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Showing results for tags 'Swiss'.
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Here's one I have been wanting to build for a while. Neat looking aircraft and 1923 fits the era perfectly. The profile...the box art scheme looks very nice. I'll start in on it tomorrow evening I hope. --John
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- Junkers F.13
- Swiss
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DH.100 Vampire FB.6 ‘Pinocchio Nose’ (SH72391) 1:72 Special Hobby The De Havilland DH.100 Vampire was built to fulfil a wartime requirement for a small, lightweight jet fighter for the Royal Air Force. Although the prototype aircraft flew almost two years before the end of the war, the production aircraft arrived too late to see service during the conflict. Despite this, well over 3,000 examples were produced overall and the aircraft enjoyed a relatively long service life by the standards of the day. Powered by a single De Havilland Goblin turbojet that was regularly upgraded, the diminutive and low-slung Vampire was capable of almost 550mph and had a service ceiling of over 40,000 ft. In common with many other fighters of the day, it was armed with four 20mm cannon, as reliable guided missiles weren’t yet in production. The prototypes for the F.3 were converted from F.1s, and around 300 brand-new airframes were constructed for the RAF as a single seat fighter, with a substantial number of those exported to Canada and Norway. It ran a Goblin Mk.II engine, which was replaced with a Mk.III. when the time came to upgrade the type to the FB.5 and the tropicalised variant the FB.9, both of which were based upon the FB.3 with improvements. The French Air Force took almost 100 FB.5s on charge at the end of the forties, which went straight into operational use. The FB.6 was powered by the Goblin III, and almost 600 airframes were built for the RAF, Switzerland who license built some of their own, and Sweden, where it was referred to as the J 28B. The Swiss airframes, some of which were later fitted with an extended nose cone that garnered the nickname ‘Pinocchio Nose’ were taken into service in 1949 and remained until the late 60s and early 70s. Some aircraft carried on as target drones or trainers until the 90s, but they were phased out of the fighter role rapidly due to the speed of development in aviation at the time, initially replaced by Hawker Hunters that also remained in service until the 1990s, when cracks were found in their wings, leading to a temporary lack of air to ground capability for the ever-so bellicose Swiss. The Kit This tooling originated in 2014, and is a reboxing with new parts and decals to depict the Swiss aircraft more accurately. The kit arrives in a small end-opening box with a painting of the most colourful decal option on the front, and profiles for all the decal options on the back. Inside the box are three sprues of grey styrene, a small fret of Photo-Etch (PE) brass, a bag of grey resin parts, the decal sheet and instructions that are printed in colour on glossy paper in an A5 portrait form. Detail is excellent, with crisp engraved panel lines, raised and recessed features, and cleverly engineered intakes for the Goblin engine that double as spars. Construction begins with the cockpit, starting with the floor and adding the rear bulkhead and head armour, with a choice of a simple WWII style seat or the Martin Baker ejection seat that was fitted from 1960 onwards. There are decals for the traditional seat that could be reused for the ejection seat, although whether they’re accurate or not, you’ll need to check. The control column is planted in the floor in front of the pilot, and the instrument panel with gunsight and dial decal is inserted into two slots at the front. The floor is then glued into the lower fuselage nacelle along with the engine front that is crisply moulded into the bulkhead, with the engine rear dropped into the front of the exhaust trunking that is moulded into the fuselage. The upper fuselage is painted and has a pair of equipment boxes inserted into the cockpit area, then the fuselage halves are closed, adding either the shorter nose, or the longer Pinocchio nose that was fitted in 1980 to many airframes still in service. You are also advised to insert additional weight into the nose, although a number isn’t given. The elevator panel is prepared with a pair of balance horns, while the wing halves are glued together after painting the intake trunking area silver before they are installed on the sides of the fuselage nacelle, using the curved trunking section as a short spar, and filling the remaining gap with the intake inserts, which have vertical splitters moulded into them, and wingtips slotted into the open ends of the wings. The booms are both made from two halves split vertically, and they are inserted into the holes in the trailing edges of the wings with the elevator panel trapped between the two fins. Some decal options have a resin antenna under the port boom, while others do not. The main gear legs are single parts with a captive bay door and two-part wheel with hub, adding the outer doors on their hinges, then retraction jacks linking them to the inside of the bay. The nose gear leg is similarly a single part with two-part wheel that is trapped in place by fitting the starboard half of the yoke to the leg. The highly visible nose bay door at the front differs between nose variants, while the sideways opening rear door is common, both attaching to the sides of the bay on their hinges. Sitting the model on its own three wheels allows you to glue the windscreen in place at the front of the cockpit, and the sliding canopy behind, which you can leave open should you wish. There is an optional decal that runs down the side that was fitted from 1960 onwards, so check the profiles for details. There is a choice of things to hang under the wings that includes a pair of resin tanks that have a small rear section added, plus two resin supports, and a diagram that shows their correct location just outboard of the wheel bays. The other option is two pairs of unguided rockets that are fitted to the inner wing panels either side of the fuselage, and have four PE stabilising fins each that fit into recesses at the rear of the rockets. Markings Whilst there are only four decal options on the sheet, there are alternative colours provided for the candy-striped aircraft, as the orange was later repainted to red. From the box you can build one of the following: FB.6 J-1082, Zielfliegerkorps 5 (Aerial Target Corps) at Sion, Flugwaffe (Swiss Air Force), 1980s FB.6 J-1156, local build airframe with a British built engine, Emmen, Flugwaffe (Swiss Air Force), 1984 FB.6 J-1154, 2 Sqn., Dubendorf, Flugwaffe (Swiss Air Force), 1980s FB.6 J-1010, 2 Sqn., Dubendorf, Flugwaffe (Swiss Air Force), 1964 The decals appear to be printed using the same digital processes as Eduard are now using, and have good registration, sharpness, and colour density, with a thin gloss carrier film cut loosely around the printed areas. I mention Eduard because from 2021, the carrier film on their decals can be coaxed away from the printed part of the decal after they have been applied, effectively rendering them carrier film free, making the completed decals much thinner and more realistic, and obviating the need to apply successive coats of clear varnish to hide the edges of the carrier film. It’s a great step further in realism from my point of view, and saves a good quantity of precious modelling time into the bargain. Conclusion Having not seen one of Special Hobby’s 1:72 Vampires before, the level of detail is impressive, and the Pinocchio nose takes it away from the norm, as do the Swiss decal options, especially the colourful striped airframe. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of
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HI Britmodellers, I am excited to present a build of the Airfix 1/48 Vampire with the brand new WellsProp conversion kit to make an FB.6. After the great success of the FB.1 conversion WellsProp hat offered another drop in conversion which allows us to make some seriously cool Swiss airframes... I'll be using the Matterhorn Circle decal set to make J-1102 with a sharkmouth. This marking was added at the end of her long service life. As you see this means we will also be fading the dayglo orange. The decals were available from Hannants and the sheet covers multiple subjects - the below is just a hint. The FB.6 involved a new nose and was also upgraded with Martin Baker ejection seats. These are provided as direct replacement for the kit parts. The quality is really nice and WellsProp's parts fit very nicely into the kit. You also get the late wheels. I have cleaned the mould release agent off using dish soap in this image. As 3D printed parts it's important to do this. I only had to fettle the locating hole in the nose undercarriage bay a little to get the kit to accept the new cockpit. Here's a dry run without the undercarriage bay parts: The new seat meant moving it further back and hence the cockpit has an inset. It's easy to cut a small amount from the kit upper fuselage to account for this. Looking forward to progressing this one.
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Howdy! I am getting ready to build the Tamiya 1/48 Bf 109G-6, kit 61117 and I want to paint do it in Swiss markings. I already have a decal set for it, but need some help figuring out what colors to use for the upper surfaces. The aircraft I am doing is marked J-704. Apparently, this aircraft had an experimental camo scheme applied by the Swiss. It is a green and brown(ish) scheme, but the decal set doesn't indicate what colors they were. All of the photos I can find are of the original German scheme, pre-accident. So, does anyone here know what colors were used? Thanks a bunch in advance. Brett G
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Hi there, Recently I bought the Revell 1:48 Swiss Hornet kit, and according to the instructions I should mix two paints for both upper and lower outer surfaces (Revell 371+374 in two different blends). I'm not keen on mixing paints, so anyone for the official FS or RAL numbers? Cheers, Rob
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Here I present my Swiss A320 built using the Zvezda kit. The kit is OOB except for the decals being from DrawDecal and the Sharklets from BraZ. This was one of my first builds getting back in to the hobby, so apologies if it’s not the best with detail etc. I am missing the Antennas which I may add now that I have some better tools and patience 😂. The Zvezda A320 kit along with the A321 is a great one, as you get the option for flaps extended or retracted, and it comes with different landing gear options to simulate the lack of suspension applied to them when the Aircraft is on finals. The model is painted using Halfords Appliance White, Greys are a variety of Revell Aqua Colours. Red for the tail was Revell Red. I went for the flap extended option on this model, but want to get more tips/practice with ‘weathering’ for the wings etc, as it’s not something I have done before. Would be good to find out what others do to achieve this effect? The decals fitted the model excellently and would have been complimented by AA decals to give that extra ‘real’ effect. Overall I am quite happy with a ‘simple’ livery build for building up experience etc. Thank you for looking and as always any feedback is greatly appreciated. Alistair
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Hello all, Kit Manufacture: Revell Scale: 1/72 Type: Agusta A-109 K2 Extras used: None, built out of the box Paints and colours used: Stynylrez Grey Primer; Tamiya X-2 Gloss White, Tamiya X-17 Pink; MRP-184 Signal Red; Mr Hobby GX100 Superclear III Other info: prolonged build time as lost the mojo for the build halfway through Build thread: here 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 01 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 02 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 03 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 04 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 05 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 06 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 07 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 08 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 09 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 10 by Neal, on Flickr 1-72 Revell A-109 K2 REGA 11 by Neal, on Flickr
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- Air Ambulance
- Swiss
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Hi everyone, This kit was given to me by my brother in law for Christmas, it is going to be air ambulance as I have a soft spot for these choppers seeing that I am a Paramedic, Helimed have helped me out more than once on a bad job. So I'm quite keen to try and do a decent job of this kit.First update is going to be the usual box, instructions, decals and sprue shots:The box with a nice piece of artwork:IMG_1061 by Neal, on FlickrInstructions in the usual Revell layout and their normal pain in the backside paint call outs:IMG_1062 by Neal, on FlickrIMG_1063 by Neal, on FlickrIMG_1064 by Neal, on FlickrIMG_1065 by Neal, on FlickrIMG_1066 by Neal, on FlickrA small sheet of decals:IMG_1067 by Neal, on FlickrThe sprue, not much flash on this kit compared to my previous EC-135, nice level of detail too for a small scale:IMG_1068 by Neal, on FlickrIMG_1069 by Neal, on FlickrIMG_1070 by Neal, on FlickrIMG_1071 by Neal, on FlickrSo I've already made a start on the build but will wait a bit to an update as I really need to finish my "Planes on a pole" sig entry before getting carried away with new builds.Take it easy guys.Neal
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- Helicopter
- Air Ambulance
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My second Bf 109 in foreign markings, the first one was a Finnish 109G-2. I built this Hobby Boss kit in the span of 5 days, the build itself taking an afternoon thanks to the use of acrylics and the good fit of all the parts. The Swiss markings came from Aeromaster's 1:48 sheet "Foreign 109s" in 1:48, designed in 1997 for the Hasegawa Bf 109G-2/G-6. The fuselage band came as a decal, and I was a bit aprehensive of using it because I didn´t know if it would conform well to the model. Much to my surprise, it did conform without issues. Here are the photos:
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- hobby boss
- messerschmitt bf 109g-6
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Another project, another Bf 109 in 1:48. This time is a Bf 109G-6 in Swiss colours, which didn't differ much between the regular Luftwaffe ones except for the use of the white cross over red backgrounds. Decals will come from Aeromaster's 1:48 "Foreign 109s." The Aeromaster sheet ins from 1997, so it was designed for the Hasegawa G-6. I hope the red band is able to cover the spine of the Hobby Boss kit without issues. Photos: Box:
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I can't quite tell from the pictures that I have found, but does anyone know, of the captured Luftwaffe or Swiss P-51B Mustangs (or even other a/c types for that matter), when they were repainted, would the original english stenciling / data have been left on and in any places where they were painted over, would they have been replaced in either Country's own language?
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I'd been thinking 100% that the next plane on my to-do list was going to be a Gloster Javelin but my hand got swayed into plucking this from the stash. The Swiss Air Force get an A+ for their instagram feed - this appeared on my recommendations list just before I went to the retrieve the Javelin from the loft and jumped another kit to the head of the queue I can't recall why I had this - something makes me think it was added to another order as it took it over the 'free delivery' line and was cheaper than paying the delivery charge. Let's see how it builds up - looks straightforward enough albeit with some oddities
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- Hobby Boss
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Could anyone help me with the civil livery of the Kondor E.IIIa in Switzerland? The aircraft was in service of Comte Mittelholzer & Co., later Ad Astra from 1919. I have a kit of this aircraft by Choroszy Modelbud whose painting instructions say the plane's fuselage was red overall. However photographs I've found on Swiss websites suggest otherwise: http://www.e-pics.ethz.ch/index/ethbib.bildarchiv/ETHBIB.Bildarchiv_LBS_SR02-10104_461877.html http://www.swissair00.ch/kondor-e.iiia.html From the topside of the wing and the rudder it's clear that the rest of the aircraft was some other colour. Any information on the livery would be much appreciated!
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F/A-18C Hornet Swiss Air Force 1:48 Revell The F/A-18 Hornet was developed by McDonnell Douglas and Northrop from Northrop's YF-17 prototype in the 1970's for use by the US Navy and marine Corps as a carrier capable multirole fighter jet. Northrop's YF-17 was initially a design for the US Air Force and McDonnell Douglas were brought in to make it carrier capable following their success with the F-4 Phantom. In the late 1980's Switzerland after evaluation decided the F/A-18 was the aircraft to equip its Air Force. The aircraft was designed for carrier operations so it was felt a good fit for operations from short runways with steep takeoffs. The aircraft were to be built locally at Emmen. Due mainly to cost implications and some noise abatement problems the Swiss Air Force only works office hours. The Kit On opening the box you are greeted by Monograms old F-18 kit. The fuselage including the wings are split top & bottom with 3 additional parts trees. Construction starts with the cockpit. A basic 4 part NACES ejection seat is constructed and added to the cockpit tub along with an instrument panel, control stick and engine controls. A pilot figure is provided if you wish to use him. Once complete the cockpit is installed in the top fuselage half. The fuselage halves can then be joined together making sure the tail plane parts and the engine parts are installed first. The two tail planes are joined and the instructions indicate glue is not to be used in order that they can move. Following this the nose is added and the intake parts on both sides. Next the vertical tails are added along with an arrestor hook, airbrake, and various antennas. The landing gear and gear doors are then added. Due to the design of the landing gear it does contain quite a few parts and these will need to be carefully assembled to get the aircraft to sit right. Finally the pylons can be added. Sidewinders are supplied for the wing tip rails if you want to use them. However the aircraft regularly fly completely clean or with just a centre line fuel tank. The outer pylons should not be used as these are not correct for Swiss aircraft. Decals The decals are the star of this re-release. The design is by Daco Products of Belgium and they are printed in Italy for Revell. The modeller is given two choices of markings from the Swiss Air Force. It should also be noted that the IFF antenna on the nose, and the ID light on the left nose as used by the Swiss Air Force are not included in the model and will have to be sourced by the modeller. 18 Staffel "Panthers". 17 Staffel "Falcons". Conclusion The kit is fairly old now and this shows in the tooling. However the alternatives can be expensive. This kit is a cost effective way to add a Swiss F/A-18 to your collection, with a little work required. Revell model kits are available from all good toy and model retailers. For further information visit or
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Just finished Airfix's latest, and what a superb little kit it turned out to be. No fit issues, a little filler required here and there, a nice cockpit and a wonderfully thin canopy. It captures the sit-up-and-beg look of the real Vampire T.11 perfectly, and the method for attaching the wings and booms has banished all memories of misaligned tailbooms on other Vampire kits permanently. It will not be the last Airfix Vampire that crosses my bench, that's for sure. Hmm... Norway... Kit built out of the box with addition of masking tape seatbelts. Painted with Vallejo Model Air (first time- very impressed) Aluminium and varnished with Alclad matt clear lacquer. Decals by Bright Spark.
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Good evening to all. This is my latest creation I just finished for now. Maybe in a couple of months I will consider to do so wash or dirty it a bit. But in general I like my airliners clean so I might as well leave it like it is. The livery decals are home designed and printed. Windows, doors, warning signs and coroguard are from the excellent Daco airbus decal set. The Pitot tubes, AOA sensors, antennas and winglets are from the photoetched set from the same set. Enjoy. George