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So I'm in another city and away from my Ventura for a bit and decided I needed a simple little project to keep me out of trouble. I reviewed my stash on scalemates.com and decided a little $5 Academy Airacobra kit I picked up at the London, ON show in October might be suitable. I did a little searching and discovered Canada had one of these planes for evaluation in 1941 and crashed it in the Gatineau Hills across from Ottawa, where I grew up. Here's the plane flying.... ... and here's the plane after the pilot failed to switch from an empty gas tank to a full one. A write off. So I could model AH621 in its glory but at least a couple other people on the planet have already done that. Someone even made and sold decals for it. So it seemed I should do the crashed version instead. I've modelled a crashed Hurricane and Ventura, so why not? I seem to pick the underdog planes and do them in a crash. Based on crash photos I marked up a diagram for cuts. Here's the kit I am working with. Turns out the previous owner had assembled the cockpit and fuselage... without paint but with a huge chunk of putty in the nose because this is a tricycle landing gear plane. Seems he also included decals for the Mongolian air force. Here you can see what was assembled... including one landing gear door closed. This triggered a deep desire to disassemble all of this. Not sure if that was the right way to go. Unlike the Ventura restoration, I didn't want to go slow and soak in IPA. Acetone had worked wonders in the late stages of Ventura disassembly so I used it here, rubbing it along seams with a q-tip. As of last night when I had started (after drinking a stout and assembling the dough for a kugelhopf sweet bread) I was doing well separating the fuselage but then caused some nasty damage where plastic ripped along the nose and tail where the bonds were stronger. So the fuselage was still fused at nose and tail where both were damaged, and the middle was nicely separated. Cue regret and annoyance until I returned to it this evening. I decided to accept the ugly butchery and focus on making cuts according to my diagram. Perhaps the cuts would help me get the putty out and separate the plane pieces. It worked. Here you can see the rudder, second cockpit door, and nose cowling cut off. You can also see the cut along the tail around the radio access panel, and the chunks of putty I was able to remove. So mood is lifting. The crash photos show the tail was bent quite sharply. In order to facilitate the bend and overlapping panels in the photo, I cut the tail on both sides around the radio access panel, and I cut around the top panel as well. However the plastic is too thick to allow for a realistic fitting of these cut pieces together into a "crunched tail". So, out comes a file and I ground away on the edges on the two pieces of fuselage to bevel them thin. Then I assembled the pieces for a dry fit mockup to approximate the crash photo. Not a bad rough start! I need - a stronger tail bend - build a forward doorframe that gets ripped away from the fuselage (in the photo the door is ripped off and on the ground like my mockup above) - remove access panel in nose - thin out and damage nose cowling pieces - open nose piece and add a mulched up reduction gear mechanism showing I'll also work on the majorly deflected elevators and the sheared wing and aileron. Looks like my relaxing little quickie is moving along 🙃

Time to unveil the next car which will be getting some paint on it this summer. But this one is going to be a bit more of a challenge than the others... If we go way back in time to Christmas 1988, 12 year old me received this kit as a present. At that time I didn't have such useful stuff as paint, and I think this may have been the first time I used cement rather than UHU (I thought it was UHU, but judging by the strip down performance it seemed as though some parts had been cemented - damned if I can remember after all this time though). Anyway, as is usual at that age I leapt straight into it whenever I was allowed space on the kitchen table, and set about gluing bits together. No paint meant the whole thing was yellow, but never mind, I could make up for that by using all the decals for both the #7 and #8 cars - that'll make up for the lack of paint right? 🤣 Anyay, after 10+ years sitting on a shelf, and another 20+ sitting in a box it was looking a bit sorry for itself. First job was stripping it down which I always find quite a depressing part of the job - it almost feels like you're destroying it rather than rebuilding it. And this one didn't all want to come apart easily; there are some parts where the plastic preferred to break rather than the glue come unstuck so I'm just hoping I can get those repaired something like ok. And then there are a few pieces gone missing over the years, but as far as I can tell there's no more than 5 missing parts, none are clear and all should be capable of being replaced. So time to go ahead. And, after attacking it with vinegar, IPA, the freezer, hot water (accidentlly too hot for half of the engine block but I'm hoping I can salvage that) and the ultrasonic bath I ended up with a load of pieces: Not that really does look depressing doesn't it, seeing a model housed in some margarine containers. It gets worse if you look close-up and see the broken bits too. But no point dwelling on that, it won't fix itself so better get started. First bit to try and get ready for paint is the chassis. I've brushed some acetone over the bits of glue on the surface which oftened it to aid removal - I avoided using that during the strip down as I was worried about melting the plastic rather than the glue, but it looks as though I would have been better using that than all the other things I did. So with the glue softened, careful scraping with a #17 blade and som esanding has left it almost in a position to spray the primer and see how bad it looks. Just two problems - firstly I'm still spraying the Micra and Pontiac... And the second problem goes all the way back to 1988 when I didn't have sprue snippers and instead used the kitchen scissors. And when I removed the chassis from the sprue it looks as though my aim was off and I took a chunk out of the side of the chassis. I decided it would be better to try and fix than now rather than leave it, so first step was to put some plastic card in there to give a base: Once that was set I applied some spare sprue dissolved in acetone (well I say dissolved, it has actually turned into a gloop) as I wanted something a bit stronger in there than thinner. But I got it applied and sanded back, only to discover that I hadn't quite got it built up enough. But as I had got enough strength into the repair I was able to add filler today... at which point I realised I hadn't got a pic of the repair. But hopefully you don't need a photo to imagine it all straighted out. So that's the start of my scary Porsche restoration challenge, expect it to be slow and painful but hopefully you get the picture. Thanks to all who drop in to look at it.

My Hurricane is entering a painting and decalling phase and I want to take my time letting each step cure because I am using Vallejo acrylics. So I'm considering my next project... inspired by @Brigbeale's restorations, and @rob Lyttle's Lockheed Ventura/Lodestar masterpieces. Gentlemen, any tips, tricks, and input most welcome. I will also be reviewing builds from @Ed Russell and some articles. Tony O'T was the king of the venturas. I now have four 1/72 minicraft Venturas that I have picked up second hand. This one is a partly-built 1/72 minicraft Ventura I got at a show for $5. The vendor tried to sell me on the fact that a "museum-quality" modeller had done most of the work for me but I told him I was going to take it apart anyway. The paint and seams look good but I want a 1942-era Ventura, freshly built, wearing TLS cammo, and turretless and gunless, snatched away from RAF delivery for the purpose of RCAF training at 34 OTU Pennfield. So this fellow needs to come apart and come clean! I want to make this one into the Ventura coded FY-F AE728 crash that my great uncle experienced while training (described elsewhere on BM). I'll remove the turret and cover the turret and astrodome holes, collapse starboard landing gear, open the escape hatch in the cockpit roof, and open the passenger door on the port side. . In the pic below some more issues... two identical pilot seats? Each with an ejector pin seat cushion? And a giant full bulkhead with a space-age circle in the middle? Nope nope nope. My Ventura needs less than half a bulkhead behind the pilot only, and only one seat. And a better seat. And seatbelts! Behind that would be the radio op position. I'll add that too. I've read crash reports and it's interesting to read the radio op witness statements. They sometimes have no clue about what's going on because they are tied up in the wireless training exercises. I'll need to do something about the nose. I need the windowed version. For some bizarre reason all four of my minicrafts are the USA version of the plane. Same with other ones I've seen in stores. All the RAF versions are being sold cheap down in America where shipping would cost me as much as all four kits together. Drives me crazy but there it is. I may try sawing off the noses and vacuforming new ones in clear. Unless there is a source of noses somewhere? Ah but shipping! I dunno. Does minicraft sell replacement noses I wonder? (for their alternative RAF / B34 Lexington versions) I sent Academy an email. We'll see what happens! Bomb bay is buttoned up. That's fine but it'll come apart anyway probably. In the background you see the tailplane pieces. I would like to cut out the rudders and elevators. I probably need to check on @rob Lyttle's work. Finally, what's this? Some creepy psychopath modeller trophy? No, it's phase 1. Soaking the pieces in water. Then I'll drain them and freeze them for a few days. If CA was used to glue them, supposedly this should help expand and break the bonds. Phase 2 will be handing the pieces over to my wife. She soaks 3d prints in IPA at work and she's due to replace the liquid soon. She'll toss the pieces into the stuff for a week maybe before sending the liquid on to be properly disposed of. I'll clean the stuff off at that point and see what's what. So why start with this one instead of the pristine ones? Something to learn on and just try everything without worrying about it. When my wife bought me the Revell Ventura last xmas (first kit in 40 years) I got so tensed up with perfectionism it really surprised me. Having extra copies helps! This one will proceed slowly as I need to see how well I can break apart and clean his thing first.

Time to make another WIP post I will probably forget about lol. I have a really old (for my standards, so like 4 years old) Lightning that really needs some TLC. Made it many years ago when I was still new to the hobby. My plan is to restore and convert it to F.6 XS903 (this plan has since been altered and I'm converting it to and F.2 instead) I stripped the paint, I'm sure my neighbours were confused with what I was doing lol. The result was quite good. I then moved onto reworking the interior. I was looking forward to fixing the ejection seat, that was in a pretty sad state. Ready for scratchbuilding and details I am very happy with the result. Outdated photo but I have started putting everything back together, the fit is quite awful, as expected, and there will be a lot of gaps to fill. Expect more updates soon...

Yak-38 "Forger" | Revell | 1/72 Ukrainian Air Force, Severniy airfield, Kirovskoye, Crimea, 1993 Finished this on 8/26/2022. This was a restoration of a Revell I built in High School, which meant stripping paint, dis-assembling and re-assembling, filling in panel lines, and either buying or scratch building details. Unfortunately the kit is not terribly accurate, being too long and too narrow. However, as a whole, it looks more like the real thing than the HobbyCraft version. The most accurate in 1/72 is AModel, but it's out of production and I wasn't able to find one. About this aircraft (adapted from the Begemot decals sheet): This Yak-38M was the second pre-serial aircraft and belonged to the Yakolev bureau. Stationed at Seerniy airfield , Korvskoye, Crimea at the end of the 1970's. Initially this aircraft had standard blue color scheme. This aircraft took part in test flights during different research programs. It took part in test flights from a civilian ship during May 1984, taking off and landing from a special platform mounted on board the "Nikolay Cherkasov" container carrier. During August 1990, this aircraft was used for test flights from the deck of the newly built "Tiblisi" carrier. Before these test, the aircraft was repainted in this unusual scheme. After the break-up of the USSR, it was turned over to Ukraine. At the end of the 1990s, the aircraft was donated to the Vinnitsa aviation museum where it was repainted and exhibited to this day. That last sentence is important because Yellow 83 at Vinnitsa has a different medium blue color (much brighter) and the light gray and medium blue are reversed in the color scheme when compared to the operational versions (a picture of the operation version is here: https://russianplanes.net/id24849). My version is the operational version. This project initially started with a HobbyCraft kit in my stash, but when I decided the Revell looked more accurate, I finished the HobbyCraft to figure out how to do some of the details, and then started on the Revell. WIP is here. Finishing: CA filled gaps and panel lines Paint: Mr. Color FS15042 (dusted with cobalt blue to lighten it up) / Mr. Color FS35164 / Hataka RAF Medium Sea Gray / Mr. Color IJA Gray (bottom) / Mr. Color FS36375 (wheel bays) / Custom mix of Russian interior green and FS36375 for the Cockpit. Aftermarket: Begemot Decals / Armory Yakovlev Yak-38 Forger wheels / Quickboost MiG-29A Ejection Seat w/Safety Belts Some details I had to fabricate: Here you can see the IFF antennas in front of the cockpit. They were difficult because they were so small, but they look more realistic than the ones that came with the kit. There's also the protruding sensor coming out of the windshield, which I made from scratch. The two bent antennas and the long pitot tube came with the kit. I scratch built this little antenna: Here's some main gear doors extending from the fuselage to the main gear: These sensors under the intake (one on either side): I made this directional control nozzle out of a glass bead, and I sanded down the white colored sensors because they were molded bigger and at sharp angles which is not very accurate: And here's the ejection seat next to what's left of the kit seat: Here's a "Before" photo. Not terrible, but I knew I could do better. Love the decals Hope you like it! Questions, comments and constructive criticism welcome!

Found this just now and I don't recall seeing the footage posted here, so for all my new Aussie modeling mates, here it is. What a rugged little fighter that gave sterling service and was developed in an amazingly short time period. Makes me want to pull one of my Special Hobby kits from the stash! Enjoy! (Footage via YouTube.) Mike

My restoration of an Airfix 1/32 Bond Bug (M10C) The "patient" before restoring: Afterwards: Exhaust was scratchbuilt. Dave

This one is a rebuild of a kit I built at least 30 years ago. It's quite a simple kit what with being motorised, so it only took a couple of months to complete. Nevertheless, I'm still quite pleased with the way it's turned out - not perfect by any means but a big improvement on how it started out. This is the build thread if anyone wants to see how it came together. The kit started out in one pieces apart from a couple of pieces which had gone missing, but was decidedly grubby and looking a bit sorry for itself. So, for a fun little project between longer builds, I took it to pieces, painted it (just bare plastic before) and got hold of the Shunko decals to have another go at those. The decals are definitely the biggest challenge with this kit (60 in total, including some which are quite large) and the Microsol saw a bit of action. The end result isn't perfect, but that's as much down to the shape of the car and trying to get the decals to conform than it is anything else. Clearcoat is Pledge Revive It (aka Future) - it didn't airbrush too well but spread out quite nicely when brush painted and apart from a couple of runs produced a decent finish. Anyway, enough chatter, here's a shed load of photos No pics on the mirror this time, mainly because the underside if low to the ground and pretty featureless, but I'm sure there's more than enough below anyway. (I couldn't get a better pic of the interior than this) Thanks for looking.

Saw the first episode of th new series of Warbird workshop last night, it was on a 2 seater hurricane. I'm sure the hurricane officionados here will correct me if I'm wrong, but I wasn't aware that there was a 2 seater hurricane during WW2. Anyway, the programme was a brisk run through of the restortion work, with soe historical perspective, and finished with the daughter of a BoB hurricane pilot taking a flight in the 2 seater. next week's programme is about a restoration of the Navy's first seaplane.

Didn't take long (by my standards at least) to get this one completed. As suggested by the restoration tag, this one is a restoration of a build first done about 30 years ago back when I was barely a teenager. The kit itself is a snap together (Snap-Loc in Tamiyaspeak), and I understand is based on a radio-controlled model. That would certainly explain the way that it only has about 20 pieces excluding the motor, and half of those are in the wheels and axles! So not a challenge then, perfect for a younger builder building up kits quickly. The real thing ran in this livery at Le Mans in 1986, where it came 7th and won its class. Not that difficult to win its class when it was in the Experimental Class and so the only entrant It came back next year in the Rothmans livery and caught fire. For the build, this was done as a straight out-of-the-box build apart from adding a mesh to the rear to hide the red and blue cables to the motor. Anyway, having bored everyone with the waffle, it's time to bore you all with photos instead... First of all, this was what I started out with. As can be seen, it's showing the full effects of having been on an open shelf near a cornfield for about 10 years ago with dirt and yellowed plastic, not to mention badly applied and degraded decals. Having come across a replacement set of decals from the 2011 rerelease of the kit while in lockdown, I decided this was due a refurbishment. So here's a set of photos from around the car under a variety of lighting conditions. A bit annoying, but I had the side peg holes filled, sanded and smoothed and all was well until they sank a bit with the gloss on. At least they're not black circles as on the original build, but I would much rather they weren't there. The mesh at the rear appears to be doing its job of hiding the battery compartment, motor and cables behind it. Unfortunately reflections stopped me getting a good shot of the interior, but here's a top-down view of the car instead. And finally, here's a couple of shots of it with its road-going cousin which I built 3 years ago. Contrary to what the second picture implies, they do all sit flat - it's the white surface which is a bit uneven and the car does not tripod! Overall verdict? Well if you want a 1/24 Porsche 961 I don't think there's an alternative. There's no getting around that this is a very simple kit, and would take a LOT of work to get a good level of detail on it. But equally, the shape is pretty good, and it's capable of being built up into something which looks good on the shelf. Hope you like it, and thanks for looking.

After the detailed (and it must be said enjoyable) build which was the Fiesta, time for something a little simpler. Or a lot simpler to be exact - as I understand it Tamiya's Porsche 961 started life as a radio-controlled car before becoming this snap-fit model. Probably simpler that I would buy nowadays, but this one left the shop and was originally built by my younger self somewhere in the very early '90s or possibly very late '80s. The car itself is the one which ran at Le Mans in (if memory serves correctly) 1986, and has one of the simplest racing liveries you're likely to come across on a modern racing car. So it's another restoration job which I can just relax with before going onto the next new-build. If I'm honest, I wasn't planning to do this one just yet, but I came across a set of decals in Switzerland on ebay during the depths of lockdown and that gave me the impetus to get it started. This is what I started with: As you can see, it's a bit grubby and the decals are past their best (actually, the decals are much worse than the photo implies). So, into some water and the ultrasonic bath went the body, and before long the old decals were removed. Of course, that revealed just how much the plastic has yellowed where it was exposed to the sun when I displayed it all those years ago. One thing which gives away it's R/C heritage is that the windows are firmly attached to the body in the factory, so I've had to mask them over to (hopefully!) avoid overspray. Running a scalpel around the edge of the windows allowed me to shape the window masks, fingers crossed I didn't dig into the plastic. Having cleaned up the mould lines and fitted the clips to the inside of the body (not sure why they needed to have separate clips to connect to the chassis, but I presume it was for added robusteness when used as an R/C car), it got a layer of Halfords White primer. This time around, I tried putting the panel wash on after the primer rather than the colour coat: The panel lines don't look as obvious after the colour coat (Halfords Nissan Arctic White) is added, but I don't feel that they're as consistent this way. It's not that they look bad, more that I prefer the look when the panel lines have gone on after the colour. Obviously, it's not just the body which needs painting, so does the chassis. And this one has the potential to be a pain since it's black on the underside and white on top. First of all I painted the chassis Halfords Satin Black, then masked off the underside ready for the white. Having sprayed that, I was pleased to see that there wasn't much in the way of overspray, and nothing of any importance. And then I noticed I'd completely missed a strip on the front left wheel well Yesterday, that white was sanded off and had the first brush coat applied (not bothering about spraying as it's not going to be noticeable when finished, just need to get near). So that's where I got in the pre-build preparation for this one. Going to be quite simple, and relatively quick one for me, but hope someone likes it.

So guys just shifted over from this thread. in continuation of my quest to restore Hurricane Mk I P5202/Z7059 depending on which source you believe (although i would be P 5202 which shot down a Me110 on 11.9.40 whilst with 213 Sqn.) I wanted to do a ACSEA marked aircraft but seems not possible?? i want to do it half exposed and unpainted and half covered and painted. I find the main wheel hubs suspiciously like those of the vampire NF 10 parked next to it??

Approximately a year ago, I started the Airfix vulcan, a notoriously bad kit, now I have decided to continue making it and fix some mistakes. Here's some of my progress. Sanding down old and rough paint One wing fully painted. someone special is in this picture

I found this just now and thought it might be of interest, as it offers a good view of two F6F-3's aboard the Enterprise in 1944 with the external bomb pylon which could be fitted to the RH wing center section. I hope it is useful for modeling projects. Mike http://www.navsource.org/archives/02/020625.jpg I discovered this while looking for more photos of the -3 bomb rack; I was not aware that the Collings Foundation had this Hellcat and that she was a genuine F6F-3N! Can't wait to see the final result at an airshow! This was one well-traveled Hellcat! https://www.collingsfoundation.org/aircrafts/grumman-f6f-3n-hellcat/

After all the time spent on the Skyline, I feel it's time for a shorter project. To that end, I figured it was time to restore another model from my youth. In truth, I don't feel I did too bad first time around on this given I was about 12 or 13, didn't paint it, and had nothing to do the decals with other than fingers, water and a duster. However, 30 years have taken their toll on it with the decals having suffered a little over not to mention that it has got covered in dust and shows the effect of 10 years on a shelf next to a field - it got a fresh coat of dust every harvest time! This is what it looked like a couple of months ago. So it's time to bring it back to life, courtesy of some Shunko decals and three sets of instructions - one in Japanese downloaded from 1999.co in Japan, one average quality scan from one I found on sale on eBay and a scan of a set of instructions for the Airfix model of this car courtesy of @theplasticsurgeon from this very site. Between those three, I'm reasonably confident I can get the painting about right too. First job was to take it to pieces and get those decals off. Oddly, it was much easier to get the car to pieces (probably because it was stuck together using UHU rather than solvent cement) than it was to get all the decals off. But I got there in the end, and while I always suspected that the plastic had yellowed, removing the decals confirmed it. What did surprise me though was that the coloured decals appear to have stopped the plastic yellowing while the white areas hadn't. Over the past few weeks, I've been getting the paint on this. First up was the primer, which at least returned it to plain white and covered the yellowing. Next up was the paint. Not all that smooth, but as it's a racing car I'm not going for a perfect finish on this one. Starting on it properly today, the first job was to add a wash to the panel lines and the bonnet grille. Generally not too much of a problem apart from that the wash started creeping both ways along the join between the door and the side skirt. I ended up scribing the bottom of the doors and trying to stop the wash going backwards with a blue-tack dam - not 100% successful and the wash is a bit heavy at the bottom of the doors but it was shaping up to be far worse so I'll settle for it. The chassis is also in the shot - very simple as this is one of Tamiya's earliest 1/24 models (serial number suggests the third one they did) and it's also motorised which eliminates space for an engine. There'll be a bit of painting around the windows, but I'm aiming to get that decalling done early so as to get it clearcoated before temperatures drop for winter.

It seems as though there is a lot of Dodge Chargers around this section of the board, and as luck would have it that's what my next project is However, this one isn't quite the same as most of the others around. Generally, when you say Dodge Charger, most people would think of the classic muscle car similar to the General Lee. A few may well think of the modern version, but either way you're probably thinking of a big V8. What you're probably not thinking of is a 2.2 litre 4-cylinder hatchback from 1982, but Monogram's version of that particular version of the Dodge Charger was my very first 1/24 car model built way back when I was about 9 or so, I seem to remember buying it because it was a) bright yellow, and b) cheap because even back in the mid-80's it was obviously not seen as a desirable car and so was reduced to the sort of level pocket money could afford. Being a snap kit, it was relatively easy to build, and for my parents had the added advantage that I wasn't going to get glue all over the kitchen table. Fast forward 30 years, and it's showing signs of age and being built by a child. The decals were definitely not on straight (where they hadn't disintegrated on me), the chrome was degraded in places, particularly the front left wheel, at least one part (the gear lever) is missing, it doesn't sit straight and when I took it apart I remembered that was because the front subframe and wheel are held on my blue-tak. at some later date (I guess when I was early to mid teens) I decided being American it should get some chrome bumpers and mirrors not appreciating that it had virtuallyno chrome on at all. And the interior almost looks like there is carpet in there with 30 years worth of dust. Basically, I've decided it's time to try to get this looking shelf-worthy and do it justice. But first, this is the starting point: So over summer I set about getting the body and chassis sprayed while the weather was ok. First job was to dip it in the IPA to get rid of that silver paint, which unfortunately put paid to the decals too - the bonnet one at least would have been nice to keep but it just wasn't to be. Then it was on with the primer, which didn't completely block out the yellow of the plastic but as the car will end up yellow that didn't matter too much. (Just realised you can see when I did the various stages by the S600 and bits of Trabant in the background of all of these photos). After that, it was on with the yellow paint which looked a lot better than yellow plastic did. The paint is Halfords Ford Signal Yellow. This one is my first two-tone paint job, so a couple of weeks after that the car was masked up and ready for the black. Initially I airbrushed this one but after a bit of operator error (basically leaving too long between coats and blocking the nozzle) I finished off with the car with a rattle can meaning the black is a bit thicker than I would have liked. There was a little overspray but nothing too unmanageable and it was cleared up without too much bother, Since then, I've redecalled it (decals were from Rays Kit Decals in the Netherlands) and given it a clear coat, but didn't grab a shot of that stage. It's part way though being panel washed, so the next body pic will have to wait. And then it was onto the engine, which was all just yellow apart from the chromed engine top end and exhaust manufold. That's been dechromed, and the engine taken apart. When I first built it, I hadn't filed any of the bits where it came off the sprue so these needed tidying up. So far, the remains of the sprue attachment have been remarkably tidy, especially as I think they were removed using kitchen scissors. I think I must have had parental help! With the washing going on, I have done minimal work on rebuilding the engine, but did get the block stuck together (the sump is on now too) ready for painting. One of the tabs holding the two sides of the engine together had snapped, and the other didn't go in as far as it needed to, so both were trimmed down prior to gluing the two halves together (hence the clamps). Hopefully tomorrow I can show off a completed body and main part of the engine.

Hello BM'ers! I am involved in a small group named the Edenvale Classic Aircraft Foundation http://www.classicaircraft.ca/ in Stayner (north of Toronto) Ontario Canada. We are a small museum based at an ex- BCATP field and we have two 1943 trainers that we use to give the public "Experience flights". They are a Fleet PT-26 Cornell and a DH98a Tiger Moth. Our Cornell is in great shape and we are busy giving rides, however, our Tiger Moth was damaged in a accident in 2017 and is still under repair. Although we are going through insurance to repair the aircraft, there is a large gap in what they are paying and what is required to get everything back to top condition. Once you open an 85 year old wing and fuselage to fix it you inevitably find more work to be done replacing worn or just too old components. As a result we are finding ourselves in a position between not getting our Tiger back into the air at all or running our small not for profit organisation into debt. We are running fund raising activities locally and we are also looking to the world wide aviation community to see if anyone out there would like to help. We have started a Gofundme campaign and I would like to present it here and I ask that you consider the request and/or spread the word to others who you may feel are interested. And if any of you are visiting in the Toronto / Georgian Bay area anytime please contact us or me and perhaps come visit. You may even consider a flight over some of the best scenery in Ontario. Thank you!! https://www.gofundme.com/restore-a-1943-dehavilland-tiger-moth-to-flight

This beautifully restored Mustang is based here in San Antonio where I live, and flies over my house weekly. The owner is the nicest fellow and has let me shoot countless detail photos at airshows. One of the nicest restored P-51D's, as you can see from the restoration and detail photos. Bruce flies her with the replica 108 gallon paper tanks all the time. Jack Ilfrey's other 20th FG mount, a P-38J, was also named Happy Jack's Go Buggy. I had the honor and pleasure of meeting him years ago at one of our annual IPMS Alamo Squadron model contests. I hope you will enjoy the story and the photos. There are decals for this one in 1/72 and 1/48, BTW. Mike http://www.crazyhorseap.be/Mustangs/Mustangs/N74190HappyJack/N74190HappyJack.htm

I just watched this on PBS America. A nice documentary on the rebuild of a former Spartan Air Services Mosquito in Canada. It culminates in the test flights by none other than Steve Hinton. Here is a link to the tube... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPH_5YhgN3M Enjoy. Pete

Revell L-1011 Tristar G-BAAA Some time ago I purchased the Revell L-1011 with the intention of doing the wacky Court Line yellow livery. I quickly put this together with no thought of the inaccuracies of the revell kit. I'm aware that there are other options including eastern express and the wonderful authentic airliners kit but I'd really like to have a go at putting this right (if possible!) The only thing that i attempted to correct was the reshaping of the exhaust section using excess plastic and reshaped.... this is the view without the engine exhaust on, i also noted that this has the correct number of flap track fairings??? - i think the airfix kit was incorrect? I am also unsure whether the engines will sit too low....... should these parts be sanded away on the wing??? Oops!..... I left the plastic wall inside the engine. How on earth am i going to get rid of this without ripping apart the whole model?? maybe dissect the tail? this is going to get messy i also didnt plan accurately where the transfers would end up so near the nose i have a disaster there. also the radome is too big (and shiny..should be a matt black) the wings should be WHITE... not grey. also the doors are like trenches, looks like i filled the cargo door trenches but left the passenger doors - for some reason no engraving for the rear passenger door? looks like a fake door compared to the others and FINALLY... the decals, whilst good in appearance like most giant decal sections they crack and can come apart. applying this whole orange strip was a disaster, luckily the decals came with a square of excess decal so i could patch it up - but lets be honest, it looks crap. also just below the reg and the 2nd rear door the decals crumpled on a curved section of fuselage I've already started scraping of the paint. so far this is what i think has to be considered *nose reshaping?? too much like DC10? *straightening the tail profile - too curved? *etched wing areas - also like trenches. They seem very simplistic and I doubt they are correct?? This is what i know I have to do *get rid of the plastic wall in the no2 engine *fill trench passenger doors *insert a hole for the aircraft stand as I'd glued it straight on the fuselage (very unstable) *upper wing surfaces to be painted white *inner orange area to be painted rather than use giant decal (will use a sticky template of decal for accuracy) I'd also like to know if braz do any RR resin engines? as the ones i have aren't the best (like lumps of plastic) As well as ordering new decals from 26, I have ordered 3d cockpit and window decals from authentic airliners on recommendation - thanks!

I had a beer delivery to Barrow Hill restoration centre today, although I didn't know that until I got there. (There's a beer festival on soon). I had a quick wander around and found it quite surreal, almost like being shrunk to HO scale and wandering around someone's train set, with some of Hornby's finest partially dismantled. There were also some lovely ones 'newly unboxed' though. There's some building work going on of (I think) a visitors centre so it will be worth a visit when done. Oh, it's somewhere near Chesterfield.

Hi, I have discovered a set of grubby decals in a stash I didn't know I had - I think it's from a 1:72 MiG-29 that I've never got around to building. Apart from the mild yellow-ness, they appear to have got grubby as well. Is there any way I can clean these up, without fundamentally destroying the sheet? - or is it a wasted effort? http://s661.photobucket.com/user/willroney/media/IMG_1978.jpg.html

I was able to get my butt down to the EAA Airventure airshow in Oshkosh, Wisconsin this year. My first ever Airventure. My first airshow in many many years. And my first airshow since getting into photography. While there were numerous aircraft that caught my attention, this one I knew I had to get as many photos as I could. I should have shot more but there's just so much to see you can't really afford to linger in any one spot for too long. So why is this aircraft so interesting? Well, as I was walking past I couldn't help but notice that she looked like she was fresh from a factory in 1943. The owner noticed me and said that's actually a pretty accurate statement! The restoration had been completed only two weeks prior. And this restoration was as complete as humanly possible. This is exactly how the aircraft looked in 1943 when she was reassembled and made ready for operations in the PTO. As the owner said to me, Rosie the riveter was good, but we had the time to make her perfect. And boy is she ever perfect. The gun sight is fully functional. There's a gun camera complete with film! Enough talk. Here are a few photos with far more up on my flickr page. Thanks for looking. 20160731-MJS_8741 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr Another point of interest. This isn't just any P-40M that happened to be painted in these colours. This really is NZ3119! These are the same colours she wore way back in 1943. While this aircraft is not known to have scored any kills, the pilot of this aircraft did get a kill in his previous aircraft. 20160731-MJS_8520 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr 20160731-MJS_8530 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr 20160731-MJS_8559 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr 20160731-MJS_8561 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr Although he did not fly this particular P-40M, this aircraft was signed by the highest scoring ace in the RNZAF, Geoffrey B Fisken. 20160731-MJS_8548 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr The level of detail is jawdropping on this bird. Everything on this aircraft is as it was when it was new in 1943. The individual markings were not just copied in appearance. But they were applied was using the original technique. 20160731-MJS_8566 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr 20160731-MJS_8569 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr 20160731-MJS_8575 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr 20160731-MJS_8579 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr I had no idea P-40's had a cloth liner in the wheel wells. Wonder how long they actually lasted? 20160731-MJS_8581 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr I learned that along with keeping out FOD, there was a second purpose to taping the guns. It indicated to the pilot the guns were armed and ready to go. 20160731-MJS_8594 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr 20160731-MJS_8599 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr Nice chocks! 20160731-MJS_8617 by _m_sinclair, on Flickr If I ever get the chance, I will happily shoot far more detail shots of this magnificent warbird. If you would like to see more just click the link to get the whole album. https://www.flickr.com/photos/92554273@N07/albums/72157672652776801/with/29616383635/ Cheers! -matt

This is a restoration of a kit purchased from a charity shop. The Merit kits are very long in the tooth now but definately worth updating with some thoughtful addition. WIP is here http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234944561-brm-p25-in-124-updating-the-old-merit-kit/ Paint is from Zero purchased through Hiroboy. The decals are Pattos, the race number for Mike Hawthorns car should actually be 23 but this was as close as I could get. I've since found some general race numbers sold in individual packs (damn it!) Very enjoyable resto with almost all the added detail scratchbuilt or parts box bits. The wheels and tyres came from SEF, just a shame the tread on the tyres is not better but I feel it adds to the period charm of this model. I am gradually working my way through a collection of these little beauties. The Connaught B type campaigned by Rob Walker is next. So, here she is in all her splendour. Thanks for looking, Steve.

A while back there was a thread that mentioned a Mosquito in Canada being rebuilt by Victoria Air Maintenance and a link requesting donations to complete a documentary about the plane's restoration process. For a very modest donation, you would get a T-shirt, a poster, a video and credits in the video for being a donor. Well, I really want to see a Mosquito fly and I thought why not and hoped it wasn't a scam. I would occasionally get an email indicating there was progress being made on the documentary and the plane restoration. Today, I got the T-shirt and the video. Both are amazing. Here is the T-shirt I have watched the first part of the video and it is very nice. Now I just have to figure out how to get to Canada and see this beautiful aircraft in person. Kudos to the restoration team and the documentary team.