Macsporran

I've been lucky to have many great cars and I'd love so many of them back. The memorable ones would be a Sierra XR4i with the big biplane spoiler and a fancy red paint job, A Golf GTi, an Opel Monza 3.0l that went like stink, a Honda Legend 3.2l, a few BMW 3-series, a 7-series and couple of 5-series. Any of which I'd have back in a shot. (These were all company cars and, with frequent promotions and job-changes, I got a Christmas present of a brand-new motor every so often!) The dog from this period was a bloody awful Land Rover Discovery that kept breaking down - once locking us all out at a beach in the South of France until it cooled down at about 2 in the morning (very fed-up kids!) Then the tax rules on company cars changed and it became more sensible to buy, so I usually went for an ex-demonstrator and liked a couple of big Volvos and another 5-series . Then came the mid-life crisis and the weekend sports cars - a terrific fun MX-5 Indiana and a very potent Audi TT (the 225bhp 1.8l, not the useless 3.0l). Finally, best of all a yellow Porsche Boxster S - most fun ever! (I just sold the Porsche last year and miss it like crazy!) The dog of this period was a new BMW Z4 (the one with the folding tin roof): I'd wanted one so much and finally got a real bargain on an ex demo car with only 3k miles, but what a disappointment. Very uncomfortable - Cramped and bumpy, terrible gearbox - always hunting for gears, the paddle shifts were slow, the roof jammed half open on the road. Terrible car, still I got back what I'd paid for it. Current car though is the best of the loth. A BMW 435Xi - 309bhp, 0-62 in 4.7secs, 4wd, fast comfortable, looks fantastic. I'd like a lot of the old ones back - but wouldn't change this one for anything. (BMW want me to trade it in for the new shape, but I hate that big stupid radiator. I'm retired now and do much less mileage, so I'll keep it for a while yet.)

The Air-Britain SE5 File is the bible on the type - it lists every SE5 and SE5a , SE5b etc built with a short potted history of each one. 1/48 plans and pages of colour plates but not much detail stuff. The RAF Museum "British Military Aircraft of the 1st WW" will give you exact dimensions for all the rigging wires and control cables. The Albatros Pubs SE5/SE5a Squadrons is also worth having. The Osprey "Duel" series SE5a vs Albatros D.V gives a good cockpit repro. Lots of other bits and pieces but if you join the ww1aircraft.com site, the forum there will yield fantastic amounts of photographic detail and expertise. HTH

Pop over to the forum at ww1aircraft.com and put your question there. Many experts such as Aviattic's Richard Andrews and the Fokker Guru, Achim Engels regularly post there and will likely know immediately. forum.ww1aircraftmodels.com HTH Sandy

I've been rigging WWI biplanes since the 70s, originally with stretched sprue, then invisible mono thread, through rolled wire and elastic thread and I would not recommend the last FWIW. My preferred choice is chameleon fishing line in 2, 3 or 4lb strengths. The 2lb would be fine for 1/72. I find elastic thread (and I've tried Uschi, WNW Ezee, Infinity etc etc) all has a flattened profile and never looks right when it twists. Elastic thread also has a limited life and some older models show the thread has deteriorated (especially if subject to sunshine) and frayed or broken. I use a .3mm drill in a cheap ebay USB minidrill, or a pin vice, to pierce through the wing etc. I run a fishing line through top wing and apply a spot of CA, Then run through lower wing hole and hang a clothes pg on the end to tension it and apply another drop of CA. with a very sharp razor blade I slice off the projecting bits and, with a little practice minimal clean-up is required (often under a roundel decal etc. A variation is to only half drill from under the upper wing. On larger scales you can half drill the holes and glue in a fusewire twisted loop for attachment points. In 1/32. some like to fold the wire back through a tiny brass collar (Albion Alloys) to simulate turnbuckles. A benefit of the fishing line. or mono thread, is that, before application, you can pull a length through a paint-soaked patch on filter paper to pre-colour. I use Revell Aqua Aluminium for this. Each to his own, and there are lots of methods used very successfully by expert modellers, but this is my tuppence worth FWIW.

I was about to suggest Winged Victory and Sagittarius Rising, but I see they've already been recommended. Good choices. However many of the autobiographies will give you a real pilot's seat feel for the kit, tactics, strategy and thinking. Try those by McCudden, Collishaw, Willie Fry, MvR, Buckler, etc. Also a great little anthology of personal memories called 'Tumult in the Clouds'. All these are eminently readable, gripping even - and will put you in the middle of things much more than all the technical photo/plan books. Sandy

Hey Allan, most of these are old Aurora or Merit repops (plus the excellent Lindberg Jenny and poor 1/43 Heller SPAD) and will fall together easily, if not terribly accurately, but... The Glencoe Albatri are the company's own efforts and are undoubtedly the worst 1/48 WWI kits ever made. Nothing fits- the nose is a joke and the wings are just flat panels underneath. When originally announced they were reviewed in Windsock and Ray thought augurs were good. But when the pressings arrived they were terrible. Such a let-down. The decal sheets are however superb. Just bin the kits and use the decals on an Eduard or Roden kit. Trust me, I tried to build one - wish I'd thrown it in the bin earlier. S

There is a sense of no-going-back when you start a WNW kit. I bought every release as it came out and built quite a few, but when the company imploded I must admit I stopped building them fearing I could never replace. Then the prices on ebay went silly and I had a good think: I'd bought the big Felixstowe, Gotha and AEG kits to fondle, muttering "precious" as I did so, but realised they were far too big to actually complete and display so - off they went to evilbay at silly prices! (I'd bought the Gotha G.IV at £92, post free, and sold it for just short of £600!!!) For a couple of years now I've been building 1/32 CSMs, Meng and Rodens but my NY Resolution was to admit I probably wouldn't live long enough to build the 40+ WNWs I still have, so there's a Fokker D.VII on the bench as I write. It is so good to get back to those incredible fit tolerances and crisp details. There I've said it - 46WNWs (including 2x Albatros Jasta 5 trilogies!) Confession is good for the soul! Probably need to add more security cameras now though.. S

Yes I built it a year or so back. Lovely kit with lots of internal detail. I couldn't bear hiding away all that good stuff so left off a forward side panel to show cartridge drum, cable etc. This also helps solve the issue of panel fit: with so many separate panels and covers attaching to the framework you do need to be super careful and continually test-fit everything. (similar to, say, a WNW Fokker D.VII's engine panels - the tolerances are much the same.) I don't have hosting software but if you are interested the build log is over on the ww1aircraft site https://forum.ww1aircraftmodels.com/index.php?topic=12570.0 Cheers

Howd'ya block this crap?

Au contraire, Roden did fairly thorough research on what the market wanted. They invited all the members of the specialist ww1aircraftmodels.com site (with 3000 dedicated WWI modellers) to compile a list of wanted 1/32 kits, then vote on their favourites. Obviously subjects already kitted by Wingnuts were excluded as no sane manufacturer would invest heavily when there might even be the remotest chance of the WNW moulds re=-appearing. The SPAD XIII, Sopwith Strutter and Avro 504K came out top of our poll. Roden committed to look at these subjects in depth and unsurprisingly chose to do the SPAD first as they already had some common bits tooled with their S.VII kits. Most of us asked for USAS SPADs, so better sales are likely with this release, although I certainly have bought one of the initial release. We understand the Avro 504K is now well into development and hopefully for release next year. Roden asked the target market what was wanted, then produced it. What more would you want them to learn?

I suppose all this elevator background musak is okay if your hobby is knitting but I go for the hard stuff when I've got a warplane on the bench! Last night it was Act III of Die Walkure, which opens with one of the most famous pieces ever - I love the smell of victory!

Just seen the instruction booklet. Jeezo! it IS a Wingnuts re-incarnation isn't it? Same layout, same paint guide, same team, same pics, same biogs! Wonder if this means that after an initial popular choice (Spitfire/SE5a) we can anticipate some oddball releases, like say a 1/32 Martin-Baker MB5, a 1/32 Blackburn Skua, culminating in a 1/32 Me321 Gigant glider with a boxing for the Me323 transport - which will sink the company and leave Hannants shelves groanng with unsold stock, alongside the WNW Gotha UWD white elephant? Maybe Border would pick up moulds for an unreleased 1/32 B-29 (or a V bomber!) and make another fortune from somebody else's work!

What's an STGB? Is it some variation of LGBT?

Beware the door-knockers - it is not only The Word they spread!

Enjoying your progress Cliff, but I'm waiting to see how you get on with the acetate windsceen. Way back in the 60s I remember building these sports models and the Cadet series saloons - the Rover 3.5 and Jaguar 2.4 etc - which all had the useless acetate sheet for the windows. I could never get it to form a curved shape or adhere to the frame. Of course the adhesives back then were pretty useless for the job, apart from Araldite but that always ended up a sticky mess. I'm hoping you'll solve a sixty-year-old problem and my best wishes for your success!

Just seen the final result, Mark - Excellent. Lovely model. Sandy

Many thanks for reply re cutter - and I see how quick and useful it is for replacing crappie decals or creating new ones. It's on the to-do list. Congratulations on adding the wraparound: (sorry for causing the associated repairs though.) Looks great - every bit an SE. Cheers Sandy

Nice progress, Dave, on a fine looking Schweinhund. Do you mind me asking what make and model of mask cutter you use, as I'm thinking of investing in one and need a bit of user feedback. Many thanks. Sandy PS if you haven't attached the top wing as yet, you might wish to add the distinctive 'wraparound' to the PC10 that was characteristic of SE's. Just an inch or two along LE and TE and tips of both wings and tailplane undersurfaces. Not a biggy but something we WWI types get wrapped up in our anoraks about! PPS I think the Roden box art is rather misleading as C1149 acquired its full red fuselage after the armistice when restrictions were relaxed and many squadrons hanging about in France or Italy waiting to be repatriated were allowed to keep busy painting all sorts of wild colours - like the fabulous chequered Camel D8239! 😀

This is a great site for general information but if you want specialized gen on a specific WWI aircraft pop over to the forum at the ww1aircraftmodels.com website and put Albatros D.II in the search engine. You'll get all the info you could possibly need. (But come back here afterwards!)

Here's a great opportunity to use old paint brushes! Cut an angled slice off end of brush handle (at about 20 degrees) to leave an oval section. Cut small pieces of sandpaper/emery paper/micromesh etc (maybe 8mm x 6mm). Glue to oval section of brush with PVA glue. - et voila! perfect sanding tool to get into those difficult to reach areas. (Dispose and repeat afresh as necessary) (pic shows a paintbrush/micromesh tool used to gently sand a wrecked decal) https://forum.ww1aircraftmodels.com/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=12860.0;attach=16341;image

Address to a Haggis Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face, Great chieftain o the puddin'-race! Aboon them a' ye tak your place, Painch, tripe, or thairm: Weel are ye wordy o' a grace As lang's my arm. The groaning trencher there ye fill, Your hurdies like a distant hill, Your pin wad help to mend a mill In time o need, While thro your pores the dews distil Like amber bead. Robert Burns Although the list of contents sounds vile (offal in a sheep's stomach), the taste is magnificent, accompanied by bashed neeps and tatties and washed down with copious glasses of malt whisky. If you've never tried a real Haggis Dinner you've missed one of life's great culinary triumphs. As to the wonderful sound of the bagpipes there's nothing as stirring as a pipe band swaggering past with snare drums clickety-clicking behind. Why else did the British Army march into battle behind them for two hundred years! Indoors they are often played with a chanter which is much quieter than the full set of pipes. I once sang with the Edinburgh Festival Chorus (200 trained voices), the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra (120 players) and 5 pipers in a recording in Glasgow. With the singers and orchestra giving it laldy at full blast fff, the 5 pipers opened up and drowned out everything!! Real Scxottish bagipes are very very loud!

You obviously overlooked my statement " Some of these models have also appeared in a mag but in much less detail" when you erroneously stated "Your second comment now seems to suggest it's actually articles published solely online! Not to worry. I'm glad you enjoy your printed magazines. I'm glad there is still a market for them. As I stated above, I earned a few bob publishing articles in Scale Models back in the 70s and 80s and it would be a shame to see them disappear entirely.

I suggest you go over to the ww1aircraftmodels.com forum and have a look at the "under construction" files. You will find build articles on specific models, many by master builders, that go into far more detail than anything I have ever seen in print. Some of these models have also appeared in a mag but in much less detail. These logs often evolve over many weeks or even months and interested parties can comment, question or advise the builder as the model progresses. This is just not possible in print. There are some estimable publications, (such as the Windsock WNW build files,) which do give huge amounts of detail - but even these don't allow the reader to fire in a question, in real time, as to how an effect has been achieved.

How does any hobby magazine survive in this online world? I used to subscribe to several modelling mags (and indeed contributed to a few,) but find the depth of info now available via expensive printed sources miniscule compared to what's online for free. In my modelling cabinets I've got Aurora Knights, Airfix birds and a sailing ship, 1/24 vintage and modern cars and 1/32 aircraft. Thus I'm fairly interested about all sorts of models. My real passion though is 1/32 WWI (reawakened by the Wingnuts decade) but the occasional article I find published on a Great War plane has often been pre-empted by the author publishing step-by-step build articles online. I like physically holding a magazine - much more satisfying than a tablet, on a train etc - but I can get vastly more info from various specialist WWI modelling sites (for free) than I'll ever get on paper. Plus I can zoom in to details, ask questions and electronically file pictures easily for future ref. I'm sorry to see these mags withering on the vine, but I'm afraid they're past their sell-by dates.

Superb video and I'm sure it had an impressive morale boosting effect on the population. Thanks for posting. However having read a lot of Solzhenitsyn etc I'm maybe a bit cynical about the sunny, happy air of the whole thing. When you see the same faces and dresses repeatedly you realise how stage managed it all is. Still, the lucky cast would have got a day away from their daily grind for the filming!