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So this one was a real struggle and the end result is not really what I hoped for. Managed to loose one of the winglets but found one in an unstarted A320 box. I messed up the markings on the horizontal stabilisers, putting the markings on the bottom side after painting and before mounting. Whilst trying to mount them I broke the locator tabs, both of them! Super glued them on and the right one managed to fall down at least 4 times. Paint was a bit messy, not sure why, maybe too much dust in my appartement... Decals from 26 Decals, lovely as usual but still I was able to screw some things up causing me to get a second set. Anyway, I mostly build aircraft I actually have seen/photographed and this one I saw early July in Funchal, Madeira and I made this photo: And then the finished model: Hope the next one on the bench comes out a bit better - Peter

Well, thanks to Mike (@mitchem) I am able to crack open another kit (or 2) and eventually add them to the shelf of doom. I put out a request for a Singapore Airline B777 decal and he came to the rescue. I had an SIA kit but with 50th Anniversary decals. I wanted to do the standard scheme as in September we will have our first international flights into Canberra being serviced by SIA B777-200ERs. So why not build one? A few guys from our club got together for a Friday build night and I broke open the kit and go it started, trouble was there were 2 kits in there! Oh well, a double build was started The other B777 will be a British Airways aircraft, very smart scheme IMHO. After the fuselages were knocked together I got on with correcting the horrible shape of the flap track fairings, one wing down 4 to go! The other side awaiting attention and the engines were also knocked together ..with the result that some filling, filing, and sanding will be required. While the paint on the A350 is drying I will be attending to these.

My latest build is one that has been on my wish list for a long time: the Lockheed L-1011 Tristar. As some of you may know, I am a big fan of Tri-jets and have built the Trident, Yak 40, Yak 42, Boeing 727, Tu-154M, DC-10 and MD-11. So basically all of them with the exception of the L-1011. My KLM DC-10 took almost 70 hours to complete (because of all the metal colours) and as with the DC-10, most liveries for the L-1011 have metallic undersides and engines and I didn't feel like spending another 70 hours on this kit. Thus, I went looking for a relatively easy livery. And luckily I found one: The Air Atlanta livery (specifically TF-ABV) which has a completely white fuselage and engines. Boring? Maybe, but nice looking white isn't ugly and besides, the wings were challenging enough, since the flaps are metallic, with difficult shapes. The L-1011 project was launched in March 1968 (first flight in November 1970) and set a new standard in technology and safety for wide-body jetliners. The L-1011 was Lockheed's only commercial jetliner and its design was based on an American Airlines request for a large-capacity, medium-range aircraft. It also became Lockheed's last civil aviation aircraft. The success of the aircraft was hampered by high inflation at the time, but especially by competition from the Douglas DC-10. In addition, the bankruptcy of manufacturer Rolls-Royce with the only engine option (the RB-12) was a major blow. A cash injection from the British and American governments eventually saved Roll-Royce and with it the L-1011, but the damage was already done. Only 250 aircraft were built (against more than 440 of the DC-10, which also wasn’t great for Douglas). However, the L-1011 was certainly a technically advanced, safe and perfectly capable aircraft. The kit is once again from Authentic Airliners. Injection molded kits are also available, but as with the DC-10, the Authentic Airliners kit is by far the most accurate. Decals are from 26decals and the cockpit and window decals from Authentic Airliner decals. I also used Nazca for the Corroguard as well as some details. I used Tamiya TS-26 for the white parts and MRP Boeing Grey for the grey parts. For the slats and flaps I used Allclad Airframe Aluminum with a mist of Inspire Chrome to give it a bit more shine. The exhaust were airbrushed using semi-polished aluminum. Anyway, enough talk. On with the pictures: And one quick final picture with the Lockheed L-14 from F-RSIN also in 1:144. Hard to believe that only 33 years sit between these two aircraft! And with that, my Tri-jet journey is finally over! As for my future projects: I'm currently working on the SE.2010 Armagnac as well as the Antonov-140, but my next wide-body build is going to be the A340-600 in Star Alliance (Lufthansa) colours, also from Authentic Airliners. Thanks for reading and see you next time! ~Martijn~

Well, I know this subject was quite popular last time but having recently got some decals from Ray at 26Decals to replace those that came with the kit (which were poorly printed) this will be my first foray into this year's GB. Photos taken by me at Ringway on 23 Aug 1966, presumably it was on the Manchester - Prestwick - New York route. I'm aiming to build at least two aircraft but have to get my From Russia with Love entry done before too much will be done in this GB. Regards Mike

Unfortunately one of my intended builds for the Airfix group build has been ruled out as this particular version dates originally from 1983. So I'm intending to build the 1/44 Airfix Boeing 727-200 in the time span of the group build. This will be one of the few 727s ever to carry British Airways livery via its franchise partner Comair of South Africa, who operated five aircraft of the type on the Johannesburg to Cape Town route. My chosen example is ZS-NOV in the "Delftblue Daybreak" livery - the only BA 727 to have ever worn this livery. Decals are from F-DCAL - I've recently purchased a few of their sets and hope that they are easy to apply. The first stage will be to remove the raised panel lines and fill in the windows...……….more to follow. Regards Mike

A pair of Revell 1/144 F-14A arrived yesterday, so the plan is to build them in flight as a wingman pair. The bags of bits

As I'm only involved in the Lockheed Group Build over the next two months, I thought that I would try to build my MD-11 alongside the Tristar. It will certainly be finished as one of those in the KLM fleet that I've flown on - probably PH-KCD "Florence Nightingale" but perhaps PH-KCE "Audrey Hepburn" The kit comes with decals for the later (narrow cheatline) livery but I've also got the 26Decals for the delivery scheme with the wide blue & white cheatline - which would be much easier to mask / paint. So far the four sections of the fuselage have been assembled: The two port sections were glued together on a sheet of glass - although this still left a small gap on the outside of the joint. The two starboard parts didn't fit as well, so I added the tail section to the complete port side first and then the forward section. The above photo shows the results of an initial round of filling, sanding, priming and rescribing - not too bad (sorry forgot to take a photo before starting this process) Looking at the side profile some more filler is needed just above the red ball Mike

I've not entered an airliner in a Group Build for well over a year, so time to make amends: This will be the Zvezda A321 kit with RicWarcup decals and Bra.Z winglets to build N701FR "Otto the Owl". Having relatives in Colorado, we have flown to / from Denver several times in recent years and I'm always drawn to have a walk around Concourse A and get photos of the Frontier aircraft that are on the gates. Mike

Hello everyone! This is Mikro Mir kit, which I really like and highly recommend. I'd venture to say it is the crispiest and most delicate short-run kit I've seen. Mikro Mir's Tu-22 comes close, and I am looking forward to building that one. Having checked the gear details I had serious doubts whether designing PE details for it makes any sense (in the end it did - there are still some tiny PE bits that can further enhance it). I like the slightly irregular, hair thin panel lines, sharp trailing edges of wings and tail; the plastic is good to work with, no big fit issues and it is so lovely tiny. The scene is loosely based on a monument airplane that used to be displayed on a square in Świdnica, Poland. I wanted to build two-seater variant of Yak-23, however Polish Air Force never used two-seater Yak-23s which instills a major and obvious historical inaccuracy. Having this one already onboard I was less worried by some other bits that may or may not fit any particular reference photos. The airplane on display was easily accessible, kids favorite, and as such subject of slow but steady decay and settling on one single "proper" state of the airframe to reproduce is nearly impossible. (decals are custom printed, PE parts used in my usual prototype fashion, some scratchbuilt elements) Here are couple of period photos from Świdnica: And here is the model: Thank you! Leszek

Some time ago I was designing turned/PE missiles that are now Shelf Oddity mainstay. I also did the design for 3d print of Sparrow I missile back then. The F7U Cutlass or F3H Demon that would best accommodate the early pointy Sparrow are still on wish list. At some point however I bumped into the following pictures: Here we are: late 1940s / early 1950s, Point Mugu Test Center - Naval Air Station west of Los Angeles. First Sparrow missile, named XAAM-N-2 (X for experimental, A for air launched, another A for air target, M for missile, N as Navy and 2 - well - number two) is casually tested on F6F Hellcat, one that is well outside its color comfort zone (as indicated by further research). Perfect, isn't it? After theWW2 the dawn of jets saw Hellcats quickly shifted to secondary/support roles. Fortunately the aircraft was designed in traditional Grumman fashion - sturdy, tough and capable of taking abuse. The test machine was F6F-5K (drone) converted back to be piloted. Steel blast shield was added to the cabin wall in expectance of test missile bahaving unexpectedly. The regular centerline fuel tank was substituted by a pod containing cameras, pylon fitted to the right wing and there it was. The (X)AAM-N-2 Sparrow I was much more pointy than its later variants. Much faster looking. Hugely cumbersome homing process required the pilot to maintain the target locked throughout the whole flight of the missile. It found very limited use in late 1950s on F7U Cutlass and F3H Demon but was quickly phased out and replaced by semi-active homing Sparrow III (AIM-7B). This is Platz kit which means good fit, good detail, whatever's faulty is my own contribution. Of course no manufacturer does such exotic one-offs, therefore own input was required with regard to: - missile (3d print) - pylon (plastic sheet) - centerline pod (plastic sprue+some small bits) - lengthened tailwheel leg (brass rod) - decals (custom printed in MF Zone) - blast shield (aluminium foil) The model: Thanks!

Hello everyone! This is P-42 (former T-10-15 Su-27 demonstrator modified to set time to climb records) in 1/144 scale. Base kit is Trumpeter, with some chopping done to align with the original airframe. Anything that was not essential to the very basic purpose of flight - including paint finish - was removed. Tips of vertical stabilizers, ventral fins, IR dome, tail sting - are all gone, so are most of antennas. In 1986-7 the P-42, equipped with uprated engines which along with other modifications gave thrust to weight ratio of ~2.0, set series of time-to-climb records, beating those set in 1975 by likewise lightened and stripped out F-15 Streak Eagle. This model served as a prototype for Shelf Oddity brass Time and place: Thanks for watching! Leszek

This is not my best model by far, but probably the most desired one, battle born with lots of setbacks. Definitely not the tidiest one, but I still like it! I wanted to build MD-90 so bad. Decals took almost 60 days to arrive (but they were a pleasure to work with and many thanks to Greg Drawbaugh for helping me out with my order). The correct grey colour took about a week of waiting and after that painting went horribly wrong. I painted 4 thin coats and it was worse and worse. I don't know what exactly went wrong since I was using spray can paint that time, painting outside, but I had to scrub it off in panic and paint it all over again with more or less satisfactory results. Still the surface is very rough. The Eastern Express kit does not fit well, but I don't believe Minicraft is better either. I've tried to give her a look of a real workhorse of an aircraft as she was, maybe slightly overdid. Kit: Eastern Express MD-90 Delta Airlines Decals: Draw Decals SAS MD-90, AA MD-87/90 Windows, a bit of kit decals My lockdown T-tails fleet Cheers, Steve

Okay, this needs some explaining to do. This B767 Zvezda was the first 'conscious life' kit, bought 10 years ago. Back then I had very little idea about the whole hobby industry size and put it together 100% out of the box. Probably skipped a lot of tiny details. During the recent shelf revision I took a closer look and it was painful to watch. While the principal assembly was okay there were gaps everywhere (no putty at all), the tailfin was split and wouldn't stick together even when I managed to cut it all open (thanks to a poor Zvezda glue), the KLM livery was all over the shop, I even question myself if I was on drugs at that time (probably, not), the paintjob was terrible. So she couldn't be on a display but I either felt bad thinking about throwing her away. A decision was made to do a salvage job as good as I can. I scraped all the paint off, filled all the gaps. Restored couple of spoilers, rebuilt half of the tailfin, made some antennas, that's as far as my skill goes. Then I've got British Airways livery from Ascensio (highly recommended if you'll ever come across it) and technical details sheet from Pas-decals. I had a long big doubt about the beautiful Ireland livery so I went on with the standard one (Chapham, I think?) Some mistakes I couldn't undo, I believe the MLG doors were mixed up and the engines are GE instead of RR of course which is a shame, but I decided to let it go. Also it lacks the nose ballast so it's tail heavy as expected Repainting was quite a painful job, took like A LOT of tape masking. There she goes in her second 'airline'. I'm quite satisfied with the result. The only photo I could found of the old look which kinda hides most of the issues in the depth of field. That nice take-off look!

This will be my entry for the Group Build: I've previously made a start by joining the fuselage halves together and working on the joint - this still needs tidying up but I'm sure I'm within the 25% rule. In the next week I'll have a think about what to do with the No2 intake. A recent thread has said that the Braz insert needs quite a bit of work to fit neatly, so may just go with a blanked off tube instead. As there are no other group builds for me until June, I may build my MD-11 alongside this one in a WIP! Regards Mike

My entry for this Group Build is as the title says: a 1/144 Revell DC-10 finished in British Caledonian livery as G-DCIO with decals from Ray at 26. So that's two references to the tenth anniversary via the aircraft type and also its registration Box shot and first fill on windows: The rest of the parts: and finally the decals: I'm intending to build with no afterparts or any major surgery - if the shape is slightly "off" anywhere I can live with it. Regards Mike

Rarely do I post a finished build, but perhaps the amount of builds started would leverage that.... No. This Draken has been ready since about June, but other commitments (some of them can be applied as decals to 1/144 F4D, F-14s, F-15Es and F-16s - if one would follow the Shelf Oddity trace) stood in the way of doing proper photos. The kit is F-Toys, sripped of the factory applied paint with the help of Wamod Acrylic Cleaner. Underneath the original paint you will see crisp panel lines, some fine details and loads of potential. The weakest part of the kit (or of all F-Toys kits in general) is the canopy. Recently Brengun began to release vac-formed replacements, so this is less of an issue. Gear doors in this kit had been replaced with prototype PE parts, some antennas added from the same fret, pitot and fin spike from Master. I scratch-built the main undercarriage legs, which ...kinda shows - I took the liberty of presenting only the photos that do not display this unwanted feature. Tail bumper-wheel were also scratchbuilt. The Danish art of mantainence was the desired end effect: RLM02 from Valejo used as base and Hataka Blue Line B025 Interior Green for extensive touch-ups. Selected touch-ups received glossy highlight. In 1/144 two additional layers of paint, applied with the brush produce some noticable bumps.... Some panel lines were accented, some smoke stains added (a little too much?)... The finished model goes like this: And well, that's it, really.

This has been on the shelf of procrastination for a few years but having got another detail fret from Daco at Telford, it is now finished. An out of the box build with Authentic cockpit decals. It took several attempts to get a good finish from the Daco (Xtracolour) paint; thinned, brushed and polished with micromesh. And a few of its sister, which has been on here before but I suspect the photos are in some lost bucket

I had intended to build this one in the Airfix GB but unfortunately this particular kit was first issued too late to be eligible. The aircraft is one of five Boeing 727s used on the Cape Town to Jo'Burg route by Comair but finished in full BA livery. Modifications include: Rear wing fences removed and new leading edge ones added Full size nose gear doors from plasticard Daco cockpit Top edge of #2 intake reshaped where it meets the fin Rear HF antenna from brass rod FDcals for the tail art / doors and Authentic Decals for cabin & cockpit windows. Paints used include Halfords Appliance White and Fiat Capri Blue, MC218 Aluminium (leading edges) and SM07 Chrome Silver (engines). Build thread here Anyway, enough words so here are a few photos and one with a DelftBlue 727-200 (the blue really is blue and not black!)

I bought this kit last year intending to build it in the De Havilland GB but.............. Not too many parts, though a couple of the smaller ones have disappeared from the sprue before it got into the box The above pictures were taken about a week ago and I now have the fuselage together There's quite a bit of flash to remove (not really an issue) and as others have noted, the plastic is quite rough and prone to odd "lumps" here and there. Apart from the fact that two of the 3 castellated engine exhausts are missing, the main problem looks like the wings. These will need some careful sanding on the insides to get them to fit together.

So having failed in this GB miserably, I am taking my place in this KUTA. Hope to get cracking soon.

Calling this finished, but waiting for nose probe to arrive, then it's finished! Pitroad kit with Retrokit skybolts and chaff dispensers

Its been a helluva 12 months, hospitalised for half of it, split up with my partner, moved house and then, Donald Trump. I finally feel like mangling styrene after a years layoff and thought I’d start small. Any smaller and I’d need a microscope. This will be OOB and that teeny canopy is going to test my shaky hand but it’ll be cool to get a model built again. Not sure about about which scheme, I’m favouring the tiger stripey one. Incidentally, the new issue has the instrument panels left off back in 2011 Paint wise I’ll be continuing my experiment to make my Mr El Cheapo pre-mixes from last year that worked pretty well on this beastie. Boxes: Sprues Amazingly good detail Decals and minute canopy I'll see y'all next week! A

Hi All, My plan for this Group Build is to use the 1/144 Eduard MiG-21MF Dual Combo kit and display a pair of Polish 21s over their home base of Lask: Not sure yet exactly which era or livery to set the models in but will probably build one of the pair in the two tone grey low viz camouflage as per kit instructions (circa 2002). Planning to glue an extract from Google maps onto a base and then use Perspex rod to depict the planes in flight. Regards Mike

Hello, Here is F-toys P-38 rebuilt and repainted as an Alaskan P-38G. Quick build, easy kit, highly recommended. Paints are Testors enamels with pastels for weathering. The background is the Mojave Desert. Thanks, David Muroc Models

OK a month to go on this GB so I will have a go at another model, seeing as the TU-104 is complete, bar a few aerials etc! I like the Amodel Russian subjects and they build into a decent representation of the real thing in my opinion. Here goes - quick pics so I can get cracking later today. Usual wobbly panel lines but its a simple looking kit and I think it will build quickly. Might use the Aeroflot kit decals, but not sure how good they are - anyone got any experience here? Windows I hope to fill with the Humbrol stuff if they are not too big - will do a test later. I have the Amodel Il-12 so I may build that alongside in a production line style! Again decals look questionable but what are the aftermarket options?