Thomas Bell

Many thanks. By unpleasant coincidence I kept getting vague photos taken while the a/c were sitting on the ramp. Naturally, the weapons bay was not the focus of these photos.

That makes more sense than black. Thanks much. TOM

Just remembered something about the B-57E. When I was researching my Osprey book on the B-57 in Vietnam, I was rather stunned to find that I could get almost no official documents on the super secret program that flew B-57E's under the call sign/code name "Patricia Lynn." What could these ostensible recce/ELINT-modified birds have done that bore top secret classification after fifty-plus years? While I spoke with dozens of air and ground crew in the B-57B/C, who were very eager to finally have their story told, I could not find a single Patricia Lynn crewman. One thing virtually every one of the B-57B pilots told me: The B-57E model was "the Cadillac" of the entire American Canberra series. High praise indeed for what was designed as a lowly target tug. Now, the Patricia Lynn birds were painted a sinister matt black, and in addition to a very large nose radome -- the B-57B was strictly no-frills, lacking both radar and air refueling capability -- the whole E-model jet was a virtual antenna farm. TOM

Steve; One thing I was able to gleen from photos is that the piston on the trapeze actuators was highly polished steel, as we see on landing gear struts. When these go out of use they quickly turn dull. The instructions with the kit call for black, but I haven't seen photographic wvudencec for it so far. Thanks for your quick help. TOM

John: Please forgive me for not replying immediately to your "yes" on that disk of photos. Please PM me with a mailing address. You'd last post jarred my memory on a lot of B-57/Canberra issues. For example, I wasn't aware until that NASA visit that the canopy on the WB-57F is the stock xanopy for the B and E models, and the thing weighs 800 lbs. I also wasn't aware at the time that the auxiliary turbojet engines had been removed. Though I now livev in NYC, Houston is my home town. I spent a lot of time at Ellington Field, where NASA Aircraft Ops is located. NASA is at one end of the field while an Air National Guard interceptor squadron was at the other end. While I couldn't beg a ride from NASA in those post-Challenger days, the Air Guard were quite generous in providing me rides in their F-4 Phantoms. (I believe my thumbnail ophito with the poo-poo-eating grin was shot after one of those flights.) I spent a lot of time watching NASA's oddball fleet come and go, including the bizarre Super Guppy and the GS II Shuttle simulator, along with their squadron of T-38s the astronauts still use for hacks..When I first saw the WB-57Fs, they had all four engines and were in natural metal finish. They still bore the USAF's rather disingenuous tail stripe in blue and yellow with the 'Weather" designation painted on it. But I blather on. Let me dig out that disk for you. TOM

Gentlemen, I've finally decided to attack the Squadron/Encore 1/48 scale version of the venerable Deuce that's been in my stash for a dozen years. Based on the 1990 Monogram molds, the Encore boxing includes a profusion of resin and colour PE parts, along with a fine decal sheet (which I am replacing with AM markings). What I can't find are painting instructions for the internal missile bay and trapeze-style launch rails. Even the USAF technical order, TO 1-1-4, itself is no help. I'm pretty sure the overall bay colour will be Interior Green (FS34151), nut it might also be that greenish yellow often seen on USAF interior surfaces during the Cold War. I'll probably go with the green. Where I'm stumped is in the colour of the rather conspicuous launch mechanisms, the "trapezes". I have plenty of photos, but none that clearly show the colour, only that it differs from the bay itself. Can any of you Cold War/Century Series fiends out there help a brutha out?

As always, I'm not sure I'm asking in the the right place. I've finally taken down my ancient HH-43 Kaman Husky/Eggbeated/Pedro (the latter it's call sign in Vietnam). The 1/32 kit has an astonishingly good outline given that it's more than 60 years old. It is, however, quite short of interior detail and I have no drawings for scratchbuilding. The fine Lone Star Models upgrade was OOP last I checked. Can anyone recommend any resin, PE or drawings for this kit extant today? Thanks from Brooklyn, gentlemen. TOM

Just for the belated record, I did wind up using epoxy, of which I had shed loads. It's a bit of a PITA, but it did the trick. Now I'm facing an AMS problem with my Jug build, one that dogs me perpetually. I have far too many aftermarket parts, many if which are duplicates by different manufacturers. I suppose as problems go, it could be be worse.

As usual, I'm late to the party, but I have a few thoughts: First, as I believe was noted, a brown stripe on a US conventionally armed, air launched missile indicates a live rocket motor, while a yellow stripe closer to the nose denotes a live warhead. Occasionally, as I witnessed on an F-15D in which I was a passenger at the William Tell weapons meet, you will see an AIM-9 Sidewinder with a brown stripe for the live motor and a blue stripe indicating an inert warhead. The reason for this is to preserve valuable drones (that year they were shooting at QF-106's, which broke my heart). To further protect the drones, heat generators are mounted on the wingtips. Still, a pilot will occasionally send the missile right up the drone's tailpipe. The color on the nose of live B-61 nuclear gravity bombs is, as close as I can determine, burnt umber. I have never been able to pin down the FS number. Modelers occasionally confuse the red protective cap on the 61 for the actual nose. TOM

The title is an understatement, and I feel obligated to begin with why this question is so ridiculous. You see, besides 35 years as a professional aviation writer, and though I am a Texan, I worked as a modeling writer and editor for three major British aircraft modeling magazines for almost 15 years. And my modest book publishing history -- extremely modest -- is with a British publisher located, not in a posh London building with the type of architecture the critics call "whimsical" and with a humorous nickname (think the one that resembles a pickle, et al), but is headquartered in an obscure address in some place called Botley, Oxford. However, I would wager that most, if not all, of the aviation modellers on this site own one or more of their titles though probably none of my obscure US Air Force subjects. But enough digression. So, anyway, having established my bona fides,, I should know pretty much everything about the glues and solvents we use for assembling plastic components, but when it comes to cyanoacrylates, I only know the bare basics, and often ruin models by my poor skill in using the thin stuff in particular. And this ruination being committed by a modeler of 60 years experience (I started at 8), and who still does occasional museum modeling. Now to the silly question. Right now, I'm working on Hasegawa's wonderful 1/32 P-47D-25 bubbletop. I've got tons of aftermarket parts for it in every medium. I'm just now at the step of gluing the cockpit to the fuselage half prior to closing the two halves (If I may digress a yet again, I test fitted the fuselage with the aftermarket cockpit dry fitted, expecting a decent but hardly perfect fit of the enormous P-47 airframe castings. I was gobsmacked to find that the fit was not near perfect, it is perfect. So perfect that it makes a satisfying snap when the halves are joined. I couldn't believe Hasegawa, who have finely detailed kits, traditionally tend to have fit problems with wing and fuselage joins in both the fuselage halves and wing- and stab-to-fuselage fits, especially in 1/32 kits, like the dreadful fit of their deceptively excellent 1/32 P-40. I couldn't believe a perfect Haasegawa fit so I ran my finger over the entire seam at least a half dozen times and examined it closely with a powerful magnifying lens. The perfect fit is confirmed and no filler or sanding will be required. I have encountered this maybe once in my life in a 1/32 kit. If you like the classic Jug or American WWII subjects in general (the RAF also flew a few Jugs, and aftermarket decals for RAF Thunderbolts, though hard to find, are out there. Should you choose to build an RAF P-47, and can't find one of the rare sheets for it, all you need are RAF roundels and fuselage codes from your spares box.) Okay, I've put off the embarrassing question long enough by describing my experience that should mean I know everything about the tools and chemicals we use in our hobby. Here it is: I can't close up my fuselage until I've installed my (quite excellent) resin cockpit casting. When I went to fetch my superglue for this operation I. found out I had run out of every thickness, and had not a drop in the flat. And the Walgreens near me that, oddly, sells a brand of the stuff popular with modelers, had just closed for the night. Being jmpatient and not wanting to wait until morning (it's half past midnight here now, though it was not yet 11 pm when I began this absurdly long and digressive post, which I pray is not paralyzingly boring,) So to the dumb question at last: Does toluene-based solvent glue have any effect on resin, which I understand is in fact similar to some type of plastic, though I doubt it's similar to polystyrene. (I just read the label on a bottle of Tamiya Extra Thin Cement and was surprised to see it's composed of acetone and a couple more nasty sounding chemicals, but not toluene, which is in old fashioned tube cement.) As much as I use aftermarket resin components, I know almost nothing about its composition, and have never made a resin casting despite knowing how to do it. So there it is, the shame of my ignorance revealed for all my respected UK peers to see and mock. I know you all think we Americans are stupid, and my only defense there is that a small -- very small -- percentage of us have IQs that almost approach room temperature. And, and as long as I've gone off-topic, let me just say that what really galls us Americans about you horsey Brits is that you finally discovered dentistry and even dental hygiene, so we can't even make fun of you for your hideous teeth any more. Hell, the average Brit today has teeth that rival the choppers of a Hollywood film actor. Anyway, could some of you help me, or possibly suggest a trick for mounting my resin cockpit using some arcane method that doesn't require super glue? And if you can, could you please refrain from heckling me. I can take it from my own countrymen, but mockery from Brits would devastate me. I come from that Southern class who are all Anglophiles and so I was reared to believe that everything British (okay, to be honest, only English) was superior to anything American. Evelyn Waugh, one of my more admired authors, found American Anglophiles insufferable. I hope you all don't feel the same. And please forgive this terribly prolix screed. I know it was all over the map, but that was to distract you from the silly question that was buried among the verbiage.

I am, as usual, late for the party. The legendary kit designer Paul Koster sent me his last set of decals plus the instruction sheet for his 1/48 vac-form conversion for the F-5B, to be used on the ancient Monogram P-38.kit. Koster has St. Ex's recce bird in three-colour camo (brown, light green with a light-blue belly. The sheet is aging, but is salvageable and if anyone wants it, I'm happy to pass it on. Tom

Dammit, I just took this kit off the shelf today, having looked forward to it since, well, 2014. But now, having run across your astonishing build from eight years ago, I'm afraid mine's going back into the stash. I just can't aspire to your level of artistry. TOM

Wow, just wow. I have dreams of getting to build an F-111B as you have. What a magnificent set. Tom

I'd like to get my hands on that kit just so I could use this Zotz decal sheet I have for a camo'd OP-2E. It also has markings for the lesser-known gunships, like the AC-119 and AC-47. TOM

I recall at the time the SR-71 was first shut down, it was revealed that Gen. McPeak had been rejected by the SR-71 program and this was his revenge.