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AlexN

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Everything posted by AlexN

  1. Hello Nigel, I have just read through this thread, after reading through a number of others of yours. I' m speechless, but in a good way! Fantastic work: I caught myself a few times thinking, "this is a photo of the real thing - hang on, no it's not, it's a model, and a 1/72 scale one at that!" I take my woolly winter hat off to you! I particularly liked the area inside the side door, with one of your signature fire extinguishers . Once again, fantastic. You certainly have raised the bar and given me a goal to work towards - whether achievable or not doesn't really matter. It was also great to see some pictures of food - an essential part of AA's thread - making a tentative comeback. It's a strange wee beastie, the Osprey, and seems to be mostly driven by hydraulics. It must be a maintenance nightmare as it looks to be a very complex piece of engineering. I have the Italeri 1/48 kit of the animal, and your thread will be a very useful reference for it when I get to it down the track. It's looking fantastic, and I love those stain black props with the transfers neatly applied - they finish it off perfectly. Apologies for the gushing, but it does look really lovely! Cheers, Alex.
  2. Your Spitfire colours are much more like the DE/DG that I remember as a kid than the so-called DG on your Lanc. That's no criticism of you - that's aimed straight at the manufacturer of the paint evil grin! I have to say that I have been well and truly put off Vallejo paints - in my case it doesn't matter as I have more paint than you could poke a stick at. Weathering - yes, that's sound like a good idea, Ced wink. Cheers, Alex. (Edited for typos only - I now have Safari's auto-corrupter turned off!)
  3. Ouch! I feel for you! Exterminate, indeed. BoB is a bit early for North Africa (and as far as I know Herr Galland wasn't posted there) otherwise you could claim "sandstorm" - but with the scale of those lumps, maybe you should make that a (Silesian?) mudstorm! I loathe H24 with a vengeance - at least with hairy-sticking. I almost had nightmares from the stuff. H69 seemed to be a totally different bucket o' snakes, and went on fine, probably 'cos the 'orrible H24 was acting as a suitable primer. Do I hear hear the Spitfire calling?
  4. Excellent! , as Davros was wont to purr (probably the late Michael Wisher's most spine-chilling role). This bodes well for the paint, depending on what it is, so all my fingers and toes are double-crossed (that will teach me). With regard to page-bumps, I think that BM flips over at 20 posts; the Oz Woodworkers' Forum does so at 15 and I kept kept an eye on it, narrative-wise, a bit. Anyway, the point seems moot so I won't worry about it. Cheers, Alex.
  5. The primed Bf is looking great! This new stuff might be the non-lacquer/-enamel primer that we have all been waiting for. It will be interesting to see what its own cure rate is; its tenacity on unprepared(-ish) styrene (including masking tape(s); reaction of the various topcoats available to it; anything else (fingerprint absorption?). I am watching progress with this stuff with keen interest. Possibly the name - Stynylrex - comes from Styrene-Nylon-Resin-x. A bit like ABS (acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene). Cheers, Alex. PS - Bother, I didn't mean to bump the page, sorry! Should have counted (grimace). PPS - I wouldn't go scratching it right away, well, within 24 hours of spraying, anyway - paint needs (all surface coatings need) to be given a chance. I am always wary of YouTube and its denizens wink grin scratching-head-type-thingy.
  6. A fantastic result for one of my favouritest planes! Well done! Chhers, Alex.
  7. My favourite historical book is The Narrow Margin, by Derek Wood with Derek Dempster, on which the BoB film is based, I believe. It is in a diary format for the most part, with an enormous number of archive photos (all B+W, except for the front cover with scrambling Spitfire pilots from the film, and a pair of silhouetted He 111s over the sea, on the back). It is probably long out of print, but I did find quite a few copies for sale on Amazon a few years ago, when I was thinking of replacing mine, which fell apart very early on (1970!) with overuse and poor paperback binding quality. As I remember, there are some photos of Herr Galland in it. The book also shows the extreme knife-edge that Britain was on during the Battle, and Britain might be said to have been saved by a lost He 111 crew over London, and the immediate repercussions. That is a really gross oversimplification, but it marked a clear turning point in the Battle, which gave a bombed-out RAF time to breathe and regroup. Not entirely on-topic, but not entirely off, either. Cheers, Alex.
  8. That theme is an actual march, written for the Luftwaffe (I Can't Remember the name of the composer, but he was German, funnily enough). We played it through in rehearsal in Concert Band early this year.Edited - I think that Roy Goodwin didn't write it, he borrowed it - but I could well be wrong wink. Unfortunately, our band music is in storage (not a shipping container at the bottom of a stack, happily) while we move to a new and slightly less commodious rehearsal room, so I can't check it. I did recognise the tune immediately, the BoB film being one of my favourite favourites, however - and the name of the composer on the march card was NOT R. Goodwin. I will keep trawling the internet in the meantime: the Wikipedia, while producing some very interesting information on the Director of Music for the Luftwaffe, Hans Felix Husadel and his influence on instrumentation, melody and harmonic elements in Luftwaffe marches, it did not supply any direct information regarding this particular assertion of mine one way or the other. More research required! Note: I am quite happy to be proved wrong. Most of what I have trawled up so far does suggest that I am wrong - one I have my paws on the march cards, I can then check dates of composition, etc. so -forget all of the above and pretend that I never wrote it. A.
  9. I recently found out that what I thought was RLM 02 was wrong (I assumed, as an adolescent back in the 70s, that Humbrol had it right. Now I don't know who to believe as every single modelling paints manufacturer has a widely differing version -and I don't have access to the "correct" colour chips. There are some German WWII aircraft (including Me 262 "Black X") in the Aust. War Museum in Canberra that I could possibly visit, but the likelihood of original paints having degraded and discoloured over the last seventy-odd years would be very close to 100 %. Sorry that I'm not much help either. Someone* did a comparison of Luftwaffe colours using a large number of manufacturers, that I read recently, but can't remember where, and appear, stupidly, not to have bookmarked it. From my tattered memory, the WEM ColourCoats and Testors ModelMaster enamels came out closest, but I could be wrong there, too. Perhaps Nick Millman on BM has some recent thoughts on the subject. A vexing issue for Luftwaffe modellers. Cheers, Alex. I've remembered! It was Peter, of Peter's Planes fame, the links can be found on this page here.
  10. Hello amblypygid, Heh - funnily enough, when I was bowing the the er, request, by The Bosses (wife and daughter) about the shed size, I remember saying to SWMBO that I probably wouldn't be happy unless the shed were the size of the entire suburb. And even then... The junk room is actually quite small and the Tiger Moth is a 1:10 flying (obviously not at the moment) model from much-tinkered-with plans by Dale Tattam, published in the still-sorely-missed Radio Control Scale International magazine (RCSI), a plague upon Traplet Publications, it was and still is my favourite magazine. Some snaps that I put up in my introductory thread show said wings peeking out fretfully from within a pile of stuff. I'm sorry to disillusion you, but I don't have a full-sized version (I wish I did, but I wouldn't have anywhere to keep it!). I do know someone who does, and a Chipmunk as well, the latter of which I had a chance to fly from the rear seat for about five minutes: it's a pity that I was horribly airsick at the time! But I am straying dangerously off-topic - in someone else's thread! (Then again, the Chippy is sometimes referred to as "the poor man's Spitfire" grin/wink.) Cheers, Alex.
  11. Spray booth - hmm. No plans for one yet because...hey, wait a minute! I had a look in the junk room, on the shelf that supports the Tiger Moth wings -and there they were: 1x Iwata Hi-Line HP-BH and 1x Testors Aztec 470 ABs! How about that? Thanks Ced, I owe you one: thinking about spray booths set off a train of thought that jogged a memory and some logic, and there they were Big Smile! So, now there are slightly more plans, but I have to say that airbrushing scares me. I borrowed one from school, including a small air compressor, for school holidays when I was about 15 - and haven't used one since. It worked well, but I think it's the cleaning and maintaining of the wee beasties that have been putting me off. I will start thinking a bit more seriously about a spray booth, though. Fingers crossed for the Badger Stynylrez primer! Cheers, Alex (who took the cheese?)
  12. It looks as though you have a lot riding on the Stynylrez being* up to snuff. A "polyurethane", I see. I will be watching with great interest! * Another corruption! What is it with Safari or one of its "extensions"? (I don't think it's an extension though.) It is incredibly aggressive but totally unpredictably** [sic.] (it leaves a number of odd mis-spellings alone). I can't find out how to suppress the monster - there isn't anything that I've found in the System Preferences either. Aargh! Where's the axe? ** There it goes, again.
  13. Rattle can o' Tamiya primer in the back shed - or outdoors if it isn't raining (ha ha), I think. I had a bottle of pre-paint wash made by somebody-or-other (company whose name I don't recall) which is currently somewhere that's not here (i.e., I don't know where it is). From my memory of it - it didn't work. Sorry, not much help, I know . Doesn't Airfix do an acrylic primer? I know that they do an enamel one in the 14 ml tinlets. What a conundrum. A.
  14. Looking excellent! I feel for Jimmy and his ad-hoc orthopaedic surgery! Ouch! Better than what happened to your "T Tommy" rear gunner, though, eek. Cheese fondue (that's stretching it a bit) A.
  15. The codes should work on iOS 8 - or any iOS. The problem that I'm having on the iPad at the moment is that non of the toolbars is appearing, either because it's a "mobile" thing, or Apple's Javascript and/or HTML(5) support on iOS (WebKit?) needs a real shake-up. (Having said that, I have had some URL link failures on Safari on the Mac recently which work on other browsers - but I'm really starting to stray OT there.) I use 'coded' smileys all the time because they are easy to remember - especially : popcorn :, big grin and a wink .Cheese sandwiches, Alex.
  16. Hello Ced, Very interesting photo of the fired outboard gun port: not a trace of fabric to be seen inside the hole, just a sharp outline. Filed for future use, many thanks! Nice potrait of Sgt Jennings, too SMILE (sorry, couldn't resist wink*). By the way, there's no transfer IP hiding around in the box/bag, is there? Cheese and crackers, Alex. *I'd better watch out or The Mods 'n' Rockers will be after me!
  17. Hello Ced, OK, um, sorry - it was my first time, too. Using the "popcorn" smiley(?), that is - did I score 1, snarf snarf? (I know that that isn't quite the right word, I'm being difficult. Sorry. Again.) I'm looking forward to seeing what you can do with the Spitfire smiley face, big grin, puzzled look, more popcorn, etc. Cheese and greens, Alex.
  18. Looking fantastic! I have only had to deal with transfers once since 1975, about eight years ago on a 1/72 Airfix DH Tiger Moth (and didn't I have fun with Humbrol Trainer Yellow Matt: once I overcoated the 'orrible matt "yellow" with Humbrol Yellow Gloss, however, the colour problem went away). As I remember it, the transfers went on surprisingly easily: I had, and have, bad memories of transfers-past. Lots more joyful experiences of the older variety, no doubt, if I can ever get that -ing (as Mr Tulip* would no doubt say) shed finished. Can't wait to see what she looks like next . Cheese and greens, Alex. * Vide "The Truth", by Terry Pratchett.
  19. Looking great - roll on (well, not literally) the decals transfers! Cheers, Alex
  20. What a fantastic job on this Sea Vixen - a great ad for the kit (except for the transfers). Well done! Cheers, Alex.
  21. Looking Good, Ced - transfers next(?), then the ceiling? The airspace must be getting a bit crowded up there by now. The carpet monster - sibling (or cousin?) of the sock monster. I seem to have a plague of sock monsters at the moment, pesky little things. At least, while I'm getting the workshop underway, the carpet monster is lying doggo*. It just occurred to me - the workshop won't have carpet, ergo, it won't have a carpet monster! Hooray! Cheeses of various sorts, Alex. * Maybe...
  22. Oh dear, oh dear. He's a bit cross, isn't he? I can relate to this...a lot! (I've run out of likes again ). I like his alternatives. The Badger primer popping up again, too. I vote for the Tamiya and Mr.Surfacer . Never had problems with either, either; they need good ventilation though... Cheers, Alex.
  23. It's very odd. Some people seem to swear by them, others seem to swear at it. By "them", I mean the Vallejo/AMMO-Mig/AK collective. From what I've read on the AK web site (signed by Allejandro Vallejo(!)) they are all appear to be under the same umbrella - they certainly use the same bottles (I do like the included ball-bearing, I must say). At least the Mig pigments don't have the drying problems (unless you might be applying the VMA/AMMO/AK washes over the top - which you probably wouldn't be - directly - anyway ) . I'll be interested to see what it does here, that gent's(?) "one hour" claim surely must be suspect - even the bottle says wait 24 hours. Others, of course, say wait weeks... My opinion (and I'm very opinionated ) is that the various edicts issued by the Euro Chemical Police (RoHS?*) have resulted in stuff that can be drunk (or eaten), but are not in fact fit for original purpose (I use "original" rather than "intended", because I'm not sure that the ECP intend stuff to be actually usable - ahem, my little joke, ahem, cough cough . Seriously, though, I have encountered problems with various surface coatings failing recently, after all-over-the-world-regulations governing ingredients have changed (see link above?*): this includes marine varnishes, marine paints, marine epoxies, and modelling paints, as discussed with Ced "offline". It was not only highly annoying in the boat-building instance but very costly in terms of both time and money. And I mean costly. Grrr. My one hope is that technology will catch up with the rules and regulations - they will have to, otherwise all manner of things and occupations and livelihoods will go down the tube (if they haven't already done so). One thing that has occurred to me with the Vallejo & Co primers (and possibly overcoats) is that the surfaces to be painted need to be ​scrupulously clean, i.e., washed with detergents, rinsed, and/or wiped with IPA or meths, in order to deal with residual mould-release agents. That might be worth investigating. * Possibly not RoHS itself - but I'm sure, from what I was told by the UK distributor from whom I acquired a quantity of formerly spectacularly-good marine varnish, that "The Rules Had Changed". Cheers, Alex(N).
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