1/72 Old Tool Airfix Lancaster

[SaminCam]

My latest completed kit is the 1980s Airfix 1/72 Lancaster which my dad picked up for me at a car boot sale. She's pretty much built out of the box though I added a bit of detail in the cockpit with plasticard and scribed some extra panel lines on the wings. She goes together really well for a forty year old kit and very little filling or sanding was required so I managed to preserve most of the raised rivets.

 

I decided to model her wheels up - there's not much detail on the undercarriage or wheel wells and I figure it's hard to beat a Lancaster in flight anyway! The stand isn't finished yet, I'll add a proper piece of threaded rod to the wooden base, rather than balancing on the m8 caphead which you'll see in the photos. The stand will screw into a nut glued into the bomb bay doors and the doors are held on the model using two small neodymium magnets at each end of the bomb bay. This allows the Lanc to be easily removed from the stand (without unscrewing anything) and also reveals the bombs. 

 

The paints are mostly Tamiya acrylics but I went for the Mr Color version of Dark Earth. The only real problem I had with the kit was trying to use the original decals. I ended up cutting away as much of the yellowed carrier film as possible and had to "glue" some of them on with Future, they also reacted oddly to the decal softener (with and without Future) so aren't settled down particularly well. One good decision I made was to mask and spray the thin black and red lines on the top and bottom of the wing so I didn't need decals for these.

 

Finally, the weathering was a bit of an experiment. I did a mottled pre-shade between the rivet lines to get the tonal variation in the panels and I added to this with brown and black oil paints. The chips are done with Tamiya flat aluminium and a fine brush and the exhaust stains are a combination of sprayed and painted oils. Spraying thinned oil paints works really well and has the advantage of being very easy to clean off if things don't quite go to plan. 

 

Thanks to everyone who tagged along for the WIP, your reference photos, tips and encouragement kept this one going right to the end, even when the decals were driving me mad! The WIP is here if you're interested: 

 

Enjoy the photos! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope you like, thanks for looking! Sam

[Farmerboy]

What a great job you have done with such an old kit, good job!

[DaveyGair]

Superb mate!  I hope when I get round to doing my 'new tool' version it turns out as good as this. I'm going to be doing some 'wheels up' prop driven aircraft in the future and the only thing I would do differently would be to loose the prop blades and fill/blend-in the resulting holes, applying a bit of 'prop blur' effect with an airbrush round the hubs, I've seen this done on other models and it looks effective.

Anyway, a superb rendition!

 

 

Davey.

 

[Mr T]

Nice build, the 1980 kit is not bad, although a bit deficient in detail these days. I used one to build a Lincoln with the old DB conversion about four/five years ago

[Unfinished project]

Very nice build. It’s great to see these old Airfix kits built 👏👏👏

[phildagreek]

Smart work!

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Great looking Lancaster. 

[Dermo245]

That's an absolute beauty, one to be very proud of considering what you were working with.

Love it.

Cheers,

Dermot

[72modeler]

The ole gal cleaned up pretty darned well, I'd say- a very, very nice Lancaster! 1st- I love the stand you made; very clever! 2nd- a true Lanc modeler who knows how to do the exhaust staining from the outboard side of the outer engines; well done! BTW- what paint did you use for the undersurface, as it looks very convincing in 1/72! 👍

Mike

[Mark4700]

You’ve made a cracking job I’d the old kit. Love what you’ve done with the display stand. 

[Mikey-1980]

Excellent job!

 

Really love the way you have mounted it too.....how sturdy is it?

[stevej60]

That's outstanding finishing Sam beautiful build.I.m building the old tool Dambuster kit great fun!

[Ruskin Air Services]

Got 3 of these, 2 from the original 1979/80 release which are nicely molded and one from 1985/90 release with nasty sink marks! This one's on the bench and being built as squadron leader Ian bazalgette's 'T' Tommy of 635 sqd  RAF Downham Market. I also noticed that the mold was damaged when new!

[Retired Bob]

Really great looking Lanc,    I have some of these old kits in the loft, perhaps I should get them down. 

[woody37]

You’ve nailed it mate, absolutely brilliant. Does the kit just rest on the bomb doors or is there some way of them clicking into place?

[IanC]

Blimey, when you said 'old tool' I thought you meant the ancient 1960s job!

 

I remember this one coming out and everyone getting excited at what an advance it represented. You've done a wonderful job with it.

[Thom216]

Outstanding job! I like how you worked the stand and all. Very neat.

[kapam]

An excellent build!

It proves again that not all old kits must be left unbuilt.

Wonderful job! 👍👍

 

[Tiger331]

As others have said, a great result using an old classic. If you can do this with the 1980s kit, I cease to wonder what you will achieve with the most recent tooling. I especially like the subtle shading and exhaust staining.

 

Well Done, Sir !   

[SafetyDad]

Great stuff! Looks excellent. Thoughtful build, really convincing paintwork and an ingenious display stand. 

Take a bow!

 

SD

[Eric Mc]

That looks great

 

That Airfix Lancaster is pretty good. When people say "considering what you were working with" I think they are being a bit unfair to Airfix. If course it lacks some of the intricate detail (dare I say fiddliness) of current Airfix mouldings but it a good basic kit and as this build demonstrates, can look stunning.

 

Of course, of you were referring to the original Airfix Lancaster from the late 1950s, then "considering what you were working with" would be a very valid comment.

[fightersweep]

3 hours ago, Eric Mc said:

That Airfix Lancaster is pretty good. When people say "considering what you were working with" I think they are being a bit unfair to Airfix. If course it lacks some of the intricate detail (dare I say fiddliness) of current Airfix mouldings but it a good basic kit and as this build demonstrates, can look stunning.

Have to agree. The 79/80 Airfix Lanc release is still a decent kit, and was pretty well state of the art at the time. I remember the reviews being very positive. Details weren't too bad either, with some turret detail and full bomb load. The fit is pretty good too if my examples are anything to go by, although they are first issues. As they've been superceded by the new Airfix Lanc, the fairly cheap second hand prices of the older kit present a good, solid Lanc kit for not a lot of money. Happy days! As Sam's build shows, a stunning looking build can be achieved. Nice work! 🙂 

[Buzby061]

Lovely job, just shows what can be achieved with some old fashioned modelling skill.

 

Pete

[Wulfman]

A lovely Lanc, great build and finish.

 

Wulfman

[SaminCam]

Thanks for all the positivity, glad you like her! @Eric Mc,@fightersweep, I completely agree and apologise if I gave the impression it was *really* old tool! My version basically fell together, no issues with fit or sink holes and I was able to keep the raised rivets intact because I didn't have to fill and sand much at all. If I was doing it again I might beef up the spars holding the wings to ensure the dihedral is spot on and I definitely should have got some fresh decals, but other than that the kit was great. 

 

@woody37, @Mikey-1980, I'll add some better photos of the stand once its done properly but to answer your questions, it feels like it should be pretty sturdy. The threaded stand screws into a nut which is held in the bomb bay doors between two thick pieces of plasticard (you can just see these in the photo) which were surrounded with 2-part epoxy resin - screwing the caphead in, it feels solid. The doors themselves are held on to the fuselage with little magnets in the bay contacting onto metal strips on the doors. There isn't much space for magnet on magnet and I found the attraction to be too strong anyway (stronger than the glue!). I added two extra plasti-card spars to stiffen the doors and these have a small overlap into the bomb bay which also helps with alignment - it all goes together with a satisfying click. Unfortunately the auxiliary fuel tank (???) that's supposed to go in the middle of the bay and which I'd carefully painted and weathered wasn't even close to fitting with the bomb bay doors shut! 

 

@72modeler the underside colour started with grey and black pre-shading and the top colour is a mix about half way between Tamiya rubber black and flat black. I'm afraid I was mixing as I went in the airbrush cup so don't the exact ratios but did build it up over the pre-shade in four or five heavily thinned coats, rather than one at once.