Wafu

Hello Bob, the etch fret for the CH-47 is 49mm wide and 12mm high. Hope this helps?

I’ll get back to you shipper’s.

Cheers Mark and CT, I’ve looked for the Eagle Strike decals over the weekend, no joy. Even the two bobs ones are out of stock at that Hannants place. I can get them direct but I’ll have to keep looking for C decals.

Hi all. A question for the Eagle guys on here. I’d like to model my Tamiya 1/32 F-15’s in markings of the Lakenheath based squadrons. That’s all well and good but I can’t seem to find any decal options to allow this, can anyone help me with advice on achieving this? I’ve asked Daco to reprint the 1/32 decal sheet but I can’t see this happening this side of my lifetime, so it’s down to you eagle experts to advise me. Thanks in advance.

Yes, earlier Jet Boxes had a flatter profile at the window centre seem, however Bell, AgustaBell and third party manufacturers like Aeronautical Accessories, all started putting a bulge in the screens. You can also get clear, blue tint and a smoke tinted screens. When I worked on the Jet Box, getting the right part number screen was a nightmare, hence why we tended to change in pairs.

Depends what Sqdn you’re doing? 771 and 772 had SAR blades fitted to their Mk 5 and Mk4 respectively. The Pingers of 706, 810, 814, 820, 824 and 826 all had standard green upper and black lower metal blades, changing to composite blades in the late 80’s to 90’s. The Junglies had standard colour blades fitted to 707, 845 and 846 Mk4 Sea Kings. No use being ‘tactical’ with a gurt big yellow blade wizzing round😂

I’d concur with the reflection of the airframe colour. The SAR blade was fitted to any of the five hub attachments, the key for blade fold used to be a white PCR (Pitch Change Rod) that aligned with the black or white vertical stripe on the starboard side gearbox fairing.. Also, the blade with no Hyd pipes on the hub was the number one blade that went over the spine for folding. I loved working on the Sea King but I now work on the S92 SAR aircraft, far better a helicopter than the King but you’ll always have a soft spot for the aircraft you used to work on.

Phil Flory has a novel way of displaying his large scale and large 72nd models he builds of his website, he hangs them on his wall via their tails. This may sound odd but I do admit he’s right in saying they are like pieces of art hanging on the wall. I build helicopters with their rotors folded where permissible and Naval jets with their wings etc folded.

I use the 48ers site to find the best available aftermarket for a specific aircraft I’m going to build.

I’d agree with Parabat, neither is a good option, in fact the Academy kit of the Tomcat is the only kit I’ve binned halfway though building, literally threw it away. Parabat is right, look for the Hobbyboss offerings, maybe even a Hasegawa one, or save and get either the Tamiya or AMK version. It’s only my opinion but the Tamiya Tomcat is the best by a long way. Just found this on eBay, not mine by the way...https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/193484338773

I’d say Firefly because of the radome on the wing.

Wow, Cheers Royal. PM inbound.

So, the time has come for me to make the obligatory FAA dio with an 892 F4 being launched from the aft cat on the Ark in 1/48th. Can I ask if anyone has or knows where I can get a good deck plan of that area? Coastal Kits bases only do part of the deck by 4 spot, I’d like to do my rendition of the Phantom on the cat with water cooled blast deflectors deployed etc. Would any one be able to point me in the direction of the reference material? Cheers in advance. The Woo.

Thanks for the kind words and comments. Stay safe, stay indoors (build models)

Hi all, Here's my latest build, finished a few weeks ago but with what's been going on around the UK, I've only just got my laptop out to put this on the forum, apologies for that. My build is the Trumpeter 1/32 F/A-18F kit with a few additions, Quick Boost seats, Aires cans and a compilation of kit and aftermarket decals (Galaxy Model decals). I wanted to build a slant on this workhorse and after looking around in some of my reference, I found a few pictures of the CAG bird with tanks and a refuel pod, seemed a natural progression from my 1/32 conversion of the A-6 to a KA-6. I had to rob another kit for the extra tanks and the refuel pod was 3d printed. The Sidewinders are from Bren Gun, everything else was from the kit. A straight forward build apart from a little scary moment whilst building the upper and lower airframe parts. I wish Aires did a pit for this, no sidewall details does stand out and oh I wish we could buy seamless intakes. Anyway, pictures are better than words, so here she is... 1/32 Tamiya F-14A next..

Pic sent..

Haven’t seen the fade yet, time will tell though.

Hi all, Hot off the bench this afternoon and after a monumental struggle with Revell decals, here's my two Royal Navy Mk3 and Mk8 Lynx helicopters in 1/32 scale. The Revell kit's are separated by a good few years, the Mk3 came out sometime ago now and the Mk8 just last year. I'm not a Revell fan, I find their kits cumbersome, however I've eaten my words with these kits. The engineering that has gone into them is to be commended, well done Revell. My only complaint would be that on the Mk3 the airframe RWR antennas from under the exhaust and the rear of the sponson fairings are missing, can't see why but they are. On the Mk8 Revell have included them. The builds are from the box apart from including Scale Warship Models blade fold kits, a brilliant way of keeping these models in a minimal space. The blade fold is a great addition to both kits, very well detailed and easy to assemble. Now the negative, the Revell decals are poor, very poor. They have the thickness of cardboard and are as easy to install as the said cardboard. I used every trick known to me and even went down to using Tamiya extra thin very sparingly just to make the blooming thing settle down. They're not great but from two feet away I'm reasonably happy. I must thank Greg B at this point, after a wanted ad was placed for a second set of Black Cat decals, Greg came to the rescue and shipped a set from the other side of the globe. Many thanks to him for allowing this to be completed. Rant over and on to the next project before returning back to work.

Pappy, I have the Haynes Lynx book and see that it has a couple of photos in of the ‘gun’, if you’d like me to send them to you please pm me your email.

Bombheads are not to be trusted😉

I’ll have a go at this but I will say I worked on RN Lynx in the 90’s and things did move on in the Lynx Fleet. The RN lynx uses a different floor part (15A) to the other kit options. It basically has single cockpit controls and no seat rails for a rear cabin crew member. The RN version cabin section looks like it has some sort of protective wooden floorboard doublers (load spreaders?) with circular cut outs for the tie down points. Only the pilot had controls, the Observers position had its controls removed. This aided both parties to focus on their tasks in the cockpit without the issue of control restrictions from the Observer. Yes you are right the deck in the cabin was clear with a wooden troop floor painted dark grey installed. Only the Export versions with sonar seems to have the rear seat on the rails fitted ( I saw this on Dutch and German Lynx that came to Royal Naval Naval Air Station Portland) Steps 59/60 indicate that the main gear units can be in one of two positions, the 'normal' position with the wheels parallel to the a/c centreline and a second option with the wheels splayed outwards 45 degrees. I assume this is some form of parking position to stop the a/c rolling around on a pitching deck at sea. The main undercarriage was only in the forward facing Position when being stowed and towed at Portland, when on the flight line the wheels were positioned at 45 degrees for flight even on land or at sea. The kit provides the option of spread or folded Main Rotor Blades (MRBs). Step 110 deals with the spread MRB option and 120 with the folded option. In step 110, each MRB cuff has a clear part (6E) added to a locating point on the top of the cuff, however there is no mention of these parts for the folded option in step 120. These parts represent the Main Rotor Spindle reservoirs and should be fitted what ever the head configuration is. They are filled with OEP thick oil. Q4, didn’t have these fitted when I worked on Lynx so can’t help, sorry. Cheers the Woo.

Check out this guys Intruder, http://www.arcforums.com/forums/air/index.php?/topic/311878-132-air-to-air-refueling-iraq-1991/

Thanks for the kind reaction to the Taddy Tanker.

Hi, As the title says this is my attempted at the large tadpole. I didn't want to build the more commonly seen bombed up version, so whilst looking around I discovered the Steel Beach conversion for the Intruder tanker version, the KA-6D. The kit also see's the addition of the Avionix cockpit set, the SAC centreline tank and the excellent AOA decal sets for the aircraft and stencil data. Additionally I used a mix of Alclad, Tamiya and Mr Hobby paints. A Dark Dirt Flory wash was used to dirty down this well used fueler. The last trinket was the Eduard Remove Before Flight tags in both 48th and 32nd, not seen in these photo's but added later;) And one just now with the RBF's installed.

I agree Bruce. Heartfelt thoughts to you and your countrymen in this time of extremely trying times. We in the UK are shown the loss off life and your countries real estate, stay safe you all.