Giorgio N

A few thoughts: EU subsidy to Eduard postage ??? Nothing like that exists in Europe. The increase in postage has already been explained. In my experience Eduard has never offered the cheapest postage and other Czech manufacturers usually have cheaper options. Buying from Eduard can save money or not depending on how many items are bought and where they have to be delivered, fortunately the brand is now available pretty much everywhere. Personally I still buy from Eduard but generally I try to buy enough items to justify the postage. Always had a very good service from them. Overtrees: I have bought several and will likely buy them again. Today however I'm a bit colder regarding them, at least for the 1/72 kits. I can live without PE but when it comes to stencils I realised that in the end paying a bit more for the Weekend Edition kits makes sense even without using the kit markings. The price difference in 1/48 may make more sense though. Rivets: this sure is a matter of personal taste and personally I have no strong feeling either way, in any case if a kit must have rivets then the Eduard treatment is one of the best. The way they have moulded rivets in their latest kits results in them being visible only from very close distance once the model is painted. They also represent fasteners differently to show that they are not rivets. I've seen even better representations of surface details in some other kits but overall iI can't complain with Eduard's surface detail

On many F-104 schemes however stencils are very visible, and a company should supply them, more so when the kit features a price tag of that kind. It would be like buying a 50k car and not having air conditioning...

Ok, I must be a bit tired lately... I had forgotten that I have a Carpena sheet in the stash that include a French F-100... here is what the sheet says,where I've combined the English text with part of the French text to add more complete information. Pale Yellow Sand: Celomer 2345/4080/3251. Closest FS 20222 but less yellow. Humbrol 93 exact match Dark Green Sand: Celomer 4080/5054. Closest FS 24201, a little darker. Humbrol 179 exact match Brown Grey: Celomer 4080/2741. Closest FS 24091, close match. Humbrol 98 exact match Gray Blue: Celomer 4080/6107. Closest FS 26329, exact to very close match. Humbrol from 65 to 87 with white added The sheet then comments: "These colours are given for a newly painted aircraft. It is superfluous to add that these colours, when seen in Djibouti, would have already faded. French camouflaged F-100s never carried FS colours but rather Celomer colours were applied. In particular, only one green was carried, the darker green was in reality a brown-grey. By sheer luck Humbrol paints offer nearly or exact matches.

Des, sometime I can't understand part of Montalbano dialogues myself....their Italian is not really that perfect... It's a great series though, I was a bit surprised to see how popular it was in the UK but then really it's a quality product Having the same magazine, I checked their references and I believe that they don't recommend Humbrol H14 but rather Humbrol HI4 from the old Authentic line. HI4 was the colour meant to reproduce the wartime Italian Nocciola Chiaro, that is often quoted as similar to FS 30219, so would make perfect sense for the F-100 (the French tan in pictures is not really that different from the US paint). Overall the suggestion HF6 is maybe not too bad, as really the darker green in pictures looks almost brown. HD1 for the lighter green on the other hand is IMHO too green and not olive enough, again compared to pictures. The suggestion for the lower surfaces is IMHO FS 35622, a colour well known for having been used on Israeli aircraft for quite a long time. Not sure it's really the best suggestion here, IMHO 35622 is too light and not enough grey Aerei Modellismo was back then the only real Italian modelling magazine and was great, but most of their colour references were approximate and based on observation of pictures rather than the study of official documents.

It is IMHO unfair to compare the price of this first edition of the Eduard kit with the Airfix kit. This Eduard offering includes PE parts, masks and a decal sheet for 6 options, in line with other limited edition and profipack boxings from the same manufacturer. The Airfix kit has no PE, no masks and offers 2 options on the decal sheet, that is what Eduard today offers in their Weekend Edition kits, priced quite a bit cheaper than the Profipacks and limited editions. Now at the moment there's no Weekend Edition of the P-51D, but even considering the Chattanooga Choo Choo box it looks quite good value, at least in my corner of the world: the Airfix kit retails for around €25, the Eduard kit is around €37... should I add PE and masks to the Airfix kit I'd have already spent the € 12 difference, add a decal sheet to cover 4 more subjects and I'd be well beyond € 40. I have no idea of what the Weekend Edition will cost, the Spitfires go for € 20-22, so comparable to the Airfix P-51D.

A coat of gloss paint may help in keeping the decals together but none of these is as "tough" as the Microscale product. As Micro Decal Film is quite cheap, I'd just buy this rather than trying with Tamiya or other gloss paints. Afterall the Microscale liquid is specifically designed for this task, glossy paints are not. If you can't find the Microscale liquids, using a glossy paint may be a better-than-nothing solution, but with no guarantee of success. Speaking on Micro Decal Film, yes you can also use this to seal the artwork printed with an inkjet printer on decal paper. It is actually a very effective product for this task. Keep in mind however that home-printed decals will suffer from some limitations, most important the fact that you can't print white unless you have a specific printer. This means that any light colour will disappear over a dark background, as inks are quite transparent and you can't add a white base under the artwork. You could print some artwork on white decal paper but for several bits in the decal sheet you'll likely not be able to sort them. In any case I feel that you grabbed a great bargain with all those kits for £80, even if you have to buy a few extra decal sheets you'll still have saved a lot of money !

Mike, in reality I have to thank Romain ( @rom1 ) for originally posting the link to this document a few years ago. I duly saved this as I like having as many "original" documents on camouflage as I can. When it comes to the research side of colours, I like getting information as accurate as possible and original official documentation is the way to go. That then I end up using on my models paints that are not too accurate only because I already have them in the stash is another matter..

Steve, the lack of proper colour in the document is annoying but most of these are referenced to the Afnor standard. Googling the relevant number shows colour samples for a good number of colours. Unfortunately the Afnor deckfan with all the chips costs more than I'd like to spend, a problem that affects pretty much every standard

Don't know if it's the same document you are referring to, but it is possible to find online some older versions of NORMDEF 0001 - Coleurs de la Defence Nationale, an official French document stating all colours approved for use by the armed forces of that country. A massive document, with 186 pages, listing all approved colours and their use, reference to existing standards for the colours when these apply (generally the AFNOR standard) and even CIELAB values for all colours and the tolerances for each colours. The document also contains formulas regarding the use of the values given and IR reflectivity ranges. A great document for those interested in these things, that unfortunately poses a serious problem for modellers: while all colours are listed with their use, this is only expressed in general: you can find that a certain colour is used for camouflage of aircraft, but not which aircraft uses which colours. This is made even more complicated by the fact that often we have references to Celomer paints, but any number attached to a Celomer paint is a catalogue number given by this company (that I believe is now part of PPG), so without anything to convert the catalogue number into the AFNOR standard it's not easy to find the colour in the document.. Still it's a very valid document when looking for a certain colour, as the reference to the standards and the presence of CIELAB space values means that it's possible to identify what the colour is like One other aspect to consider is that I don't know when this document first started being used ! It may very well be that it was not in use when the F-100 was in service, so may not be useful in this case. At the same time it's very well possible that the same colour used on these aircraft survived into later years and made it into the document when first issued.

Don't know of any source for 90" roundels, but Modeldecal sheet 103 had 100" roundels. If the size was indeed 90", the best option would be finding a 1/32 sheet that include 40" roundels.

Xtradecal X72-044 has a couple of 84" roundels. Alternatively it could be possible to use 1/48 roundels

All RAF day fighters, apart from SEAC, switched to C type roundels over the wings in January 1945, so this also affected aircraft based in Italy. 2 TAF machines differed in having C1 roundels, that is with yellow border. I don't have the history of that aircraft available, I believe that the well known picture showing her flying over Italy was taken in mid '45 and by then the roundel used would have been the C. If the aircraft was in theater before January '45, then she would have worn a B roundel over the wings at that time. (and usual caveat, the definitions C, B, C1 and so on are used here because they are well known to modellers, but they were not official designations etc...)

Don, you may know this already, if not you may be interested in knowing that decals for a camouflaged 612 Sqn. Vampire were available in Modeldecal sheet 101, of course with silver undersides. The aircraft chosen was WA402 "J", the CO aircraft in 1956 Although the sheet is OOP, it can be found quite easily from the usual sources of second hand modelling items

The fact that you're only able to spray wide areas and not fine line may be due to the paint drying on the tip of the airbrush needle, so clogging the nozzle. This may also explain why the airbrush spits at lower pressure while works fine at higher values. To avoid the problem, you may try putting a couple of drops of thinner in the airbrush cup before painting, then spray the thinner. This will leave a film of thinner on the tip, so retarding the onset of the problem. It's also worth having a small brush at hand, with which you can use to gently clean the tip when too much paint builds up

I have checked a couple of Modeldecal sheets and both seem to indicate low demarcation. Yet pictures seem to show very little if any contrast between upper and lower surfaces on the booms. I believe that it's a matter of these being mostly in Dark Sea Grey, that shows less contrast with PRU Blue. I will look for a few more pictures, maybe they can shed some light on the matter.