KLP Publishing

I'm pleased to report that I can finally declare this one finished! The livery decals are from V1 Decals, and the cockpit windows and wing root landing lights are from Authentic Airliners Decals. The two VHF antenna blades are from CRM, while I scratch-built the red anti-collision light. I must say, it's quite difficult to photograph a mostly white object against a white background! But my coloured backgrounds aren't big enough to accommodate the low-down shots, unfortunately. The model has a lot of flaws, but I'm still really happy with the way it turned out. Now to finish its Welsh Models stable mate! Kev

Our largest title, Building Race #80 Spitfire Mk XIVe in 1/18 Scale, turns 6 today! And to celebrate, for the next 7 days, we’ve reduced the price to just 18 Australian dollars. So hop on over to our webstore and grab yourself a bargain! Kev

Man, this thing is really crawling towards the finish line! Originally I'd hoped to have it done by the end of March, but here we are nearly two weeks later, and I'm still trying to nudge it across the line. I've finally got it up on its legs, but can't for the life of me work out how to attach the y-shaped support struts to the main landing gear. Doesn't seem to work whatever way I go about it, and the instructions are no help at all. Here's what the Minicraft instructions give you: After examining some photos and renders of the real thing, it's clear that Minicraft has this whole arrangement backasswards, and it's nothing like the real thing. That's just not achievable using the kit parts, so I just fudged it as best I could: Stuff like this is a good reason to do airliners wheels-up! Kev

I’m pleased to announce that the next title in our Build Guide Series will be Building the Airfix Gannet AS.1/AS.4 in 1/48 Scale, by Gary Boxall. We are in the preliminary phases of developing this title, so stay tuned for more news and information! Kev

I’m pleased to announce that our latest title, Chevron and Cross: Camouflage Paints and Camouflage Schemes of the Royal Hungarian Air Force, is now available! In this 417-page eBook, author Károly Magó covers the camouflage paints and schemes of the Royal Hungarian Air Force from inception until 1945 in forensic detail. Using historical photos, original documentation, and extensive primary research, the author sets out to answer the following basic question: “whether the Hungarian Air Force had used Hungarian or German standardised colours and shades to paint the aircraft”. Along with extensive discussion of the subject, the book features over 200 photos, dozens of original source documents, period advertisements, and colour comparisons using salvaged aircraft pieces. Written with a modeller’s eye, the book also includes 46 colour profiles by Viktor Szalai. The book is available now for immediate purchase and download from the KLP website for 25 Australian dollars. Kev

Oh man, that was a nightmare! But I'm pleased to say that masking and painting the lower surface Coroguard panels is now done. It's far from perfect, but will certainly do as a shelf-sitter. Once I've dealt with a bit of overspray, it'll be on to the final stages of completion. Kev

I've just finished masking and painting the Coroguard panels on the upper wings and tailplanes: I used SMS Dark Gull Gray here, which turned out to be a pretty good match for the decals, though a tad lighter. Still have to do the lower surfaces, which will be an altogether more complicated process. Wish me luck! Oh, I elected not to repaint the engine pylons in light grey, as I realised after starting the masking job that it was going to be a lot more difficult than I thought, and really not worth the bother. Kev

Today—31 March 2024— is the 7th anniversary of the public launch of KLP Publishing, and to celebrate, we’re having a 20%-off sale on all titles! Simply use the coupon code 7YEARS at checkout to receive 20% off the value of your shopping cart. That coupon code again: 7YEARS The sale runs for 7 days, and ends 7 April 2024. I’d like to thank all our customers and friends for a great 7 years, and especially for the amazing support we’ve received since taking KLP Publishing full-time in late 2021. We have many great titles planned for 2024, so stay tuned for more news and information as it comes to hand! Kev

Thank you, sir! Kev

Gloss coating done: I used Alclad's Aqua Gloss, which I generally reserve for those occasions where I'm concerned that a solvent-based clear coat might affect the decals - which is the case whenever they're laser-printed, like here. I'll leave this for at least 48 hours now, before going anywhere near it with masking tape! I've also discovered some errors and omissions, some of which I also plan to attend to. The most visible one is that I got the colour of the engine pylons wrong. I assumed they'd be white like the engines themselves, but they are in fact the same light grey as the wings, so I'll be attempting to correct that, at least. Kev

Happily, the FCD Coroguard decals came off without much trouble at all: The next step is to give the entire model a couple of liberal gloss coats to protect the existing decals and paint work, and then it's on to some tedious masking... Stay tuned! Kev

These Coroguard decals are going to have to come off, unfortunately: They're like that all the way along, on both wings. They reacted badly to Microsol, and no attempt to fix them has yielded any results. The uppers aren't in great shape either, and haven't even had any Microsol yet. I had exactly this issue with this same decal brand (Flying Colors Decals) on a 767 build from 10+ years ago, so never again. I'll strip them off and mask and paint them. And sadly, I'd already applied the underwing registration discussed earlier, so it looks like that will be wasted, too. Quite bummed about this, as it was all going quite well until this point. But then, it isn't really one of my builds until something like this happens... On the upside, the decals on the bottom are out of position anyway, and not necessarily a very convincing colour. But what to paint them with? Kev

Awesome! Thanks for that. Tom Probert also confirmed this position for me, but it's nice to have a photograph of it. Kev

And here's the promised update! Decalling done on Ed Force One: I've taken the photos against both a white and a charcoal background, since each offers a slightly different perspective on the model. The only decals left are a pair of stencils for the nose wheel doors, and a registration decal whose placement I can't determine: My best guess is that it's supposed to go under the outboard end of the starboard wing, but I can't find a single photo that confirms this, so will probably just leave it off. Just need to deal with all the wrinkling now! But very happy with the way this is turning out. Kev

Fairly racing ahead with this one now! I gave in to angst and gave the fuselage another coat of neat SMS White, painted the engine and APU exhaust areas, and pulled off all the masking tape: I ended up spraying the entire tail silver, so that I didn't have to guess where the leading edge demarcation should be, and the decals would have a uniform colour under them. Of course, I didn't then mask the entire tail, so I ended up with white patches anyway. I then proceed to get as many decals on as my evening would allow, starting with those tail decals. I figured that if they failed me, then I could reprint them from the scans I took, but happily, this was not required. As it happens, though, the decals themselves are printed on a continuous sheet without any white (probably laser printed), so the tail decal really needed to be laid down over a white background. Too late, she cried! And a different angle against a white background: I'm really pleased with how it's turning out. The windscreen decal is from the Authentic Airliners Decals "3D" set, but I've decided I probably won't use the cabin windows from that set, as the fuselage will already be quite busy once all the decals are on, and the windows that come with the Ed Force One set actually look pretty good. I'm hoping to get all the decals on for the next update. Stay tuned! Kev

Indeed they do, Ray. Unfortunately both my bottles have a very obvious beige tint, which I can't explain, but is evident on the wings of my MD-80 build: For the first layer of colour on the wings of the 757, I mixed a bit of this beige Boeing Grey in with the Light Grey, but it didn't shift the colour appreciably, so I went with straight light grey for the second coat. Kev

A quick update, as this build finally makes it to the painting stage! SMS Light Grey on the wings and tailplanes: The strong studio lights make it look basically white, but it should have enough contrast with the white on the fuselage when it goes down - which will happen after the silver bits! Kev

Engine repairs completed, though I might still need to do some work around the pylon/engine interfaces: Creeping ever closer to the painting stage! Got some Flying Colors coroguard decals to assist: Kev

Well, I'd hoped that I could report back with glowing news about progress with this one - particularly regarding a successful fix for the engine angles. But it turns out that my decision to do it after installation was not the best one, and there's a reason most people attend to it first. For a start, the wing root on the inboard side of each engine is in the way of making a clean cut where I wanted it to go, so this was a bit of a struggle. I also had to cut much further into the pylon than I wanted to in order to elicit any movement from it. But I got there in the end, shimmed the gap with styrene, and bogged it all up with Milliput: Or so I thought! A couple of minutes into sanding back the Milliput, this happened: At least the other side survived! That's enough to ruin your best pair of undies. So after some swearing and half a tube of CA, I managed to get it back in place: I also think it's now pointing a little high again, but better than OOB. I guess I'm just going to have to treat this area as fragile from now on. Hopefully that mess will clean up OK. Stay tuned to find out! Kev

Time for another update! I took the RB211 engines that my friend Ray Seppala sent me, thinned out the intakes a little, and then installed them onto the wings. This was followed by a light coat of primer to see where things were at: It actually doesn't look too bad! Earlier, I'd used Tamiya epoxy putty to blend in the forward wing roots and make them look like some semblance of the real thing. Still a bit of work to do there, however: The other thing that this kit is infamous for, is the upward rake of the engines once installed: I've read about various ways to fix this - most of them prior to installation, but I felt I needed to install them first, so I could assess the problem properly, and correct it against some fixed datum points. It actually doesn't look too bad at first glance, but the giveaway is that the fronts of the engine intakes are perpendicular to the ground, whereas they should be sloping rearward from top to bottom. My plan is to make strategic cuts to the pylon just forward of the wing leading edge, and then shim them with styrene stock. Wish me luck! Kev

Build Guide Series No. 8, Building the Special Hobby Tempest Mk V in 1/32 Scale, turns 3 today. And to celebrate, for the next 7 days, we’ve reduced the price to a mere 12 Australian dollars! In this 227-page eBook, Chuck Sawyer undertakes a forensic examination of the Special Hobby 1/32 scale Hawker Tempest Mk V kit, combining it with the Barracuda Studios resin nose upgrade set to produce a stunning model. He leads you through all the pitfalls of construction, and of integrating the resin nose and propellor into the kit. We’ve included tutorials on decanting spray cans for airbrushing, achieving a flawless, high-gloss base coat, and working with HGW’s Wet Transfer decals. So, head over to our webstore and grab yourself a bargain! Kev

I just wanted to take a moment to remind everyone to remember to download the books you purchase from us here at KLP Publishing. I’m currently sitting on a list of 15 customers who have failed to download their purchases for some reason over the past several months. I’ve reached out to each of you twice via email, using the email address supplied in your order—once from my KLP email address, and once again using a Gmail account. If you didn’t receive your order confirmation email containing the download links, or either of the follow-up emails, please contact me and we’ll sort it out. If you’re simply not sure of the download process, I’ve written a handy guide that should answer any of your questions: https://www.klp.com.au/2017/12/06/purchasing-downloading-our-books/ As outlined in that article, if you created (or were logged into) an account while making the purchase, then the books will always be available from the Downloads section of your profile. Occasionally a customer will make a purchase without understanding that all our books are digital-only, and will quietly sit and wait for something to arrive in the post. While this is unfortunate, and a refund is available upon request (provided the books have not already been downloaded), most are happy to download the digital book once they realise their mistake. However, if you’re in this boat yourself, and now can’t find a download link, please contact me and we’ll rectify the situation. If you’re not sure if this situation applies to you, or have any other questions, simple reach out through whatever channel suits you best (email, Facebook, Instagram or on the website), and I’ll do what I can to resolve the issue. Kev

I’m pleased to announce that we’ve just added a brand-new 28-page Walkaround section to Building the Airfix Buccaneer S.2C in 1/48 Scale, and thus released a Version 2.0 update! These photos, taken by Tony Patrickson of Anbarún Models, feature Buccaneer S.2 XV361 at the Ulster Aviation Society museum in Northern Ireland. To celebrate this momentous occasion, for the next 7 days, we’ve also reduced the price to a mere 12 Australian dollars! The discounted price ends at midnight, Monday 26 February 2024, AEDT. In this 116-page eBook, renowned UK modeller Geoff Coughlin takes you through the building and painting of this new kit. Along with Geoff’s terrific build, we’ve also included some colour profiles by Simon Hill, an overview of the kit itself, and a set of ordnance-related bonus photos—and a brand-new Walkaround section. This a free update for all existing purchasers, and of course new purchasers will always receive the latest version of any of our books. In order to obtain your free update, simply re-download the book using either the original download link in your Order Confirmation email, or log in to your KLP account and download it from the Downloads section of your profile. If you don’t have either, please contact me and we’ll sort it out. Kev

OK, so the tail decals don't fit the Welsh kit at all - probably even less so than here. I broke out my V1 Decals for the later livery - also allegedly designed for the Minicraft kit - and had much better luck: A little short at the bottom, but I can live with that, so I'll be switching to this livery. That leaves me with set of "Somewhere in Time" decals that I can't currently use, which is frustrating. I'm thinking I might take my hi-res scan of those decals, adjust it to fit the Welsh tail, and reprint them (just the tails) on decal paper. Worth a try, anyway. Kev

A bit of a longer update, this one - the end of which leaves the viability of the project hanging in the balance! My next move after the last update was to fix the awful leading edges of the tailplanes at their roots: They're bulbous, blocky, and don't blend into the fuselage at all. Here's my best attempt to fix them, and comparison of the two: Still not perfect, but a bit of filler should take care of the rest. I then moved to tackling the fuselage seams. I started by filling the cut-outs I made with stretched sprue, before laying down a bead of black rubberised CA along all the joins: I also did two of the three cabin doors on each side, as they're situated too low: Here's a close-up of the kit's abysmal wing root fairing: And the real thing: Ugh. Now comes the coup de gras. Since the point of tackling this awful kit was so I could put some cool Iron Maiden stickers on it, I thought I'd better check that they fit. They're home-produced decals, and I was assured by the vendor that they were designed for this Minicraft kit. But hey, if only life were that simple: And if you're thinking, well at least it seems OK at the front, think again: Doesn't look like a "designed to fit" scenario to me. Now, I know that the Minicraft tail is inaccurate in shape, and perhaps the tail decals are scale accurate in that regard. But that just means that I was initially misled when purchasing these decals, and also can't use them on this build. Thank heavens I stopped to check! So, where to now? As I see it, these are my options: Revert to the kit livery and finish the model; Bin the whole thing as a bad idea; Modify the tail decals to fit the kit tail, potentially distorting the iconic design; Modify the kit tail to match the decals, potentially creating worse accuracy issues. I don't have the Zvezda kit, but I do have the Welsh Models 757, so I'm going to drag it out and check the decals against it. If they fit better, than I'll probably pass them onto that build and do something else here. That would be the neatest solution, even if I'm not particularly interested in the Northwest livery that comes with the kit. And anyone who knows me will realise that #2 is just not an option. I'm not keen on #3, and #4 seems like a lot of work for a kit that really isn't worth it. So it's probably going to be Option #1, and I'll just have to see if I can use the Iron Maiden decals elsewhere. There is one more option that I just thought of: I also have decals from another manufacturer for the later "Final Frontier" tour livery, so perhaps I should see if they fit better. I'll be back later with the results of those fit tests. Stay tuned! Kev