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ESK 2000B Gun Camera (4417 & 5133) 1:48 & 1:32 CMK by Special Hobby During WWII it was helpful to all combatants to be able to verify claimed kills in order to obtain accurate numbers on enemy attrition, which helped immensely with strategic planning. They were also used during training to help the novice pilots understand where they were going wrong, and could be strapped to airframes that otherwise couldn’t be used. The Germans used such devices, which could be mounted internally where there was space, or externally on smaller airframes. These sets depict the Zeiss ESK 2000B camera, which was mounted in an aerodynamic bullet fairing, and attached to the airframe by a mounting plate. Due to the limited space available only a small amount of film could be stored in a cartridge within the fairing, so the operation of the mechanism was synchronised with the pilot’s thumb on the trigger in an attempt to catch the action, which didn’t always work out 100% due to the erratic movements in dog-fighting - even in training. Both sets arrive in the CMK/Special Hobby yellow themed blister pack, with a header card and instructions behind, completing the package. In the 1:32 set are six resin parts, and in the 1:48 set there are five due to the differences in moulding the two scales. You will also need some fine wire to lead off into the airframe on an external mounting. Construction is a piece of cake with the bullet fairing mounting onto the base, and the three tiny parts inserted into their sockets moulded into the sides of the camera. You can find the location for many of the aircraft that used it with a quick Google, but CMK have included a drawing for the Bf.109E on the instructions for both sets, even down to the location where the control wire enters the wing at a nearby maintenance hatchway. 1:48 ESK 2000B Gun Camera (4417) 1:32 ESK 2000B Gun Camera (5133) Conclusion An unusual and interesting addition to any WWII German fighter that is incredibly well-detailed, and starts to add a back-story to your latest project. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of

Here is the other Miles Magister Mk.I of Heroes Models in 1:144 scale that I finished this week. It represents R1918 of 312 (Czechoslovak) Sqn, RAF, UK, 1941. This is a delightful resin kit with the windscreens made from thin plastic sheet and the exhaust pipe from plastic rod. Obviously some work is involved and for more information see my WIP in the Kampfgruppe144 forum: http://www.kampfgruppe144.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=7326. As with the other kit, it was built OOB with my only addition being the underwing pitot. I'm aware the main legs are in the extended position but I realised too late. The kit was fully painted and varnished with brush. Thanks for looking and, as always, all comments are welcome. Miguel

From 2 years ago, another toilet-equipped flying wonder. SBS' Latecoere 28 is a welcome addition to the slowly growing line of civil options provided by smaller (in size, but big in brains) manufacturers. SBS releases of the different versions of the DH88 racer and the Farman F.190 (and other subjects) are to commend in every sense. As said in the WIP article, you could build this kit as it is, but I decided to go a few extra yards to tweak it a bit and add some things. The "Comte de la Vaulx" (in honor of a FAI preeminent member), flown by Mermoz, realized the first commercial crossing of the South Atlantic and added a record for that to its existing numerous ones. The Late 28, part of the legend of "La Ligne", opened the South-American region to new horizons, and pioneered and heralded the future of commercial aviation for that part of the world. Names like Mermoz, Guillaumet, Saint Exupery and many others will grow to the stature of legends. In 1929 Saint-Exupéry was appointed director of the "Aeroposta Argentina ", a branch of the Aeropostale. I made for this kit a full interior (the manufacturer provides a full cockpit) with restroom and cabin equipment. If you are curious, go the to WIP link of this post, BUT it you really need to use the restroom, please note that the toilet discharges au plein air 🙂 And now, images of the completed model (but why of why did I then photograph this model on grass instead of tarmac?)

Unusually for me I planned my years intended builds by looking at the Britmodeller group builds for the 2021 and worked out which ones I wanted to join. So here is my second non injection GB entry - a F-RSIN resin kit of the lovely post war Languedoc airliner in Air France colours. My plan hopefully coming together later in the year with another 144 airliner for the French Fancy GB, again in Air France colours. So here we have it - simple looking kit with minimal number of parts Box and decals Fuselage and winds - two pieces - bonus! # And lastly white metal props, brass tube undercarriage and resin tail plane. The fuselage and wings are fine smooth resin and hopefully I will add some subtle panel lines to add interest. Done no real research yet but hoping to put this recently acquired kit together quickly and test out the new airbrush on the all important paint scheme - all silver, so preparation is everything! Cheers JP

Here is one of a pair of kits I finished this week. It's a Miles Magister Mk.I of Heroes Models in 1:144 scale. It represents 1208 of the Força Aérea Portuguesa, at Base Aérea Nº 2, Ota, Portugal, in 1952. Portugal received 10 Magisters in 1946 serving under the Aeronáutica Militar. When this merged with the Aviação Naval to form the Força Aérea Portuguesa in July 1952, 10 new serial numbers were allocated even though several had been withdrawn form service. The Magister was officially withdrawn from service that same year although there are reports of one still being used from Ota in 1956. These aircraft were painted aluminium overall. This is a delightful resin kit with the windscreens made from thin plastic sheet and the exhaust pipe from plastic rod. Obviously some work is involved and for more information see my WIP in the Kampfgruppe144 forum: http://www.kampfgruppe144.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=7326 The kit was built OOB with my only additions being the oleo links of the main legs and the underwing pitot. I'm aware the main legs are in the extended position but I realised too late and they were too delicate to modify. The kit was fully painted and varnished with brush. Thanks for looking and, as always, all comments are welcome. Miguel

This came from out of the blue for me - a nice spring surprise. Print scale has issued a resin kit, the boxes have been sent to Hannants already according to their FB page: https://m.facebook.com/printscale/ To be issued in 1/48 and 1/144 too

Star Wars Star Destroyer Engine Bells & Shield Generators (10120-1/5000 for Bandai) 1:5000 GreenStrawberry Star Destroyers. It’s just occurred to me that despite their name, they can’t even destroy planets, which was why the Death Star was created - as Alderaan found out to their cost. Still, it’s a cool name. Apart from Tantive IV, known at the Blockade Runner in the olden days, the Star Destroyer was the first ship to hit the screen at the beginning of Star Wars: Episode IV. Bandai have the Far Eastern kit rights to the Star Wars franchise, but those kits are so nice that they keep finding their way to our shores here in the West. GreenStrawberry are big Sci-Fi fans, and have a ton of sets for these kits and many others to improve the detail and accuracy of these kits. This set is intended for the recent Bandai 1:5000 Star Destroyer kit, which although quite a bit larger than the usual 1:72 kits of fighters and so on, can still be improved upon. The set arrives in a small dark-themed box, and inside are five resin parts and a fret of Photo-Etch (PE). The three larger parts are the replacement engine bells without the thick fluted lips of the kit parts. They still have holes in the centre for the lighting kit if you’re lucky enough to have that variant (Brag: I do!), and the three surrounding baffles that are visible at the very tip of the engine bells are supplied on the PE sheet together with a more in-scale fluted section of the engine bell that should be rolled to match the size of the bells and is attached on a tiny dropped lip inside the edge - you can just see that in the picture below. The other two resin parts are the shield generator “golf balls” that sit atop either side of the bridge superstructure. They are moulded on small casting blocks with a central support section, around which the visible PE structure is fitted. The PE part has the support shape etched-in, so that you can glue the resin ball in place before you begin to fold it to shape. Before the outer struts are folded up, the inner ladder-like supports are folded up and glued in place on the etched squares that gives them a good contact patch. With those fitted, and there are 12 for each generator, the outer legs are folded up to touch the underside of the faceted spherical skin. The completed generators are glued into the space left by removing the chunky kit supports, after which the tiny little antennae are glued to the top at the intersection of the facets, as per the accompanying diagram. A scrap diagram shows how the supports should look from the side to assist in placement. As an aside, you can see some holes in the model that have been drilled to accept fibre-optics later in the build in these pictures. Conclusion Another great set from GreenStrawberry. A little delicate folding will be needed to do it justice, and those tiny antennae are best left off until the end. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of

AS promised over on the build thread HERE some pics of the finished beastie are provided: It was a fairly problematic build, but I'm glad to add her to the collection. Thanks for looking, Ed

I'm going to try to get this finished, having started it a couple of years or so ago, can't remember what GB it was! Here's where I got to, the airframe assembled, some filling done, primed and some remedial work done. I decided to do an in-flight, 'Operation Firedog' machine. Hopefully I can manage the myriad of small resin and etch detail parts yet to add! Davey.

Having decided to build an Airfix Mosquito Nf.II over on the 'Interceptors' GB I thought why not build another which has almost a similar scheme, this being a conversion of a Tamiya B.Mk.IV into a B.Mk.XVI. The Airfix kit went together Ok, I added a bit of interior using some bits from an Airfix Wellington I recently did. I had a Pavla Vac-formed canopy which was a lot clearer than the thick Airfix one. The framing was done using painted Tamiya tape. I used .009" thou guitar string for the receiver aerials. The decals are by Delta Decals, printed by Tally Ho! They were very thin and opaque but went on well onto the 'Klear' gloss coat using the Mocro Set/Sol solutions, or so I thought. After doing the Matt coat the codes and serials silvered badly I ended up painting over it after rescuing them failed, the serials are hardly readable still! The Tamiya kit is the first aircraft of this manufacturer I think I have ever built, having made lots of their 1/35th scale vehicles back in the 70's! It was superb to put together as all Tamiya kits are. For the conversion I had put together 'Brengun' resin Two-stage Merlin's, Blackbird models Bulged Bomb-bay and 100 Gallon tanks and their decals for a 109 Sqn B.Mk.XVI. Of course Airfix had to announce their new kit last month so I decided to get on and get it done! The new nascelles fitted very well, just don't cut the kit parts on the panel line as stated in the 'Brengun' instructions as you'll have a gap, as I found out! The bomb-bay didn't fit that well and needed a bit of filing of the part and the fuselage, I think it looks just a bit too bulged maybe? The tanks fitted well without much trouble.The decals went on superbly, being thin and adhered well. I know the canopy isn't correct, I tried to fashion some of the 'blown' type side windows but it didn't work very well. Hopefully Airfix have the correct side windows, unlike in their CAD drawings! Comments and criticism welcome. Davey.

Hi everyone, I am about to start the kitty hawk su-30sm which came with these resin exhausts. I need advice on how to remove the flash without damaging the part as I have no idea how to. Thanks

Another resin model on a stand.I only added the pilot figure in the cockpit.Did the nose light form transparent sprue and made a gunsight.I used paints from tamiya and MM.

Hello to all.Here is my 1:72 Aircast resin Soko g-2 galeb.This has got to be one of the best resin kits I have ever worked on.it fits really well and the resin is quite soft and easy to sand and glue.I added some spare fujimi pilot figures in the cockpit and made the nose light from transparent sprue.The paints used are tamiya and MM.The decals came from the box, some are balkan models and some are home made.

How many of us get side tracked and end up building something else,well I started cleaning up 1/700 Chieftains tanks and the Stalwarts . These were bought from Starling Models and they do them 1/350 as well.Stole this of Wiki ,it describes it the Stalwart perfectly . The Stalwart, formally classified by the British Army as Truck, High Mobility Load Carrier (HMLC), 5 Ton, 6 x 6, Alvis/Stalwart and informally known by servicemen as the Stolly, is a highly mobile amphibious military truck built by Alvis that served with the British Army from 1966 until 1992. I'm doing Intrepid ,mainly because everyone else does Fearless and my friend served on her also. The kit its a straightforward resin kit with P.E. and decals ,this is the only good kit in 1/700 yes agreed with would love this in 1/350.It can be built straight of the box,but having vehicles for the landing craft I needed to have the dock flooded ,which means having the stern lowered ,so to do this, had have a thicker based to get the right angle,with that done could turn my attention to Intrepid.The flight deck ,well not going to say anything,but had to replace it with plastic card.hope the picture shows it couldn't be use.There is no detail in the dock area ,but once finished and painted the ship,I can turn to that afterwards.I have replaced all the hatches, grills and put ladders on. I bought this at Telford ,last year 2019 ,feels like a century ago after this year,away I never noticed no decals only last night,panic started to set,checked everything I could think of and thought just email L'arsenal which I did this morning ,they have already replied and they are sending a new set at no cost. Excellent service .That's why I,m not moaning too much about the flight deck.

I've been woefully inactive in my chosen hobby this year for various reasons, but with the end of the year looming large, I wanted to try and get one finished before 2021 hits us square in the face. I ordered this little resin kit after seeing it on these here forums, so made an order on eBay and have been waiting for the Russian and British Post Office to deliver it until yesterday. I couldn't resist, as it is just such a simple little kit. There are six resin parts and a resin base, plus a roll of copper wire for the aerials, and a thicker length to connect the finished model to the base. The parts were a piece of cake to remove from their casting blocks, as they were 3D printed, so the orb halves had a myriad of tiny little legs that I cut off with nippers then scraped them away. The antennae bases were similarly easy, but the base needed a good sand with my Dremel with repeated tests to check it was sitting flat to the floor. Whenever I have a butt-joint between two cylindrical or hemispherical parts, I always trim away the majority of the centres, which leads to easier fitting and less chance of the parts wobbling or fitting at a funny angle. I joined the two halves with CA, taking care to align the three dots and the larger access hatch between the two halves. it went well, and I ended up with a nice sphere. I drilled out the attachment point to the base with a 0.8mm drill, and the antenna bases with a 0.35mm drill, as I was replacing the copper wire with 0.3mm carbon fibre rod, as it's deadly straight, resilient and very flexible, while springing back to shape unlike the copper, which will bend and probably need straightening all the time during construction. Then I cleaned the parts in a bath of IPA (not beer), and squirted some primer on it, letting it dry overnight. Next job is to decide which type of metallic paint I'm going to use, and whether I'll need to prime it again in black. The base is going to be gloss black with white or silver lettering, so I'll need to deal with that slight wobble on the bottom of the front, which I couldn't see until I'd taken the picture above. I've got a lot on my plate at the moment with the site misbehaving, plus my dear old mum having just having had a serious op last Sunday, but I'm still hoping I can get it done before the end of the year, which at time of writing is a fortnight. Will I make it?

As stated in the build thread HERE: I am posting a couple of pictures of the Bell XP-83 just completed: As you can see in the photo above, I failed to add enough nose weight, so it's Mr Clear Sprue to the rescue! Thanks for looking, Ed

Hi mates, 2020 has been a weird year. I've only built two kits, and both were resin - two kits from CMR, the Blackburn Firebrand and Martin Mauler. I figured that I might as well make it an all-resin year and follow up those two with the beautiful S.B.S Model kit of the de Havilland DH.88 Comet. That way, instead of remembering 2020 in terms of maskless neighbors spewing bio-aerosols and conspiracy theories about Hugo Chavez, I can simply remember it as "the year I swore off injection moulding and only built resin." See? Simple. The kit has some of the nicest castings I've seen, and it was a joy to build. I chose G-ACSR because it was painted in British Racing Green - I seriously thought about putting some Team Lotus stickers on it. Anyway, here is my usual summary: Project: 1:72 de Havilland DH.88 Comet Kit: S.B.S Model kit no. SBS72003 Scale: 1:72 (as Zeus and Kronos decreed in their meeting on 21/12/20) Decals: From the kit, representing G-ACSR, flown by Owen Cathcart Jones and Ken Waller in the 1934 MacRobertson Air Race Photoetch: Included with the kit, primarily for the seat belts and fiddly bits like throttle levers and controls Resin: Uh, um, the whole thing is resin, including the canopy! Paint: Gunze H6 Green, H11 Flat White, H12 Flat Black, H37 Wood Brown, H77 Tyre Black; Alclad 115 Stainless Steel; Tamiya XF-16 Aluminum, XF-69 NATO Black; Floquil 110015 Flat Finish (satin or egg shell) Improvements/Corrections I cut out and re-positioned the elevators and added the balances for both the rudder and elevators. I also added the cable holding the canopy open, made from Nitinol wire. WIP build thread: Link Now, let's see some photos. Enjoy! Cheers, Bill

Hi mates, Let's see, this year I've built one resin model and I'm soon to finish another. So why not grab a third resin kit from the stash and stick to my theme? After all, 2020 is a goofy year no matter how you slice it, so I might as well swear off injection moulded styrene - resin rules! And maybe, just maybe, all that resin dust will nuke the bioaerosols floating around from that coronavirus thing. So here is what I found lurking in one of my cabinets: the S.B.S Model kit of the de Havilland DH.88 Comet in glorious teeny tiny scale (1:72). I don't know much about this aircraft, but I'm sure you folks will educate me. Now, way back when this kit came out, @general melchett mentioned that it had some of the finest resin castings he had seen, and darn if he's not right. This is a sweet little kit. As can be seen on the box, you have two choices for the paint and marking scheme - red (G-ACSS) or green (G-ACSR). Both of these flew in the 1934 MacRobertson UK to Australia Race, and I seem to recall there was a black one as well. I rather fancy the red one myself, it being the winner of the race and all. Although the green one reminds me of a Lotus, and it has the Union Jack on the tail... The parts breakdown is conventional, and the detail is exquisite. This is 1:72, so the fuselage is a mere 4.5 inches long or so. The engine nacelles and wings are one piece castings. The fuselage-wing fairing is a separate piece, which is a feature that I really like. The Aki Products Sea Fury that I built last year is engineered this same way. The remainder of the parts are all nicely cast and detailed, although there aren't a lot of them. In addition, S.B.S provide a small photoetch fret with the usual seat harnesses and instrument panel (with film instruments) and white metal landing gear struts. The canopy is cast in clear resin, and the model has provision for mounting it open (it's hinged on the starboard side in real life). The other clear resin part in the photo is the tip of the nose. I'm guessing this was a light? Well, that's all there is to it. At my current rate of completion it should only take me about a year to build it! Luckily, this aircraft still exists so there are lots of photos out on the Interweb thing. The last I read it was part of the Shuttleworth Collection, and I think that's reason enough for me to return to Old Blighty for additional research. I'll need @CedB as my chauffeur again, otherwise I may not be able to find which pubs have Doom Bar on draught. I think he has them all committed to memory. Cheers, Bill PS. I wonder if I can find a 1:72 scale typewriter somewhere...

This is the 1/72 Sharkit resin-and-vacuform kit of the Edgley Optica. It's a pretty basic kit, and even to build the yellow G-BGMW prototype (which is what the kit is intended for) it would benefit from some detailing inside the cockpit and at the rear of the ducted fan nacelle. But I wanted to reproduce the Optica that flew in the cult-but-dire movie Slipstream (1989). This needed some modification of the prototype version: an extension to the upper nacelle and elevator trim tab, shrouds on the undercarriage, an overhead control box and wider instrument panel in the cockpit, flow directors on the upper wing surfaces ... in addition to the necessary pitot tube, sundry aerials, landing lights, a stone guard on the front wheel, control columns and rudder pedals, and rear support struts for the engine. And some other bits and bobs. In addition, I printed up decal sheets to reproduce, as best as I could, the feathered patterns on wings and nacelle, and the odd symbol on the tail. Build log is here: It's a resolute tail-sitter, with no room for added weight in the very open and thin-floored cockpit. I've made no effort to photographically conceal the short transparent rod that props up the back of the nacelle. Edited to add: here are a few views on the Coastal Kits "Abandoned Airfield" display base, which arrived in the post today.

While the XP-91 Thundercepter V-Tail model works it's way through the paint shop, I've decided to while away the waiting hours by starting another resin airplane, the Bell XP-83, by Anigrand. This model has a certain interest to me, because I originally started working on it piece-meal a few years ago, and then when I got to that point, I discovered that my kit had two right side intake nacelles, but no left side. I emailed Arnold at Anigrand to ask whether he might supply the correct part I needed. He soon replied that during a move, the molds for his original XP-83 had been lost or damaged, and that he would like to find one of those older kits, to remaster some molds. I volunteered what I had (forgetting to enclose the wings) and sent it off to him. After several months of not hearing back, I sent a couple of emails, but got no response. About a year or more later, I was browsing his website, and saw that the XP-83 was for sale again. I figured he had forgotten his promise, so I just ordered another kit, paying with Paypal. Soon, I got an email from Arnold saying that he had lost my email address, but remembered my name, and he refunded the price of the new model plus shipping, so he did, in the end, honor his promise. A very nice gentleman! After seeing the remastered kit, I compared it to the old one I had started. First off, unlike the old kit, the newer one had only 1 teeny tiny pinhole, and virtually no flash at all. In addition, this time the kit had a clear cast resin canopy, rather than the usual vacuform, which the old kit had. Anyway, here is the kit box, and the instructions: As you can see from the parts explosion, there aren't many parts to this kit, which meets my simple model desires at this time! I started off the build by prepping the interior of the fuselage and intake/engine nacelles (one of each persuasion this time!): The cockpit area and front wheel well were given a shot of Interior Green, while the nacelles had a shot of black primer at either end. When dry, the cockpit interior was given a coat of clear gloss, to attach some cockpit decals, which are fine for the very tiny cockpit on this model, and won't really be seen much later on. The decals for the side console will be cut from portions of this old IPMS sheet which I found on line, and used for these situations. This sheet happens to be one I recently acquired on E-bay: Above right, After the nacelle primer had dried, I shot the interiors where needed, with some Alclad II Aluminum, and the engine faces with some Alclad II Polished Aluminum. The photo shows that the background area of the engine face on the right side has been painted flat black, while the one on the left has not been thusly painted yet. Next, the engine fan blades were given a wash of black to pop out the blade detail a little: Above right, they are then glued into the nacelles with CA. The whole point of all this is to make the engine fronts stand out a little, while giving the illusion of depth. Next up, the cockpit "detail" is done, with the kit supplied decal added to the instrument panel. In retrospect, I probably should have used some from the IPMS sheet, but you can't see much of it when done, anyway. The two areas on the sides of the decal shows where the edges of the panel need to be sanded to fit the cockpit. The simple seat gets some tiny strips of aluminum foil, painted a light grey on the dull side, and the the tips of the strip on one end are bent over to the grey side, to represent tiny buckles. They are shown here attached with white glue, and when dry, will be bent down into their needed shapes with a toothpick: Next, the decals were added to the side consoles, and when dry the cockpit wash given a coat of matt clear. Then, the fuselage halves are CA'd together and when dry, the I.P., control stick and seat are inserted into the cockpit. Also shown is the spiffy new cast resin canopy: The canopy pour block needs to be sawn very carefully from the canopy. Resin tends to be brittle, so I wouldn't attempt to snip it nor snap it off! Above right, After sanding the fuselage seam a little, the canopy has been attached with G-S watch cement, and the tail attached with CA. Masking tape has been added to keep the tape off of gluing surface, and "X" marks where each side of the fuselage will also be black primed and then painted Aluminum, as were the nacelles, earlier. Well, that's enough for the first install. If you'd like one of these kits, I can certainly recommend the new tooling. Get 'em before they're gone, HERE. Ed

Hello I made underwater small diorama as gift for my wife birthday. Main character was printed on resin 3d printer. Enjoy. Cheers

Hello again, As is usual, the black primer on my XP-47B is taking forever to dry, so I'm going to give it a few more days. Meanwhile, as I have been getting bored, I'm going to start another concurrent build, something I seldom ever do. This offering is the excellent LF Models 1/72 rendition of the original Curtiss XP-42. I say excellent, in regards to general appearance and accuracy, but alas that comes with the caveat that there is lots of trimming, sanding and sprue stub nipping before you get to the end. Therefore, I must say upfront that this is NOT a good beginner's kit, although those with a few miles under their belts can probably see it through! The kit is a multi-media kit, with plastic main parts, and resin detail, add to that the vacu-formed canopy and windows and a few photo-etch parts, and it looks like this, a LOT of stuff crammed into a very tiny box: Interestingly, the box includes drawings for two later mods to this aircraft, but no parts to make them. These modded aircraft were very short-lived, perhaps with only a flight or two each. They were designed to try out differing cowl shapes, and are interesting, should some of you wilder modelers out there wish to stray even further afield than this kit... In my old age, I have come to dislike cockpit interiors a lot more than earlier in my life, because they slow me down from my primary mission in life -- to hack and slice plastic! Anyway, I decided to start there, and do the cockpit later on. First step was cleaning up (flash and pouring blocks, mostly) the resin parts for the front end, albeit two front cowl halves and the prop spinner: The center photo, above, shows the prop spinner centered up atop my propeller jig, talked about in some of my other prop type build threads, so not repeated here. Anyway, the part is centered over a bit of two-sided cello tape, to hold it in place while I mark three vertical lines from each three-bladed position, to the tip of the spinner. This is to help align the prop holes (which are NOT provided by the kit). Since the whole top of my prop jig box is covered with plastic shipping tape, the two-sided tape will peel right off later. The far right photo, above, shows the prop spinner having been moved to the side edge of the box (so that the drill bit would reach), with a suitable thickness of scrap plastic (arrow) used to control the distance of the hole from the rear of the prop spinner. Later on, I will drill a hole in the center of the rear of the prop spinner, to make a mounting shaft. (The kit directions show a nice resin prop shaft in the directions, but not is actually provided. That doesn't matter much however, because there is also no hole in the cowling to receive said shaft!), a matter which I will address now. Since gluing the two front cowl halves together with CA results in the large hole as shown, I placed the assembled cowl halves on a bit of scrap 40 thou or so plastic card, and using my trusty #2 lead pencil, traced a circle, inside the cowl's front opening onto the plastic "A". To the back of that part, now labelled "B" I added two bits of square thicker plastic, simply to add depth to support the prop shaft in a hole which I will drill later: Center photo, above, shows the filler and CA that I added to the cowl inside, after positioning the part "B" assembly (square bits to the inside) in the front hole of the cowl. This is needed to re-enforce the join (also, I sanded the part a little too small in circumference!). The powder is just a nail-building powder, used with CA adhesive to build up fingernails with fake tips, etc. It's about the same as baking soda, but a finer grind. I use it because my wife had it laying about, and no longer wears fake nails... Above, far right, part "B" from the front. After the glue fully cures, I'll sand it a bit. I'm doing all this, rather than just gluing the spinner in place, because I don't want to take a chance on sanding the spinner out-of-round, when working on the model later, as most resin models require a lot of sanding! Also, it will be simpler for me to add the propeller blades, using the jig, later on. Lastly, for now, a small chisel is used to remove the injection stubs from the inner wing surfaces; the ones in the center belly pan won't be in the way. At this time, I also glued the kit-provided wheel well roofs over the wheel well openings, on the inside: Well, I'll be back later with some kind of updates for some model or the other! See you then... Ed

Originally designed as a half scale model of a planned jet airliner it became apparent during the design phase that the layout was unsuitable and but it continued as research a/c for investigating the characteristics of swept wings. Three were built. The first used a Vampire front fuselage and was used for low speed research. It crashed after spinning at low altitude. The second was used for high speed work but crashed whist practising for an attempt on the world speed record. The third, modelled here, had a modified fuselage having a more pointed nose and a lowered, more streamlined, canopy. It first flew in July 1947 and in September 1948 became the first British a/c to exceed the speed of sound, although completely out of control at the time! It was passed to the RAE in November 1949 for further research but crashed in September 1950 for reasons unknown but believed to be pilot incapacitation due to lack of oxygen. I once heard Eric Brown describe it as the most dangerous aircraft that he had flown. This resin kit was produced by Planet models and went together fairly easily. There are three basic components, the upper and lower halves of the wing/fuselage and the rudder, all nicely moulded and free from pinholes. The most notable problem being the fit of the upper front fuselage – it doesn’t and requires filler to correct a large gap between the front portions ahead of the canopy. I realised later that I should have spent some time thinning the rear sections of the wing to produce a sharper trailing edge. The kit is supplied with two vacform canopies. Unfortunately there is a flaw in that the frame which runs down the centre of the forward section is not quite in the centre. I had to trim the top of the pilot's seat to stop it fouling the canopy.. Not a big deal as it is hardly visible. One final problem appeared whilst fitting the u/c. The a/c sits slightly nose up and the model does not. It is partly due to the mainwheels being oversize, compared to Barrie Hygates drawing, and something else which I could not work out. I ended up shortening the legs to get it to look right. In fact the original legs looked far too long to retract into the wells whereas the shorter legs look to be about the right length. The finish is Alclad Airframe Aluminium over gloss black enamel followed by a light coat of Alclad Aluminium to reduce the shine. John Whilst putting it in the display cabinet I was reminded that I had seen that wing planform before... I had always thought of the 108 as being small but, as a half-scale model of the proposed DH 106 it had a span of 39ft (about 12m) Compare it with its American equivalent the Northrop X-4

Here is my Anigrand Craftswork 1:144 resin Kawasaki Ki-108 "Randy" I built back in 2011. It represents one of the prototypes at the Rikugun Koku Shinsa Bu (Army Air Testing Centre), Gifu Factory area, 1944. It's one of the bonus kits of the Kawasaki Ki-91 bomber set. Only four prototypes of this aircraft were built and flown, the second pair being of the improved Kai variant with greater span and length. According to what little references I could find, this kit seems to be a little in between both variants but closer to the first pair. This was a particularly troubled build. Some parts were poorly moulded and the fit was quite bad. All of the parts had an 'orange peel' surface so I had to sand them all smooth first. I added the top radio mast (from a Sweet Zero) and the wing pitot tube (stretched sprue). I thinned the main wheel doors as much as I could. The kit was fully painted with brush except for the matt varnish which was airbrushed. I used White Ensign Models Kawasaki Army Green for the top surfaces and Vallejo Light Blue Grey (RLM76) for the undersides. This kit had the decals missing so I sourced them from other sheets. Since it was a prototype, I kept weathering to a minimum. Thanks for looking Miguel

Stowage & Accessories Set – British FV510 Warrior (SPS-073) 1:35 Meng Supplies via Creative Models Ltd We reviewed the new Meng Warrior here after the second tranche arrived with Creative, but we’ve had this stowage set since the initial release, as it went out of stock almost as fast as the kit itself! They’re now back in stock, so here it is. The set arrives in a brown cardboard box with the contents shown in a large sticker that covers the majority of the top flap. Inside there are two bubble-wrap bags of resin, totalling fifteen parts, each with its own casting block, carefully attached with the smallest of contact points to reduce the amount of clean-up needed. The largest part is a long rolled up tarp/awning that is attached to the side of the Warrior’s slat armour, with three Bergen day-sacks, two jerry-cans, and three Camelbak-type drink reservoirs that a soldier can strap to his back or attach to his Bergen, with a drink-tube draped over his shoulder and a handy bite-valve ready for a quick drink at any time. These things must be a godsend for troops in the Middle East, where the heat can have you dehydrated in hours or even minutes if you’re working hard. The Camelbaks have separate straps that are attached on each side of the narrow pouch, and one strap has the drink-tube fastened in place, although the picture on the box shows them loose. If you wanted to portray that possibility, scraping the moulded-in tube off and replacing it with some wire would do the job, adding a drop of super glue to depict the blunt T-shaped bite-valve, shaping it when dry. A quick Google should tell you if the military tubes are blue, but I suspect they might be green, but you know my memory. With resin, you should take the precaution of wearing a mask when cutting or sanding it, as the tiny particles are harmful to your health if breathed in. Washing the parts in warm water will also improve the adhesion of paint, as there may still be some moulding release agent on the parts when you receive them. Take care not to use water that is too hot, as this may cause deformation to more delicate parts, but this technique can conversely be used to fix warped parts, using cold water to “freeze” the changes in the parts. Conclusion This is a beautifully crisp, detailed set, but it isn’t what you’d call cheap. If you think it’s worth a punt, pick one up soon, as they seem to be flying off the shelves. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of