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Well seeing as I'm co-hosting I thought I had better declare my intention build wise for what promises to be another very popular and very enjoyable GB. As I mentioned in Dennis' ( @Corsairfoxfouruncle ) Bird Dog thread I have had an interest in the secret war in Laos ever since reading a truly fantastic book called "The Ravens" by Christoper Robbins which tells the tale of a group of American airmen and CIA operators who fought against overwhelming odds to support the local Hmong population in their struggle against the Pathet Lao and the North Vietnamese using nothing more than light aircraft and helicopters with the hottest ship available to them being the T-28. Armed with machine guns, rockets and bombs these armed trainers waged their own war against the fairly sophisticated weapons of the North Vietnamese, and not without success either. As it stands at the minute I am unsure as whether to build a T-28 flown by the Ravens or by the best pilot the Laotians had, a Hmong pilot by the name of Lee Lue who had an uncanny ability to place ordnance with pin point accuracy and had to show the USAF fast movers how to do things on several occasions when they had whizzed over a target in their multi million Dollar hi tech aircraft and missed the target and the Lee Lue would come along and roll his little T-28 into a dive pickle off one bomb and flatten the target. On to the kit. I will be building Roden's 1/48 T-28D Trojan which was released a few years ago and seems to be nicely moulded and perfectly adequately detailed for me, it actually comes with markings for the 606th Special Operations Squadron of the USAF based at Nakhom Phanom in Thailand used over "the trail" in the late 60's but I will leave that for someone else to build. Anyway here are the obligatory box and contents shots; The contents; The kit options; I do like the idea of that CIA one from the Congo but that is for another GB. My laptop is currently moving at the pace of an asthmatic snail with heavy shopping so updates might be a while in coming but don't worry I am really looking forward to getting started on this one as I have been wanting to do it for a long time. Thanks for looking in and as usual all comments and criticisms are gratefully received. Craig.

Jasta 18 Vol. 2 Raben's Ravens - 1:48 Pheon Decals Eduard 1:48 kits. August Raben took command of Jasta 18 im March 1918.Like many German commanders he sought to build an 'esprit de corps', and ordered the application of a striking livery to all of Jasta 18's aircraft. The noses back to the cockpit were painted in bright vermilion red, the rest of the fuselage back to the tail in white. The top of upper wing was in red, and later the top of the lower wing also. Some aircraft also received red lower surfaces of their wings. Each also had the symbol of a Raven (Raben in German) as a unit marking, and individual pilots chose their own marking to go alongside. Thus marked, Staffel Raben went to war and achieved notable success, with something between 112 and 126 victories by the time of the armistice seven months later. By this time they were equipped with the superb Fokker D.VII which were of course painted up in the flamboyant red and white scheme. This decal set from Pheon was released in 2013 and reviewed here. Ever since, I planned to build at least one of each aircraft type and with a few days off at Christmas have finally got around to completing the set. I would still like to add a couple more of the Fokker D.VII's to the line up if I can obtain the kits. The beauty of these 1:48 sets is that you can build several of them as I have done here, as they they don't take up much space. It reminded me how good the Eduard kits are as well, I still have quite a few in the stash and this project has got me building more of them now, after being diverted on to Wingnuts Wings 1:32 kits for several years. Pfalz D.IIIa - Ltn. Hans Muller Albatros D.Va - pilot and serial unknown Fokker Dr.I - 479/17, Ltn. August Raben Fokker D.VII (OAW) - serial unknown, Ltn. Hans Muller The only one I modified was the Albatros, as the Eduard kit has undercarriage legs that are too short, resulting in a 'dumpy' look to the way it sits. Details are at the end of this post. Nex up, I am working my way through Jasta 18. Berthold's Boys. A Pfalz is already under construction, and I have some Alabatros D.III's & D.V's waiting in the stash. Using a Wingnut Wings Alabtros as a reference, I measured the undercarriage legs in that kit, and converted the result from 1:32 to 1:48. This showed the Eduard 1:48 legs to be 3mm too short. It is not much but it makes a huge difference to the sit of the finished model. Lengthening them could have been problematical, as the upper position of the legs needs to remain as it is, in order to meet the fuselage mounts in the kit. Leaving them on the sprue in order to hold this position, I cut the lower 'U' shape off and inserted 2 3mm lengths of plastic strip. Left to harden, the extensions were later sanded flush and blended in. The work will later be mostly hidden by the undercarriage bungee cords that are wrapped around this area. Comparison with an unmodified kit (top) and the modified one (below). The difference is subtle, but very noticeable in real life. Happy new year everyone! John