jackroadkill

I've just accidentally bought an old-school Airfix Tornado GR1/1a, so that could work for me in one of three GB's - NMCZ, Bomber and Shark Mouths. Of course, if there was a "What the bloody hell was I playing at?" GB it would work nicely for that, too.

I use Colourcoats enamels mainly (but happened to have the right colours only in Humbrols) and have found their naptha-based thinners to be excellent, both for their own paints and Humbrol's.

RFI is here:

Thanks chaps! I've another in the stash and am looking forward to coming up with an interesting scheme for it.

Can you come up with some sort of countback system?

This has been a most enjoyable build of a surprisingly attractive little aircraft. It took me just over a month to complete, during which time it overlapped four other builds. I built her completely OOB, apart from the pitot head (for which I used some steel wire after I broke the kit's own one off during construction) and the decals. Originally I baulked at using the kit's decals which looked like nothing but trouble, so I bought some an Xtradecal sheet which shows various schemes. This decision came back to haunt me, as they were very thick, which made getting them to conform hard work, and at the same time very brittle. In face, several of them refused to adhere and broke up during the decalling process, so I ended up having to adapt some of the kit decals to fit - you'll see that the day-glo is in two shades, unfortunately. I used Humbrol enamels and they did the job surprisingly well, I'm pleased to report. WZ584 was apparently built in 1953, and is depicted as she was when part of the Central Air Traffic Control School at RAF Shawbury in 1970. Apparently she still exists, privately owned and broken down in storage at Binbrook, or at the owner's address near Grimsby, or sold to someone in Canada, depending on which source you choose to believe. She is registered now as G-BZRC. She got around a bit, so to speak, during her RAF days, and did many jobs in many training roles before being sold off at the very end of 1970. Anyway, here she is: Any comments or criticisms welcome. Thanks, JRK

Right, she's finished. Perhaps not my most technically proficient build but, despite the decal issues one I quite like nonetheless. She's a pretty little airframe and I think she looks pretty good in her day-glo livery. Thanks to everyone who has looked at the thread, offered advice etc, and in the case of @Skymonster, pointed out small but significant errors! Cheers, JRK

This just made its way to my door, for the princely sum of £17. Now all I need is someone to make a ragwing conversion for it...

I wish I'd thought of that, Mark! Hi, I'm Jackroadkill and my foot is properly wedged in my mouth...!

Yes, I'm disproportionately peeved by it.

I've had some serious issues with the decals on this; the Xtradecals have proved both thick and delicate; it trying to get them to adhere properly and conform I have torn or crumpled several beyond repair, so I've adapted and used the kit decals to fit. The nose stripes and boob stripes are Airfix's ones, cut up to fit. The only problem with this is that the Xtradecals shade of orange is slightly more washed-out than Airfix's shade, so unfortunately there is a discrepancy here. I can live with it but it's annoying - AM decals that aren't as good as the ones they're replacing sticks in my craw a bit. Anyway, moaning aside, she's come on well. I've got the panel line wash on this evening and hopefully won't trash the decals when I take the excess off later. Thanks, JRK

Having built up and painted the rear end of the engine, which you can see through the wheel wells, I had some thinking to do: As you can see in the above pictures the engine looks fine - but the yawning emptiness of the fuselage doesn't. I decided that although it would mean the engine being lost to sight and not being correct in the rivet-counting sense that I would do this: There are supposed to be tie rods, hydraulic rams, pipes etc etc in there but I couldn't really find much in the way of references, so I went with visuals over historical accuracy. As you can see I've also added filler where needed to limit the wow factor of the wing joints. Thanks, JRK

I've managed to get on a bit with the build, and the majority of the airframe is built. The resin cowling is on, and I've got the prop built (and it's much nicer than the kit prop, too. I mean, it's for the right aircraft for a start). I painted both rear cockpit decks - there's a choice of plastic or PE - and went with the PE one, even though there was absolutely no discernable difference between them. There are fit issues around the wing roots: Hopefully I'll get onto the painting shortly. Cheers, JRK

I used nine of my ten available votes but there's no way on God's green Earth that I'll have time to enter nine GB's! I managed four this year and each one overlapped at least one of the other three, which made for a bit of a production line and maybe I didn't enjoy the builds as much as I would have otherwise, so this time around I shall pace myself a bit better and maybe be a bit more discerning about those I actually enter. Or, more likely, I'll just jump in with my size 12s and put myself in the same position again!

Ah well, thanks for trying, VP.

Yes, you might have to have a word with yourself about that!

I've voted - I just hope I can stand the wait, unlike last year when I made far too much emotional investment in the Bunfight and stressed over it something chronic. Still, only two weeks to wait until the die is cast. I've made myself a promise, too. With one exception I am only going to use kits out of my stash - I won't be buying any new ones for the GB's. Honest. No, really.

Wow, thanks chaps - fine praise indeed. Has anyone seen the deliberate errors yet?

Thanks very much, both of you.

Brilliant - thanks very much. Yours looks really smart. I'll have to pull my finger out to compete with it. Thanks Mick, me too.

Have you got any pictures of it that I could see, please?

With the completion of Jupiter's red spot (ie a seemingly never-ending Tempest) and the Vampire build rapidly approaching the end, it was time to raid the stash and choose my next build. I had a few considerations which I bore in mind when making this choice: As much as I've enjoyed my recent Beaufighter (1/48) and Beaufort (1/72) builds, I was keen not to embark on another twin-engined kit. I wanted to build a Luftwaffe kit as although this is my main area of interest I haven't built one since the Bf109 GB back in the summer (and there's no danger of having to include invasion stripes!). A simple, quick build, by my standards, anyway, was definitely on the cards. Something a bit out of the ordinary, with few available references (and therefore plenty of leeway) seemed like a good idea. With the above criteria in mind I went up into the attic and it wasn't long before this presented itself: First impressions are that it'll be a simple build and that the plastic is very soft indeed, possibly softer than the chewing gum my ICM Spitfire was made from. When I opened the box I found that I'd already bought some Montex masks and a Quickboost propeller and cowling, so I'll use them along with the laughably basic HB PE set. The Reich defence bands come as decals but if I'm feeling brave I might airbrush them. There is debate as to whether this version of the TA152 ever saw service, and references are not very prevalent. With that in mind I will consider it largely a "what if?" build and go with the 76/81/82 colour scheme on the box. One advantage of this state of affairs is that it'll be hard to get the scheme wrong.... The plan is to squirt a load of RLM 02 over this lot first and then build the cockpit: Following that I'll get the airframe together reasonably quickly. I'm not anticipating doing much in the way of alteration to the kit; I suppose I might do something with the control surfaces if the fancy takes me. Thanks, JRK

Oh man, that's just superb. What a job!

Thanks chaps - much appreciated.

That's an excellent philosophy to adopt; I must infuse my next build with as few monkeys as I can get away with (which, thinking about it won't be hard as it's practically a "what if?" build anyway). I think this one will turn out very well.