Whofan

First build in my Austrian Air Force project. My mother in law was Austrian, and we spent many holidays with our relatives in Carinthia, Southern Austria, staying with them halfway up the valley of the Drau between Spittal and Villach. We would often see Austrian Air force planes and helicopters flying along the valley, usually below our level (I think the relative's house was something like 1,000 metres abouve sea level) including Drakens on one rather noisy and exciting day, and some later helicopters. The Westland Whirlwind flown by Austria's Air force served between '58 and '65, long before I met my wife. The model flown was the Whirlwind Srs. 2 (HAR Mk 5) which the eagle eyed and helicopter buffs will see is not what the Airfix kit I modelled is! My excuse is that I have had decals for this for months, couldn't find for love nor money a suitable italeri kit, so decided "what the hell" and got on with it. Actually, my wife won't have a clue if it's the right mark or not, so to an extent it doesn't matter!) The build was OOB, except for a little bit of albion alloys tube, brush painted overall in Tamiya RLM 02 (supposedly grey, looks green to me.) I've painted the rotor blades in Tamiya flat aluminium, I couldn't find a clear "guide" to the real colours used. The Decals come from Blackbird Decals, they went on easily and without too much - if any - silvering. As I mentioned in Ced's WIP of his scary skeeter, I had a Frank Spencer moment with the windscreen, where masking went awry and I had a devil of a job cleaning up the overpaint, but lessons learnt and all that. The upper side "glazing" was not of the best quality, and after gluing in some formula 560 was used to fill in several gaps. Mostly fairly well. One window from the side didn't like the pressure exerted while I was holding the model, and popped back into the fuselage. Rather than split the fuselage to remove it, I used a small square cut from a Sainsburys danish pastry box, glued that on with formula 560, and decided to think of the kit as Captain Hook's crocodile, as like the croc, you can hear something rattling around it ...... So here it is, apologies for the slightly dark photos.

When I saw your comment I must admit I did think it might be 1/76.

I do have a windscreen, but frankly I have been having problems masking and cleaning - and the rest of the glazing isn't much good, either. Still, it says ©Airfix 1958 on the inside of one fuselage half, so I should make allowances for it being a year older than my younger brother! I'm doing mine as an Austrian air force heli, using Some aftermarket decals from Blackbird decals.

Why do you master modellers (and I'm pointing at Bill, too!) have to make helicopters look so easy? And why is it I read such sagacious advice when I make a bit of a mess in the windscreen of the Airfix Whirlwind I'm almost throwing .... completing? I say windscreen, most of the glazing in this kit looks a bit iffy. ps for non native Brits, a bit of a mess translates to it looks bloomin' awful, while a bit iffy translates to **&#@4!!(+ **!

I saw this, I haven't read it fully yet. It looks like an excellent read for all modelkers!

re Prize idiot, are you talking about the chap who was obviously using a mobile phone to film the lorry while driving his car?

I haven.t, but I can ! In fct, I have Mr Color chart I picked up at a show and while I spotted the Japanese aircraft orange-yellow, I missed the character yellow! it does, from that little cship on the colour card, look the part. I know my 2nd nearest LMS (I am spoilt for choice, I have 4 within 20 miles) stocks Mr Hobby, so there will be a visit soon.

Apologies for wandering in to the Nordic gb, as some will know (because I've mentioned it before) I have a project involving Austrian air force planes, because my wife is half Austrian (through her mother) and one such item in the project is the Saab safir. I am following the safir builds with interest, as I am the Tunnan, Draken and Saab 105 (all flown by the Austrian air force) and I was hoping the BM Nordic massive wouldn't mind offering some advice on the safir. As virtually all the other aircraft in my Austrian project will be in nmf, I'm going to do the Safir in the all over yellow scheme shown in the box. trouble is, the instruction simply says Swedish trainer yellow. Checking IPMS stockholm I get a reference for FS 36555. I'm not sure I can match that to an existing Humbrol/Mr Color/Tamiya paint, through Humbrol Insignia yellow seems to be a good match. I think it needs to be a more orangey yellow than yellow, and I was wondering if there are any thoughts on a fair match? I'm not averse to using a rattle can of car paint from Halfords or the Range (hycote); I find the Halfords paint to be pretty good (I use their Matt black paint as a primer, it's a very good, dense black and adhered well).

Hi, Your link takes me to a sign up/login page. Could you put the link for the gladiator u/c?

Currently half way through Gerald Seymour's Battle sight zero. Well researched, but somehow just ... dull.

Julien, thanks for this. I had already decided that I would use one of the aluminium paints available when I make up the next Mig 15, but I will keep the halfords steel paint for other projects.

Now I'm confusing you! It's only what people think (despite the poor photo) of the metalllic colour I had from the Halfords steel paint. What do you think? Too dark for an NMF finish?

Mike, apologies, it's more an RIP than a WIP! I was just moving on from the earlier part of the discussion about the source of what I had thought was a Frog kit into pointing out how awkward it was to build. If anything, it's probably more of a paint query, as that's how I left it. I'll bow to your fine judgement.

Okay, I've been getting on with the "Frog/Ruch" Mig 15 variant, and all was going well. At least, the tube of PPP still has some in it, the cutting, sanding and filing in order to get the wings to fit to the fuselage - and the tailplanes, too has been done, and the two odd pieces of plastic on the sprue tentatively identified as possibly being fuselage mounted radio aerials. I say tentatively as they are not actually referred to in the instructions, but shown on the sprue plan. The guns were interesting items to fit; the 37mm cannon body had to be sanded down in a curve on the underside to fit the fuselage, as it had been moulded completely straight. And none of the guns had any marks on the fuselage to identify where they went, so fit is a little bit of guess work. I gave up trying to fit the air brakes - they weren't ever going to fit in the recesses in the fuselage, so I filled those with PPP - which surprisingly didn't turn out too bad. Then it came to painting. I gave it a coat of Halfords matt black rattle can paint as a primer, which as you can see, turned out okay. a few little wrinkles around the nose, which didn't look too difficult to sort out. After it had cured in the airing cupboard (these old things have their uses!) I decided to paint it with a top coat of Halfords steel (wheels) paint. Well, I got a coat on, and this happened; Some runs on the starboard wing, tail, starboard rear fuseage, and on the underside some runs on the tail planes, a bit of a contact ith a piece of paper under the nose, and some odd variations in tone from quite glossy to quite dull. I think I have a good idea why I got runs, too close, too much, etc., but I'm going to shelve this, and move on to the KP Mig 15 which does look a better shape, albeit the cockpit aperture looks odd. The question is, however - the paint colour. Given the actual aeroplane is said to be an aluminium colour, dos the halfords steel paint look too different? Some of the aluminium paints I've seen I thought have been too bright - for instance, the Halfords aluminium is quite silvery. I'm impressed with their matt black paint, which I wil use again for nmf as a primer finshes, but what thinks the BM massif on the Halfords steel colour?

The B17? I thought "a licence built fortress?" until I saw the photo ..... The G.46 reminded me of the G.55 WW2 fighter in the shape of the cockpit fairing, no kit available? and thanks for the heads up on decals, I had several sets from IPMS Austria at Telford last year.

I’ve just ordered one from Hannants to go in my Austrian Air Force project. i was thinking it’s going to be a bit of an odd project, as there are a number of helicopters either in or were in service by the Austrians that I doubt I’ll do, and also it’s quite heavily Swedish laden, with the Tunnan, Draken, Safir and 105. I’m looking forward to keeping up with your build, Reini, always nice to see how others solve problems!

£1200!

There are two main themes for me, aircraft that flew off HMS Ocean during the Korean war, when my father was a yeoman of signals about Ocean during her two deployments, though I have a seafire which preceded my father's time on the ship as Special Hobby kindly provided it with decals for an Ocean squadron plane., and hellcats, because they too flew off Ocean. Then there's the Austrian Air force, because my wife is part Austrian, and we have spent many, many holidays there visiting relatives. So I'm gradually moving from the Yak 11 and Tunnans into the Typhoon eras, which doesn't preclude helicopters. Not overkeen on helicopters for some reason, though we have often seen Austrian Air Force helicopters chugging along the valley below my realatives' home! I seem to have something in common with others, in that something quirky, or unusual by way of aircraft catches my eye - (and wallet) - like the Do335, or the Ho 229, and even the Ki 61 Hien, one of the very few in line engined Japanese WW2 fighters. Also not so quirky, but unknown to me before I rediscovered modelling and found Britmodeller, aircraft like the IAR 80, and some of the French early 2nd WW aircraft, some of the Italian fighters. Lately I've picked up several modern (ish) British army vehicles, the airfix Coyote, Jackal, Warrior, the Takom FV432's, the Meng Husky, mainly because my new son in law is in the Army, and so they take on a personal interest. Outside of the themes, I think my interest gets piqued by quirky, unusual, and downright odd. Like the Motorhead Heinkel He 111 - which might be joined by the Iron Maiden spitfire!

They are, but they do with all of these partworks. I often wonder how many people grit their teeth and keep paying the £5, 6, 7, 8 or more for the 100 or so issues, and how many ever complete the "model"

Oh no !!!!!

I hope no-one mentioned Skynet ................

If that’s your “inspection kit”, I feel sorry for your clients - we had some lubrication handy!

I've just seen an advert on tv for a 1/18 scale spitfire partwork model. unusual features were a base that has arms to move the completed model in several directions, it has working lights and a rotating propeller. first part £1.99, remaining parts (I presume around 100) £9.99. It appears to be this one; https://hachettepartworks.com/spitfire-mk-ia/spitfire-mk-ia-issue-1

In my employment with H M Customs and Excise we would end letters with (Name) Officer of Customs & Excise. Among the people I worked with were a married couple, Andrew and Ann Keen.They each signed letters A. Keen Officer of Customs and Excise.

They are good there, they replaced my wife's IPad after its screen developed a fault within warranty. The building itself used to be the min Midland Bank in Birmingham, then it was sold to Waterstones, and then Apple took it on.