Mick Modeller

Probably something along the lines that every movable 165 AVRE was in theater..... Some of the things that were/are kept very quiet was that there wasn't too many servicable Challengers in Germany, with the unbelievable sight of stripped Challenger hulls minus turrets littering tank parks. I remember seeing a shot of the "Battle Damage Replacement Squadron" tanks........ Late mark Chieftains, now that said something......

I remember Soltau days and the AD Spartans with their 5-oohs, looked so silly but we'd have had them in a heartbeat!!!!

Painting Stage 3.

Hi Boys and Girls, Masking and painting time, starting to get real exciting. The Masking Light Grey Coat. Looking good.

Bit of a long job this one, had an enforced break for several reasons, I guess the most important one was the ole Bacardi Vouchers fund being somewhat depleted, but I've just received the latest instalment of pieces from AFV Models and another burst of activity is required..... New Swing arms, mounts, o-rings to seat, bump-stops, bushing set for the road-wheels & shock absorber set. I guess that this should be it for the hull, I decided not to go for the metal shock absorbers, for once I didn't see any advantage to it. There was one problem with the bottom shock-absorber screws fowling the hull, so a trip to a lathe owning friend is required, for this and to open the road-wheels to allow for the new bushings. I'm also looking for a new two motor gearbox for the tank, can't have a Leo without the pivot turn....... although I'll run her first on the original gearbox until I locate a suitable (cheap & suitable) gearbox. I've also been replaced all the Tamiya screws with hex-heads and just about everything else is bolted on. The next move is to finish the rear plate, with metal parts for holding the spare track links etc.

Hi Guys, Thanks for that, I had a feeling that it would be Trumpeter, I'm still wandering towards one of the turrets below, love the touch of sights etc on view when the hatches are open. My eventual aim is to get a T-64 A or B and Chieftain Mk 9 or 10 replicating BAOR and GSFG in the early 80s. Any ideas of when it's actually coming out? T-64A T-64B

Hi all, Anyone heard of anything forthcoming in T-64, not too worried which mark, just has to be better than the Skif kits currently available.

Hi All, The project is still in very early days, While I would love to build Bobby Woll's Tiger 1 from the summer of 1944, but whilst my research is only scratching the subject the Tiger 1s used then were mid to late production models. I had also thought of building Otto Carius's Tiger 1, but I'm not keen for doing that in much the same way that Michael Wittman's Tiger 1 is also out. The model most likely to be made will be along the lines of: PzKpfw VI 'Tiger' (early prod) 'S12' 13 s.SS Pz-Komp LAH, Autumn 1943 As to the spacific tank, I have under "factory rebuild" a Tiger II that I built almost 20 years ago with the turret number 233, so I'm leaning towards this commanders Tiger 1. jacksdad64, sent you a PM, sorry I was too late for the other books.

Hi Troops, I will shortly be building a 1/16 Tiger 1 and I'm looking for guidence on which model I could make. Ideally I would make a late model Tiger 1 summer 1944, but I don't believe that would be possible without a shed-load of scratch-building. I can vaguely remember reading about a book that detailed to which units the various tigers were delivered/issued to, any ideas as to the name of this book or similar? Thanks All

Just a paint update: Stiggie has just received the Model Master paints and reckons on the grey and light blue being spot-on, but that the dark blue being too light. He's now going to order the colour from Xtacolour and White Ensign. I've asked him to make a swatch of the three colours so that people will have a better chance of getting their colours right.

Here's one for Splinter, Aardvark or Flankerman. Just got the latest issue of AirForces Monthly and pages 56 to 58 deal with Exercise Safe Skies 2011 part of which was held at Flanker heaven.... Oops Mirgorod, there are 2 Su 27 full pics and 2 partial photos along with 70 Blue and another Su 27UB. The full photos were of 75 Blue and my baby 30 Blue, but the caption was of most interest. "Waiting to be overhauled by an autonomous aircraft repair plant, this Su-27 is still in its old Ukrainian Air Force colours with the characteristic large, green radar nose". I always thought that the Green/White Nose dielectric panels were an identification sign between early-late production airframes. Over to you guys.

Love the subject and the scale. When you hear the banter from bomber community my favourite coming from the BUFF drivers, that when the last "Bone" B-1 equals BONE gets delivered to the Bone Yard that the crew would be picked up by a B-52. Now wouldn't a B-52 in 1/48 be something worth seeing!! I was on an exercise at Catterick when at least 2 squadrons of B-52s flew over at low level (probably 1-200"), the noise was enormous and the earth moved, quite literally!!!!

Just a wee update, we're going to have a trial of I made contact with the builder of: and his comments are below: Well, I mixed the dark blue using Xf-2 and Xf-8 from Tamiya, the grey is Xf-54 and the light blue is RLM 76 from Vallejo. However, it should be a little bit more blueish, so I suggest you use some other RLM 76 with a few drops of blue added to it. I hope that could help. All the best, Mitko One major difference between Mitko's paint job and that which I'm after will be a satin finish, Stiggie and I both agree that a matt finish looks dead and as you'll see from my guide photo there is a satin look to the photo. The quest continues.

Can I stick my nose in albeit a bit on the late side, but there will almost certainly be a diference between the same colour of paints along with a plethora of other "defects" and wear 'n' tear. Another example could be the yellow band not being the whole way around the circumference of the bomb or completely yellow, I had one such 4.5" Naval HE projectile in my collection, but alas was sold in perference to one with better painted markings. Any combination could be good, the americans sold off a huge amount of bomb casings for scrap and then had a shortage once the Vietnam war kicked off, meaning that at one stage aircraft that could carry 20+ bombs were flying with one or two, you'd have thought it better to load one bird and lessen the risk to others. But as long as one type of bomb was to be kept on a Mer/Ter there shouldn't have been an issue. However with such a large load it would be very likely that a couple or all of the sparrows were left off. Hope this helps.

A note from Stiggie, The black primer is to tie all the different materials together and it gives a great base for shading as well. I always prime my models with this which is Vallejo primer and is superb.

It's a devil or the deep blue sea job!!! This pic is the colour/shade guide that I'm aiming for This model is the closest that I've seen to correct colours, albeit faded, but I can't find where I found the pics to see if he gives any references to the paint colours. Two extremes of one colour, albeit 08Blue is quite faded, whereas 56Blue looks brand new.....

Valid points, the problem with the stinger is that there isn't a replacement (in 1/48) otherwise I would have used it so it was a case of getting a close representation, the Flanker that I'm having depicted has had some of its flare dispensers blanked off, but I want to show some (artistic license) and of course she will be fully armed with a load that I would use (AL Again). I'm not for going down the road of wholesale scratch building and the cost that that occurs, I've already gone down that route with a 1/16 RC Leo 1 that I'm building, spent £150 on the model, and have spent €800, $250 and at least £100 in local componants and I still have €500 worth of turret & swing arms etc to buy and thats assuming I don't go for broke and add Tamiya DMD electronics and gearboxes to give it that true Leo gait. How old is the reference, the guide seems to date before the Flankers were centered in Mirgorod, current Flankers seem to have a brighter shade. Thanks for the pointers.

A new Stig is born.......

Hi Guys, In case you haven't seen my last addition, I'm looking for pointers for the best paints for Ukrainian splinter camo. So far Model Master's Flanker colours seem to be winning the bet, but I'm open to guidence. Over to you Flankerman (and others)...... Cheers Pete

Hi All, Getting caught up in a couple of updates Old pattern tail stinger being moded. Primered. Has anyone any guidance on the correct colours for Ukrainian Flankers? Cheers

Hi Troops, Sorry for the delay, some update pics to keep you abreast of affairs.

That is GOOD!!!!!!!

Latest update.

Hi All, Things have been kinda quite lately, I’ve been waiting for some of the short supplied track pieces added, but they arrived last week and I have finished the tracks and am now onto painting. I’ve decided to spray the tracks with etching primer and then Tamiya TS29 Semi Gloss Black, from memory this is a close match to the colour that I’d seen all tracks painted. As an aside, it seemed unnecessary to paint tracks as once used cross country the paint was worn off in a matter of minutes or hours running. After that depending on the circumstances the tracks got very shiny or rusty, the latter happening if there was any moisture in the ground. The tracks would actually get so shiny that reflection was a problem on bright days!! One other part that I prattle on about is the wear surfaces affected by the road-wheels and idlers, the areas of contact got very shiny. The next move is to fit the track-pads which are a push fit, well I tried that and my fingers and thumbs hurt after only a couple of pads trial fitted….. I’ve now moved onto using the faithful “Irish Screwdriver” (light) actually a 4oz ball-peen hammer, after a sharp tap the pad isn’t going anywhere. The final touch will be to add a locating colour to every 7th end-link, back in the day the clued-up drivers/crew would mark each track-pin/link that was removed so that it would be easier to find an easily removable link. The painting didn't go as well as hoped, perhaps I should have washed the tracks in some sort of thinners or solvent. Even with the primer the overcoat is quite fragile, but I guess the final word will be how they look on the completed model. Also had some camera probs, so apologies in advance for the pic quality On fullsized vehicles when new tracks were fitted they would never came in complete lengths but were sub-divided into smaller sections, with Leo 1 tracks coming in 7s and when it came to building a track the 7th link would be well greased to ease fitting meaning that these ones were natural breaking points and painted or otherwise marked for future reference. Were you unfortunate in taking over a vehicle without any of the above it was a wise move to get the crew to do so at the earliest opportunity. It was also a good skive as the powers wouldn’t’ get in the way as wherever possible tracks had to be tucked away in their hangers every night…… Lastly the new drive sprockets arrived today, once more little works of art, the sprocket rings are individually bolted to the final drive with 12 indvidual M1.4 bolts.

More progress, Looking again at the rudder pedals, I'm not sure if I would go far on them, they'll be fairly invisable, lost the cockpit colour, had to give up a perfect match when we went for the eduard set, but I feel you have to make compromises, else where do you end up.......