Admiral Puff Posted February 1, 2020 Share Posted February 1, 2020 I see that the Big H has two kits by this company - a DH.1 and a DH.6 - for sale. I've never heard of the company before, and Scalemates hasn't been all that helpful. From the appearance of the mouldings they both look to have been mastered by the late, great Joe Chubbock - can anyone confirm, please? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alancmlaird Posted February 2, 2020 Share Posted February 2, 2020 I built a vac-form DH1 by Phoenix, in tandem with a scratch built one, both in 1/72 scale. The Phoenix kit is pretty old I think, and pretty crude but accurate. . The engine, props and wheels were vac-formed rather than white-metal or resin as more recent vac offerings, and were replaced. The scratch-built one gave a more satisfactory result, I think You'll find the build on here maybe a couple of years ago.. Link below. Ialso posted the finished model on a separate page. I saw their DH6 once recently on ebay, but decided against buying and began renovating my scratch-built DH6 from 45 years ago instead! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admiral Puff Posted February 2, 2020 Author Share Posted February 2, 2020 Thanks, Alan. I'm interested because I knew Joe, and want to collect some more examples of his work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr T Posted February 2, 2020 Share Posted February 2, 2020 I built the DH6 about 30 years ago and it was not bad. The parts were well formed and fitted together. Wing and tail were all single surface and the wings from what I remember needed some care to ensure a reasonable aerofoil section. Aeroclub did packs that had engines etc for some of them, of course they will be long gone now. I will see if I still have model somewhere. They were a bit basic, but Joe seemed to be reasonable with getting right shapes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Swindell Posted February 2, 2020 Share Posted February 2, 2020 9 hours ago, Admiral Puff said: I see that the Big H has two kits by this company - a DH.1 and a DH.6 - for sale. I've never heard of the company before, and Scalemates hasn't been all that helpful. From the appearance of the mouldings they both look to have been mastered by the late, great Joe Chubbock - can anyone confirm, please? Joe Chubbock usually signed his moulds with his initials and the year of production, eg a vacform sheet with JC87 was mastered by him in 1987. Without digging them all out, I think all the Phoenix models I have (most of the British ones) were mastered by Joe. I'm not sure but I think he owned the company, and the masters passed to Blue Rider after his death? Some (most? all?) of the Blue Rider vacform masters were produced by Joe and he did work for other companies as well. He had links with Aeroclub who provided white metal parts for some of his kits, so @John Aero will hopefully be able to give some more detail? I'm not sure why you think Scalemates hasn't been helpful, it lists most of the Phoenix kits? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Thompson Posted February 2, 2020 Share Posted February 2, 2020 One of the first vac companies I came across doing mostly WWI. For the day, they were excellent, especially when they stared to regularly include metal parts and decals. Very similar to Joystick. I' recommend them. Most of their subjects are still not covered, except by other vacs, or resins, (some of which are more iffy than the iffy-est of Phoenix). Paul. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Swindell Posted February 2, 2020 Share Posted February 2, 2020 40 minutes ago, Paul Thompson said: Very similar to Joystick. Yes, that's another brand I was trying to think of, pretty sure some of these were Joe's masters as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Aero Posted February 2, 2020 Share Posted February 2, 2020 Joe was behind a myriad of small companies in that he either did the masters, or they were done under his tuteledge. Joe used to hold personel pattern making classes at his small flat in Wimbledon. I'm trying to think of many of the persons names involved at this moment in time, (put it down to age), However the companies were, Akita, Formaplane, Phoenix, Scaleplanes, Expo Models, Libra, Joystick, Roseplane and I think some Esoteric, though most patterns were by Jim Wood and Gordon Stevens. I don't recall Joe ever owning any of these businesses, but he was ever helpful. He was an ex Para IIRC, more used to falling out of aeroplanes. I either supplied metal parts to a number of these companies or we aimed parts of our range to support them. I still have one of Joe's 4H pencils of which the lead was chisel shaped and this is what he used to engrave his panel lines into the Lime wood fuselages. The wings he did with plasticard sheet and the ribs were done by scoring with a scalpel and then running a finger nail along them to just close the ridge. Somewhere I've got a couple of his original patterns. Oh dear another dose of pull up a bl**dy sandbag. John No doubt this info will end up on the detestable Scale Mates (IMO). 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brandy Posted March 2, 2020 Share Posted March 2, 2020 I have both in my stash. Give me a while and I'll post some pics for you. Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Posted March 2, 2020 Share Posted March 2, 2020 On 01/02/2020 at 23:44, Admiral Puff said: DH.1 and a DH.6 I've added this to the title so that it's more obviously WWI Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brandy Posted March 14, 2020 Share Posted March 14, 2020 Sorry I've taken so long, but here's what you get. I hope that helps. I have a few more Phoenix kits including the Otto Doppeldecker and Caudron G.IV. They all look pretty good but I'd need to compare them to drawings to state with any certainty how accurate they are. Ian 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Thompson Posted March 15, 2020 Share Posted March 15, 2020 Ian, yes, recognise those. IIRC these were two originally issued without metal parts, and maybe not decals either. Usually accurate by the plans of the time, but in some cases the older plans have turned out a bit misleading. When I returned to modelling in 1999 there was a large stock of these, along with Blue Rider, Joystick, and a few others at the LHS ------------ which actually was LHS, the Luchtvaarthobbyshop, dangerously close to where I lived in the Netherlands. Didn't know Phoenix did a Caudron G.4 - I've gone a funny green colour now. Paul. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pheonix Posted March 17, 2020 Share Posted March 17, 2020 Ian, It is all very well you showing us photos of the DH 1A and mentioning the Doppeldekker and Caudron, but the question is, when are you going to build them? P 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brandy Posted March 18, 2020 Share Posted March 18, 2020 Patience Grasshopper! Ian 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevehed Posted March 18, 2020 Share Posted March 18, 2020 Interesting. First time I've seen the difference the Beardmore and Renault set ups make to the DH1 /1A nacelles. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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