Tom Hall

Nick, if you want a really nice A-5, you'll probably want at least some of the Eduard version. The Hasegawa rendering is not the greatest. In the Hasegawa kit, the indentation aft of the cowling for the exhaust does not extend far enough aft. (This is a mistake Hasegawa apparently did not make on their 1/32 version.) The vent doors aft of the exhaust trough are too proud and needed to be of a more triangular cross-section. You could, possibly, transplant the Airfix A-8 exhaust troughs and vents, and Hasegawa's cover for the nose guns. I'm afraid there is no perfect solution to make the Japanese A-5 in 1/72, if that is your goal.

B.hammer, Squadron "green" putty is basically an auto body refinishing product which we call "glazing putty" in the USA. It should reduce to pea soup with a drop or two of lacquer thinner, which will make it adhere to styrene quite well. If you reduce it with lacquer thinner, you'll want to allow plenty of time for curing.... P.S.: For that matter, you can also use liquid cement for models (the ones with MEK in them) or acetone to make the green putty more liquid. Whichever of these solvents you choose, you should get better adhesion but there will be shrinkage.

Learstang, I believe that there is not yet a Douglas A-20. Nor is there a North American B-25, an Li-2 (C-47), or a Catalina, or any other seaplane, AFAIK.

Touvdal's got a couple of I-16s going. They are 1/72.

So far, I see a well-rounded assortment of Soviet-made airplanes in 1/48 and 1/72. Just to summarize our inventory and without pressing anyone to build anything, I don't see any Ilyushin DB-3, Il-4 or Il-10; I don't see a Tupolev SB-2 (although Hardtarget's Ar-2 is close) or a Tu-3; I don't see an La-7; I don't see a MiG-1; there is maybe one Yak-9 and that is in the planning; and I think no one has undertaken a Polikarpov R-5 or Po-2 yet. Forgive me if I have overlooked a thread named with a Russian heading or a type hidden in a multi-type festival. I hope this helps anyone who is thinking of joining this group build on the airplane side.

Jockney, you must be psychic. I had just been shopping for lead. Toko instruct that a 10-gallon milk pail is to be placed in the nose. Or, maybe it is a 10-gram weight. Ten grams would be roughly a third of an ounce, or seven of my new split-shot fishing line weights. There is not space for seven in the nose; five will have to do. Removed some plastic from the hidden part of the ventral fin to reduce weight aft. Put in some duct for the dorsal air intake. Glued on a couple of guide blocks for the floor, which I have test-fitted at least 15 times. I have also filled the hole where the nose gear strut is supposed to be inserted. It's too far forward for where I want the floor.

Well, a lot can be improved. Parkinson's Law: Work expands to fill the time available. For one thing, Toko has put a lot of access hatches on the surface. They stand a bit too proud and I am sanding a lot of them down. Toko also put some raised rivets on the aft fuselage. I removed them. The sheet metal work that Bell and Hudson (an American auto maker) did on these planes was excellent, and there were few or no raised rivets on P-63 skin.

Took warp out of wing pieces; enlarged the wheel openings; enlarged the leg openings, changed the angle of the leg openings slightly and applied putty; filled lines in wing lower half in preparation for new aileron and flap lines later; attached wing air intake; started some ducts for wing air intake; made backing for landing light; removed trim tab from left aileron; installed fuselage ventral fin and fuselage air intake halves; filled indentation on left half of intake (because I am fairly sure it was just an oval plaque or decal that Toko mistook for an opening - purple arrow below).

Thank you for that advice. I am far from being a professional photographer. I have tried tinkering with colour adjustments after the fact using various software. It is not a good use of my time, so the more colour fidelity I can get from the camera, the more satisfied with it I will be. I know that I cannot expect perfection in colour reproduction. (I once spent a lot of time shopping around Hollywood to get a fine reproduction of a 1941 colour slide. Even with all of the sophisticated colour film knowledge in Hollywood, I found that it was not practical to get all the colours of the slide.)

Many thanks for your comments. I shall look at your photos, Baron. The tripod I have. The lighting I have. It's the camera for detailed close-ups that I am considering. Am not set on the Canon but have owned a couple of their earlier models and like the brand. I presume that Sony's A6000 is more of a travel camera and less of a budget studio camera for product photography. The Sony SLT-A65 seems fairly similar to the Canon T3 and T5. Since this camera is to have a specialized use, that being detail on small things, I am considering buying just the camera body and purchasing the lens a la carte. One thing I am not finding in online product reviews is discussion of colour fidelity. I have an old digital camera that was more or less blind to violets and purples. I can put up with a lot of fidgety procedure to take a good "studio" photo if I can actually get proper colours and fine detail. Any comments on colour fidelity? To get it am I going to have to step in price level?

I have never owned a camera that is capable of photographing fine detail in closeups. Am now researching. I don't intend to use the camera for action photography such as car races, air shows, etc. Don't especially need it for landscape photography, either. Any thoughts on the Canon EOS T3, T5 and T6 Rebels? To photograph the detail of coins, plastic models, HO trains and small products, a high quality 50 mm lens or the Canon 18-55 mm lens would get it done, wouldn't it?

Since the Ju-88 group build looks like one that I have no chance of finishing in time, I would like to enter this one, if I may. I will build the Toko P-63A kit. Luckily, it includes the ventral fin for the P-63C-5. I will decide what to do about the canopy in due course. It's not as awful as one or two reviews make it out to be, but it may need a little grinding and polishing to deal with a bit of distortion or misplaced canopy frame. Need to examine photos. I have to use some imagination about the markings. While it is easy enough to see which planes went to the VVS (see Joe Baugher's online lists of airframe serial numbers of US planes), it is not easy to find photos of Soviet P-63s of 17 IAP and 821 IAP of 190 IAD; 781 IAP and 940 IAP of 245 IAD; or 888 IAP and 410 ShAP of 128 SAD. These are the units that were arrayed against the Japanese in August 1945 that had P-63s. It looks as if I will need to buy some decals for the tail number, which will begin either "311..." or "444...". I'm not sure I can devote the time needed for a model right now, but here goes.

There is a wealth of detail photos of the A-1 (also possibly applicable to other variants) starting at http://forum.largescaleplanes.com/index.php?showtopic=21808. More than 50 pages worth.

Mottlemaster, I probably would not be able to finish in the allotted time, but if it's process and not product that counts, it would be a conversion into an

I am toying with the idea of joining you, if I may. Would need to get a better camera. Won't attempt any more GB's until I have a proper camera.