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Time sure flies, when you're having fun. So here today - 5 days before 'take-off' I present my topic for this Group Build. Hasegawa's 1/48 P-38J w/Eduard etc and Kagero decals: I'll be starting this on friday the 6'th of june and I be having 'The Longest Day' on the telly as further inspiration! I'm really looking forward to this! Cheers - and may your glue never dry out! Hans J

Even though I'm knee deep in Tomcats right now, I thought it would be rude not to get involved with this GB! So am going with this fella...completely OOB in the D-Day markings option. Cheers, Dermot

This is the kit I have been working towards for a while now. I saw it quite a few months ago but thought, because I hadn't built any plane kits for over twenty years or so, that I ought to practice on something smaller/cheaper in case I messed it up. Well I've practiced on three 1/72 and (currently) one 1/48 Spitfires and, in a week or so's time, I'm going to hopefully start this one. I've read a lot about how good this kit is and, when I noticed that this group build was coming up and there were decals for Jerry Billing's Spitfire included in the box, I thought it was the right time to have a go at it. Jerry Billing, a Canadian pilot, flew the original aircraft, of the kit I'm going to build, on 7th June 1944 and there's a good article about him below - the link to which was kindly passed to me by JackG: http://www.clubhyper.com/reference/jerrybillingbs_1.htm Anyway here's the kit in all it's glory - the first one I've built that includes PE. I know most people on BM will have seen the kit before but I'm too excited not to include the photos of everything! Jerry's Spitfire's markings: I can't wait to get started on this! Kind regards

My next build will be the M4 Sherman 75mm Normandy and configured as: Co. C, 70th Tank Battalion, Utah Beach, Normandy, France, D-Day 1944 (later modified to the 37th TB, 4th AD, Brittany, France 1944)

Just to prove that I have put a finished model onto a base he's one I made earlier. Tamiya Cromwell IV with the Crew from the Churchill for effect The base came in at a phenomenal cost of about £1.50 admittedly, a few years ago, but the sea-foam moss was the biggest expense. Ah! those were the days......

Can anyone please answer the following queries I have about softskin vehicles in the Normandy area June 1944? - Did the British Army have any U.S. softskin vehicles such as Half Tracks, GMC 6x6 etc., at Normandy? If yes, were these vehicles repainted in British Army green (Mickey Mouse?) or did they remain in US Army Green The British did have DUKW's but were these repainted or did they remain in US colours? Grateful for any constructive assistance here as I'm not very knowledgeable on this subject but I have quite a few vehicles to paint for a D-Day dio. At present I plan to paint the British Vehicles with Vallejo 71012 Dark Green and the U.S vehicles with Vallejo 71016 (RLM 73) US Dark Green. cheers Mike

Douglas Boston IIIa 'Over D-Day Beaches' 1:72 Special Hobby The Boston / Havoc was relatively fast, manoeuvrable and rugged. That coupled with the fact that it had no real handling vices, it was well liked by aircrew. The aircraft was born from a USAAC specification for an attack aircraft in 1937. Douglas designed the Model 7a powered by two 1100hp P&W Twin Wasp engines in competition with North American, Stearman and Martin. Despite its manoeuvrability and speed, there were no orders made initially from the US, but there was interest from France. Overlooking the ‘Neutrality Act of 1935’ development continued with support from France and an initial order was made by them of 270 aircraft. With the collapse of France in 1940, the aircraft that had been delivered were shipped to North Africa, but fell under the control of the Vichy government although never got much use against the Allies. The remainder of the order was sent to the UK. The Boston I was underpowered at 1050hp using P&W Wasps and lacked the range needed for daylight operations in to Germany. The Boston II brought further power from the Wasp engine delivering 1200hp, but the Boston III was a major improvement and was brought in to service with the RAF in the summer of 1941. Using Wright Cyclone engines of 1600hp, it had much larger fuel tanks important for the ‘Light Bomber’ missions the RAF needed from it and better armour protection. Amongst its first combat missions, 99 & 226 Squadrons took part in an attack against the German warships Scharnhorst, Prinz Eugen and Gneisenau which were returning to German ports from Brest in Feb 1942 in what has become known as the ‘Channel Dash’. In 1943, 342 Sqn (Free French) became the fourth squadron to operate the type. Under the control of the 137th Wing of the 2nd Tactical Air Force along with 88 & 107 squadrons, they focussed on bombing targets in Northern France including coastal defences, communications and German Airfields. Bostons were also used in the night intruder role across Europe and in Northern Africa contributing to the fall of German occupied Tunisia in May 1943. In all, 13 RAF squadrons operated the Boston with a further two SAAF squadrons supporting the North African front. The kit The A-20 series of aircraft from MPM have been around since 2007 following the first release of the A-20G with its solid nose. The first ‘glass nosed’ British / French kit came in the guise of the later Mk.IV/V. Having built this kit, it was very impressed with the quality of both detail and general fitment and it builds up in to a beautiful rendition of the Boston. There were a few minor issues I had to deal with and I’ll pick them up later. This new Boston III under the ‘Special Hobby’ brand differs most notably from the later version by having a rear gun opening rather than the Martin turret as well as a panelled nose glazing. On opening the kit, you’re presented with 5 medium grey sprues, one clear sprue and a resin one containing the smoke laying tubes used on some aircraft. Detailing on the parts is extremely well done. The fine smaller parts are exactly that, very fine and well detailed. Surface finish is superb, finely recessed panel lines leave you in no doubt as to the quality of the kit. I can’t see any signs of sink marks and flash is minimal. The instruction booklet is A5 in size printed on good quality gloss paper with colour throughout. The steps are clearly drawn and easy to follow. Assembly starts with the cockpit and rear gun station interiors. Detail here is more than adequate for the most part. Separate side wall detail is supplied to enhance the detail in the cockpit. The only thing that is lacking is the dingy that resides behind the pilot which if you decide to leave the canopy open will be an obvious omission. I made one out of rolled up tissue paper for the mk.IV I built soaked in Kleer before painting which gave a good representation when complete. Assembly of the engine rear nacelles comes next. Again, more than enough detail is presented both internally and externally. With the interior complete, they are simply fitted in to the fuselage halves before sealing them up. Be aware at this point, the kit is a tail sitter (guess how I know? !!). An instruction included for a 10g weight at the front but there isn’t much room. My suggestion would be to include more weight located below the dingy stowage which is a little further backwards but much more room to house it. There will be a little space in the nose section below the floor later in the build, but better to have too much than too little! As mentioned previously, surface detail on the fuselage is very refined with finely recessed panel lines and the fabric effect on the rudder subtly represented. The carburettor intakes above the wings come as separate parts and fitment is good. Quality of surface detail on the wings mirrors that of the fuselage in terms of quality. Assembly of the engines and cowlings comes next. Be careful here on which version you want to build as two variants have the type with exhausts protruding through the cowling covers, whist the other two have the exhausts backed together in a ring behind the cowling. For the former, the small exhausts protruding from the cowlings are individually fitted which is a little time consuming and fiddly to place accurately as per the instructions, but look good once in place. Both banks of cylinders are provided with good representation of the cooling gills on each cylinder block and a separate gearbox. Assembly of the gear is again a little fiddly due to the framework that has to be assembled for the main legs to sit on. My recommendation here is to dry fit the nacelle around the assembly before the glue dries to make sure that it doesn’t foul correct fitment of the nacelle once everything has hardened. I found fitting the clear parts to be a little problematic on my previous build. Having heard of others who had the same issue, be prepared in case this arises in your build albeit a different version but the same configuration. The windscreen on mine didn’t quite align to the contours of the fuselage and I ended up snapping it on the Mk.IV trying to bend it under hot water. The nose part was also a little difficult to align to the main fuselage, so I’d recommend plenty of dry fitting before you insert the floor part in to the glass section to see how it all lines up. The issues I had could well of been self- induced on the glass nose, but looking at it on the shelf now, everything looks well. The floor section within the nose includes the side panel details and an additional bomb sight and seat is supplied too. The rear gun station instructions are leaving me a little confused. The drawings show the guns to be positioned protruding rearwards over the top of the fuselage, but the clear part is supplied in the ‘closed’ position. I can’t see how this will work unless you cut away the clear section that opens up on the real aircraft. The rest of the detail pretty much ‘bolts’ on to the built aircraft including gun side blisters, aerials, props, wheels and gear doors. The interior of the gear doors and opening canopy section are nicely detailed too. If you decide to do the version with the smoke generators, the resin parts are fitted to the lower fuselage bomb bay doors. The decals Four schemes are provided in the kit, all from the D-Day period as you would expect from the title! They are printed by Aviprint. Register is good as is colour richness. I don’t remember any issues affixing them on my earlier build. The schemes are: 1. BZ264 / RH-B – 88 Sqn RAF operating from RAF Hartford Bridge, Hampshire 1944 2. BZ389 / RH-E – As above but with smoke generators (Operation Starkey) – operated as decoy to D-Day plans 3. BZ208 / OA-G – 342 ‘Lorraine’ Sqn sporting French roundels – RAF Hartford Bridge July 1944 4. Unknown serial / OA-A – 342 ‘Lorraine’ Sqn sporting British roundels – RAF Hartford Bridge July 1944 Conclusion Having built the Mk.IV version a couple of years ago, I can thoroughly recommend this kit if you’re wanting to build a Boston. The detail and generally assembly is good but watch for the few issues I mentioned with the clear parts. MPM also do a coloured etch set to accompany this if you prefer a little more detail, but the basic kit looks good without. Review sample courtesy of

After a short break from posting due to moving house I decided to take on the New tool of the airfix dakota , this was also my first stab at using Humbrol Acrylics and although the colours were spot on I still prefer the tamiya. The actual kit went together well and despite the over complicated wing roots and lack of cockpit detail I decided not to go for any after markrt bits and went with it OOB. I also tried the Humbrol decal solution and am glad to say its excellent

Hello all, I recently acquired the Spitfire/Typhoon D-Day combination package. For those of you who aren't familiar with it, Academy has re-boxed the Typhoon Mk. Ib and Spitfire Mk. XIV with new decals. My question is does anyone have any experience with the newer decals Academy has been packing in their kits? I had a heck of a time (as most would expect) with my previous kits from the Korean manufacturer. I am hoping to hear that they have corrected their thickness issues, but not holding out for awesome feedback.

I don't build tanks, but this kit is a present of a good friend who did not know that I don't build tanks and this GB is a good chance to deviate into the new territory Airfix kit is a nice little set with good level details for the scale and almost perfect fit. I spent about half an hour and he vehicle is half done:

Just seen the announcement on PMMS here it just gets better and better

Here is my rendition of the 16AA Bde Gate Guardian - a C-47 re-furbed and painted to depict KG374 as she looked on D-Day. I sourced the fuselage codes from KitsWorld, but they ended up being too wide in relation to the D-Day stripes compared to the real deal. They're the right height and the D-Day stripes are accurate, it is apparent that the codes on the real gate guardian are narrower, so i have opted for a compromise - just the 'YS' codes. The Italeri kit provides the KG374 decals as black, which I settled for instead of red, and other photos I've seen show KG374 with just the 'YS' codes forward of the fuselage roundel. The roundel white was rather see-through unfortunately. I decided not to accentuate the panel lines with a wash as it wouldn't look right (esp after the Airfix Dakota-Gate!). So, without further ado, here she is. The real plane;

Hi all, unwilling to learn I will start two builds in this GB. First is the Tamiya P-47D with Zotz decals. Otherwise OOB. So chances are good this shake-and-bake will be finished in time: The other build will be Eduard Typhoon with Alley Cat resin enhancements. And although I am not sure I can finish it in time I just have to enter a british subject... Rene

Landing Craft Assault LCA Used to land 47 (Royal Marine) Commando, 4th Special Service Brigade on Gold Beach Operation Neptune, Normandy, 6 June 1944. Armageddon 1/72 On D-Day, LCAs were used to land troops on Juno Beach, Gold Beach, and Sword Beach. Royal Navy manned LCAs also landed the elite US infantry formations on either flank of Omaha Beach and the Rangers who assaulted Pointe du Hoc. The westernmost landings by US forces on Utah Beach and the pre-dawn landing on Îles Saint-Marcouf were also conducted from LCAs. FredT 7 Cdo landed on Gold Beach at 09:50 hours on the 6 June. Five of the LCAs were sunk by mines and beach obstacles with the loss of 76 of the 420 men in the Commando. These losses delayed their advance to the primary objective the port of Port-en-Bessin. Leaving the beaches after noon they fought through La Rosiere and dug in around Escures for the night prior to their planned assault on Port-en-Bessin on the 7 June. Most available landing craft kits seem to focus on the ubiquitous US LCVP and LCM3 designs used by US troops. However it was the more sophisticated British LCA that was used by British and Commonwealth troops on D-Day, as well as being used to land the elite US units that were expected to encounter more difficult beach conditions. Kits of the LCA are relatively hard to come by and this "Armageddon" branded kit by the French firm Mach2 is not cheap. As with all Mach2 kits it is a short run mould which requires a lot of tidying up to complete, but builds into a nice example of this very important vessel type. The Thorneycroft LCA alongside a US LCVP Higgins Boat:

Sherman "Crab" Tank 1st Lothians and Borders Yeomanry, 30th Armoured Brigade, 79th Armoured Division "Hobarts Funnies" Operation Neptune, Normandy, 6 June 1944. Airfix 1/76 Amongst the first Allied units to hit the beaches on D-Day were the specialist vehicles of the 79th Armoured Division, including the Sherman Flail Tank, designed to clear the way through the beach obstacles and minefields for the landing infantry to advance. This is the Airfix kit with some very minor modfications. Its not a very accurate model, but conveys the general idea!

Grumman TBM-1c Avenger II, 855 Sqn Fleet air Arm, RNAS Donibristle / detached to RAF Hawkinge & Thorney Island Operation Neptune, conducting D-Day anti-submarine and anti shipping sweeps, 6 June 1944. Academy 1/72 with own decals As perhaps to be expected, my 70th Anniversary builds project hits a crescendo this month with the anniversaries of D-Day. Amongst a number of builds I have completed, is this Academy 1/72 Avenger as a Fleet Air Arm aircraft providing anti shipping cover over the beaches and along the English Channel on D-Day. Academy's TBM 1/72 Avenger kit owes much to the old FROG kit (many of its parts are interchangeable and it includes a FROG stand!), but is a much nicer build with excellent fit and nicely engraved detail. It also has a marginally more detailed cockpit (just). Better still, it has the British-style domed cockpit side windows. I've only made a few minor changes to this one, mainly in the cockpit, plus a set of decals complied from the FROG kit, the spares box and home-made - the cartoon character was inkjet-printed from a profile found online. The build was very straightforward - no filler needed, but the cowling needed a little more sanding than expected. FredT

Just seen this and I can't wait! Apart from the 1/72 Lightning bonanza that 2014 seems it will be (for me definitely), i'm glad that this Beaufughter/Spit Mk.IX set is on the way. Not very often that I find justification to shell out an arm and a leg on a new Hasegawa boxing. Wonder which side of 50 squid this will be? http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10262265 Mart

Just bought this at WH Smiths. It is full of photos and squadron/aircraft marking details. I like the layout as the publishers have made separate chapters for the various elements pertaining to D-Day, namely: - The invasion stripes - Fighters and fighter bombers - RAF units and aircraft (with order of battle) and colour profiles - 'Jammers' and 'Spoofers' - Ghost invasion fleets - Operation 'Titanic' - Air medical evacuation -The heavies -Tactical reconnaissance and the 'Air Spotting Pool' Could be a useful resource for the upcoming D-Day group build? Mike

Kit: 1/72 Academy Hawker Typhoon Ib. Extras: CMK Vacu Canopy, Eduard Photo Etch, Vailant Resin Rockets and Rails Decals: Carpena (Code Letters), Techmod (Roundels), Serials and Stencils from the kit. Thanks for your interest.