DH Mosquito 1.72 scale

[TonyW]

Another one getting started down on the farm...

 

This time it's the new for 1971 Mosquito, in a 1989 boxing but pretty much as it was released back in the seventies. The earlier fifties release Mossie was way past its best by '71 and this new one did a good job of replacing it. The old one was still for sale when the new one came out and was available for quite some time as an overlap. It would have been easy to buy the old one, thinking you were getting the new tool.

 

 

 

The mouldings are really crisp and clean. The undercarriage would look good at 1.48 yet alone 1.72. The whole thing feels more like a later Japanese kit to me. I'm looking forward to having a go at this one.

 

There's a ton of options as far as finish goes and everything's up for grabs for a while. The yellow prototype would have been a certainty had I not just finished a Zero in that same colour. Maybe another build down the line?

Bomber colours? Fighter colours? Invasion stripes? Not sure yet.

 

 

This picture at the back of the Mosquito Profile is a tempter...

 

 

Probably not for this GB though, there is only a month left after all!

 

More as it comes together.

 

Tony.

[stever219]

Good choice of kit Tony.  I have an example from this period that I started on a while ago  but I’ve found that the plastic has become very brittle; even careful cutting produced broken bits so please exercise caution.  

 

Another potential problem with this kit kit is the main undercarriage: the assembled units are a bit too wide to fit comfortably into the bays.  If memory serves the wheels are a bit too wide (forcing the legs too far apart) and the nacelle walls are a bit too thick, reducing the available room for the legs.

 

The kit doesn’t give you the “bomber” nose and cockpit so the prototype, even in its later camouflage scheme, is a non-runner, as are any B. or PR variants.  There’s plenty of choice of markings for early fighters and fighter-bombers with single-stage engines and even, with very little conversion, T. Mk. IIIs in either overall yellow or silver with yellow training bands.

 

However you build it it’s a good kit but, like it’s 1950s forbear, it’s now desperately in need of an update.

[TonyW]

57 minutes ago, stever219 said:

 I’ve found that the plastic has become very brittle; even careful cutting produced broken bits so please exercise caution.  

 

Another potential problem with this kit kit is the main undercarriage: the assembled units are a bit too wide to fit comfortably into the bays.  If memory serves the wheels are a bit too wide (forcing the legs too far apart) and the nacelle walls are a bit too thick, reducing the available room for the legs.

 

The kit doesn’t give you the “bomber” nose and cockpit so the prototype, even in its later camouflage scheme, is a non-runner

 

 I'm with you on the brittle plastic. An attempt just now to drill out the exhaust pipes resulted in a bit of shrapnel flying about!  Easy does it from here on in.

 

That's annoying with the wheels, they are sat here painted and ready for action. I'll have a go at thinning the doors and walls as far as I dare and see how things end up. The worst that can happen is that I'll have to cut and shut the wheels if all else fails.

 

There's a spare nose in the kit. I'll look into any possibility of chopping it into a bomber nose if one's needed. I wouldn't be having these problems with the 1.48 Monogram kit, everything's in the box, from about 1963 as well!

[stevehnz]

Tony, I built one of these for the DH group build last year(year before  ) & came up with a solution for the undercart which I thought worked quite well. At least one of the mounting points in the wheel bays each side (doing this on phone from memory)  stands proud of the inside wall. Thus I reduced in height a little, maybe 1/2 ish but more importantly, I cut away the bottom side so I could slide the under cart mounting lugs into it from below. These lugs  on the under cart legs I also trimmed back a little so they were about the same as the depth of the wheel bay mounts This let me insert & remove the assembled under cart at will. Look at the angle you would do thus from & you'll see where to trim away the lower side of the wheel bay mount. Come the time, a drop of glue into each wheel bay mount will hold it firm. 

Steve.

[Max Headroom]

I built one for the French Fancy group build a few years ago. I’d find a link but all the pictures vanished in the Great Photobucket Farce. From memory....

 

canopy needs replacing (too thick)

bare interior

the wheels are too small and devoid of hub detail

the undercarriage is a pig 

brittle plastic

 

Here are some pictures I’ve retrieved of the build to help. The cockpit is done with scrap plastic and the chord wise ‘strap’ behind the cockpit in the last photo is 5thou strip, sanded back to half thickness and sealed in with a wipe of liquid poly.

 

Hope they are of use

 

 

Trevor

[BIG X]

Wow - your 'flying along' already

[TonyW]

Thanks Trevor, lots of good info there.

It's amazing how Airfix had a decent stab at the undercarriage legs but then lost the plot with the cockpit interior. What I'm looking at here is a bit sparse to say the least.

After my photoetch experience with the prototype Lancaster build, I suspect I'll revert to form on this one and back out of adding too much in the way of detailing. One day I'll have a go at building a kit as accurately as I can, but at the moment I'm happy to just build. Not so much a cop out, more following the path of least resistance. 

An ebay bid came in for me last night that might sort out this builds direction. I'll keep assembling for now, once the Ebay stuff turns up I'll have to decide on the final finish.

 

Tony.

[Max Headroom]

Hi Tony

 

I hear you but honestly the hardest part was making the radio as I didn’t have a piece of plastic to whittle into shape. That was a fun bit of the build.

 

Trevor

 

 

[stever219]

11 hours ago, TonyW said:

There's a spare nose in the kit. I'll look into any possibility of chopping it into a bomber nose if one's needed. I wouldn't be having these problems with the 1.48 Monogram kit, everything's in the box, from about 1963 as well!

That’s for the FB. XVIII version and it’ll need a lot of cutting, filing, filling and sanding to resemble a bomber nose.  The old FROG kit has the option of a bomber nose but nowadays is getting harder to find, even in one of its Soviet bloc incarnations, and has accuracy issues all of its own.  

 

Don’t worry about the lack of detail on the Airfix wheel hubs: they represent the later standard which were fitted with dual brake units rather than the earlier single brake versions.  As such they may not be suitable for the Mk. II night fighter.  If you’re worried about the undersized hubs they could be drilled out and replaced with suitably-diametered discs of 20 thou (0.5 mm) plasticard. 

 

On the subject of accuracy the Monogram kit has some gotchas of its own: the fuselage is too slab-sided so each wing is too long to give the correct overall span, the fin is 1/4 inch too tall and the prop blades are the wrong length.  There are others but all my references are 150-odd miles away.

[TonyW]

This is getting interesting on many fronts.

Thanks for yet more useful info Trevor, my Mosquito education is on a vertical learning curve since I started this one.

Although not exactly state of the art, the references I have here have proved very interesting reading. Not being too familiar with the plane I was fascinated to find the prototypes nacelles shorter than production ones, along with other more subtle differences. I didn't know about Bomber/Fighter schemes either. See what I mean about a vertical learning curve!

It's also interesting to me that owing to my rather odd preference for old models, built out the box warts and all, I find this kit to be a detailed, almost state of the art kit! It's a measure of how far things have progressed that another update is apparently required. As a collector/builder (in that order) I find stuff like that fascinating. It charts the development of the hobby and the development of Airfix as a company. I want to dig out my 1.48 scale Airfix kit and take a look to see how that one shapes up now. I can even feel a bit of a pull towards the 1.24 Superkit if only to see how it compares to the earlier Spitfire and Hurricane etc. Things could well spiral out of control here, if I'm not careful!

 

I did have a word with myself about the amount of detailing I was going to put into this build. I'm going to confess to wimping out a bit. There's a couple of reasons for that. Firstly, the build is for the GB more than as a stand alone Mosquito build, if that makes sense. I don't want the build to stall before the deadline. I also want the build to fit in with my wider collection and be able to sit it alongside the earlier builds I have of the Mosquito. Airfix updated the original mould during its long run and I have built examples of the modified kits. I model the model more than the original, don't forget. Collectors are weird. Collector/Builders even more so!

 

Anyway, here's how the build sits as of this morning...

 

 

 

The cockpit got assembled as Airfix provided with making tape seatbelts being the only nod to detailing. Trying the canopy showed me that my eyes were not going to see an awful lot once the framing was in place. I may well fit a crew to take the eye away from the sparse interior.

A tiny bit of filler was needed on a few sink marks and after a hit of white primer I see that the wing roots will need a bit as well. I've also hacked off the nose to give me some options once the final configuration is decided on. 

 

Yesterday evening, after a days work in the garden, I sat out and watched a load of Swallows wheeling about the sky above me. They have nested in the gardens of our row of houses. The shape of them twisting and turning all over the place reminded me of the shape of the Mosquito, my other half thought them more like Spitfires, which is probably more appropriate to the Swallows flying antics, but I'm on a Mosquito roll at the moment. So there.

 

Tony.

[TonyW]

Here's where it all started, the first two bagged kits. Devoid of much in the way of detail but still recognisably a Mosquito.

 

 

Then the T3 came along with it's Roy Cross artwork and a few very basic mould modifications, none doing much to bring the kit to the forefront of model making, but at least a start.

 

 

I'll dig out the all singing, all dancing, 1971 new mould box when I can, and add it here.

[Rabbit Leader]

I didn't know that this 'first' Airfix Mosquito was reissued and modified during its production lifespan. I recall my cousin had both the Series 2 & 3 Mosquito kits and remember commenting that the wheels from the earlier kit looked more like bicycle wheels rather than anything you'd want an aircraft to land on! 

 

As always Tony, the Airfix history commentary that you're happy to provide is equally as good to read as the many WIP's that this GB is generating. 

 

Cheers and thanks.. Dave. 

[Paul J]

When the boxed series 2 came out I do believe they modded the tool by adding the fabric effect to the rudder and elevators. I think I have a different S2 wrapper to those shown above. Will post pic if I find it.

[Lawzer]

Very nice choice indeed!

 

[TonyW]

Things are moving along quite nicely with the Mosquito, final scheme has been decided and it's yet another Commando Comic build. I found a cover that was far too good not to copy. I'm going to build about half a dozen kits following this theme, they should display well together.

 

Here's the build at the half way stage...

 

 

The correct colours got binned once the Commando path was chosen though. Here's how it sits at the moment. The green was mixed to copy the cover picture using a mix of Humbrol 6 and 226. It's all kinds of wrong, but looks just the job next to the comic. The underside needs masking and painting, followed by codes and remaining transfers, then a satin clear coat overall. The undercarriage needs a bit of drybrushing and then final assembly and this one will be done.

 

 

With the Zero and the Whirlwind finished using the comic book theme I'll be about half way through the planned series. This shot should give you an idea of a couple of others planned to follow these three...

 

 

Tony.

 

 

[Ventora3300]

A quality build, Tony. I'm thinking now that the Commando comics are the place to go for accurate references. The covers are amazing but the detail they get into the story pictures inside is something else, all in black and white too! Enjoying this. Cheers. Mike

[Paul J]

30 minutes ago, TonyW said:

Things are moving along quite nicely with the Mosquito, final scheme has been decided and it's yet another Commando Comic build. I found a cover that was far too good not to copy. I'm going to build about half a dozen kits following this theme, they should display well together.

 

Here's the build at the half way stage...

 

 

The correct colours got binned once the Commando path was chosen though. Here's how it sits at the moment. The green was mixed to copy the cover picture using a mix of Humbrol 6 and 226. It's all kinds of wrong, but looks just the job next to the comic. The underside needs masking and painting, followed by codes and remaining transfers, then a satin clear coat overall. The undercarriage needs a bit of drybrushing and then final assembly and this one will be done.

 

 

With the Zero and the Whirlwind finished using the comic book theme I'll be about half way through the planned series. This shot should give you an idea of a couple of others planned to follow these three...

 

 

Tony.

 

 

The Typhoon Raiders art looks familiar.. A bit like the Airfix art on the Typhoon kit gift set.  Re the AirAce library I still have around a 100 of these in varying condition.

 

By the way, the Mossie build  is shaping up well

[TonyW]

18 minutes ago, Paul J said:

The Typhoon Raiders art looks familiar.. A bit like the Airfix art on the Typhoon kit gift set.  Re the AirAce library I still have around a 100 of these in varying condition.

 

By the way, the Mossie build  is shaping up well

 Thanks.

 

The codes on the early Airfix kit are HF-L, not a million miles away from the Raiders comic cover. That could make life a bit easier here, the L can be cut to a T without too much aggro. The Rocket Blitz cover looks a bit more colourful though. Decisions, decisions... 

 

I think Air Ace had just about the entire Airfix aircraft range covered! Half a dozen or so should do for me though. 😁

[TonyW]

It's nearly there! Yet more paint touch ups required, plus the addition of the nose gun barrels and I'll be calling this one done. The chances of this model staying in one bit for long are pretty slim. The plastic is like glass. The undercarriage looked terrific all built up, but fitting it was a nightmare. Despite warnings here about the fit problems and me taking steps to minimise them it turned into the fitting job from hell. 

 

Here's the plane as of about five minutes ago...

 

 

Tony.

Edited September 4, 2018 by TonyW
wrong picture

[Rabbit Leader]

I'm really loving this comic book theme Tony, it's exactly what this hobby should be all about, however all too frequently gets bogged down in the pursuit of accuracy. Your latest builds have all rekindled this golden modelling age period and I for one am so happy to see it all unfold again. We are glad to see your prolific contribution mount by the week, which is a sure sign that this GB has been a tonne of fun. 

 

Cheers and well modelled.. Dave 

[TonyW]

Thanks Dave,

There's no doubt this GB has been a ton of fun at this end, I can't believe how many completed models are getting churned here! Seeing all the other contributors builds coming together certainly gets me wanting to do more and more. I'll miss the GB once it's over, that's for sure.

 

The Comic book builds are right up my street. They link kit history with the period the kits first appeared. I've been careful to make sure the price tag on the comics matches the kit release date to within a year or two. How's that for attention to detail? There's a danger of overkill though, so I'm going to stop at a half dozen or so builds to head that one off at the pass. I think the current three built will do for the GB, the rest can be put together with kits I have that are already built. I'm looking forward to sorting them out, but will leave that task until after the GB ends as there's a bit of a backlog building up here at the moment.

 

Tony.

[stevehnz]

A nice idea to theme your builds here Tony, I've really enjoyed this trip back to the past on these different levels, its really putting the FUN back into modelling.

Steve.

[Paul J]

On 31/08/2018 at 13:11, TonyW said:

 Thanks.

 

The codes on the early Airfix kit are HF-L, not a million miles away from the Raiders comic cover. That could make life a bit easier here, the L can be cut to a T without too much aggro. The Rocket Blitz cover looks a bit more colourful though. Decisions, decisions... 

 

I think Air Ace had just about the entire Airfix aircraft range covered! Half a dozen or so should do for me though. 😁

I was referring to the new tool gift set issue for the image on post 15. Now wondering where artist Adam Tooby is getting ideas from...hmmm.

[Paul J]

Hello again. Image attached showing Airfix Series 2 wrappers with the Mossie one at bottom. Different to those shown here.

 

Three bob in real money terms....

I have many more wrappers and instructions saved. I recall posting images of lots of them here in a thread of some description.

[TonyW]

That's a nice looking collection of headers.

The two with the red band toppers are Type 1, with the others being Type 2. The T1 Me110 image was tilted a bit to give the T2 header a diving look. The same happened with the Beaufighter with the image re-worked by Charles Oats for the Type 3 boxtop. The Mosquito also got re-worked for the T2 boxtop shown below.

 

The T2 Mosquito you show was one of two T2 headers for the plane, the other being a front view with a darker blue background. I'm missing one of those if anyone has one going spare.

There was also a short lived T2 box for the Mosquito, Swordfish, Hunter and Bf110. All four are pretty rare these days.

 

Edited September 5, 2018 by TonyW