Fritag

Lovely work Neil; beautiful finishing - as always.

Didn't think of that Andy Got some clear decal paper I could spray and have a play with if I don't get the next painted version to work.

Bill - I think you and Neil are right; the centre strip is too wide. I used 0.75mm masking tape and laid masking tape either side rather as as Dean described. I guess 0.75mm was too wide. So - off with the old strip using a cocktail stick as a scraper and then some 12000 micromesh - and on with the next attempt. Turning into a bit of a saga......... Trying 0.5mm masking tape this time - on the outside to start with as per Cheshiretaurus. The tape is so thin it's hard to stop it from curving however..... Used as a guide to put tape on the inside - and offered up to the cockpit as per Dean. Definitely a better thickness Bill? Decided to leave it until tomorrow and see if it still looks straight before masking either side etc. I would like to avoid yet another failed attempt if possible

I need to get the JP5 windscreen in place and the decking behind the seats finished before I can prime it. I've doing the odd half an hot here and there over the last week to try and achieve this - but with mixed results. Decking area started well; added the avionics support structure - fiddly but no real issues: Looked ok under paint - and I ask painted and slightly weathered the coaming. Avionics boxes were small but manageable: And the whole thing looks ok with a bit of oil wash/filter - it gets a bit dirty at the back there where the canopy slides foreward and back. Actually - now I look at it the little black box on the rear decking behind the stud seat (fatigue meter I think) looks a bit on the weedy side. Might replace it...... The windscreen has proved itself to be a pain. The problem is the internal vertical bar in the middle. I think that the kit part is better than the Pavla vac form version - not least because (and I think dr_gn said this some time ago) the JP5 canopy is actually pretty thick for real. So I had to file of the vertical bar - which is incorrectly moulded on the outside and polish up the canopy - no big deal: But then I had to mark and paint on the bar on the inside. And that has proved tricky. I found the centre top and bottom and temporarily marked the outside of the canopy before putting a thin strip of masking tape on the outside as a guide for masking the inside: Then masked and sprayed the cream colour seen from the outside and then the internal grey: I'm on about my third go now. And I still can't get it truly vertical! I swear it all lines up nicely vertical when I mask it......and then when I unmask - it's gone skew whiff. I'll beat the sucker yet........ Steve

Improvement and just one more bit to mask Gonna try the same on my JP5.

Loved your Jag, Jer - and looking forward to this. Glad you chose the wrap around scheme as it suites the Bucc well to my eyes.

Great work with the PE landing light Mark. Gotta love little lenses. I don't have much experience of PE - and I find it pretty unforgiving stuff. I'll be interested to see how easy it is to get the top of the outer flap box to blend into the wing.... BTW. I like the idea of using the perspex base as a true flat surface for jigging etc. Might have to acquire a bit This build looks fun.

No idea myself - never used it - which is just one of the many reasons I've been following the build. But I bet you get itchy fingers soon enough. In fact I bet you're feeling them right now................

Yep. Good save that. Your framework looks grand thro' it. Old friend of mine (now sadly deceased) had an Auster and took me up in it once. Lovely it woz. Went to visit him once and found the Auster fuselage in his house coz he was working on it! Now that's love....... Steve

Absoulutely gorgeous Iain. Never tried a NMF p'raps I should visit the Harrogate Games Workshop and browse the paints..... Feel your pain with the gun barrells; but where would we be without a bit of muppetry to make life interesting - mind you I'd never have noticed if you hadn't owned to it. BTW: Them Tamiya stands are bloomin useful aren't they. Steve

I know it's a perennial debate but I think Bill's right about the panel lines here. They don't look to my eyes like they need any enhancement. If and when you do decide to weather her Duncan I don't think she needs a panel line wash.Not that she needs any weathering - she's magnificent as she is.

Incredible construction skills Martin. You make it look effortless; I'm sure it isn't, but that's how you make it look

Got me hooked. Didn't know you could do that with gloss cote. Like it.....

Thanks for all the suggestions on glue chaps. Thought it through - and then decided to use cyano anyway.... Used a home made tool (ok - just a cocktail stick cut to a finer point and a slit cut in the end) to carry just the right size drop of cyano and then let capillary action do the rest. Did one leg first to tack it in place and then when I was sure it was all lined up I did the rest: Came out fine. On to the next problem; - whatever that may be....

It's in the industrial estate next door to Inverness Airport. Here's the cockpit of its Lightning. Told you it wos tiny: Oh. And it's an F.1A - XM169 - only half a dozen away from yours!:

Ahh. Course I s'pose I should be fighting you for the honour of the 'Procopius' username. Maybe I could borrow it when you're on hols.....

That is one beautiful Lightning Duncan. Fingers crossed for the canopy demasking....... Great chat about Alclad. Dunno if it's made me more or less worried about using it for the first time tho' It looks great in that black finned scheme. It's a brute of an aircraft - but the round topped fin seems to add just a touch of elegance missing from the square topped ones? I was just up in Inverness for a few days and the little aviation museum there has a Lightning fuselage. It reminded me that the cockpit was tiny. I mean really tiny. Not to mention being an ergonomic slum. Iconic tho'

I believe that I am at present bringing necessary Britmodellor balance to Procopius's prodigous modelling output over on the group build threads. Whilst he appears to be taking unofficial leave from marketing (dunno how he's managing it otherwise) I'm up to my bl**dy eyeballs in the law and so am averaging out his ouput by proceeding with extreme methodicalness (aka sloweness)........ The main gear doors are closed on the ground - so I gave the doors and the bits of the bays covered by the doors a quick squirt of rattle can humbrol 11 and a slosh of MIG dark wash - bit of practice really seeing as how nowt will be seen. And then snuggled the doors down with some cyano. Thankfully they ended up in the right place. I get very nervous fixing stuff with cyano. Then - armed with my new best friends - a 0.1 mm Rotring pen and some graph paper - I built the frame for behind the seats: And that seems to fit ok too..... At the mo' it's just sitting in the holes I drilled for it. Not sure what glue to use as it takes a bit of fiddling to get it straight and I reckon if I use cyano it'll end up skewiff. That's all for now folks........sorry

Looking forward to this Col. S'pose harriers are all right in an airshowy-uppy-downy-lefty-righty sort of way. But favourite?......takes all sorts to make a world mind

Yep. Just wot I was thinking - albeit him and all the others got there first.........

Cripes Procopius; is any marketing actually getting done just at the moment?

I think she's lovely. Stick another canopy on her when you've lost the urge to vomit every time you see her and she'll be perfect Quixotic model making makes for great entertainment. Chuck in a poetic turn of phrase and its exceptional. Anyroadup methodical is a synonym for slow..........

North North East and then North North West. Had a great time thanks Col. What's not to enjoy with scenery and weather like this (Faraid Head looking back to the mainland): The range hut on Faraid Head was manned and there were several Typhoons meandering about at medium level - but they never came low down (shame) and they never seemed to drop anything on Garvie Island. Dunno what they we doing but it didn't seem like a lot of fun.....have happy memories of dropping live thousand pounders on Garvie. I was given liberty to 'play with plastic' (as the wife calls it) when we got back. So I started gently by trimming the resin copy undercarriage doors to fit the Airfix undercarriage bays and gluing some short length of plastic rod into the bays to give the new doors something to sit on - the last photo shows the Airfix doors by way of comparison. Hope to get more done today - and then back to work tomorrow Steve

Yep. Halfway to Cape Wrath area now. Off to tramp the hills. Used to be guaranteed to see some jags and tornados doing OLF at 100'. No longer tho That struck me too. They were really delicate and stalk like. Not like any other throttles I've ever seen. Must admit I had a play with em. Might have waggled the control wheel a bit and muttered 'woosh' a bit too......... Pilots' space was tiny. The back of the Valiant was mostly the same green too - so I think it's probably the original colour. The pilots' bit of the Valiant was all black.Loved this panel: Steve

Thread drift warning. In Inverness right now. Been in this part of the world many times and never realised there was a tiny aviation museum nwxt door to the airport. I saw this Vulcan rear crew seat Rob and thought of you: I don't think the bang seat cushion is authentic somehow. But the thing that amazed me was this: The nose of a Valiant! And you can go inside! How cool is that. I might have sat in the driver's seat for a bit....... My dad worked on Valiant's during his national service - on 7 squadron. And this Valiant was a 7 squadron one: Drift over. Steve