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Ok the idea for this build is a bit of a mash up of a couple of builds I have wanted to do, but didn’t the time or the motivation for at the time. One has been running around in one form or another in my mind for quite a while now. I have come close a couple of times to starting it, (a Ho-229 was to be the base for one) and I sort of did with the Turbo-Prop Arado, but it still wasn’t quite what I had in mind. I have two similar projects on the go but they're on the back burner for a bit. The second was that I have a Planet Models Ju-388J nightfighter (Jumo 213 version) sitting in the stash that I have been dying to build and have never had the excuse to. So after seeing the Ju-88 STGB I finally had the idea of how to killer two birds with one stone and bring these two ideas together! So the plan is…… If the war had stretched into 1946 we would have seen some interesting aircraft and technologies in service, especially so with radar technology advancing as quick as is was. By the end of the war we were already seeing the next generation of radar systems which operated in the Centimetre band, like the RAF’s H2S and US H2X radars and the German FuG-240 (Berlin) & FuG-244 (Bremen) units. A few of the Ju-88’s were fitted with the FuG-240 and it was found they recovered their original speed which had been lost with the earlier radar units and their large antennas/antlers! It would have been only to be a matter of time before the use of the FuG-240 (and later versions) would have been more widespread, with it being fitted to newer aircraft models as they became available. With the venerable Ju-88 reaching it’s peak in the Ju-388 family this aircraft would have been a prime candidate for the new radar system. Well that’s the plan, chop the nose off a 388 and fit a new nose, simple really, but……….. I want it to be as believable as possible and not too whiffy which will make it a bit harder. So this will be the base, Planet Models Ju-388J-3 with Jumo 213 engines, of cause I reserve the right to add lots of other stuff as I go along, it wouldn’t a normal build if I didn’t throw in heaps of extras! The 388 is actually quite a nice model the only thing that may give me issues is the wings, they are very slightly warped and getting the dihedral right will be fun! The nose is just a resin cast of the long radome version, it looks a bit better in my opinion than the shorter version. Well best to start by cutting off the nose, luckily there is a very convenient panel line to follow for this. Strangely enough this happens to be almost perfectly round which will make life much easier as we go to fit the nose. Ok first fit, it doesn’t look all the great, I’ll need to move it forward a bit. That’s looking a bit better, so I’m going to have to add a bit to get the profiles right, I have a plan for that! First I’ll make a ring using plastic card, working with plastic will make this part so much easier! Next to fill the gap I’m going to use plastic strip like so. I just keep adding rings till I get the right diameter. Then add a disk at the back the size I require and the first part is done, only a small amount of filler required for shaping. Ignoring the joint gap for the moment I now have to decide how I want the new nose to sit, sort of inline with the horizontal axis or a bit dropped down? I like the inline one as it looks good, but I have to remember the flying attitude of the 388 (and 88 for that matter) was slightly nose up, they didn’t fly truly level! So I may need to have it slightly drooped down so the antenna face would be lined up to the vertical axis. Have a look at how the antennas were mounted on 88’s and you’ll see what I mean. Well I’ve made a start, there’s only a couple of hours work (I needed a brake from the Ta-152 as I was getting annoyed with it!) and the project is a goer. I’ve actually done the filling of the nose now as well and it’s looking good! This won’t be a full time project, just something to work on when my other builds frustrate me and I need a break from them. I can’t promise I’ll be finished by Xmas either as I’m bound to do other mods on this as I go along. This should be an interesting build!

Hi All, A long time in the making, she fought me along the way, and, I ended up putting her to one side and finishing something. But she is now 'over the line' and, while my modelling skills weren't up to the challenge, I am happy she is finished. The last in my Nachtjager series I'm keen to do something more colourful I based the camouflage on the first picture and the kit instructions. It looks to me as if the light coloured 'splotches' (wonder what the German is for that!) were applied in the field so I painted the basic splinter camo, applied the decals and then sprayed the splotches, hope it looks all right. Complete OOB and while I would like to say it was a pleasure to build, I can't. Perhaps I'm a bit jaded after 7 odd German Nightfighters Thanks for looking and sorry about the photos, best I can do I'm afraid. Cheers, Shane

Hello all. For very personal reasons I want to make a model of the de Havilland NF M.XVII in 1/72 scale. My question, or rather questions, concerns the following: is there any other kits in this scale besides the Tamiya? And: how accurate is it (they)? I'd like to make the model as detailed and accurate as possible, so I will likely post more questions regarding the particular aircraft. Thanks in advance! Dennus

Hello All, not sure if I posted this. Completed it earlier in the year - a Tamiya 335 kit with some owl resin Ju88 SN2 aerials. A bit of a what if night fighter. The build is not great but I am happy with the finish. Thanks for looking and have a great Christmas, Ian

And all through the skies, Not a creature was stirring not even the flies. The ammo was stacked by the cannons with care, In hope that the Englanders soon would be there. Hey all After my brief bout of insanity, during which I constructed a car model (see http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234991043-deuces-wild/) I have returned to the side of light and reason with yet another aircraft Today I present Revell's 1/48 Bf 110G-4 finished as the example flown by Obst. Hans-Joachim Jabs of NJG 1 in the spring of 1945. Enjoy... So the Revell/Promodeller Bf 110 gets a lot of criticism for supposedly inaccurate engine nacelles... I don't know about you but it still looks like a Bf 110 to me, so it can't be that bad. The kit went together quite well, with some, but not terrible seams to clean up, mostly at the unusual wing to fuselage join. The prop hubs required the most work as they were slightly mis-molded (is that a word?). This required plastic sheet and putty to fix. The cockpit is second to none and only requires careful painting and some harnesses. The radar array was scratch built, as the kit arrays are attached directly to the sides of the nose, whereas Jabs' plane carried the antennas as depicted. All markings were masked and painted with use of a Montex masking set which also supplied masks for the canopy. The camouflage was done freehand with custom mixed Tamiya colours adapted from those used by J.M. Villalba in his RLM Painting DVD, for the RLM 75 and 76. The exhausts were painted with Dark Iron lightly misted with Vallejo Rust and slathered with dark wash. Just realized I forgot to install the rear machine gun before pictures... it's err.. out for maintenance. Yeah, that's believable Regards

Hello! So after some time I show you my JU 88 G6 from Dragon/Cyber Hobby- Orange Box in 1/48. Pretty old kit and because of the many re-edtions the moulding suffered from that. The construction was a real challenge. I've tried to avoid filler. So dry fitting is a "must do". I have replaced all MG 151 with brass rods. The FUGs are from Mastermodel. Another challenge, because I tried the solder them. In the end it wasn't that hard, as I've thought. I made a template that helped me a lot.The rear antenna holder is also a brass construction soldered togehter. I've rescribed the fuel hatches on the top of the fuseage. Soon as the construction was finished, the painting started using Vallejo RLM 76 and Gunze RLM75. I really liked the paint scheme done by Chris Wauchop from Hyperscale. That black tail fin really got me! After all I'm happy this project is done. Greetings

I've always fancied making an all black Korea bird, or a late Vietnam Electric wizzy, wither USN or USMC. (Also used by the US Army too, but details are scarce to say the least. I suspect test aircraft only?) Can I safely assume the Sword release has been abandoned? So that leaves: 72: Matchbox or 48: Encore A choice between an old kit in my preferred scale) or an expensive one. I know there are issues reported with the fit of the matchbox canopy, and lack of cockpit detail is pretty much a given, so a rare trip to the aftermarket will be likely to achieve food results. Have I missed anything? If I stumble across a MB kit is it still worth the effort considering the lack of competition (note: whilst I don't mind basic detail I don't want to be filling trenches)

Ok time for another project, can’t have the production studio sitting around ideal now can we!! Ok this is a project I had talked about previously and more recently with Arnold (Arniec), and well once I get an idea in my head I just can’t help myself. I will do a background story for this but basically I’m taking the Arado Ar-234, which is one of my favourites and playing around with the design. Last time, well it’s still in progress, I took it to one extreme; Turbo Prop/Swept Wings/P5 Nightfighter nose. All were planned for it at one stage but probably never together!! Ok this time a wee bit more saner ,sort of! We’re back to fitting props to her but this time the power plant is something less exotic…piston powered, though the Junker Jumo 213 was a pretty advanced engine. Added to this I wanted a sort of simpler wooden body and wings…by some strange coincidence I had just purchased a Revell Focke-Wulf Ta-154 (the old Dragon one). This would become the donor for the engines and as I am a but lazy and didn’t want to mess around wing engine/wing mounts, the supplier of the wings as well. I also had lying around an Ally Cat conversion kit for the Ta-154 to turn it into a production A-1 version with the Jumo 213 engine. Plus I have some resiny bit coming as well. This is the look I am going for, someone else has done this modification before so that is where the idea come from. The really cool thing is the wings for both model do swap over fairly easily and they are a similar distance apart as well. So I had all the bits ready so let make a mess! Ok this time all the conversion work will be done in plastic that will make life so much easier. First off the wings were built up, I need to join these two together to give me a stable support as undercarriage is now in the engine pods! I added extra bracing between the wings, which should help with this, once completely dry I check how strong they are and add more if necessary. I want the wings to be pretty much flat with the top of the fuselage so I had to cut out the fuselage to match. The wings are attached to the upper section of the fuselage as it comes with this model which helps make the alignment process so much easier. The RO station will be moved from behind the wings to behind the pilot (actually just behind the nose wheel well). Because the main landing gear is quite forward I needed to do this for weight distribution. Also the main gear has gone from the fuselage so bigger fuel tanks can be fitted, so no drop tanks. So this is sort of how she will look. Because the 234 was a sleek bodied aircraft in the first place she looks like a high performance beast and those big engines seem to suit her. So another build is on the way, not sure if it’ll be as quick as the last two….just depends on how it all goes together. Now I know what happened when I turned the lights off and where all that missing alcohol went!! Oh and all the leftover bits?? An All-Metal Focke-Wulf Ta-154D2N with BMW 003 engines is on the way!!!!!

Ok I’m the first to admit I am totally mad and this build will prove it! My work pattern has changed so I will have more time for models!!! So rather than signing up for more GB’s…or actually completing the ones I’ve signed up for on time I decided I needed a new long-term project. The Heinkel He-177Z was a long term project which I loved so instead of building the bigger one I have gone for this project which I had mentioned a few times. I love the look and it’s super cool, plus a nightfighter as well! I had received all the bits sometime ago but after a quick look at them I got very scared!! The reason for this is the add on bits from Unicraft!!! The parts may be a little bit basic which is to say they are basically lumps of resin and not much else! So the basis for the build will be Hasegawa’s 1/48th Arado Ar-234C-3 which will provide the body, interior and undercarriage, though it will probably end up providing a of other bits as well! The wings from Antares are nice and need little work to fit my build. The engines or turbo-props are barely recognisable as engine parts and as can be seen I have had to add sheet plastic to help build them up so they at least may be round in shape! They even come with an internal engine sections if I wanted to leave the engine covers open…or should I say a blob to match the rest of the engine blob! The new nose is….well more or less useless, as can be seen from the photo is much smaller than the canopy section. The mod kit is for the Hobby Craft Arado Ar-234 which is completely the wrong in the nose section compared to the Hasegawa model, it’s way too narrow! So I can either modify the clear section which is pretty well impossible or completely build a new nose section! Plus all the other bits in this mod kit are pretty well useless as well, I will have to use most of the kit parts for this build! I will either have to modify the resin bits I have or make a completely nose section, which at the moment looks to be the easiest path! So I have pretty well given myself a not so easy task for this build. Whether I complete this build or if it is destine for the box of doom is something to be decided as the build progresses. For a start I need to get these engines at least round in profile, hence the addition of card to the engine bodies and spinners. If I can get these sorted there may be a possibility this project will get going. Once the main bodies are round in profile I can work on the nose cones and props. Once these are done I can then start to work on how they will mount to the swept back wings, custom mounts will be needed for this. So this is going to be a crazily big project, nothing that will be completed in a couple of months for sure! Again I must be completely crazy to attempt this build, I had planned it for the WhatIf III GB, but given the work required it’s not possible in the time given. So this Christmas or next I’m not sure when it will be finished so welcome aboard on this crazy adventure. So welcome along for the ride, it will be bumpy and the driver will curse at regular intervals....oh and regular updates are not included!

I'd like to present the second of my two Defiant nightfighter builds using the new tool Airfix kit: For the build thread of both kits please see here. The kit goes together very well with few pitfalls for the unwary and none for the wary; as long as you test fit and know what you are sticking to what, where and why, it more or less builds itself. Mine is OOB apart from the addition of an aerial wire from EZ Line. Once again I've painted the wingtip navigation lights in red and green; in real life they were clear perspex covers for coloured lightbulbs but I am content to let the colours represent what they are. I had a hell of a time trying to get a subtly distressed effect for the paint finish and was about 20% successful at a guess, though the camera then decided to overlook much of the subtlety so it was a largely wasted effort, however it was a laugh if nothing else I used the kit decals for most of the national markings and stencils, but the fuselage roundels, codes and serials are from the Print Decals set for the Defiant - I don't really know what to say about these... they are thinner than the kit decals and had very little carrier film but apart from that I felt they were inferior in every other respect which is a sad look-out for a set of aftermarket decals. The 'red' of the roundels and serial has a strange Fuchsia tint to it which does not look good next to the slightly bricky-red of the Airfix decals which looks better to my eyes. The colour density and printing was also inferior to the kit decals though perhaps with that fuchsia tint that is for the best. I might have got a dud set, I certainly hope so, as there are some very nice options on the Print Scale sheet. Anyway enough, I am happy with the end result; here are the two kits together: Thanks for your attention gents Cheers, Stew Edit: nearly forgot; here is the real N3313

I tried to be patient, and to hold my peace, telling myself that if I just waited until July I could build a few of the new Airfix Boulton Paul Defiant kits for the BoB GB... but the kits looks so nice, and there are so many possible options that I would like to build, that my cunning lower animal brain hatched a plan: build a couple of nightfighters, and maybe in July when the BoB GB starts, a couple of day fighters if I do run out of other things to build (which given the contents of my stash being specifically tailored to the first 18 months or so of the war is not likely to happen unless by choice). So I find myself here: Looking at these: ... which is a bit of an embarrassment of riches. I think I will be building the sharkmouthed N3328 from the kit decals, and N3313 of 264 Squadron from the Print Scale set. I recently moved into a new flat in a tenement, and being on the ground floor means all the other tenants have to trek past my front door in the communal hallway to get to their flats. This is a new experience for me but logic dictated that it is probably not best to have the sort of smells emanating from my flat that the uninitiated might erroneously associate with a crack factory or methamphetamine lab, so as an experiment I invested in a set of Hataka RAF acrylic paints (though I will only be using the interior grey-green for these builds). For sprue shots I refer you to Mark's pictures here, which are better than anything I might attempt. Construction starts with the fitting of various internal parts, I will be using the crew figures who are unique to this kit and look rather good... The floors, seats and bulkheads etc are just clicked into place to keep the mating surfaces free of paint, which was then sprayed: The Hataka paint went on nicely and covered well, didn't smell too chemically either... The detail parts were painted and the painted pilots fitted: Then posed for a picture with the gunners: The instrument panel was decalled and fitted into the fuselage - note that it sits a bit aft of the coaming, so you need to paint the back of the panel as well: I think I got a bit out of sequence with the instructions and built the wings next (I was waiting for the decal setting solution to dry on the IP, that's my excuse and I defy anyone to prove otherwise): Then joined the fuselage halves: The wings and fuselage halves both fitted very well, I needed a smear of filler along the upper cowling to disguise the join and sanded the leading edges of the wings just for tidiness' sake. As Mark (FZ6) noted in his build, the trailing edges of the wings are rather thick; how much of a problem this is for you depends on your tolerances but to me it is not excessive enough to be worth remedial action (I have fairly sloppy standards though). I then fitted the aft turret fairing - both raised, although you have to option to build it lowered if you prefer; I am so used to seeing it raised that it looks a bit weird if it isn't, so as you see it was an informed decision on my part and not just some whim that occurred on the spur of the moment: Then I sort of slipped out of sequence again and masked and fitted the pilot's canopy and the forward turret fairings. I chose to do one closed up and one open; it seems it was fairly common practice for pilots to leave the hood open and anyway, because I can, okay? A word on the canopies - again, as noted by Mark (FZ6) the framing is not terribly well defined, it is as if it has been moulded at an angle and I think it might be something to do with Airfix moulding the turret 'glass' as one-piece (which is an excellent thing)... if you are particularly averse to masking I would recommend you wait until Peewit, Montex or Eduard make a masking set for this kit - you can bet that these are being worked on even now (and you can also bet that the Eduard one will cost almost as much as the kit, so I leave it up to you to decide whether you really do hate masking that much, although the Peewit and Montex sets are generally much cheaper). Still got those turrets to do Finally, I assembled the various parts for the radiator and the oil cooler, I plan to Blu-tack these on so I can spray them when I do the camo then remove them to paint the grilles before permanently gluing them back on: ... and that's where I am now. Hopefully will get some more done at the weekend, so far it has gone very well. Cheers, Stew

Typically lovely kit from Hasegawa, no problems to report - just fancied a problem free build for once!

Hi folks, This is my first GB on Britmodeller and, given the relatively generous building time, I thought I'd try my hand at enhancing a Revell 1/72nd He219. Note that this is Revell's original release, not the ex-FROG one that has relatively recently been re-introduced. Regarding 'enhancement', I'm no Tom Probert or Nobby, but I like adding a bit of representative detail where I can, with the aim of causing doubt in whoever looks at it as to which particular kit it started out as. Whatever, the Uhu it is and we'll see how it turns out; I have a small amount of AM to throw at it (wheels, etc.) but it will mostly be just the Revell bits and whatever I can cobble together to add to them. I will add the obligatory sprue shots when I get the kit out of the loft, but I won't be starting immediately as I have a couple of other things to finish first. regards, Martin

Ok here we go with another GB. Was a bit hard to choose what to build for this one, but after much thought I decided to go with a common theme that I like Nightfighters. And seeing that all my nightfighters so far are twin engine the Tigercat seemed the logical choice. So I’ll be building Italeri 1/48th F-7F 3N Tigercat, this will almost be straight out of the box but …………. will be adding Quick Boost Undercarriage Cover and Gun Barrels sets, and Scale Aircraft Conversions Landing Gear set. I have always liked the look of this aircraft but had just not gotten around to building one, so here we go, this should be fun….and hopefully a simple build. Not too sure what the colour scheme will be, have a bit of time to think about it. First post of the group!

Hi all, I’m about to embark on a fairly major build project on a 1/48th Hasegawa Ar234B-2/N Nachtigall. Have got lots of extras to add and have lots of info and pictures of the more normal beast but very few on the nightfighter version. Records indicate there were only two that actually flew “operationally†so pictures are quite hard to come by. It’s the cockpit that I really need info on, mainly as to whether the bomb site in the daylight version was still fitted to the night time variant? Plus the centre gun pod doesn’t really fill me with confidence when compared to the drawings that are around. If anyone can point me in the right direction with links or pics, that would be great. Plus any additional info would be great on these rare beasts. cheers

Almost time to start another one. Though this time I'm going to have everything but the kitchen sink thrown at it!! I'm going to build the Hasegawa 1/48 Ar-234B-2/N Nachtigall, I have always wanted to build this beasty so I'm really looking forward to this one. Plus this will be another to add to the collection of nightfighters, maybe 25+ and counting, still mostly packed away as I don't have space or shelving to display! This will be the 5th 1/48 nightfighter I have and will join the; Ju-88G6, Ta-154A-0, He-219A-7, and P-61A. I'll be doing it in the alternate RLM81/82/76 colour scheme of 140145, one of only two that are recorded to have flown, plus the splinter camouflage will be a nice change from the more normal (?) RLM75/76(/66) colour schemes of German nightfighters. As you can see I'll be throwing all sorts additions onto it as I go along, other than engine, they are; Aries Cockpits set & wheel bays Aries Wheels & masks Eduard Cockpit masks Eduard PE set Master Model FuG 218 Neptun antenna set Squadron Crystal Clear canopy, to replace broken item! And anything else I might find on the web! I love the Master Model antennas, they're just so fine and detailed, much better that the PE ones included in most models and reasonably priced if you get them from Hong Kong! Well this should keep me busy...now just waiting for starters orders then the fun starts!