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Undersurfaces on the F1C & B in the air defence scheme were aluminium according to Cocardes Hors-Serie No.1 Mirage F1 and had a low demarcation line on the fuselage. In some photographs , especially in late service this appears to be a light grey which unless there was a repaint is presumably down to weathering or a result of the photographic process.

Harrier , Rafale and forthcoming S-3 Viking books on the website this afternoon alongside the existing magazines and F-16 Part 1 so that's one of everything ordered.

RAF boxing released 1994 , RN & SAAF boxing in 1996 and a re-release in 2005 which some boxings at least contained two sets of parts for the price of one which apparently was a misunderstanding somewhere along the line and in my local modelling shop where I was then living the owner set aside to offer his regular customers first refusal (I gracefully did not refuse). Built the first and second as soon as they were released and have the third in the stash. In my experience it was a very nice and well detailed kit BUT not one to be rushed and perhaps one more appreciated by the modeller than the assembler , main problem was the two fuselage halves which were split horizontally and on them the plastic was perhaps a bit too thin and needed to be joined very carefully and slowly an inch or so at a time to ensure a good fit all around. I have read some comments that the the fuselage halves were warped which notwithstanding my comment above was not actually the case with the original two boxings I had but as I have never actually done anything with my 2005 re-release I am not able to say with any certainty that the mould had not deteriorated by then A few years ago Airfix sought opinions on which of their classic kits to re-release and I do recall that they made it clear that their 1/48 Buccaneer would not be considered.

Very well summed up. Pick any model paint range , look up one or more of the on-line paint comparison resources , quite possibly routing via one or two 'similar' colours , and one very quickly starts to see variations in interpretation by different manufacturers. Add in variations of manufacture , storage , preparation and application of both the original and model paints and the possibilities widen then eventually no matter how 'accurate' the model paint is it might well be the case that it just does not meet our expectations nor 'look right'. One of the great joys of our hobby is the enjoyment found from taking a set of parts , building to what we want the aircraft or whatever to resemble and then finishing to what we recall or imagine the aircraft to look like bearing in mind that memory , photography , renovation colours or even in-service painters are all fallible.

'Black Bats' , Eagles and Wild Cherries by Dr. Kevin Wright covering mainly but not solely ROCAF/CIA Neptune Operations over and around mainland China and a good introduction to the wider field of overflights and infiltration of mainland China If you are looking for something different to model you could well find your inspiration here with very much modified and later armed Neptunes (AIM-9 to fire at overshooting MiGs if they had not shot it down) followed very briefly by similarly configured Orions only being part of the story. Got interested in the subject a few years back when I was building a 'Black Bats' P-3A and with some digging discovered that all sorts of WWII and early post-war US-built aircraft had been involved in overflights either with CIA involvement or for purely Taiwanese purposes. On the other hand the PLAAF installed MiG-17 radars in the nose of Tu-2 and restructured Tu-4 with dorsal mounted radar , guns with IR sights and extra crew as airborne controllers. Both sides operating at often very low-level and with high losses. So , if you are looking for something really different . . . . . .

Most of Europe actually but the local council elections in Scotland like every other election held in the UK will be on the Thursday and with (any Covid restrictions notwithstanding) the growing move towards Regional counting centres and increasing move away from overnight counts the building will be in use for at least most of Friday and possibly into Saturday making the transfer from a counting centre into a display and trade arena impracticable.

And quite rightly so , what excellent moulding. Never been that taken by the Dauntless myself and closest I have ever got was a Polish released re-box of what looked like ye olde rather sparse Airfix parts won at a model show Tombola table some years back which was quickly passed on to someone else but this certainly looks like a very impressive kit.

With the Chief of the Defence Staff suggesting that risks of an 'accidental' conflict with Russia have been increasing over recent years towards their current state a policy of not carrying BVR missiles when policing the UKADR just for the sake of showing-off a well recognised but in terms of the mission superfluous capability might be one way of sending a message of restraint in addition to the above-mentioned operational and financial benefits.

Website is at - https://www.phoenixscalepublications.co.uk/ - both magazines and Part 1 of the F-16 book are on it at the moment but I might hold off until early in the week to see if any of the Rafale & Harrier books become available after Telford.

Ordered from and delivered to home this week rather than the proceeds of a frenzied hedonistic rampage through the halls of the International Centre at Telford this weekend. From Aldi One each of the 1/72 Airfix Starter Sets aircraft which were a Sunday Special but did not reach this far north until Thursday A68205 Messerschmitt Bf109E-3 , A68206 Supermarine Spitfire Mk.1a , A68210 Focke-Wulf Fw190A-8 , A68216 Hawker Hurricane Mk.1 , Hunting Percival Provost T.4 From Black Mike Models Hand delivered by Duncan on Thursday , who would have imagined a take-out home-delivery model shop before Covid? Two 1/48 ICM 48300 OV-10A Bronco Via eBay 1/48 Roden 440 Pilatus PC-6C/H-2 Turbo Porter ‘Air America’ , to join their AU-23A Peacemaker gunship bought a few years ago. From Amazon F-102 Delta Dagger Illustrated by Lou Drendel , published 2021 by Amazon , released this week as the latest addition to the series with the usual mix of images and artwork although only a short introductory history with the remaining text in the form of much-expanded image captions rather than the previous ‘first-hand accounts’ which makes it far more image intensive and for me anyway far more enjoyable. Interesting to read in the foreword that there had never been an F-102 title in his ‘In Action’ series. PS - having had a chance to go into the book in more detail it should be noted that while there is one passing reference to changes being made to the wing design it is not actually made clear that for production aircraft this was manifested by either the 'Case X' or 'Case XX' wing which were not interchangeable and can be identified by aircraft serial number.

On Sunday staff at our local branch said that they were 'on the table in the back' but were not being released until Thursday in that branch. Friends and family in other towns in the general area checked their stores earlier in the week but the starter kits were not on sale. Popped in late this morning here in Montrose and they were there labelled as a 'Thursday Special' , no idea why different parts of the country had them on Sunday and others such as around had them for release today.

Airfix Model World with calendar appeared in my newsagent today a week late and at first glance I cannot see anything hidden in any of the box-art used in the calendar that might hint of things to come as once was the case. Aeroplane is about due which I believe will be including a photo based calendar.

They are out there although often purely in the French Language , expensive to start with and often out of print at which point Amazon prices especially become ridiculous. If you widen your search you might find something although it will probably still be pricey by nature of the market and France's taxation policies on printed matter. You could try specific authors such as Alexandre Paringaux , Frederic Lert , Alain Crosnier or, Phillipe Roman or try French publishers of aviation titles such as ETAI as you have already seen and others such as Zephyr , Heimdal or Histoire & Collections some of whom also publish monthly magazines and special magazine editions which might help with what you need. Most of the books I have from the above relate mainly to Mirage variants/units with some having crossover to the Rafale and although the standards of photography are astounding none of the Mirage titles although often including servicing and engineering activities have quite the same level of consistent nose-to-tail close-up detail as the Duke Hawkins titles. Regarding Duke Hawkins it might be worth your while dropping them a line to see if they have any plans for the Rafale , be surprising if they did not and they are planning to release another two titles before the end of this year and have a full programme planned for next so there might be something sooner rather than later from them.

Flat ended resin blades are included as single pieces in the OZ Mods 1/48 A-26K conversion intended to replace those on the Revell/Monogram propellor hubs. I have a set of the blades going spare if you would like to try , pm mailing address if you would like me to send them.

Think they could have offered free shipping.

From B N A Model World 1/48 Oz Mods OZCONV4802 A-26K Invader Conversion as a possible solution to what I feel to be the apparent shortness of the ICM A-26K gun-nose parts. Merely a personal opinion so please don’t shoot the messenger but the resin gun-nose seems to be near enough the same length as that of the older style gun-nose in the Revell/Monogram A-26B kit with both being noticeably longer than that provided in the ICM kit. As I say merely a personal observation and the proof of the pudding will be in actually assembling the kit. The OzMods conversion parts also includes two part wingtip tanks with a recess to fit onto the wing rather than the butt joint on the ICM parts however even with the moulding plugs still attached these parts are very slightly shorter than the kit parts and with them removed are well under length so any benefits of a potentially stronger fit might be outweighed by the level of filler/surgery required. At time of purchase shipping from Australia effectively doubled the cost to around £20 if anyone might be thinking to try the same. From Key Publications Two of the latest addition to their book series. US Air Forces In Europe - In The 1980s by Kevin Wright , the final decade of the Cold War with a wide variety of types and colour schemes still serving at that time. North Korean Aviation – An Eyewitness Account by Gerry Manning , excellent civil , military and social coverage of the to date unique 2016 Wonsan Airshow.

Was using Hermes around this time last year for sending stuff around the family and was on some occasions having deliveries made within twenty-four hours of handing in at the local parcel drop. Early this year started getting demands from them for excess charges on an item which had been sent and they were declining to deliver until these were paid - demand included correct parcel number , my name and address and those of the recipient - checked with the recipient and they had safely received the item , checked with Hermes and they confirmed that the demand was not from them but could/would not explain how a third party could have obtained the information so have not used them again since. Still recieve items delivered by them but delivery times have grown during the year with some items taking several days from reported dispatch by sender to being shown as received by Hermes to then arriving at one of their facilities and then remaining there for up to a week before being on the move again. To be fair I have some items travelling by Royal Mail which show similar delays during the same period so maybe not circumstances unique to any specific carrier.

The AMK 1/48 MiG-31 and associated upgrade set. In my opinion perhaps the most intricately moulded and best detailed kit I have ever come across , bought when first released a few years ago and just a bit too nervous that my ham-fisted attempts would handle such fine engineering as well as it deserves.

Was wondering about one or two detail points but your very thorough review has cleared them up , many thanks. Already contacted Duncan at Black Mike to reserve a couple on their arrival up this end . . . . . and then hopefully the OV-10D in the next month or so. Anyone want to pay me vast amounts of money to save an old going to get around to it one-day Testors kit and Paragon conversion for the nation?

My set aside copies of AMW and Combat Aircraft , both with the 4th. as their intended issue date , have not turned up in my local newsagent yet and as of half an hour ago the AMW slot in my local Tesco is still empty but with subscription issues arriving as mentioned above and both magazines having sent out their 'latest issue' email ads it would seem to be an unusual but not entirely unknown distribution hiccup. Newsagent tells me that they now rarely get a magazine delivery on Saturdays and never on Mondays so might be early next week for me.

From Guideline Publications Catching up with some more Warpaints in lieu Warpaint Special No.1 P-47 Thunderbolt and No.2 Messerschmitt Bf109 both Edited by Alan W. Hall and No.5 P-51 Mustang by Kev Darling. Warpaint No.10 Vickers Wellington and No.15 Short Stirling both by Alan W. Hall , No.93 Messerschmitt Me262 by Kev Darling , No.94 Supermarine Attacker by Tony Butler , No.111 OS2U Kingfisher by Kev Darling , No.130 Ilyushin Il-28 by Nikolay Yakubovich From Home Bargains Another four Christmas Bauble Storage Boxes , intention with the first two was only to rationalise my 1/48 spares but decided to carry on the project into the 1/72 I rarely build , military and miscellaneous spares. Arnold Clark Vauxhall Crossland SE , 1:1 scale pre-built model , ‘71’ Plate , 14 miles on the clock and monthly repayment two-thirds of its predecessor 'ECO' model which in turn had a second-hand value almost twice that of the final settlement figure.

This might be of interest to occasional buyers of Flypast who are unable to view the sealed contents before purchase. Picked the December issue of the above at my local Tesco today and the 2022 Calendar is bundled with it in a sealed paper envelope which prevents it being fully inspected. Especially nice this year with a different full-page A4 sized colour aircraft side profile artwork for each month - Swordfish , Wellington , Spitfire , Vulcan , Lancaster , C-47 , Me 262 , B-17 , Hurricane , Mosquito , Halifax , Zero. The Calendar has been a long-standing annual event so I would not imagine that this is a Tesco specific bundle and going by Key Publications practice in previous years I would expect Aeroplane and Airfix Modelworld to include their own specific Calendars with their next issues due in the next few weeks.

No idea if it comes within their terms of reference but suspect that if goods have not been supplied BUT the supplier has refunded OR the purchaser has obtained a refund through their bank/credit card then there would be no reason for them to take any interest even if it was their business , only had experience of them once or twice and any form of resolution seems to be their preferred option to enforcement even if that were an option unless public safety is involved. I do believe that the USA has a Federal statute specifically involving taking payments by mail including on-line for non-existent items (if that were to be the case with the June/July issues) but whether cross-border cases are pursued especially for the sums likely to be involved would be another matter for any in that situation . . . . . visions of FBI SWAT Teams abseiling from helicopters amidst a cloud of Tear Gas in pre-dawn Bedford.

August/September issues still on the shelf at my local newsagent so not recalled up this end of the world yet and might be wrong but seem to recall an earlier explanation in one of the many threads the SAMI Saga has followed over the past year or so is that recalled magazines generally get pulped rather than returned to the publisher , back-issue copies are usually part of the original print-run.

It was out and about for much of today drawing repeated circles in the sky centered over Perthshire , again as 'Solex 01' , possibly working with Hawks 'Aggressor 01 and 02' over the Firth of Forth and north along the east coast of Fife and Angus.