Stew Dapple

Hello gents, here's my fifth completion of the year, Kotare's 1/32 Spitfire Ia (Mid). I had a momentary sag when I realised I was on the final stages of this kit, the same way that you might when you realise you're on the last few pages of a book you were really enjoying and you don't want it to end. It's an expensive kit, for sure, but it's beautifully moulded and engineered, not so complex that it's difficult to build, doesn't require weeks, days or even hours of sanding, filling, scratchbuilding etc. so depending on what you enjoy about modelling this may not be the kit for you I had a couple of minor irritations - I didn't like the look of the landing gear leg attachments at all so I ended up fitting the landing gear legs before adding the upper wing... I wasn't too keen on adding the fuselage spine light before fixing the fuselage spine in place, but in fairness that was a good solution and I only had a bit of resentment due to the fact it meant I had to mask it before painting. Finally I wasn't terribly happy at having to shave off part of the cockpit door opening in order to have the door closed as if it were me who was the freak here and not those oddballs who want to leave the door hanging open The paints used were Colourcoats of course - for the strange interior green colour noted in the instructions I used ACRA08 Verde Mimetico 53192 which is a close eyeball match for the Humbrol 120 recommended in the instructions (I needn't have bothered, you literally can't see anything except the pilot's seat and armour if you have the cockpit closed, and I had painted those in ACRN28 RAF Interior Grey-Green as this was one of the optional colours noted in the instructions). Upper surface camouflage was ACRN09 Dark Green over ACRN10 Dark Earth and the undersurface camouflage was done in ACRN01 - Sky "S" Type. I wasn't really taken with any of the kit's markings options; Al Deere has always been a hero to me but I just don't like to see a Mk.I with a Rotol prop and spinner, plus the proportions of the fuselage roundel look strange (though they are accurate); Richard Hardy's aircraft is basically famous for being captured more or less intact which doesn't strike me as a great claim to fame, and the 610 Squadron Spitfire has the fuselage codes on wonky... I tell you building this kit I learned quite a lot about Spitfires (and I thought I already knew a fair bit but I was overestimating quite a lot as it turned out) and one of the things I learned is that I can get quite uptight about some strange things Anyway I ordered some aftermarket decals and used the ones for one of the 92 Squadron Spitfires from August 1940; it too has a misproportioned fuselage roundel but for some reason I like that one. I almost managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by picking the model up to test fit the underwing pitot while the decals on the starboard side were still wet with decal setting solution: the serial and squadron code on that side both disattached themselves from the model and stuck as little crumpled decorations on my fingertips. By a stroke of extreme good luck, our late forum-buddy Silver Fox had sent me some years ago the 1/32 transfers from the Kagero Battle of Britain Part II set which included the same aircraft as an option - the stroke of the serial is slightly thinner and the grey of the squadron code a little darker than the individual aircraft letter, but I was happy to accept the trade-off for the save. Well, sorry for the ramble, if you made it this far, thanks for your attention Cheers, Stew

Sorry for the delay in getting started gents; just had to clear the workbench Hope to have some progress on the Whirlwind over the weekend Cheers, Stew

Lovely job on both the aircraft and the ladies Andy, beautiful work Cheers, Stew

Gentlemen, start your hats Good luck and have fun everyone Cheers, Stew

Haha you gave me a bit of a turn there Steve, I thought I had missed the start date Cheers, Stew

Oh I noticed... Cheers, Stew

Haha yes the AM just kept following me home... off the internet The LF masks are thin vinyl, I've used them before and got on okay with them - I would definitely eschew vinyl masks for canopies unless nothing else was available as they need to stick to the clear parts while the interior, exterior and varnish coats are applied which can be days or even weeks... Kabuki tape doesn't have an issue with that but I'd rather not rely on vinyl for it. However for the camouflage masks, they just need to be applied long enough to have the disruptive camo pattern sprayed over them, so they're stuck onto a painted surface rather than unprimed clear plastic, and they need to stay there maybe one hour? I may come a cropper this time, but I'm reasonably confident they'll do the necessary The canopy masks are Kabuki, made by ASK, I'm not sure if they also make the masks for HGW, they look very similar. Thanks Dennis, I hope that you have picked one up now? That's good intel Carl and thanks for the illustration, that may save me a deal of frustration Thanks Steve, I remembered there was a build of one of these on the forum and for some reason I thought it was yours I've built a couple of Special Hobbies small scale kits and got on all right, this will be my first biggie of theirs so hopefully I will muddle through Cheers, Stew

Big, you say? Well okay. It's almost the biggest model in my stash, the Special Hobby Westland Whirlwind Mk.I. It's big: And it's been unstarted for too long: Did I mention that it's big? While waiting in the stash it has accumulated quite a bit of aftermarket; a set of seatbelts: Some resin wheels and cannons - I'm not that comfortable with the idea of the resin cannons which I think would be more vulnerable to breakage than the kit's plastic ones, but if they look much better I would probably go with them: ... and finally, canopy and camouflage masks. What can I say? I'm lazy and I'm prepared to pay any company that offers to indulge my laziness So I'm set. See you at the start line gents Cheers, Stew P.S. It's big

Hello gents, just finished this, my fourth completion of the year: Trumpeter's MiG-3 in 1/32. Quite a simple kit, went together pretty well. Painted in Colourcoats ACUS37 - WW2 Insignia White ANA601 and ACS01 - A.II Blue. Kit decals were used. Thanks for your attention Cheers, Stew

Well I said I would need one... Cheers, Stew

She's a beauty James, nice work Cheers, Stew

I'll be wading in with the Special Hobby 1/32 Westland Whirlwind, it was a present from a friend quite a while ago and has just been sitting there collecting aftermarket ever since I think it's overdue an airing. Cheers, Stew

Revell's 1/32 FW190A-8/R2 Sturmbock with EagleCal decals for Yellow 2 of 6/JG300, Löbnitz, December 1944: Build thread is here. Cheers, Stew

... and I'm done I did the 'glamour' shots this morning; I posted the two pictures above because the colour came out much nicer than the gallery shots using a dark grey background: But still, in the great scheme of things it doesn't really register The Revell FW190 is a really nice kit, a bit fussy in places but you can see why they did it in the case of things like the engine and undercarriage which both came out quite nicely even if, in my case regarding the engine, it will only ever be seen again if the model is broken up Anyway it's a relatively reasonable price for a kit of this scale and as far as I know quite an accurate one, a pretty easy build and a pleasing result More pics in the Gallery. Cheers, Stew

Looking sharp Bob Cheers, Stew

Whoops, I missed the stage where I completed and fitted the landing gear assembly, but trust me, I did, as can be seen below. I applied all the transfers that I had decided to apply which included very few of the stencils (even though the EagleCal instructions note that this aircraft apparently carried a full set of stencil markings). Yes I know, but I'm getting too old, impatient and shortsighted to spend a day adding tiny text decals and since I don't have to, I decided I wouldn't. The decals I did use (EagleCal decals are printed by Cartograph) were absolutely top-quality and a pleasure to apply and probably deserved a more conscientious modeller than me, but them's the breaks. Once they had time to bed down, I applied a coat of AK satin varnish which I bought after the debacle involving the Citadel varnish and the FW190D. I didn't have any application issues but the end result was a little more at the shiny end of the 'Satin' scale than I was expecting, it doesn't matter enough to me to do it again but I think next time I will add a bit of matt varnish to the mix just to take the albedo down a bit. So, just a last few bits to be added and some detail painting to be done, and this will be done; I hope to get it finished over the weekend Cheers, Stew

That's Boss-level wife-trolling there Bill Hope you're doing very well too Cheers, Stew

Good start Tim Cheers, Stew

Happy to help mate Yes it's a bit of a shame about the engine but really it took me less than a day to paint and assemble it, which I could maybe have cut down to half a day if I'd only painted the bits that might be seen at the end, so it wasn't like months of toil for nothing I'm just glad that after going to all the trouble of researching, designing and moulding the engine parts that Revell still allowed you the option of not having the cowlings open to display the engine I didn't get any transfer application done over the weekend, but did spend a fair bit of time fiddling with the landing gear. The main covers and legs were started: ... and their ancilliaries cleaned up ready for painting: Wheels and tyres were assembled and the colours roughly blocked in: I know it looks like I've got one 'ribbed' tyre and one smooth but in fact they're both ribbed, just one is more out of focus than the other as the auto-focus seemed fixated on the plastic packing stuff that I jammed the cocktail sticks into Finally the undercarriage bits got a coat of RLM02: Cheers, Stew

Thanks Mark, I think it's about as good as I could have done it Not weathering it though. Thanks James, yes I think I was pretty lucky with the mottling, could have been a little more sparing with it but otherwise one of my better efforts I was working from home yesterday but had a couple of breaks and got the (presumably) heat-resistant painted panels to the rear of the exhuasts masked and painted: I think today I will mostly be fiddling with landing gear, maybe some application of transfers later Cheers, Stew

So, there was mottling. Just a brief recap of EagleCals' interpretation of the original camo: I did my best; a little overwrought and indeed overdone, but it will have to do as it's unlikely I could do any better anyway I can take some consolation from my long-held and long-cherished belief that the appearance of mottling always improves about 25% when the transfers are applied Finally, I could not resist unmasking the tail-wheel and fuselage band: Actually not too shabby, no overspray or undercreep on the fuselage band... the blue is a bit more saturated than I imagined it would be and rather brighter than the EagleCals profile, but not as bright as the JG300 fuselage band on the decal sheet for the Revell Bf109G-10. So if they can get away with it, presumably I'm within acceptable parameters Next I need to mask the square black area behind the exhaust outlets and in between that start generally fiddling around with the undercarriage bits Cheers, Stew

Yesterday I got the RLM74 applied: Spot the undeliberate mistake? I neglected to paint the opaque rear part of the canopy I've done it now and I thought I'd photographed it, I was planning to use that picture to spare myself the embarrassment but it turned out I hadn't photographed it after the touch-up so it's a fair cop guv I've got the day off today (but am working tomorrow ) so I predict some mottling in my immediate future... Cheers, Stew

That's quality mottling there James, well done Cheers, Stew

Thanks James, I'm always pleasantly surprised by how well the RLM76 covers even over black, I think it's going to be a problem and then it isn't Me neither Dennis, but good whisky tends to come with good corks I got the grauviolet applied: I could have just pressed on and applied the RLM74 grey-green, but I was feeling lazy and there's still plenty of GB time left Cheers, Stew

Haha thanks James, it amused me at the time and actually it probably has saved me some time and irritation over the years I suspect it was just easier to paint following the line, but that's applying my mindset to it Have Blue: Hopefully I can apply the Grauviolet today Cheers, Stew