Search the Community

Whilst researching a friend's father-in-law's service record (see my earlier Halifax question) I came across these abbreviations which I cannot identify. 10 SOS, Reception Centre Blackpool. What's SOS? After that he went to 2W 23. No idea at all here! His Wireless training was at 2 Signals School. I can't find a record of it. His gunnery training was with 5 AGS. According to records it didn't form. Any help greatly appreciated.

Hi, I started it last July, finished yesterday. This is Frog mould of He 115 C produced now by Revell, I converted it into He 115 N of Norway. The conversion (WIP thread) was presented here:http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235006240-norwegian-he-115-in-172/. The photo of this machine, which inspired me to construct it is that one: There is also a thread in WWII part on caputred in England ex-Norwegian He-115s http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/63595-captured-heinkel-115/&page=4 where Mr. Kjetil Akra was kind to present some illustrations from his not issued yet book on He-115. I appreciete very much his great help in details of differences between Norwegian He 115 and German He 115 C. The main part of conversion was in engines and front glazing. I not exactly followed the scheme in profiles of Kjetil, since for me the at the photo above some non-regular Norwegian national insignia is overpainted hastitly on the top of fin. Moreover I see the dark green spatches on wing near fuselage and they are not present on profile. The spatches on left wing are my "licence poetica" but I think they are in logic of Norwegian patterns which you may see on Hover MF 11 as well. Here is the results: Photos are taken with bulb light, now I wil have to wait until week-end to do day light at home. When I go work in morning it is still a bit too dark, when I came back it is dark again.... Comments welcome Cheers Jerzy-Wojtek P.S. from Saturday, the 11th Feb 2017 Below are addditional, day light photos which I promised :): Thank you for watching J-W

Hi Everyone, Just managed to get some photo`s of my very latest effort, which I hope you don`t mind me sharing Special Hobby`s 1/48 Airspeed Oxford built from their `Royal Navy` Boxing Finished in the second marking option from the box to represent an `Oxbox` of the Far East Indies Fleet and based at various locations including: .....Tambaram, India and Puttalam, Katukurunda in Ceylon ( according to the instruction leaflet ) Built 99% OOB with just ignition harness and aerial wires added........ ..although, after establishing that there was no way of seeing them, I did away with the fiddley photo-etched seat mounts and put them on little blocks of wood instead One of the easiest SH kits I`ve ever made with very little filling and sanding involved. Hope you enjoy, thanks for looking Cheers Russ

Tamiya 1/48 Sturmtiger vignette under construction. Just to add the keep off/out tape and paint the huge projectile.

Hi everyone, Just found time, so I hope you don`t mind seeing some shots of my latest effort My attempt at AZ`s 1/48 `Lily` Finished to represent an aircraft of: 8th Sentai, 3rd Chutai, Burma, 1942 Built mostly from the box contents except for the nose gun barrel which I lost somewhere along the road Added ignition harness from wire, aerials, seat belts and................. pitot tube. Wasn`t too bad a build, a big improvement over their Vengeance which was the last one of theirs I tried. Hope you enjoy,thanks for looking Cheers Russ

STEEL Seatbelts (Various) 1:48 & 1:72 Eduard Here's the latest batch of the newish STEEL seatbelts from Eduard. In case you don't already know, they are Photo-Etch (PE) steel, and because of their strength they can be etched from thinner material, which improves realism and flexibility in one sitting. Coupled with the new painting method that adds perceived extra depth to the buckles and other furniture by shading, they are more realistic looking and will drape better than regular brass PE. Seatbelts Italy WWII Fighters (FE826) Contains two sets of belts including the twin shoulder and single lap belt, with optional rear section. Seatbelts Italy WWII Fighters (SS594) in 1:72 Confusingly labelled as both 1:72 and 1:48 on the package, when in fact the 1:72 labelling is correct. This set contains three sets of belts including the twin shoulder and single lap belt, with optional rear section. Seatbelts France WWII (FE839) Three sets of four-point harnesses are included, with an optional central fifth point with buckle and alternate left lap strap minus the buckle found on the 4-point version. SE.5a Seatbelts Early (FE843) Two sets of belts for the famous WWI fighter, with diagrams showing where the laces attach on the airframe. Seatbelts Soviet Union WWII Fighters (FE846) Two sets each of Yakovlev and Lavochkin designed seatbelts for their respective fighters, each with four-point harness and buckles. Seatbelts France WWI (FE852) During WWI three types of belt were used up until 1916, with two of each type supplied. Two other types were used throughout the war, and again, two of each type are included, totalling 10 sets of belts, which is quite generous. You will need to supply the thin wire that connects the belt loops to the airframe, which is described in a scrap diagram in the instructions. Review sample courtesy of

My build of the 1/72 Huma kit. Largely OOB, apart from the interior framing and outsize swastika from a Microscale sheet.

Hi, Back to my Germans shelf. I would like to share with photos of Heinkel He 46 E. This is a scratch conversion from He 46 C version, by AML, 1/72. The main difference is in engine - He 46 E has 14 cylider Gnome-Rhone engine, 3 blade propeller and NACA cowling whereas in "C" version it was 9 cylinder single row radial without any cowling and with 2 blades propeller. There was a variety of painting scheme and patterns of Hungarians He 46, which was in use during whole WWII in Hungary as main tactical recconesance airplane. Mine presents machine from 1st Recce Sq. of Hungarian Air Forces during war against Yugoslavia (6th -18th April 1941). Those days they painted cowlings and tails in yellow. Later in 1941, soon after German attack on Soviet Union (22 June 1941) they changed the national insignia into black square with white cross. Perhaps it would be interesting to recall, in context of Hungarian share in attack on Yugoslavia , that Hungarian prime minister Pal Teleki committed suicide on 3rd April 1941 in protest against forcing his country by Germans to joint this war ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pál_Teleki)... Regarding my model - I am not sure about the colours I used. You may find different shades and different patterns on various profiles. Photos. I've seen. all were BW/ I made her in rather lighter shades. The code (F.306) I made as red overspayed green - I've seen a photo or profile like that. In net there is a photo of F.316, where code number colour looks like red if you compare to red part of tri colour triangle of national insignia. However, majority of photos of Hungarian He 46 E showed very dark (black) letterings (the most of photos and profiles depicts F.303) but for earlier period, without yellow elements and with less regular camo. I supposed, that airplanes were repainted (how many times?) during exploitation. Squadron emblems are free-hand paint on decal. Comments welcome Regards Jerzy-Wojtek

Hi Next "odd and old" German - Dornier Do 18. Kit by Revell (named D-2/G-1) rebox of former Matchbox. The kit is not very accurate (as was already discussed several times I think on BM). The main flaw is that In real thing variants D-2 and G-1 had different noses (G-1 more sharp or "cruiser-like") and side-floats (G-1 larger) as well as engines and turret, whereas the plastic parts are the same in box (except the turret). After looking on photos I came to conclusion that side-floats are rather that of D variant but the nose is neither of them (but closer to G). So I decided to do D-3 variant, which from what I've lerant had smaller engines, sharp nose like G but small side-floats - so it should look like D-2 with G-type nose. The propellers in my model are resin copies of A-model Do-26 ones, front prop spinner is from drawer, rear spinner is also from Do-26 (civvie variant). I added fabric structure on fin, enforcement ("side walk") on top of fuselage, added new coolers, bombs, relings, add EZ rigging, reshaped air intakes and a made out of scratch beech buggy (or rather two buggies). The surface was sealed and re-scribed, and the nose was also corrected a bit. Painting scheme is from late 1939-early 1940 where large additional white crosses were introduced on all D-18s. The k6+IK is from 2/Ku.Fl.Gr. 406. The machine was lost on 28.09.1940. The unit emblems I took from Revell BV 138 (the unit use BV-138 after Do-18). Paint - Humbrol 243, 244 and 65 Here she is: (Edited on 23 July - I removed one photo and added four new) Comments welcome Cheers Jerzy-Wojtek

Hi, A small airplane having Czech markings appeared on 5th May 1945 over Prague bringing people joy and hope of approching end of war. It was Arado 396 http://www.vhu.cz/exhibit/arado-ar-396-podvozkova-noha/ If you can notice from above link with photos the national insignia were painted with error regarding orientation and were hand painted (in real thing) - not very precisly. Here is my attempt of build it. This is Huma kit - with smalll modification in exhaust pipes added and one bulb on nose removed (following the photos), the landing light is a bit upgrated. Decals from drawer. BTW - I expect that incoming RS model will have this painting scheme almost for sure. Comments welcome Regards Jerzy-Wojtek

Hi everyone, Here is my Ready For Inspection for this little kit, it has taken me a while to get there but i finally finished the build and I have taken the time to get some decent photos of it. The build thread can be found here and you are more than welcome to go and have a look at it. I decided to pose this in flight so wanted to do something different to the usual hang it from the ceiling with cotton thread, so I made a little vignette base and popped the Hurricane on some acrylic rod. I am quite happy with the end result even though it is far from perfect. The paints used were a combination of xtracrylix and vallejo model air. I use some aftermarket decals from xtraddecal and I used some oils for a pin wash and also some Flory Models grime wash. Anyway that is enough waffle from me here are the photos: 1/72 Matchbox Huricane Mk.1 photo 4 by Neal, on Flickr 1/72 Matchbox Huricane Mk.1 photo 5 by Neal, on Flickr 1/72 Matchbox Huricane Mk.1 photo 8 by Neal, on Flickr 1/72 Matchbox Huricane Mk.1 photo 10 by Neal, on Flickr 1/72 Matchbox Huricane Mk.1 photo 13 by Neal, on Flickr 1/72 Matchbox Huricane Mk.1 photo 14 by Neal, on Flickr 1/72 Matchbox Huricane Mk.1 photo 15 by Neal, on Flickr Please feel free to give me your opinion and what could be improved. Thanks for looking. Neal

Forgive my slow processing about this topic - but I have only recently realized that everyone is for the most part, building a replica of the same planes which actually existed. I have always followed the 'general rules' based upon my knowledge of the subject. However, I always took liberty with markings and camouflage. I feel that it takes away from the 'art' to keep replicating the same subject. Besides, who is to say that if I decide to build a plane with markings that has no photo history, what it actually looked like ? I would like some feedback as to the general consensus about this topic. Also, I am wondering if judges in model contests are so familiar with certain markings, that they have a good idea of what the rest of the model should look like.

I've been working on this for the last few months – this dio is my first born, so be gentle. It's 1/48 and consists of: Airfix 'Battle of Britain, Ready for Battle' set (amazingly good value), Italeri Mk.I Hurricane, and an entirely scratch built dispatch/billet hut, including corrugated roof & contents. A few words on the build: Airfix – great, Italeri – awful, hut & contents – enjoyable. Rivet counters please note: It's just a bit of fun and not intended to be a totally accurate representation of an RAF base, so please take with a pinch of salt. Apologies if this should be in the dio section, but as it is 90% aircrafty, I thought I'd put it here. Thanks for taking the time to take a gander. The photo on the desk is of my mum during the war and the photo on the bed is of her when she was 19. The orange booklets are pilots notes. Gorby

Hi to all,After 8 moths of hard work I finished my last diorama based on Battle of Poznan (Poland).I made a video to show the diorama. I have used Tamiya & Zvezda figures and vehicles. The building and furniture is from Airfix. The video will not leave you indifferent.--------------------------------------------------------------------Video Link: Battle of Poznan Diorama video presentation-------------------------------------------------------------------- Captures: Best Regards

Hello, we are pleased to announce another model of a so far neglected type in 1/144th scale, the Curtiss Hawk Model 75. As in the case of our previous kits, this is a brand new tooling and this time resin moulds were utilised. As far as we know, no kit of this elegant plane has been produced so far in plastic or resin in this scale. We bring here some images of the master model, the first series shots and a test build. The finished kit still lacks the canopy clear part, but otherwise the model is complete: Here are some pics depicting how the model master was made from scratch: There will be three different kit boxes, with each kit containing 30 parts and four clear parts (for the cockpit canopy, scalloped rear windows and a landing light). Of course, a comprehensive instruction leaflet and a decal sheet are included in each kit, and there are four options for each box. The kits will be available early in May. More info about the forthcoming kits and camouflage options will be found on our web site at: http://www.4pluspublications.com KR Michal Ovcacik, MARK I

This is a reconstruction (I have no photos) of a Hurricane that was operated by 135 Sqn. RAF when stationed at Minneriya, Ceylon in 1944. The red spinner was a "retrodiction" from the fact that 135 Sqn. were reported to be painting the prop. bosses of their Thunderbolts with flight colours in late 1944 - red for "A" flight, blue for "B" flight. It seems that report is open to dispute, however, and my red spinner is therefore even more open to dispute (read, probably just plain wrong). I have yet to pass through the grieving process involved in repainting black, however. The drop tanks and Vokes filter are resin add-ons, and the canopy is a Squadron vacuform so that I could build the model with the canopy open.

Hello. I've read through a number of introductions, and my story is similar to many others. About 15 years ago I built a dozen models but had to pack everything up. Good news though - I have just reopened shop. Unlike my other hobbies, the model I was working on survived 2 moves and was in the exact condition I had left it. It is a Tamiya Spitfire, and that subject was the impetus for finding this site. Even though I was unable to build, I never missed a local model show named "Mosquitocon" held in New Jersey each year. I will try to leave a link in my sig for folks to view my flickr photos of each show. I am mainly interested in 1/48 WWII aircraft, but have 2 Tamiya tank models to break things up.

Unless you're a WWII refugee – what's not to love about the good old Stuka? I'm also fascinated with size of the cannons that the Luftwaffe squeezed onto some of their aircraft. Put the two together and you get a Ju-87 G-2! I was impressed with the detail on this kit, so I thought I would see how good it was out of the box. Then I did a bit of research (my research is an hour or so on Google images) and noticed some areas for improvement. Although the engine is very nicely detailed, a lot of pipe-work is missing. I found quite a few images of the G-2 engine, but they all varied quite a bit, as a result the pipes I've added are more to make the engine look 'busy' rather than be 100% accurate, so don't use mine as a guide. The other alteration I made was to the cannon. I can't bring myself to pay half the kit price, for a couple of small resin parts, maybe that might change if a rich aunt dies, or money started growing on our trees (unfortunately, I haven't got a rich aunt and the puppy eats EVERYTHING in the garden, including trees). The internet seems full of modellers saying that after-market cannon are a necessity, but I thought I would see what I could do with the kit parts. This is the most trouble I have ever taken over painting any model (don't laugh). I noticed that the aircraft models I particularly like, have faded paint schemes, so I tried experimenting with a lighter undercoat to each of the camo colours. I even mixed all the camo colours to get it reasonably accurate – although I deliberately mixed them slightly lighter than they should be. I'm reasonably happy with the end result (always room for improvement), although I must have used a weeks pocket-money in masking tape. All the German crosses are painted, using home-made stencils. I can see why people buy stencils, wow they are a pain to do, it cost me about two hours and another truck-load of masking tape. As the kit doesn't supply swastikas (Illegal in Italy apparently), I did consider masking those as well, but I'm not entirely deranged, so I didn't. As I have been known to do the odd Luftwaffe subject in the past, fortunately I had some that had been left over from a previous build. Incidentally, you may be seeing more of the base as it isn't intended to have a Stuka planted on it for all time, I'm made it to use as a photo prop to relieve the monotony of the all black background. It is supposed to represent a planked parking area and is currently a work in progress (I would be grateful if you have any suggestions how I could improve it). My wife's opinion was “It looked nicer before you put the brown stuff on”! I had to explain that 'nice' wasn't the look I was going for.

Hi, Exactly month ago I started thread on construction of three models of Polikarpov R-5/R-Z family. I thought, that I am prepared to this work but soon it appeared, that I was deeply wrong. More is in mentioned above WiP part of Forum. The surprise was how seriously one have to change shapes of R-Z by Special Hobby. Next two kits were Apex (Encore,....) R-5 and old vacu MPM R-5. Today I finished first of this set of three. This is Polikarpov R-5 (originaly light bomber and recce plane) converted to transport variant called often "Limousine". Polikarpov R-5 was a Soviet countrpartner of machines like Potez XXV, Breguet XiX perhap also British Hawker Hart family (but larger). The model is scratch conversion of R-5 by Apex. No part of kit is left nod modified. The fuselage is reshaped not only in rear part where closed canopy is installed but also the engine was reshaped. The wings and tail had added ribs and were reshaped folowing drawings given by M.Maslov in his monography of R-5/R-Z family. The painting scheme is taken from a photo published in this book. It is described there "R-5 transport, Eastern Front, winter 1944". I have found the same photo in Net described "Leningrad front, winter 1941-42. However the form of red stars (their out lines) sugget second half of war. Below wing there are transport containers for two or three (I do not know it exactly) each. This eng. P.Grokhovskij design, originaly for 7 troops below each wing. The first flight was done with living 14 people as passangers...(instead of initially planned sand bobs ). Grokhovskij designed it for offensive tranport of troops, but I think that here it was use for evacuation of wounded. Here is result: I hope to present next two in reasonable future... (Edit 2017: I did ) Comments welcome and regards Jerzy-Wojtek

Dear fellow Britmodellers, after more than two months abroads, I'm happy to report back from my workbench. Here's a piece of "Classic Plastic" I had started at the end of last year - the 1/72 Ilyushin Il-4 Long Range Bomber. The original moulds of this kit were produced in the mid-1980s by East German company VEB Plasticard. The same kit has been available in re-boxings by Revell, Master Modell and ADP. It's a kit of typical 1980s standard, with raised panel lines and some rather chunky details. I did replace the main defense guns with metal items from Mini World. I was intending to fit a metal gun in the nose as well, but the opening of the clear part was much too wide, so I fell back on the kit's plastic part. I also replaced the plastic handrail on the left fuselage side with a piece of wire. I received two boxings of this model kit from an IMPS member at a swap-meet; some of the small parts had broken off the sprues and were missing. However, I was able to complete one model from the parts I found in the box. As the kit's decals were very old and thick, almost like stickers, I used an aftermarket set from AML ('Il-4 Over The Reich'). Depicted is an aircraft from the 3rd Long Range Bomber Regiment, operating in winter 1944/1945. Sadly, the decals were beyond their lifespan. The bigger items (the patriotic slogan and the red stars for the fin) broke into a puzzle of pieces when slid off the backing paper. I did my best to cobble them together, using some free-hand touch-ups with Red paint on the stars. The decals also left ugly glue-marks around them, but being fragile as they were, I did not dare to wipe over with a cloth, as I usually do. So, the build ended up a bit messy and won't win any competitions, for sure. Still, it's a nice addition to my line-up of Soviet WWII aircraft. Maybe someday a manufacturer will provide us with new moulds of the Il-4? A new Pe-2 and Tu-2 would also be most welcome! The model was painted with Gunze/Mr.Hobby acrylics (H72 Brown, H303 Green, H85 Black Gray) using Haarder & Steenbeck Evolution airbrush. Thanks for your interest in this topic. All photographs by Wolfgang Rabel of IGM Cars & Bikes - thank you! With kind regards from Vienna, Roman

I've just completed my 1:72 Heinkel He 111 from Revell, a second part for the diorama (the first part was this Stuka). It was very nice build without the major problems. In fact the set is so good that there were no problems at all. You can see the progress here Here are some pictures of the finished model. More when the diorama is finished.

During research for a new book, I found this amazing picture library of Ulithi Anchorage from 1944-45. Ulithi Atoll and the US Navy 1944-45 So many great pictures of the anchorage and the array of ships and various stories. Just keep scrolling down till you reach the button that says "Load 490 More Images"! Hope you find this useful, as I have. Alan

Hi, Another Messerschmitt - Me 262 a1a, Revell, decals from drawer, markings of a/c W.Nr 110826, ,9k+LK belonging to I/KG(J)51, Germany spring 1945. Comments welcome, cheers. Jerzy-Wojtek

Hello BMers! I have a question for those knowlegable about Japenese WWII aircraft. Please bear with the slight ramble below. I've been 'reconditioning' a model that I built at the beginning of 2015, when I returned to the loving embrace of Mother Model Making. The kit is the venerable Airfix 1/72 Aichi D3A 'Val'. While randomly looking at pictures of 'Vals' on the interweb I came across several pictures of captured Japanese aircraft, none of which were 'Vals'. Now to the question. Did any of the Allies capture and test fly a Aichi D3A Val, in particular the sub-type represented by the Airfix 1/72 kit? If they did are there any images available? DennisTheBear

Hi I am thinking that Privateer with Bat(s?) missile(s) would be a very attractive model to construct. I know that some use of this radar guided missile was done during WWII in Pacific since April 1944 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASM-N-2_Bat ) . Any info on this will be apprecieted - I hope not only by me , Especially photos from combat use - to identify the exact Priveeter carrying it... Best regards Jerzy-Wojtek