BikingLampy

The "Surprise Reveal" has just popped up on my Insta feed, and I've done a quick bit of scouting t'interweb. Firstly a resounding DOH! for the ECM pod **** up... Its simultaneously hilarious and deeply sad. However - do I understand it right - there's a general release "Black Buck boxing" kit and a limited edition "Black Buck boxing + coin" kit? If the former, then I'll wait until prices drop a little. While I want to build XM607 (and have been waiting until the obvious release happened), the coin is of no interest and £73 is a little steep when the standard B2 kit is available for £45. (also not a fan of paying extra for bad research!) Thanks!

@TAG - that first pic is great. Very useful indeed. Thanks! I can't quite tell - does the steel skinning carry on past the turbo exhaust up to tail wheel fairings? Thanks again, BL

Been a hair lazy with taking pics, so here's a quick catchup. Both kits were shake'n'bake OOB. I think the Corsair needed a dab of PPP in the wing roots to fill a small gap, but other wise great fit and well engineered throughout. Makes the Airfix kits I built prior to these look really a bit I bought a silver pencil to do some chipping/scratching on the Corsair as they always seem to look a bit battered. I should have bought it earlier to use on the Zero - it looks a little toylike in comparison. Weather and therefore light was rubbish yesterday while I was taking pics, so apologies that it all looks a little bit dull and overcast! While these exact airframes weren't direct antagonists, Zeros and Corsairs obviously did fight each other, so its interesting to see them side by side. The Corsair is massive in comparison - much bigger engine and prop and one can understand the high speed zoom and go type attacks the USN favoured against the slower but more nimble Zero, rather than getting dragged into a dogfight where the Corsairs advantages were less useful. Enjoy! BL

Thanks all. So finish (in period) is naked but knackered. Useful pics to have a gander at. Decal - hmm - yes, a mask would be lovely (I'm planning to spray the invasion stripes), but they don't seem to exist. I think I might try and get the nacelle painted early, then have a crack with the decals. If they work, great. If they don't, strip it and go with plan B. Thanks again. BL

I'm about to start on the Tamiya 1/72 Thunderbolt in the bubbletop version. I have a couple of Qs - one related to the actual planes, one to the kit itself. The kit question is easy - how nicely do the decals for the chequerboard paint on the engine nacelle play? I'm usually very wary of large decals on compound curves like that as there's a very high chance of making a pigs ear of it. For various reasons however, that's the box scheme that appeals a little more than the other option. The planes - How were they finished? The paint call out in the kit is AS12 - "bare metal silver", but the box photo shows something that looks like a more matt "high speed silver" paint, rather than a natural metal finish. Googling the airframes suggests WZ*P as a modern warbird is unpainted natural metal, but the pics of VM*P in period are hard to call, as I think the colour ones are B&W images colorized. Basically I want to know whether its worth playing around with doing various panels in different shades of silver, or if the whole airframe would have been painted a uniform shade. Thanks in advance! BL

Ah. Yes. Now you mention it. That's a little annoying, given all the spare plastic Airfix gives you in the box (including another tail variant without the RWR and ILS aerials) that they don't suggest trimming then off. Even the box art doesn't show it... And explains why the 'R' decal on the fin didn't fit right. Oh well. Too late now!

Phinally phinished the Phantom. Bit of a pain in the bum to be honest - partly my fault for getting carried away with aftermarket - posher seats turned into a complete resin cockpit, then once I'd spotted the missing vents and grills around the air intakes I couldn't unspot them, so there ended up being resin splitters and photoetch bleed air grills. But the kit just felt a bit overcomplicated and as a result a lot of the bits didn't fair into each other all that well. Panel lines are a bit intrusive too (not helped by me overegging it with the Flory wash a little). And the decals. J***s C****t, the decals. I think it was 3 weeks worth of solid stencils (but every single one is on there ). And they didn't play ball. None of the bigger ones had any interest in conforming to the surface, despite all kinds of lotions and potions, and anything with yellow on it was basically just not happening. Each yellow line on the bombs was about an hour each, and I ended up painting the red and yellow on the Sidewinders as the decals just sat there like planks. Looking back, kinda wish I'd masked and sprayed the red tail flash on the fin - just used the white section. Never had so much grief with Airfix decals before. Glad its done. Don't want to do another one! ...and hanging with the boys

I've almost finished an Airfix FG.1 It's gone together alright although it feels a little overcomplicated with too many parts so what should be fair surfaces are a little more lumpen. Panel lines on the underside and wings aren't too bad. Upper fuselage are somewhat trenchlike. There's some weird missing details. I'm no rivet counter, but I've replaced the intake splitters with ones with the vents in, and added the air bleed grills that sit on top and underneath the intakes. There's also some quite small but quite obvious vents above the exhaust nozzles that are missing. The decals have been hellish. Not sure if my kit was badly stored or something, but they've lost all their "stick" and are basically held on by the varnish; any that contained yellow have absolutely not wanted to conform to the surface. SOOO many stencils as well. Quite put me off the thing. Oh - and yes, an AWFUL lot of unused plastic in the box...

Thanks guys. Anyone got an (in stock) source for Daco Strong? Either my google-fu is utter rubbish, or its currently not available in the UK. How does "Ultimate Decal Setting Solution (Extra strong)" compare? I've got a bottle of Pledge/Klear, so I might give that a whirl, although TBH, I've never found it much use for anything.

I'm part way into an Airfix 1/72 Phantom FG.1 and I'm struggling with the decals (of which, being a 'toom, there are bazillions...) Currently trying to do the weaponry, but the decals, despite LOTS of Microsol/set are just sitting there like planks and refusing to soften and conform. Quite a problem doing the stripes on a Sidewinder that's about 1.5mm dia. and the decals need to wrap around. Normally you apply the 'sol and after a minute or so the decal wrinkles up a bit and you can smooth it down with a cotton bud. These are just ignoring it. Even when I can get them to conform a bit they're not adhering to the surface, poke one bit to try and make it nestle down and the rest just slithers off again. Ideas? Is there a more superduper decal softener out there? Thanks! BL

Did 'em a few years back...

Your wish...

So the 3rd of the classic BoB era German bombers. First Revell kit I've done, and on the whole it went together very nicely. Turns out the cockpit glazing didn't fit as nicely as I first thought, but not too obvious. Eduard Zoom set to gussy up the cockpit, otherwise OOB... Decals went down nicely, although the long red no-walk strips were a bit of an orifice, as was trying to make the ones on the dive flaps match up to the big crosses underneath. Paint mostly Vallejo Model Air. Thanks for looking! ...and with mates, ready for a jolly day out in that London...

I've just started on the Revell 1/72 Junkers Ju88 A-1 "Battle of Britain" boxing. I'm planning on building the box-top option of 9K+AL Edelweiss There's the parts included for the under fueslage towel-rail radar typically seen on German bombers of this era and a bunch of blanked off holes in the correctish area. 1) fitting them is not mentioned in the instructions - indeed in the plan of the sprues they're greyed out as "not needed". However the box-top art shows it in situ (although the photos of the finished model don't). I've found pictorial references of the plane in question WITH the aerial showing 2) Location. The blanked holes in the fuselage, 2 sets of which are spaced correctly for the aerial parts are in completely different locations to those shown above. The forward part is positioned about 1/2 a panel too far forward, the rear offset nearly a panel too far back, leaving an enormous gap between the 2, rather than almost touching. So can anybody tell me what Revell are playing at? I'm feeling like the ariel should be there, but presumably there's a reason Revell don't include it in the build? ACTUALLY - here's another one for the Ju88 experts - I've just realised the profile up there ^^^ says RLM 70 only on the upper surfaces. However the painting instructions are usual RLM70/71 splinter. Box art appears to be single colour, as do the photos of the complete model. I couldn't tell you anything from about the colours from the above B&W photo. So again - what's "correct"...? Thanks!

I finished this a few months back, but haven't managed to get some pics until yesterday, so apologies if its a bit dusty! OOB, bar some etch seatbelts. A bit different to my normal diet of Airfix - the big chunks all went together beautifully, but a lot of the small parts were a bit vague in their location methods. Very thin decals which when dry settled down amazingly well, but were rather fragile - I ended up having to paint the red "no walk" lines on the top of the fuselage after the decals wrapped themselves into a tangled mess. ...and with a friend...

Here's the new(ish) tool Airfix 1/72 Bucc. I added resin ejector seats and one piece intakes from Air Graphic Models. (the latter, mostly because AGM were the only people who had the right model of bang seat and they were in stock). Otherwise OOB. A pretty easy build on the whole, and plenty of modern, full colour references in the walkrounds section to work from too - thanks to those who've added pics! The decals were a bit of a labour of love - but every. single. one. went on! (I've got a Phantom in the build queue and the decal sheet on that is giving me coniptions with all the stencils!!) (forgot to add the underside pic. Pain in the bum to take as it won't rest upside down without breaking the refueling probe off! ...the low and slow with the fast and high...!

Thanks both. That seems pretty clear to ignore the yellow. I did think it may be an army thing... Cheers BL

A question for the afficionados. I'm nearly finished with the new tool Airfix 1/72 S.2C, built as XV154 on Ark Royal. Looking at pics (inc my own from Bruntingthorpe) - all the preserved ones have the twin blade antennae in front of the nose landing gear painted yellow (presumably to stop banana-wranglers from scalping themselves). However looking at the "in service" pics I can find on line, it looks like this is a later change and the aerials were painted as the rest of the aircraft - but it's difficult to tell as mostly the shots are from further away of general carrier action with the relevant area in shadow or in B&W, not highly detailed close-ups to appease 21st century modellers.🙄 Thing is - now having noticed the yellow, its quite obvious, I can't unsee it, so if it is a thing in period (and it's just Airfix being lazy with the colour callouts), I'll dig out the paint... Any advice? Thanks! BL

Tips wanted please...! I can build to "a" standard at the moment, but I'm very aware my paint prep isn't up to scratch, so trying to take that up a notch or two. I see people talking a lot about buffing paint between coats. How are you going about doing this without just stripping the paint off? I've got a 12000 grit micromesh sheet, but even that will have the paint off a raised area in 1 or 2 strokes, and can only be used on the larger flat areas wrapped around a small foam block (I build 1/72 aircraft), so I'm struggling to tidy up nook and crannies where the paint will be worse anyway. In a similar vein - how are you cleaning the model up post sanding? Everything I've tried leaves lint behind - paper towel (wet or dry), blue-roll, microfibre towel, a large soft paintbrush just moves it around. I bought some proper tack rags, but those left a sticky residue, and I could hang the whole model from them they were so tacky. Best solution so far is a wrap of masking tape around a finger, but again, that's of limited effect in tight spots or on convoluted surfaces. All advice gratefully recieved! Cheers BL

To come back to this - I seem to be getting somewhere. Going with cold water rather than tepid - takes a bit longer but doesn't seem to "melt" the carrier film as much. No Microset The saliva idea is genius. The decals still don't want to slide around the way they normally would, but with enough prodding I can jiggle them into the right place now - its no longer a case of where they land is where they stay. Hit them afterwards with Microsol and they still snug down nicely. Thank y'all

Hi, I've reached the decaling stage of a 1/72 ICM kit and am having no end of problems with the decals. They seem to have a very thin carrier film, which all but vanishes as soon as it touches the model. Despite a good coat of gloss varnish, I'm having no luck sliding them around - they just wrinkle up or tear. I can manage the bigger ones (albeit with a lot of ) but the tiny little stencils are hopeless. (I'm currently having to mask and paint the "no walk" lines as I've knackered the long thin decals. I'm using tepid water to soak them and a coating of microset before applying the decal. The upside is, that once dry they conform beautifully to the surface! Every cloud etc..! Advice gratefully received! Thanks BL

Got this just before Christmas in the annual Aldi special The kit itself was pretty shake'n'bake. I added Pavla resin ejection seats because I could, but I suspect a bit of TLC on the kit ones would have made for a perfectly passable result. I did cock up on the painting however - preshaded in black as usual, but then absolutely couldn't knock it back it with the (Model Air) red. There's most of a bottle and maybe 20 coats there and some of it's still a bit overdone. Decals settled down very nicely indeed (although - why give the wing antislip panels as decals, which are an easy masking job to paint, but not the black nose antiglare strip, which is a very awkward shape to create a mask for - especially given this is a beginners kit!) Interestingly - having had next to no interest in the plane itself as the real thing from a casual bystanders point of view looks quite dumpy - in plan, I think its actually quite an elegant little beast, with none of the afterthought lumps and bumps that seem to cover most modern(ish) jets. Hope you enjoy BL

Oh - that's top info @Jure Miljevic. Thanks very much. 20x 50kgs it is then!

Thanks - the kit comes with what appears to be 20x 50kg bombs, which would make the 1000kg payload

Hi, I've just started building a 1/72 ICM Dornier Do 17z-2. Planning on doing F1+BL of KG76, France, 1940. (to go with the Airfix HE-111 P2 already built and the Revell BoB Ju88 still hiding under my desk) The kit comes with options of a full bomb load or an extra fuel tank that occupies half the bomb bay. Which would have been most appropriate for this 'plane? I'm guessing all the bombs, as it's not that big a journey across the channel, although I understand loiter time over London was still minimal? Thank y'all! BL