This will definitely shut all the narrow minded homo sapiens (?) like myself, up. Great job. JR