John R

Nice work. As the builder of several Modelsvit kits I can appreciate the 'challenges' that you faced. John

New picture added and one revised

In some ways I feel guilty about putting people off trying to build it but I thought it wise to highlight the problems so people were warned what to expect before buying one or starting one they had. If you do start yours think very carefully about what the end result should look like when assembling the intakes. There may be a better way of getting the outer wing section to match that of the centre by using a spacer between the leading edges of the outer wing halves. I couldn't have done this because I had already glued them together when I found the problem. John

Thanks Chris. I feel an idiot for realising. It's my age you know... John

An interesting project brought to a fine conclusion. Well done. Would you care to enlighten us as to how you got the background for the first picture? John

Thank you. Judging by the enthusiasm by which this was received when it appeared in the Rumourmonger a lot of people wanted one. I wonder how many will get finished. It was a close run thing with mine John

Best of British to you! Seriously drop me a PM if you need help. The difference between the centre and outer wings is the worst bit. It might be possible to get away with a load of milliput. You don't have to worry about losing the panel lines as the real wings were extra smooth. They did not use roundels in case they ruined the smoothness John

With many of my other experimentals so you can see its size This was the future – once upon a time. The AW 52 was originally conceived as a bomber during WW2 but afterwards this was changed to a 6 engined airliner. It was preceded by a glider but as this had its limitations a twin engined version was designed to investigate the higher speed area of the flight envelope. Two prototypes were built. The first had Nene engines and the second had Derwents. The first, TS363, first flew in November 1947 but was lost in a crash after suffering uncontrollable pitch oscillations. Apart from investigating the flying qualities of a tailless aeroplane it was also used to investigate the possibility of maintaining laminar flow over much of the wing surface. To try to achieve this a special aerofoil was used and boundary layer air was sucked into a slot ahead of the elevons but without success. As for the model as soon as I learned of its existence I had to have one. As they say, be careful what you wish for! It has its good points. It’s a kit that I never expected to see and it makes up into fairly accurate model. The engine nacelles and main u/c should be located further outboard and the aerofoil section bears no resemblance to that of the a/c. The downside is that it is a nightmare to build. It is overly complicated with much internal detail that cannot be seen and almost nothing fits. I cannot believe that anyone tried to assemble one before it was released or if they did it was with the cynical attitude that idiots like me snatch at something that they knew would be unlikely to come along again. Some specific points… Starting with the cockpit interior one is directed to fit a component that does not exist. The hole in the floor for the control column is in the wrong place. The seat is too low. It is modelled without the support structure underneath. I didn’t know about this structure until later on after I had solved the problem by glueing it to the upper fuselage section instead of the cockpit floor. If glued to the floor the pilot's eyeline would be about level with the edge of the cockpit. There is a lot of PE for the cockpit instruments and also some 3D decals which appear to do the same job and the instructions are not much help. It's all a waste of time anyway as none of it can be seen. Joining the wheel halves together it appears that one half should have spigots that fit in to holes in the other half. It doesn’t. Both halves have holes. There are two quite detailed engine models to be assembled but only enough combustion chambers for one. It doesn’t really matter as only the front section is visible if you look down the intake. If you can think of a way to fit the engine nozzles after painting the model it would make life easier Fitting the pieces that make up the internal portion of the intake involved much cutting, Milliput and bad language. There was a CAD drawing of this in the Rumourmonger section showing the parts fitting neatly together so how it got so wrong in real life is beyond me. The cockpit, engines and wheel bays fit into the lower half of the centre section and the upper section is then fitted…except it doesn’t. Several things prevented this and so I took my sanding block and ground away at the internals until it did fit. The wheel bays were the worst culprit and I was pleasantly surprised to find that I had not gone through to their internals. Once that is done you have to fit the outer sections to the centre section and become aware of two problems. The first is relatively trivial in that the wing section bears little resemblance to that designed by the RAE but the second is close to a showstopper. The wing sections of the centre and outer wing do not match, and not by a small amount either. The outer section is much thinner. (At this point it was all too much and the project was consigned to the shelf of doom for several months). I got around this by cutting away the rib at the inner end of the outer wing until just the wing surface was left. I then replaced the bits I had cut away with several ‘pillars’ cut from thick sheet which forced the upper and lower surfaces apart until a reasonable match was obtained with the centre section. The wing surfaces have some nicely engraved panel lines which have to be filled as the real aircraft had very smooth surfaces to try to achieve laminar flow. There should be slots ahead of the elevons but there are none. I thought that cutting these would be beyond me and settled for decals instead. There are a couple of problems with the canopy. This is offset to one side so it means that one side of the cockpit is longer than the other but for the model a ‘normal’ one is provided which means some careful scraping of cockpit and fuselage followed by filler to get it to sit without it leaning. I do not think that the rear of the canopy is correct. One last problem presented itself. The u/c legs have spigots to fit into mounting holes but there are no holes for them to go into. I was most surprised and relieved that it required no adjustments to sit level after fitting the landing gear - about the only thing that went right. I discovered this website that has a lot of pictures of the aircraft and a copy of the article about it which appeared in 'Flight' in December 1946 https://ww2aircraft.net/forum/threads/armstrong-whitworth-aw52.49979/ Thank you to Dave Swindell and David Womby for providing information about the seat. It is here for anyone who needs to see it https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235101803-armstrong-whitworth-aw-52-cockpit/ Finally - despite all its issues it does make up into a nice model which looks 'right'. The finish is Halfords 'Appliance White'. It needs as much weight as you can pack into the nose. All I have to do now is find somewhere to put it. It is rather large. (edit: picture added to show how much space in takes up in my display cabinet) Time for a lie down in a darkened room Edit: Jan 2023 I have seen another one built. The builder said that he did not bother with most of the internals as they were completely hidden once assembled. He also fitted the outer wing panels to the centre section before joining them as I did. This left a gaping hole along the leading edge which was then filled with Milliput. John

The decals show provision for TG306, the one in which Geoffrey De Havilland lost his life preparing for an attempt on the World Speed Record John

I hope to heaven that they have done a better job than they did with the AW 52. Mind you, that would not be difficult. John

Nice work. I built the Hasegawa 1/72 version many years ago and spent a lot of time trying to find which 'blue' was used. Eventually I was told that it was from the Ford car plant 'down the road' and nobody knew which it was so I ended up mixing something to match the blue of the decals John

Dave & Dave - Thank you. Is this what you meant? Presumably the top of the drogue chute box should have a white blob on top to represent the 'chute The picture of the seat was most helpful as it explains why the seat is too low on the MicroMir AW 52. They did not model the supports below the seat so the pilot's eyeline would have been below the side of the cockpit. John

Thank you. It answers part of the question. The parachute was behind the pilot but it leaves open the question about the object behind the headrest. Recording equipment, a camera to record airflow or something to do with the seat rails? I don't think that it was the pilot's overnight bag. John

In Barrie Hygates 'Experimental Jet Aircraft' there is this large black object behind where I would expect the pilot's head to be. In photos it does not appear to be black. It might be a buff colour. Is it all part of the ejector seat? The 'not black' colour makes me wonder if the front part is the cushion being the pilot's head and the rear part is the cover of the pilot's parachute. The rear part does not appear to be shown in the cutaway of the cockpit. Can anyone please provide details or enlighten me further? John

Clearly the work of a complete nutter! Brilliant effort and I am glad that there are people like you about. The only adverse comment is that seeing it mounted with those prongs up its jetpipe gives me an uncomfortable feeling in my backside. John

It didn't carry any ordinance. it carried ordnance John ( the Pedants' Association)

Anybody who takes up this hobby has to be slightly nutty but you must be round the bend. Brilliant work. Keep it safe and put it somewhere where it won't get dusty! John

You should see the number of duff shots! I use the lower shutter speed, 1/250, so I don't get motionless propellers but I get a lot of unsharp images. I do wonder how well the experts manage. Of course with shots like that of the Bristol, where the prop is in line with you, if one's mind and fingers were fast enough a high speed could be set. I nearly missed the Bristol because I was looking elsewhere when it appeared without warning as it started its take off run from close to the hangars. It was a case of up with the camera and 'click' - Lucky John

Thank you. Peter gave very nice display which included a couple of lovely topside passes. Contrary to the impression created by the pictures above my panning that day was nearly useless and I only got one good shot from both passes.

At Last! A warm sunny day at Old Warden Peter Teichman's 'Russian' Spitfire made its first visit to Old Warden Miles Hawk Speed Six and Mew Gull Bristol M1 made a sharp right turn after taking off from the short runway I nearly missed it Polikarpov Po 2 Primary glider Bristol Fighter Miles Gemini Nieuport We were promised 5 Edwardians but the Deperdussin,although rolled out, did not fly. The Bleriot did one short hop and nearly came to grief on the second when the pilot got he nose too high after lift off Avro Triplane Bristol Boxkite Blackburn

A heart stopping moment as the Bleriot suddenly reared up after take off But it flopped down without apparent damage as it was towed back to the hangar without trouble

He's a mate. He will understand that it takes one to know one John

A really nice model (as usual) but who in his right mind would spend all that time and effort just to get something that no-one else has? John

and only $190!

Aaah, one of the posh people...😛 I was surprised to be so close to the aircraft taking off. I thought that the Elf & safety people would have put a stop to that as I was less than 100 metres from the runway. Great though. I did think that some of a/c could have come a bit lower along the display line but I did enjoy it apart from the weather. I only brought my fleece jacket along as a last minute thought otherwise... I am just about to add a few pictures of the models. John