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Here is my Blohm & Voss Bv 142 Airmodel 1/72. This was my second vacu build and it was completed in 2008. Quite a basic kit and the smaller parts had to be made by yourself. Now it was cleaned up a bit and some parts were added.

I’ve had this hiding in the stash for a number of years while easier kits have somehow pushed their way past it in the build queue. I suspect this will be an incremental build that will require bursts of patience and enthusiasm to make progress with. As anyone who has seen one of these will probably attest it’s a truly horrible thing that barely qualifies as a kit. Apart from the two sheets of white plastic and a badly moulded vacform canopy it comes with nothing more than a child’s drawing of the assembly process and half a schematic that they ripped off from Aeroplane Monthly. Some years ago when I first got this kit I put a shout out on here for any tips on where I could pick up bits and bobs to supplement it and a couple of members kindly came up with the goods. Special thanks must go to @bentwaters81tfw for his kind donation of long unavailable Aeroclub props and for his effort in sending me a really helpful set of photos from the Newark Varsity. Sorry it’s taken so long to get around to this Frank, I’ll do my best to do it justice. Anyway, progress so far. I’ve separated the fuselage from its sheet and cut the windows out. These have been fitted with bits of CD case which will hopefully be more robust in the long run than flexy sheet. I’ve also cut the cockpit area out and started fitting it with floors, bulkheads, and instrumentation. The bulkhead behind the seat is a bit of a guess on my part and owes more to the Sea Prince than the Varsity but not much will be seen of this area anyway so I’m ok with it. Ditto the props inside the fuselage which are just there to provide rigidity . The whole area will be painted jet black when it’s buttoned up so this won’t be seen. Oh and I made a couple of little seats for the cockpit - the bottoms look a bit scrappy at the moment but will be tidied up when the glue cures. The biggest curse of this kit is the terrible panel lines that festoon the whole thing so they’re slowly disappearing under coats of filler.

As promised in this thread here is a rapid review of the Airmodel vacuformed kit. The contents comes in a sealed bag, as usual with Airmodel vacs: instructions, two sheets of 1mm thick vacuformed plastic some epoxi resin detail parts. No decals are included. I must add that whenever I received kits acquired in Airmodel site they arrived well packed in card boxes protected inside by foam or newspaper. The instructions consists on a folded A3 sheet with a resumed history of the plane (in German and English), some black and white profiles and an exploded view of the parts. The fuselage has molded the Lorraine Dietrich engine but extra parts are provided for an Hispano-Suiza 12H (or 12L?). I've got two kits and one has the main parts already sanded (well, almost. I tend to do the final touches on the wings when I begin the construction). You may see that the cylinder covers are crushed, but that is my fault as they were good when I acquired the kit. Nothing that a little CA or milliput from the inside and a some filler in the outside doesn't cure. The detail is good, with a realistic representation of the canvas over the structure. The parts - fuselage and wing halfs - fits very well, although the wings requires very cautious sanding on the trailing edges, as usual with vacforms. The resin parts are very well molded, although they could have some more detail, mainly the wheels that lack the very characteristic spokes of the Br. XIX. Also the radiator must be detailed with a mesh, as the faces are plain. I didn't investigated the accuracy yet; I only measured span - 204 mm against the real 205 - and lengtht (fuselage + spinner) - 131 mm vs 131.1. So at least dimensionally it is good enough for me. In conclusion, and in my opinion, the kit is well worth the 12.50 euro it costs. It needs some preparation work as all the vacs do, and you must scratch build some parts, mainly in the cockpit, but the required work is within the reach for most modelers and result will be rewarding. Although the Br. XIX was used by many countries during the thirties, only a few decal sheets are available - Hannants lists two sheets by Blue Rider, one for Bolivian aircraft during the Gran Chaco War, and another for a Manchukuo machine. Probably others are available, and if you know of any one please please refer it here. The main reference I know is an extensive article in Air Enthusiast Quarterly number seven. Again, please share here some other references you find important. Carlos links: Airmodel site Bolivian decals Manchukuo decals

After a desultory modelling performance for 2014 (rediscovered how much I love playing jazz guitar and forgetting how much practise you need), I’m throwing caution to the wind and attacking my burgeoning stash. Need to practise my canopy masking and get to grips with Xtracolor while I’m at it. This is the victim, harmless, not very good and something I won’t weep over if I trash it. Apparently Airfix are re-issuing this – hope they put in a decent interior and do something about the wheel wells i.e. box them in and put in some detail. Decided on this wild and crazy scheme from Wings Palette, seeing as I have some horrible smeary 1948 war decals from Lift Here to make use of. Those Lift Here decals are horrible and a waste of 7.99 compared the sharply printed but wafer thin Techmod versions. That said, the owner emailed me on a Sunday and sent out a replacement that arrived from Serbia in two days. Sadly that was even more smeared and blurry than the original, Lift Here- great service not so great decals. First point of call is the sparse cockpit: I made up some crap for the side walls but got bored moving around 0.1mm rod with Mr Hobby extra thin cement so stopped after this was done and some sanity was still present. Control panel from Airfix Mk1 Spit will be added later. Hey lookit the crow bar, even flattened the ends and made it look like the one in Mk 24 I clean at Solent Sky every week! The seat should be replaced but a back rest, a jauntily angled control column and some homemade belts are going to be Pilot Officer Abdul’s lot The keen eyed may spot the rather gaudy green: used the wrong interior green, doh! Next is a gunsight- according to the refs it is a flat, bronze coloured object and this is as close as I’m getting. There were two pieces of glass but what are you gonna see through this? (And this after Future-ing!) While various varnishes dry and glues set, a quick dry fit: Time to go molest a Telecaster and play weird sounding chords, more tomorrow..