Paul Thompson

Some of my oldest EZline has now perished. So has one reel of old Aeroclub thread, which was thicker and whiter than the usual one (which I still have and is okay). Recently finished re-rigging an Aeroclub FE2b (sorry, ot rf the original post) that had been done with the whiter stuff, don't want to do that again. Normally these days I use a combination of modern elastic rigging coloured dark silver with a sharpie, invisible thread/fishing line coloured the same way, Albion Alloys 0.1 or 0.2 mm nickel wire, stretched sprue, rolled copper wire (very old, so weathered to a steel grey) and if I absolutely have to some Uschi stuff. I suppose it might have been quicker to say 'everything'. For RAFwires I tried the RB flat PE that was available a few years ago, but couldn't stop it sagging or bowing with small movements of the wings, but that was 1/48th and 1/32nd. Recently I tried some of the new bespoke sets by SBS model, one for an SE5a in 1/72nd, the other for the 1/48th Roden Gladiator, and they worked very well, but need substantial dulling down to look the part. Paul.

4598/18 was OAW built, and according to the Windsock Datafile Anthology (no.1) was (probably) photographed in September. The serial is from the mid production range, although from the louvre pattern. it looks like a late production aircraft. Problematic, then, unless the panels were retrofitted. The radiator filler cap appears to be central, which is mid production, the late one being on the port side. Quite complicated variations, covered in the various Eduard kits. The datafile has a page illustrating cowling panels and radiators, with serial/production ranges. Holler if you'd like a scan. Hannants have two boxings of OAW Fokkers in both 1/72nd and 1/48th, but they don't have decals for Mai so you'd have to sort it yourself (although even if they did, you'd probably have to paint the striped yourself. Since the serial isn't visible, at least to me, in the photograph, the easiest route is to assume it belongs to an earlier aircraft he had, and just build it with the late production features. IIRC all the relevant bits should be in any of the OAW boxings. Finally, although I've built several of the Roden 1/48th kits I can't recall if they do a late OAW. The early and mid are separate boxings. Good kits, but idiosyncratic. The 1/72nd offerings aren't so goo,with poor lower winf and axle wing fit - Eduard is better in this case. Paul.

Been there, done that - first time was a dome for a little balsa UFO from that new Gerry Anderson series. Paul.

It's still a good idea to know the minimum thickness you can use to produce a workable moulding. Paul.

Each of those holes sits above one of the extra fuel tanks on the Alcock and Brown machine, so I think they're to access the filler caps. The photo I'm looking at is one from the Science Museum, port side, with the side fabric stripped away. Can't tell if there are holes the other side as well, but if not then I think I'm probably right. Presence on the kit doesn't guarantee presence in reality, but now I'm looking for it I can't find a clear photo of the starboard side of the real thing to check. Paul.

Tell me about it. My wife is a linguist, mostly historical and english. But she's Dutch, and her perspective can sometimes dislodge me from my orbit.. Probably speaks my language better than I do, but occasionally something slips through due to being unconscious for a native speaker and hard to codify. Doesn't help that my first language is Silly. Sometimes lapsing into High Silly (I should get out more often). Paul.

What was wrong with the old window men? Paul.

......and now you are truly at one with the plastic. This is the way. Paul.

2nd non WW1 post in the WW1 area in two days. Maybe the titles should be larger.................... (Not really bothered, I know it can be easy to mispost now and then, but you reduce the chance of getting an informative answer). Paul.

Works fine on my Windows PC Graham. The Caudron is a G.III by the way. Paul.

At $40 - $50, perhaps my own expectations would have been too high, but sadly, you were gouged. The UK is not famous for having cheap Japanese sourced kits yet even Hannants, not the cheapest UJK vendor, has these for £25-27. And remember, in the modelling world we usually suffer an exchange rate of one Dollar or Euro to the pound. Paul.

On the positive side, you don't often see the Alcock and Brown version done, even though that was the intention of the original kit. May I suggest though, the thing that would make the greatest improvement to the appearance is to sand off the flying surface ribs and replace them with transfer strips. Given the condition of your hands of course this may be a non-starter for you. Paul.

What about? Paul. I think.

Except for the actual writing down bit (too lazy), yes. Paul.

Good luck. I should perhaps point out that when I did mine it was before the kit started to become ridiculously priced on the second hand market, and I had several to hand, dirt cheap, so that messing up some of the bits was only a matter of some wasted time rather than a show stopper (which didn't dull the pain when I spilled half a bottle of MEK over a completed wing). Paul.

If biplanes in particular are new to you, then the Eduard kit will be a bit easier due to better quality moulding and more precise moulding technology. But! A Bristol Fighter is a fairly hard beast to start with due to two bay wings (8 interplane struts) and the lower wing also being held below the fuselage by 4 very short struts, with the undercarriage passing through it and notching into the leading edge. Both kits need the location holes drilling a bit deeper to make securing the struts a little easier, since they don't have the level of foolproofness found in a Wingnuts kit. They're not terrible once you're used to this sort of thing, but if not then you may want to practise with a cheaper, single bay scout type like a Sopwith Camel or an Albatros first. I suggest a really good look around the internet at online builds (including those of the other two brands I mentioned) so you know the subject as well as you can before commiting to building it. I'd also seek out the Wingnut Wings website and download the instruction manual for their F2b, which although the kit is completely different shows many relevant details of hard to see parts of the real thing, including quite faithfull colour callouts for the interior (which both Eduard and Roden are only approximate about). If you go ahead with whichever kit and then have doubts or get stuck, feel free to PM me and I'll try to help out. Paul.

I've built several of the Eduard, Roden, Blue Max and Aeroclub kits over the years. For wing rib tape representation, I think Blue Max was the best, but also probably the hardest kit to build, being the most limited run of those here. And if you were unlucky you might get a kit with the infamous wing ripple, the eradication of which required much restoration work. Aeroclub wings are nice but need the trailing edges thinning a lot. The Eduard is the crispest of the lot but over exagerrated IMO, especially the plank moulded around the rim which is just a return of the PC10 paint on the underside of the real things. The actual surface of the Roden kit is fine, and there are ribs there, but no tape, which looks odd. So you can either score a tape in at each location with two scalpel blades glued together or use decal strip before the paintwork, in which case about half the width of what Eduard do is fine. Ideally, the fine details can be taken from the Eduard kit and incorporated into the Roden one, but it'll hurt the wallet. The Eduard kit is the easiest to build, but only offers one engine configuration, whereas Roden offer boxings with several different engine/cowling permutations. Personally I prefer the Roden kits with some simple detail scratch building additions, but the Eduard kit also looks okay, and as I said is much easier (but don't use the PE harnesses provided. The kit hails from a period where Eduard supplied Sutton harnesses for most of their Allied kits, whereas most of the real aeroplanes would have had simple lap belts. The Eduard Scarff ring is rather nice though, much better than the Roden styrene attempt). Left to right, Eduard, Roden, Blue Max and Aeroclub. Paul

FWIW, Xtracolor Light Mediterranean blue is X047, and the Dark one is X048. Paul.

Very nice. I see what you mean by that guy though. Looks as though someone stomped on him. I've only used a few of the sitting characters and they don't look so much like caricatures. Paul.

Paul.

This is the old Pegasus SE5 recently re-released by Freightdog with ammended decals and new vacform canopy (2 of). Just one photo since the full construction review should be in the next Great War SIG newsletter. Recommended to anyone familiar with limited run kits who wants a model beginning with SE but doesn't need another SE5a. Paul.

That was the load that came with it originally. I loved that when it was new. Paul.

Those are the ones. I thought I'd seen them in similar boxes with different names on and the one I had was Hat Industries, but I've just had a look and I have the same one as you do. (A mind is a terrible thing to lose, etc). Some of them are very useful. I like the one described as 'pilot making a gesture to the enemy'. Paul.

If those are part of the Hat set, they're true 1/72nd so hard to fit due to fuselage thickness. Nice poses though. Paul.

The plans in 'Imperial Russian Air Service' (Flying Machines Press) show a simple 2 blader mounted on a very simple stalk with the generator itself being a puny affair that in 1/72nd would be good enough represented by thick paint on the end of the stalk. Perhaps fortunately, the only photos of Anasals in the book have this area in shadow, unsuprisingly. Paul.