Rob G

Whichever one makes you happpy. Or fits your hand. Or gets out of your way so that you can work. Or has the lenses and accessories that you require. Or whatever combination of those that you like. In other words, pick one. Both are good at their level. Personally, I'm a Nikon guy because I prefer their engineering style over Canon's. But either is a good tool (and that's ALL that a camera is, a tool.)

<cough> Hunter <cough>

For fast drying, I endorse Xtracrylics. It says 15 minutes on the bottle, and that's exactly right. Poor old Mr Humbrol isn't in the race.

King Kit are a good source for Twin Otters. They supplied my last batch of 3. Problem? Me? No, I dont have a problem. Not at all.

Life's too short to deal with this sort of thing in the name of fun. It's all back in the box and may actually be the first kit I ever chuck out. Not that it's that bad, I just have other things that are more fun/important to do. Ironically, I was going to do an Italeri Predator as a second build. Should've made that my first choice, however no time now, I'm off to work.

Buy used. Those big lenses are often bought by people like yourself, who want to experiment, then find that it's all too much effort and end up with kit that never gets used. Those are speciality lenses that seldom get used to anywhere near their useful lifespan by the average amateur. Take your time, look around, and you'll be able to buy a top lens for 1/2 to 2/3 of full retail. Facebook is a good source of used gear - I'm a member of 4 used gear groups dedicated to Australia only, and I'm sure that there's similar wherever you are (I'm assuming UK). Where possible, go and see the lens in person before handing over your hard earned. There's also eBay, which generally has higher prices but is possibly safer. And also places like London Camera Exchange - not the cheapest option, but very safe. IMO, it's always better to wait until you can afford good gear than it is to jump in at the cheap end. It makes the whole experience less frustrating, you get better results sooner and if you decide that it's not for you, the retained value on higher end stuff is greater, which means that you lose less when you sell it on. Lenses especially are equipment that you keep for a long time. Once you get a good one, it hangs around. My 70-200/2.8 was bought new in 2005 and has been behind 4 different models of camera. It still rocks on my D3s but is a bit lacking on my new D810 - still, 11 years of high quality means that it's cost me effectively 50c a day since I bought it, with the attendant joys of having good gear for all this time. And it's still worth about half of what I paid for it. One other benefit is that you feel more free to actually take the thing out and use it, because there's less chance of you being prissy about it getting wet, dirty or dropped than if you'd paid full price for it. Be patient, wait and save, then buy good gear, used. You get more bang for your buck and have more fun using it. Putting my money where my mouth is, I'm going for a long drive next week to hopefully buy a used lens for 2/3 the new price, because I'm not rich, and I like good gear. (You have to be careful though - top end stuff is seductive and will take over your gear cabinet when you're not looking. It's hard to do without it once you've used it.) Feel free to PM me if you want.

Indeed Cliff. Hoist by my own petard.

Indeed they are - like the Caribou, there's nothing available that will fully replace a Twin Otter. My personal favourite is the short nose -6 on floats - they just look so right. Meanwhile, on with the build, if the OP would be so kind!

Ektuerlly Cliff, it's a rotten, 'orrible choice. Flash out the wazoo (that light, annoying type of flash) and nothing quite fits (although I may before I'm done) due to tiny amounts of mould misalignment. That's what I get for being a smartypants, I guess. Meanwhile, food calls.

Feed and water? It's only 24hrs chaps, you can survive for that long without stopping. No retreat, no surrender!

Stinger tail hook from a bit of bent wire, cut the rudder off short and extend the chord a wee bit to compensate - should work. I'm not sure that the navy types deserve such a fine beastie though.

Righty-o then! Here's my entry for this wee GB. Not starting until later today, but I thought I'd better do the drudge work while I had a chance. The Roden box tops are more funner, but this'll do. Box front. Box rear. I'll be doing the Gebirgsjaeger version, as I liked the camo (and if it falls flat or I run out of time, I can cheat and do the plain Dunkelgelb version ) As is apparently typical for Italeri, the colour callouts between the instruction sheet and the box made no sense, so I spent more time working out paint requirements yesterday than I think I will spend on the build. Then I went and bought bottles of paint, because I didn't have anything remotely close. Parts trees. All there (all 65 bits of it). The instructions have but 6 steps, so I think I'm in with a chance here. More when I kick off!

What's with all the Twotter love here recently? Seems to be squadrons of them on benches! Good luck, have fun! And yes, they're an old Matchbox mould. I have a sadly large number of them in the stash, awaiting a production line build to cover some decal sheets.

My thoughts... if you like the kit and the subject, build the thing. That's what they were made for. My personal modelling dream is to go to a model show somewhere, buy the rarest kit on a collector's table, then bust it open and start clipping bits off, right there in the hall. The gasps of horror would be music to my ears. One day...

Welcome back Debs.

My ex-RAF ground radar-trained uncle reckons it's pronounced 'twats'. But he's old and very grumpy. Regardless of how it's pronounced, I think that it LOOKS silly.

It's easy Keith. You simply move your South Welsh yard to somewhere more tropical. Simples! And the flying foxes are kind of part of the whole tropical thing too.

Tinned fruit. Abomination! Stone the heretics! Fruit comes from mango trees, and should be eaten directly from said tree, preferably the one in your own back yard. If you can beat the flying foxes to it, of course. Also acceptable are guava, five finger, banana, pineapple and coconut (the last being neither a fruit in its usual sense nor a nut, but whatever). All should also be in your backyard for mamximum flavour and convenience and none of them should ever be cooked - that's just wrong. About that wee plastic Hunter, young PC...

I guess that makes my Falcon vacs in both major scales somewhat redundant. I may buy one of AZ kits to use the cockpit details as references.

Weeman, I can't help with the Westair/Dragon question, but I do have some advice about Facebook's junk. If you use Firefox as your browser (and if you don't, you should, for a bucketful of reasons), you can add an add-on to it called Facebook Purity (aka Fluff Busting Purity, for legal reasons) that enables you to basically turn off all of Facebook's nonsense. You can also add adblockers that stop all those ads from showing up everywhere else, too. Note that Farcebook and FBP are in a constant state of conflict, where Fb continually rewrites their code to get around FBP's attempts at blocking their junk, while FBP (a one man band as far as I know) does his level best to crack that code and provide what he can to make the experience more pleasant. The irony is, that if Facebook stopped, and listened to what people wanted, as opposed to what they think we should have, they'd have a larger customer base, less dissatisfaction and a smaller IT support budget. However, like the Cold War and Mutually Assured Destruction, I imagine that it's gone too far to stop now.

I have 2. Both will be built. For my part, I consider 32th the ideal scale for WW1 scouts, as the real things are comparatively tiny compared to almost everything that came after (except Mr de Havilland's Moths, and similar types). While I'd love to have several more types as well as a couple of repeat purchases, justifying the purchase price to myself given my current circumstances is beyond even my ability for self-delusion, so failing a sudden impossible lottery win (never bought a ticket, never will), the count of 2 is where the collection is likely to stay. Note that if I had sufficient disposable income I'd be on them like white on rice - the quality of the kit is well worth the price of admission IMO. Beardie, I haven't entered your poll as I'm not sure where I fit... I have more than 1 and didn't buy them to try them out, as I knew they were quality, yet 2 is hardly a 'considerable number'. The dilemma is real.

I'm surprised that you had to wait that long! Must be good stuff on the telly.

A twin boom triple build... that's a lot of boom boom. We love you long time? (Someone had to say it.) Following along. (I'm actually surprised that Basil Brush hasn't popped in to offer a word of support.)

My life being the way it is, you'll all have to miss out on the wonder that is my F-16. That is, I wonder if it's worth finishing. Grats to thems as managed to make it over the line, great work and well done all. Thanks to the mods for popping in from time to time and lending an encouaging word. See you all on the next one.

What Muzz said. Skinny like a supermodel. To make up for that, they had insane tyre pressures (350psi main, 240 nose), and from what I've read, they were always a worry for pilots and a PITA for ground crew.