1/48 Lindberg Bristol Bulldog

[spruecutter96]

When you consider that this is a 52 year old kit, it looks amazing! She's a real tribute to your building and painting skills, my friend.

 

Thanks for sharing with us.

 

Chris.  

Edited April 10, 2020 by spruecutter96
Correcting a typo.

[Vlamgat9]

Blimey. That's astonishing work.

[mick b]

Sublime model, my dad had the Impact Bulldog and Flycatcher in his stash and I would often look at them in awe as they were quality kits even back in the 70s compared to what else was around, I still have them now in my stash 😊

 

Flycatcher next? 😀

 

Mike

[Work In Progress]

This is a brilliant rendition. I have one in the slow cooker but it will be much nearer 'straight out of the box' than yours. I do think most of the Inpact kits stand up really well today and are well worth a go, especially the actual Inpact and Pyro releases which tend to be crisper and nicer mouldings. You've done it the hard way with a Lindberg release but you did so much re-work anyway that it probably didn't hold you back much. Well done, a pleasure to view. 

 

Quick link to the WIP thread for anyone dropping in -- well worth a look --

 

[Rabbit Leader]

As is usually the case with each of your builds Brad, all the admiring plaudits are overwhelmingly justified. Whatever the name is for ‘better than Museum standard’, this Bulldog build is certainly it! 
 

Cheers and Happy Easter.. Dave (DFK). 

[stevej60]

Modelling at it's very best Brad,outstanding work all round.

[Piotr Sudnik]

Great work! 

[Artie]

Lovely Bulldog. With your permission, I'm going to save some pictures thta Will be used as a guide with my own Bulldog, but in spanish civil war colours. Your work is very inspiring, and as you properly said, the Lidndberg's kit is not exempt of some shortcomings, though the overall shape is very nice for a kit with five decades on its back...

Cheers

[clive_t]

Echo all that has already been said about this, to which I would add: absolutely outstanding modelling.

[supersonic]

Another Masterpiece!

Extra effort was well worth it!

[jannie]

What?? This is the old SMER kit? Superb rework, real modelling at its best! A well-known model builder has a signature that reads something like "There are no unbuildable model kits, just some that are not worth building" - well you have turned that adage on its head for me! Heck, I SOOO want one now.

 

...On a side note, was this the aircraft type that Douglas Bader flew when he had that infamous accident?

 

-- Jannie in BC, Canada 

[LorenSharp]

Great googlely-mooglely! I had to go back and reread that this bulldog was manufactured by Lindberg. Outstanding job! This is a museum piece if ever there was one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

utstanding job

[bryanm]

Beautiful!  It's strange how fashions change - when Inpact originally released their four biplanes (Bulldog, Fury, Flycatcher and Gladiator) the textured surface was widely praised by reviewers as a realistic rendition of fabric covering!

 

I think the SMER kit was a rebox of the Merit one, a very different animal.  The ex-Inpact moulds are in a different league.

Edited April 11, 2020 by bryanm

[Brad Cancian]

Thanks again everyone - Jannie, indeed, Bader was flying a Bulldog when he had the crash that caused the loss of his legs. The RAAF only purchased eight Bulldogs in total, and from their introduction, they were considered almost sacrosanct. A pilot had to be of Instructor rating before being allowed to fly one. However, toward the end of the aircraft’s life the novelty had worn off and other pilots were permitted to fly the aircraft. Stealing some words from another site - 

 

"For a high performance aircraft most pilots reported that it was a delight to fly, very precise and forgiving and extremely easy to land. During its service career there were only two fatal crashes and they were both from pilot error: one where the pilot dived into the water doing gunnery practice and the other when the pilot misjudged his height when doing low level aerobatics. The only oddity the aircraft exhibited was during spin recovery but once pilots mastered this eccentricity the aircraft proved a delight in the air.

 

Part of the training regime in the period 1930-5 included several annual long distance navigation exercises from Point Cook to Adelaide 1930, -31 and, Adelaide and Perth 1932, -33, -35. These exercises were quite a feat for the day as the aircraft had to be refueled every two hours and had no navigation equipment. Pilots were trained to perform minor maintenance and it is a reflection of the Bulldog’s reliability that only three failures caused forced landings in an era when forced landings were almost a daily occurrence for many aircraft.

 

By the start of WWII only three aircraft remained in RAAF service. Two had been destroyed in crashes and three had been reduced to components, the last three were all converted to Instructional Training Aids in 1940 and finally scrapped sometime during the war years. Sadly no Bulldog airframes remain extant in Australia, a fate all too common for aircraft of that era."

 

An interesting part of Australian military aviation history.

 

Cheers,

 

BC