Heather Kay

In between making up lubrication pipe runs on the loco build, I got two brushed coats of dark earth on. Some gaps at the horizontal stabiliser roots, and a bit of remedial filling on the wing roots should see things right.

Sounds like an approach to one or other of the admins or mods might be in order.

Noooo! Don’t go! You have skills you can share, I’m sure. Hang around a bit, at least.

It can do, but that old Airfix boxing had been in the stash for at least two decades. I had two, and built one for the Classic Airfix GB a couple of years back. Better kits have come along, so this old one sat there, biding its time. There’s enough left to consider building it as a crash diorama!

Getting there.

Last night I decided it was time to fit the undercarriage. With no positive location or orientation points, I’m afraid, despite my best efforts, this Hurricane May be a little knock-kneed or pigeon-toed. You can see here various details have been fitted. Intake, radiator, pitot tube, tail wheel, replacement main undercarriage struts... the lighter colours are Airfix donated parts. I'm really glad I saved that old Airfix Hurricane for all these years. It’s provided me with replacement parts where the AZ kit has rather let me down. I say that purely because extracting tiny parts from the mahoosive feed gates was troubling me. While the AZ struts are more detailed, the feed gates negated much of the finer detail. I bet, like the Airfix ones and original kit main legs, they wouldn’t meet with any mating surfaces either. As it stands (ho ho!), the undercarriage is glued to the aircraft by means of the doors where they meet the wings. The carburettor intake was originally an exquisite but minuscule resin casting. Quite how one was meant to hold it while removing the pouring block will now never be resolved. Happily, Airfix came to my rescue. I think I’m about ready to get some brushed paint on as primer. I’ll do the same trick as the Battle, and use Humbrol Dark Earth. Then I’ll be able to see where remedial work is required. I have tried the kit transparency, but it doesn’t fit. There’s something very suspect about the cockpit area, so the vac-form hood will need to be deployed. Meanwhile, I shall recommence battle with this... This is the current "day job" project. One day it will be a 1/43rd scale Great Western Railway Small Prairie tank loco. Currently, it’s bits of brass etch that keep annoying me.

would it be possible to drill holes in the bodywork - not the canopy - large enough and in places that will be easy to fill and hide later that you might be able to get a vacuum cleaner to suck the muck out?

"Make do and mend." A mantra my parents grew up with, and instilled into me to an extent. That 1970s Hurricane from Airfix is working well. It came with a wheels up and wheels down option, both with the correctly shaped doors. Sadly, though I did try, they are slightly larger than the AZ openings, otherwise I’d have simply swapped them in. Instead, I have considered chopping the angled arm part from the closed doors. Well, waddya know? The AZ kit part for the gear will go in later. The blutack is because I’m not ready to install the wheels yet. Somewhat disappointingly the retraction strut doesn’t meet the fancy pants wheel wells. Oh well. Now, I really should get on with some proper work.

Reynard it is. Raiding the spares box for a 1970s Airfix radiator. It fits, too, but I need to daub some paint inside it before sticking it in place. Meanwhile, I began assembling undercarriage. Spot anything wrong?

You know, you might be right. There’s a lot about this kit that smacks of trying to be all things to everyone. I do, though, have a cunning plan.

There has been filler. The worst area was the wing to fuselage joins, but I think it’s getting there. I suspect a swift coat of paint will show any issues up nicely. Underneath is better. I’m not entirely happy with the join at the back of the wing, but since it aligns with the rear of the big radiator it shouldn’t cause too much of a problem. Speaking of radiators... I don’t think that’s quite right. The rad front cowling is a nice resin casting, but it doesn’t match the injection moulded main rad shell. It must have seemed like a good idea at the time. I guess I’ll need some styrene packing underneath it to bring it up to the right level.

A reasonable "proper work" day was had, so I treated myself to some Hurricane time. I managed to hack the wings from the sprue tree. Many feed gates, much sanding required. I trimmed the gates back roughly, and spent a while sanding the mating surfaces of the wing parts to get the best overall fit. I will fill, sand and tidy the joins later on. Before the wings go together, the small matter of installing the exquisite resin main gear bay. I had sanded the pour block back as much as I thought was needed, only to find it needed a whole lot more before the upper wings would fit. The moulding is also slightly smaller than the openings in the lower wing. Best fit, I guess. Hopefully the gaps won't show. I'm still a bit mystified as to how the landing gear is fitted, and you can guarantee the instructions are of little help here. I think it's fair to say that if you hanker for a 1/72nd scale Hurricane, don't buy one of these kits. There are much better ones out there. Glueing technique with this kit is along the lines of getting the parts aligned as best you can and clamped together, then running liquid cement along the joins. The plastic in this kit is quite hard, but doesn't sand nicely, often leaving ragged bits that need carefully scraping away. I can see daylight… This was how much more material had to be sanded from the gear bay moulding to let the wing tops fit. It came perilously close to breaking through. I dolloped CA on the thing to try and reinforce the wafer thin parts. Once I'd persuaded the fuselage halves to meet around the interior bits, clamps and liquid cement along the seams did the trick. The joins are aligned quite well, but still need a lot of tidying. The fine engraved detail is at risk in such areas, so I will need some careful rescribing to restore anything that gets lost. The exhaust slots are open to the inside of the nose, so I backed them with some thin sheet styrene before closing up. The joint underneath looks terrible, but it has actually cleaned up quite well. Don't forget there's a ventral spine and tail wheel to go on, which will hide anything below the tail. Now to see if the wing assembly will fit the fuselage. Hmm, well, I can see some work is required. Material had to be removed from the inside of the upper and lower wings, the fuselage wing roots, and various other places. Fit, peer at it, file, scrape, sand, trim, fit and repeat until, after about half an hour, a reasonable dry fit was achieved for the front part. I wanted this to be as good as possible so I didn't need too much filler round here that would lose moulded detailing. The rear now fits quite well. There will be filler. Up top, it looks like a huge step, but you'll have to trust me when I say that once clamped and glued the fit will be much better. There will be filler. The front looks nasty here, but again clamp and glue will do the trick. As I say, if you want a decent Hurricane, I wouldn't recommend starting from here! If you enjoy a modelling challenge, though, then you could do worse.

I’ve realised this kit was designed to cover several versions of the Hurricane. That would explain why some parts are provided In resin, like the front of the belly radiator and the carb intake. In usual short run fashion, there are no locating pegs. There is also a complete lack of any location indicators for the interior parts. So, best guess was employed. Inevitably, the port sidewall interfered with the seat floor, and the instrument panel needed surgery to actually fit at all. I also found the control column would be behind the IP, until I tweaked it so it wasn’t. Anyway, once the fuselage halves are glued together you’ll barely see the top of the seat, so I could have left all the rest out.

I’ve been tempted. A couple of years back, when we were allowed to travel to distant lands, Best Beloved and I visited Norfolk. On the itinerary was Hannants, of course, and the Radar Museum. Apart from excellent cake in the museum's cafe, they had a small selection of models available in the gift shop. I felt it churlish not to buy something! I came away with this. Scalemates tells me it was first boxed in this guise around 2008, having been taken over by AZ Model from Sword. It’s a MkI, with the fabric wings. Now, already having the Airfix ragwing in my cabinet, I didn’t really need another. The markings in the box were interesting, but even so the kit was surplus to my requirements. Anyway, it sat on the shelf, biding its time. In the box is the typical fare from this kit maker. The mouldings are generally tidy, but showing flash along seam edges. You will note a variety of propellers on the sprue, including a twin-blade job. This is why the kit hasn’t been relegated to be sold on. There’s also a separate ventral spine, should the variant being modelled not have that feature. Several details, like main wheel bay and cockpit details, are finely cast in resin. Rather chunky pour blocks need quite a bit of careful cutting and sanding. Although the kit has a moulded cockpit transparency, I felt it a bit thick and not very clear. I found a Falcon vac-form replacement in the Bits Box, which will hopefully look a bit more like the early canopy and windscreen.. I hope it fits! The instructions are suitably vague about certain details. The kit transfers cover three Battle of Britain period Hurricanes. I had a notion, though, to build a Belgian one. As I began casting around for suitable transfers, a fellow BMer, Chris @dogsbody kindly donated a spare set of Airfix transfers. H22 it is then! I checked the Belgian Wings site for details, which confirmed the Hurricanes in their service have the ventral fin. The radio mast is an early type, so some brass rod will work there. If you look up H22 on the BW site, it’s a splendid frontal shot, which really shows the characteristic shape of the nose cowling on the early Hurricanes. I hope I may be able to replicate this with relative ease. I’ve made a start by separating the resin parts from their mould blocks, and getting some aluminium paint on them. Like my previous Belgian aircraft, I plan to brush paint. I have actually managed to restart my paying work, so this project will be slightly protracted - and I rather think there may be some personal issues looming that might take me away from the bench. We’ll see.

Well done! I’m sure it’ll be fine.

Had my first tea of the day, so I’m okay. @Wez not to worry. It gave me a bit of a chuckle. I’m still doing the Advanced Muppetry course.

I think the problem with broaches is they’re meant to do one job - make a hole bigger in diameter. The edges are the bits that do the cutting by rotating the broach. They're not really meant to widen slots, though they can do it with care and in soft material like plastics. To use a broach, drill a hole in the usual manner, then insert an appropriately sized broach in the hole and twist it while gently pushing it into the hole. It will make the hole bigger in diameter. It’s ideal for making a hole just a bit bigger than the bit itself manages. I use broaches to ease out drilled holes in brass so it’s easier to fit hard drawn wire rod into the 'oles. Wire rod is frequently slightly larger than the diameter quoted on the packet.

An excellent build. I enjoyed following the WIP thread, and made notes for my own Sparrow build when I finally get round to it. I always love your airfield shots, but the bombing-up cameo is particularly sublime. Well done indeed.

Thanks for the kind comments everyone!

Thanks Ian. I said in the WIP it's not my best work, but considering where it started it's not turned out too badly. Lessons learned, and perhaps I can do the Bomber Command version with a bit more skill. Between us, I think we should have propitiated the relevant Styrene Deities sufficiently to grace us with a state of the art kit of the Battle now.

Ha! I know what you mean. I just can't leave things alone!

The RFI post is here: There will be a short hiatus as I try to get on with paying work. Best Beloved has been nagging me about it for a while, so I guess I should at least try. That AZ Model Hurricane MkI is tempting me, though...

Fairey Battle MkI T70, 5/III/3Aé, Belgische Luchtmacht/Force aérienne belge, stationed at Evere, Belgium. Shot down on 11 May 1940 at Vlijtingen while attacking Vroenhoven bridge. Rather than give a history of the type's genesis and service record here, the Wikipedia entry on the Fairey Battle is pretty comprehensive, and has some good archive photos. The Airfix kit for the Fairey Battle light bomber appeared in 1968, and it was soon noted by many to be horribly inaccurate on several counts. The story goes Airfix asked for drawings, and were sent copies of what were probably early proposals for the design and not those used for production machines. Nose, tail, wings, all were way off in many directions. Anyway, until MPM produced a kit, now sadly out of production and like the proverbial rocking horse poop, the Airfix kit was the only show in town. If you want to know how much effort might be needed to make a decent Fairey Battle from the kit, you can do worse than pop over to this thread: If you want to know how to make it nearly right, but in an advanced bodgery kind of way, check out my Work In Progress thread below. My original intention was to build the kit warts and all from the box, but you know how it goes. A tweak here, a change there, and before you know it you're doing a full-blown conversion! A summary of the work I did would be as follows: Extend the nose by 2.5mm Reshape the nose to better suit the real aircraft Adjust the propellor to a smaller radius and add some details Add an extended radiator donated from a Fairey Fulmar kit Add some cockpit details, with donations from the Fulmar here and there Rework the tail completely Scribe and sand the wings, but otherwise accept they're the wrong shape So much for out of the box! The finished model looks more like a Battle now than when I started, so that's something. The model was brush painted using Humbrol and Revell acrylics. The original 1970s boxing transfers for T70 worked without a hitch. WIP thread starts here:

Done. RFI later. Belgian Battles, apparently, were finished in a semi-gloss finish which allegedly gave slightly better performance. I wasn’t sure about my finish, but it’s growing on me. Not my best work, but an interesting exercise in corrective surgery nonetheless. There’s a few techniques I’ve learned that will be useful in other projects, not least the RAF version still to do.