Nocoolname

Mine landed yesterday. Too whacked by work to take a proper look at it yet. Sat next to the MV-22 that arrived today that I've also not had time to see yet.

I think the Romans might have preferred that M10

Jamie That's a whole ton of maths and physics that my brain can't accommodate. Thanks so much for doing what I just couldn't. The world is a safer place with me being a pizza eating robot rather than working in something important like aircraft (except at scale where I'm quite good at breaking things) The pictures also reminded me that I have a 1/72 Tu-22 in the stash still waiting for some attention.

I genuinely and honestly appreciate the concerns around the care of the historical aircraft but... is there any further news about the 'model' of the Vulcan (subject of the thread?)... like, the release date, purchase options etc.?

It 'is' a good idea. 'flexible modularity' that is designed to allow interchangable parts on production aircraft to suit changing operational demands is a very good idea. If you can switch out parts of the actual aircraft as easily as you can switch out ordinance on a multi or swing role aircraft that would really increase your strategic and tactical options. The problem, though, is that the journey from concept to product is extraordinarily complicated and where it has worked in the past has been due to having the right, the same - and consistently 'high' - expertise leading the initiative from start to finish, like the proverbial golden thread, but this rarely happens these days due to a... ahem... 'modular' approach to 'product management' whereupon a 'concept' is given over to another group that may not necessarily appreciate the nuances around the original idea (that cannot often and certainly not easily be translated into a set of model kit like instructions) and as such, not only lead to the development failing but do so in a way in which the narrative points the finger at the 'idea' rather than those involved in the execution. I've seen a lot of news reports of people being assigned from a 'project profession pool' to take command of such disparate and complicated subjects on the basis that being able to apply PM principles to launching a corporate policy or a bakery automatically qualifies them to direct the delivery of a concept aircraft or a Death Star. So a great concept - modularisation of an aircraft - may fail because of a poorly thought through approach to the 'modularisation' of its development and delivery. But maybe things are sharper in the defence industry and its all slick from idea to flight? I wouldn't know given that my day job is ruining model kits and eating pizza!

Ooooooooooooooo.....! First thing I thought... 'oooo... someone has already got their hands on this kit' (I only ever wanted to build an F and ditched my G once this was announced) Second thing I thought... 'oooo... that's a great build, really nice balance of detail and weathering for me'... and has got me chomping at the bit for my own pre-order. Great stuff! Thanks for sharing.

Wow! That's a super job! The difference between this and my Airfix 1/72 F-14 effort 'back in the day' just made me hide under the table blushing Thanks for sharing!

Well I've just taken the plunge and ordered one from Black Mikes Models along with a pre-order for the B-17F. With the Su-33 incoming that's a 'lot' of super detail and temporary loft insulation on its way and mostly due to Mike's amazing reviews!

Thanks Greg! Between my knowledge of Cold-War era ordinance being so ropey it could be used in a tug of war and the wheels occasionally coming of my brain there was a good chance I'd get it wrong. I believe it should have been Mk 82's, (or as my brain sees them 'those green bomby shaped bombs that l have round yellow bands on them') of which I have copious amounts (from Academy kits and Eduard AM) in case Tamiya don't include them. Their choice of the VF-51 CAG bird is awesome. I remember seeing a built version of the Hasegawa kit sporting this scheme on display at Harrods during a school trip to the Big Smoke back in 1987 and have wanted to build one like it ever since. I'd be looking to build the CAG bird as it might have looked had it been involved in bombing missions late in the Vietnam War (c.1972).

Well, I have my 'display idea' already formed for this kit thanks to having a Tamiya 1/48 Humvee in the stash, so this will initially be displayed in the flight/hover mode with a Humvee strung from beneath. It may be some time before we see this though given that my current 'diorama' build (F-14 on Skunkworks Carrier Deck) is still... er.. on the deck and undergoing 'surgery', but at least I have all the parts I need to get cracking (save for the - prays - hopefully to be released cockpit from Quinta which would really take it up a few notches). Unlike My Sea King HAR.3 idea that never got off the ground due to the lack of a Severn-class lifeboat in the same scale

Not necessarily, if advancements in active camouflage and battlefield countermeasures deliver additional capabilities in parallel. ROV's (including vehicles that can be both manned or remotely operated as required) will definitely become more dominant with advancements in 'limited' AI taking on a greater load from and increasing the range of support to operators and commanders alike until countermeasures are developed to overcome these. If you're talking 'human equivalent' AI - which would require the replication of multi-spectrum sensive characteristics that haven't even been mapped in their original state yet (understanding even at a neural level is still immature), yet alone replicated in a manner that could be employed in an avatar (such as an armed vehicle) that could think as creatively and with as much inventiveness as a human counterpart - if that pops out of a lab we're all toast. And besides, why waste billions on a tin terminator to stop a tank when a well disguised hole in the ground might do just as well.

I've gone for lighting for aircraft before - cockpits, cabin, strobes, nav lights etc. - but no mechanics. At least not since I put a motor into a 1/72 Sea King as a kid to get the rotors spinning and nearly took my hand off. I do like what they've done with this kit though.

Andy That is simply stunning. My mind is so blown that I'm still trying to find it. It has both intimidated me into looking away from my own kit but then inspired me to dig it back out again and start working up my own build. It is like Schrodinger's hobby experience. Any chance you can start running classes for us - not on how you achieve the effects that you have, but how you make it look so 'easy'?

As you say, it's all about choice, and also perspective. To be fair, getting the size and depth of lines right at scale has always been a tricky business and its possible, likely even, that at 72nd these will be large. But many aircraft still have 'lines' - the demarcation between one panel and the next and which has been accentuated by dirt, oil or other factors - and they 'do' show up, quite clearly in many cases and in photos that when reduced in size would be comparable to the scales we use. But its really down to the modeller as to whether they wish to represent these as close to the image of the 'real thing' as they can (for me, in this case, I would go for a much lighter wash for selective panel areas only and aim for a more 'blended' look) or wish to go for something that is simply more pleasing to them. These are after all, personal works of 'art' rather than just assembly, and driven by the imagination of the perception of the creator. There is no right or wrong way. Scale modelling is an art and a hobby and while the manufacturers put in extraordinary efforts to give us high fidelity components, the outputs are governed by imagination rather than doctrine. Every build of this kit will be a 'right' build whether it has faded cammo, heavy lines, bleached panels or massive go-faster stripes with a Rebel Alliance signet. I say to each their own and celebrate each other's choice of how to represent their model. I can't wait to get mine (please Airfix... will you put a pedal on with this...?!? ) and will look to build mine a little rough and faded and will also go for airbrushed edges to the cammo rather than sharp, because that's the look that I like for my models

This year was going to be the year that I 'stopped' buying kits save a rare few that I had anticipated and planned for - namely the Revell 1/48 SR-71A, HKM 1/48 B-17F and Airfix 1/72 Vulcan. In part, because one set of health conditions was making it difficult to put the time in to the kits I had started which this was then compounded by the development of an eye condition that was making fine detail work harder and harder. It was also in part because aside for the above mentioned kits I had not really expected many more to appear that would tick the boxes, either as a brand-new never before tooled subject or as an amazing new tool of an existing subject, especially one for a kit that I might already have bought from another manufacturer but which presented too many challenges to build as I would like or one that simply blew the competition away in terms of detail. This kit is one such instance that is about to lead to a reverse in my home-insulation reduction policy. I had the Italeri kit a couple of years back and studied long and hard about how to re-scribe the lines and add the rivet details and also how to pose it with the wings pivoted inwards, but when I thought about the time and effort alongside that planned for other kits I decided to abandon the idea and let the kit go. But now this has popped up and changed that. Even 'worse' I now have to 'accommodate' amazing new tools of: 1/48 HKM Lancaster 1/48 MiniBase Su-33 1/48 Tamiya F-4B 1/48 Airfix Chipmunk 1/48 Zoukei Mura F-4G 1/48 HB Chinook If Round2 release a 1/72 Eagle Freighter or LabPod and someone else releases 1/48 Buccaneer, a 1/350 injection molded Type 42 Destroyer, R09 Ark Royal or R08 QE I think my head will explode!

This kit looks great and in my 'usual' scale for aircraft too. If I could pluck up the emotional courage I'd look to build one as either of the planes I was given my first flights in as a young cadet over at Woodvale and Valley back in t'80's.

This is the only part I've got round to assembling for my F-14 but that said, the parts are so well engineered they virtually assemble themselves so I'm struggling to see the problem here?

I click on the link provided and I'm still able to see the page and the photos without needing to log in to Facebook. I'm guessing they've set it up so that it is publicly viewable? It's good to see more pictures though the close ups are a little disconcerting since it makes what are no doubt classically fine Tamiya panel lines look like the Death Star trench. It would be good to start seeing pictures of the instructions so we can get a feel for the assembly approach and engineering decisions. I'm already satisfied that the Tamiya kit will offer the level of detail and fidelity that I would want, I'd now like to see the range of possibilities that might be on offer based on how the parts can be assembled. For instance, the separate spine suggests that it might be possible to add something similar to the Black Dog spine set to those inclined to do so while the slots at the bottom of the weapons holders suggest the possibility of adding a rack of GBU-38's, either through AM or through my Academy F-4 spares, while I am hoping that the way the radome connects to the fuselage doesn't cause too much trouble for adding a radar (either if one is produced for the B as AM or if I produce my own).

Hi Colin, I asked a question about that recently based on comments I saw in a review but the consensus so far appears to suggest that it is 'positionable' rather than working. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Thanks Steve The approach I'm taking is quite similar since it's too impractical in some instances to go for the 'working hinge' bit. Where they are feasible I'll use them, where not, I'm using tiny magnets embedded in the parts in the right position to allow for them to be repositioned without loss or breakage and extra parts as you suggested above for where even that won't work. It's all a bit experimental at the moment with a lot of trial and error. Mostly error.

Thanks David Much appreciated! I'm now going to see if I can create something similar for the canopy of a 1/48 F-4. Cheers!

Great news about the G. The only long nose I’ve ever been interested in building is the Victorville ‘Sweet Sixteen’ Wild Weasel after seeing Hasegawa’s 1983 version of the same.

I've virtually given up on MC. I've always wanted a modern tooling of the B-52 in 1/72 to render the Vietnam era B-52D with the tall tail, mostly to be able to create a far better version of what I did with the Monogram kit as a kid and I only picked up the original MC B-52G in case it was all they released and which would at least give me the basis to modify (hopefully) into something closer to what I was after. Their announcement of their B-52D gave me hope that I could 'retire' my G and build a D straight from the box but as time has gone by it's feeling more and more like vapour-ware so I'm gearing up to '3D' a tail extension and other parts in order to at least use the kit I have. I'm also disappointing that the new tool B1B never materialised either.

At least with the F-14 we got the D after the A complete with new parts and weapons so there's hope yet for at least a J and a C,D plus stores. Though I still feel it might be a stretch to imagine they'd make any of the long nose versions.

Bandai 1/72 PG Millennium Falcon. even though I have far trickier kits to build such as the MPC USS Cygnus with custom PE, the Bandai Falcon always leaves me feeling intimidated.