GliderGuider

Hi all, Sorry about the lack of updates and replies- I've been away the past week and a bit. I did make some good progress before going, she's all painted now. I'm just about ready for the daunting task of fitting the canopy. I'll post some pics shortly when I have a chance.... Thanks Christer and Col! Yes, the engines are completely Airfix plastic. No resin or PE. And yes, they really are lovely (provided you sand them down before trying to fit the cowlings!). All the best, Matt

Here's my entry, another Airfix Dakota (this one represents Flt Lt David Lord VC's aircraft during Operation Market Garden). Here is the build log. All the best, Matt

Hi all, Progress has been slow this week. Working a full week after so many public holidays was a bit of a shock to the system! But I have now moved on to the engines. These are dead easy to assemble ... as long as you sand the completed engine down a little and do some test fitting before attempting to fit the three cowling parts. This was really easy and quick but if if I hadn't there would have been a nasty gap in the cowlings to deal with. @Greg Law, thanks ... I knew when starting this kit that the cockpit glass would be the main thing to watch out for. I was very careful when assembling the fuselage not to "pinch" the fuselage sides in at the front, which would have caused real problems assembling the canopy. That's all for now, hopefully I'll get some more done over the weekend! Matt

Thanks, and I totally agree. Yes, with much of it I've been making rapid progress with everything going together brilliantly, only to find there are certain times when I have to stop and really take care to get right.

Hi Jan, Wow! That looks seriously amazing. Matt

Hi Don, Wonderful job on that C-47. She looks great and I also like the nose art. Matt

Hi Paul, I'm loving this build. Your attention to detail and weathering is fabulous. I will be sure to visit this thread again often for inspiration. Matt

Great job so far Colin, she's really looking great! My father worked on Meteor NF11s when he did his National Service with 11 Squadron RAF so I'm following this build with interest. Unfortunately he was never one for photography otherwise I would have sent some pics for inspiration! All the best, Matt

Yes, me too! Especially after reading "The Last Torpedo Flyers" - I had no idea about the part the Beauforts played in the Channel Dash until reading this book. An early 1/48 Beaufighter would look nice alongside these too......

Hi everyone, As it's ANZAC day here in Australia (and a public holiday), I've managed to make lots of progress today! To start with I finished the cockpit, glued the fuselage together and added the bomb bay doors (not that the bomb bay as actually used in the night fighter). The fuselage went together fairly successfully, although there was a small gap under the nose which in turn caused the bomb bay doors to not quite fit perfectly. I've filled the gap and started to sand it all down. The rest barely needed sanding at all. I may need to make one of these as a bomber with bomb bay doors open next time, then the fit of the bomb bay won't matter so much! I've also assembled the undercarriage. It looks fiddly but Airfix have engineered the parts very cleverly. I had painted all the parts for these on the sprues, and I would say that assembling each side to the stage where they are ready to install in the wings took less than half an hour. I've dry-fitted these in the wings and they just drop in and sit there without any glue needed. I'll reserve my final judgement on the kit until I've assembled the canopy though, I'm dreading doing this! Enjoy the pictures! Matt

Thanks Alistair! I'm sure I'll also make some mistakes you can learn from...... Thanks! I'm finding it a superb kit, it seems to be just falling together now. I'm sure to build at least another Mk. I (and a Mk. IV if Airfix make one!).

Yes, definitely on my wish list (but not in my stash yet)! Funny you should mention that today, I spotted just this morning that Special Hobby have a new Meteor NF11 coming out maybe this year - my father did National Service with 11 Squadron RAF (as an engineer) and flew in these a few times so I must make at least one of these for starters!

Hi all, Looks like I will need to get an Eduard Tempest or two to escort the Blenheim if @Greg Law's Schwalben are around! I've started work on the instrument panel. The Eduard PE one looks convincing. In looking at Blenheim cockpit photos I came across this one on the Aircraft Restoration Company website, so the above nicely captures the essence of the Blenheim instrument panel to me. On the back however the Airfix one looks rather bare. Especially when I came across this photo from the Blenheim Society: So, I drilled some small holes in the back of the instrument panel and glued some lengths of flexible plastic (courtesy of my spares box) into these using CA. The paint job looks a little messy so I'll tidy it up before fitting it in the fuselage. That's it for now, hopefully I'll get some more done during the week. All the best, Matt

A couple more quick photos of today's progress. I've now assembled much of the pilot's side of the cockpit.

Hi all, I hope everyone is having a great Easter! Thanks @trickyrich and @Col. - I agree, it was hardly the most successful night fighter. I'll continue researching throughout the build and post any gems I find. I suppose it would help if the night fighter you're flying was actually fast enough to catch the enemy bombers! As pictures of the sprues are already available here I won't worry about uploading any, and I'll skip straight to the last few days' progress. I decided a few days before starting that the Airfix parts were pretty good and that I wouldn't worry about replacing any of the existing details (like cutting off and replacing the throttle quadrant with the Eduard one), after all I probably wouldn't do a great job of the Eduard throttle quadrant anyway. So naturally the first thing I did was to build the Eduard throttle quadrant!!! I'm glad I did. Those levers are just glued straight to the quadrant itself which looked scary at first (no bending the throttles into a U-shape and threading them through a couple of tiny gaps like with some kits). The quadrant does however have some small grooves that allowed me to position and hold the levers easily while the glue dried. And wow, I've just noticed in the photo below (as they are bigger in the picture than in real life), how good do those Eduard seatbelts look? I haven't weathered them or anything, this is how they actually came. I found that had to snip the top of these off to allow part A6 to fit properly on top of the seat though, so if you're building this kit with the Eduard seatbelts, you may choose to fit part A6 to the seat first, then trim the seatbelts, and finally glue the seatbelts on once trimmed. Hopefully this will be the first update of several across the Easter weekend so I expect to be back with more progress soon. As always I would welcome any comments or advice particularly if you've built this kit before. Matt

Thanks @Christer A and @Greg Law. I've always had a soft spot for the Blenheim too and there's plenty of interesting aircraft to choose from for my build. Plenty of well known night fighter pilots started off in Blenheim Mk Is - such as John Cunningham, Bob Braham and Mike Herrick. Osprey's "Defiant, Havoc and Blenheim Aces" has some useful photos and profiles of these and others. Or, there's the Fighter Interception Unit Blenheim (L6836) flown by Fg Off Ashfield that achieved the first first ever airborne radar intercepted kill. I'm not sure of the squadron markings on this one though and these seem difficult to track down, so unless anyone here knows anything more I'll probably do one of the others I mentioned! Matt

Hi everyone! For this group build I'll be building a 1/48 Bristol Blenheim Mk. I night fighter. Below are some shots of the kit and the extras I'll be using (Eduard "Zoom" photoetch set, seatbelts and paint mask, and AML camouflage mask). I've struggled with Airfix 1/72 Blenheims in the past so I'm curious to see how the 1/48 version goes together. I have followed other builds such as this one and I'm planning to use some of the tips mentioned. You'll see from the third photo below that I've already started dry fitting to see how well the main parts fit. From what I can tell it looks to be a great kit ... I hope! All the best, Matt

Hi everyone, Finally I did another light panel line wash to the upper surfaces and added a subtle touch of aluminium around the nacelles to simulate worn paint. And with this I think I'll call my build finished. It's been fun, with a few challenging moments when trying to get the fit just about right, but not too difficult. As a tribute to a VC winner I'm very happy with the way it turned out. It's been great fun taking part in this group build, so thanks again for your comments, advice and historical knowledge, and many thanks Patrice for hosting. Seeing other builds on this forum is inspiring me to try new things and improve my skills. I'll add some photos with a better background to the group build gallery in due course. All the best, Matt

Next, I had a go at adding the antenna wire. I'm using E Z Line for this. It does look a little thick but I'm happy with it considering it's this first time I've done this - I may try the thin E Z Line or one of the alternatives I've just discovered on another post next time!

Hi everyone, After a couple of weeks with little time to finish this off, I've managed a really good go at the Dakota the last few days. I'll start off showing the weathering on the underside, as a great comparison to the shot just above. For this I used some heavily thinned black as a wash into the panel lines, and added some oil streaks with Humbrol Gloss Oil Stain wash. This was all then streaked in the direction of the airflow with a cloth. It's the first time I've really tried this and I'm really happy with how it turned out with not much effort. You may also notice I've added the various doors and antennas. More to come very shortly! Matt

Time for a very quick update. The engines are in place (although I'll need to do a bit of cleaning up on the cowlings), she's now painted and invasion striped underneath, and I've started applying the decals with assistance from Decalfix. These Xtradecal decals sure are thin and delicate (much more so than I'm used to), so I've had to go a lot slower and more carefully than anticipated. Not to mention I accidentally lifted up four perfectly applied digits of the serial when applying the fifth and final one - I figured it was a sign I should walk away! Never mind, I have heaps more spares so will start again. I've uploaded a couple of pics as a sneak peek but unfortunately the rest of the decals will have to wait as I'm away for the next week. All the best, Matt

I'd love to join in too if I may! I also have a 1/48 Blenheim in The Stash, and am planning to do this as an early night fighter. Either L6836 of the Fighter Interception Unit, which achieved the first airborne radar intercepted kill in history (which may prove difficult as the squadron code seems difficult to track down), or more likely the Blenheim of 25 Sqn in which Pilot Officer Michael Herrick scored three night victories in September 1940. I'm looking forward to getting started on this kit as soon as I've finished my current project! Matt

@tonyot, I think the Allies suffered from thinking the Germans were broken a couple of months later at the Battle of the Bulge as well. It's an interesting "what if" scenario - what if half an additional airlanding battalion (in place of General Browning's HQ), an extra drop of troops (e.g. General Sosabowski's Polish brigade) and the tanks you mentioned earlier made it to Arnhem early in the operation? Anyway, thanks for the historical background, and I'll read up more on Market Garden soon as I've always been interested but never really researched it in great detail! Anyway, I have some more progress to report, and she looks a lot more like an RAF Dakota than last time! The interior designer in me decided that Airfix Grey didn't look quite right, so I've applied some Neutral Grey (Humbrol 128) and Olive Drab (Humbrol 155). I've also added the windows and landing gear. This all went together very nicely (and quite quickly in the end). The light's fading fast here but I've managed a couple of quick photos. Matt

That's exactly what I'd do @Dansk, and I'm quite enjoying the Airfix kit at the moment. It's not in the Tamiya class in terms of fit but if I can do a decent job I'm sure anyone can!!! Matt

@tonyot, fascinating stuff! I understand Maj. Gen. Brereton's idea behind daylight drops was to avoid troops becoming dispersed all over Holland, similar to the dispersion experienced on the D-Day drops, which I guess is fair enough up to a point. That's interesting about the additional drops being refused though in spite of the RAF volunteering though. I gather Brereton also refused the trial of double tows (one Dakota towing two gliders). I wonder if they could have used FIDO to allow more drops? Bomber Command seemed to manage taking off and landing in fog, and at night too! Matt