Torbjorn

I meant the schematic in the instructions, wasn’t complain on your paintjob. It is only one side that has the fancy livery, the other side has the original camo.

Interesting looking thing - a bit odd that one side appears to be plain. One question - did you get any trouble closing the wing with the PE grilles in place? I have this box somewhere and that strikes me as a potential issue.

It’s the same plastic I suppose, so not a terrible mixup. There is quite a wide spread in quality between the different pieces: the rudder for example is thin and delicate while the V-struts are thick and clumsy. The engine I shall replace with one of their later attempts under the Roden guise: Quite an improvement I would say. I’ve put the fuselage together with wings and tailplane. The characteristic control wire slots in the tailplane were opened and the elevators positioned downwards as seen in many photos of parked machines. The lower wing dihedral was asymmetric, but a bath in hot water and some bending sorted that. I also altered the undercarriage quite a bit, to look a bit more like the real thing One more update. Attached engine and cowl and found some brass enhancements: PE windscreen and gun mount from an Nieuport 17 or 21, brass rod for tailplane braces, and control horns cut from a PE sheet. Ready for paint.

I remember now why I take long breaks between Messerschmitts. The stencils are boring and look awfully conspicuous. Marseille’s mount now suffers from mild stencillitis: The stencils are just too sharp (or too big font). I shall try to remedy this by overspraying a thinned layer of the camo. von Buremski’s machine looks... well, odd: It too could do good with a warm brown filter, so I’m thinking I shall add the stencils and overspray it, stencils and camo and all. Will that result in disaster? When will the kit makers please start printing the stencils in grey instead of in pitch black?

Merci!

I had in mind a scratch build but with several GBs colliding I settled for something simpler. This will be my starting point: I bought it as it contained, as far as I could tell, the only Nieuport RFC markings readily available. I was mildly disappointed finding this inside today: No trace of Albert Ball. They must’ve put the wrong sheet in the box. No matter, it makes it fit this GB even better. The sheet has French cockades and enough serial numbers to allow puzzling together the serials of the Nieuports of the first official French ace, Jean Navarre, la sentinelle de Verdun. Navarre’s story has been told elsewhere - let’s just say it is the opposite of boring. He was young, aggressive, daring, even reckless, and made an impression on the air service and army and society at large - and on the Germans. When he didn’t get in trouble with the gendarmerie or borrow a plane to impress the ladies, he made his mark over the skies over Verdun. Donning ladies’ nylon undergarments instead of a flier’s cap, he painted his Nieuports in stark colours and performed aerobatics over the trenches. He figured, that he could at least cheer up the men below even of there were no foes to intimidate. Navarre flew several flashy Nieuport 11 and 16. I haven’t decided yet, but right now the plan is to built Navarre’s last Nieuport 16, N1130, in which he crashed and effectively ended his career as a fighter pilot. This plane was stark red, with a linen upper wing and camoflagued lower wing. Kit contents: In summary, the wings and fuselage are very nicely detailed, and the Prieur rockets are considerably better than Airfix’s take. Other parts are less refined, especially the crude landing gear which looks like 1960s Airfix. The cockpit is rudimentary - a seat and pedals, not even a stick. The Rhone 9J (9C for a Nieuport 12 - from a modelling perspective the only difference between the types is the engine and cowling) engine I will replace with a Roden spare. The Nieuport 11/16 is *small*, as illustrated with this wing comparison with an Eduard Nieuport 17/21. The 17 is not big to start with: The fuselage contains some details I’ll get rid off, especially the wind screen which I shall replace:

Note to self, so I can pick colour if I need to retouch: Vallejo unless stated blue: 71.101 sand: Haraka rlm79 (a014), warmed by splash of vallejo wood yellow: haraka insignia orange yellow for Buremskis camo RLM75: Hataka a007 RLM??: TBD

Thanks again Jes, that pictures solves it - the F-boxing contains that piece, just need a little whittling, and a spot of clear glue for the lens. And apparently the Special Hobby Finnish G6 contained an unused airscoop just the size I needed for this. Summa summarum, she’s prepped for the paintshop.

I decided to darken the Hataka take on the sand yellow, by adding some Vallejo Wood. With this I sprayed an uneven thin layer. It got slightly warmer and I like it better. Marseille’s machine is now gloss-coated, while von Boremski’s is a bit behind:

Thank you, this I hadn’t noticed. Will have to figure out what to do about that. It is anyhow time for an involuntary break - I cannot find the airscoop. I glued the two parts together, put the piece on the middle of the desk, thought ”I’ll have to be careful or I’ll lose this” and now I’ve lost it. The other pieces I’ve put together. It’s very similar to AZ models’ F kits, just slightly more refined: for example, as opposed ti the F boxing this one has grilles for the underwing intakes. Too bad I didn’t read the instructions or I could’ve added them

Watching the paint dry on the F-4s got tiresome so I decided to take on my last unbuilt AZ Messerschmitt. It’s a boxing containing these: ...but I will make use of some Xtradecal sheets I have so that money wasn’t all wasted. One of the G-6s seen here, provably the one flown by a man named Kahler: The AZ kit contains parts to do a G-5, G-6, G-8 or G-14, with several different options of tanks and armament, making the sprues look busy: I have already finished the cockpit: Oops, a terrible photo, but I’m sure you’ve seen it before anyway. It’s very nicely detailed, I’d consider having an open canopy if I had any vac-forms. And my sandpaper is apparently RLM02 if Vallejo is correct.

Polarized canopies for desert use After having spent a week painting the required 17 layers of white and yellow to get anything looking like coverage, I’ve reached the more interesting stages of painting. Underside blue and upper side sand is one. Trying hataka colours, sand looks awfully light: As you can see the masks won’t stay over sharply curved surfaces - the stiffness/stickiness ratio is too high. The lack of pitot tube may be noticed. No matter how many times I look at the sprues I can’t find any. I’ll have to find some brass tube eventually.

Better not ruin it with potentially bad decals, there’s so many nice alternatives around. I’m sure it’s well within the spirit of the GB. I like the method with the fuse wire, I shall probably copy that on occasion. Maybe clay can give a slightly more accurate fit, but in this case nobody will be able to see the difference and seems not worth the effort.

Thanks Stix. Went ahrad and attached thr undercarriage. The Swedish one had a different style of shock absorbers so I made bew ones out of brass rod and tube. Also replaced the central ”ski” (I guess it’s a anti-nose-tip device), not because there were anything wrong with the kit, but I broke it while taking care of some sinkholes. The old plastic has become a bit brittle - makes one wonder avout the longevity of these things. Also started on the struts, which as shown above goes into grooves in the upper wing. Consistently enough the the groves are twice as large as need be and a lot of filling is needed. I therefore attached them before painting.

Ready for painting. These limited edition kits apparently contained masks, which fitted very nicely.