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Catalina PBY-5A - Airfix 1/72


CedB

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Still looking for a break from tiny stuff (the LA7s didn't really help) and still looking to make holes in the stash storage area I've chosen another big box, the old Airfix Catalina:

 

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Untitled by Ced Bufton, on Flickr

 

Scalemates tells me this is a re-boxing of the… wait for it… 1964 tooling.

So what are we expecting?

 

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Soft plastic and lots of rivets (count 'em boys!)

Flash? Is there flash?

Oooh, oooh, and ejector pin marks in all the wrong places?

 

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Wouldn't want to disappoint :rolleyes:

 

The box offers two schemes and I'm going to do the one on the box - '88' of RAF Coastal Command, North Atlantic 1943-44.

Probably weathered like the Sunderland, just not as dirty.

Probably.

At least the transfers won't be a challenge:

 

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I'd bookmarked Bill's build of his Black Cat to give me a high bar to aim for (and miss). I'll re-read that later and set my expectations :) 

This was also one of the (weak) justifications for buying the vac former so I might use that to improve the canopies.

Might.

 

So, what's in the box?

 

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Untitled by Ced Bufton, on Flickr

 

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Some nice detail:

 

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… for a kit of this age, and CREW! Hooray.

 

The thick, not-so-clear parts:

 

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Can I do better?

Can I be bothered to make the bucks?

We shall see…

 

(You know I like a bit of tension in my WiPs. Or do I?) :D 

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The Cat, a kit I have never built  but I will follow this one on the fact of nostalgia.

I remember seeing her in the Airfix catalogs and thinking yes please but out of my price range then.

Any excuse to fire up  that Vac Former eh Ced.

 

Anyhow some beer and wine (For Lady H.) loaded up + nibbles so will watch this one .

 

Stay safe.

 

Simon.

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A Catalina, great subject, and look I'm on page one and near the front!

 

Always had a mind to do one of these as a Danish bird similar to the one at Cosford I saw last year.

 

The Coastal Command sheme is a nice choice.

 

Terry

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51 minutes ago, CedB said:

Still looking for a break from tiny stuff (the LA7s didn't really help)

This should defnitely suit you :) 

 

Watching ... :popcorn:  🍺  🍾

 

Ciao

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I have an early boxing of this kit, with the lovely box art depicted by bbudde, lurking near the top of my stash that I bought not long ago from a friend.  I’ve built one previously and, on the whole, it went together well.  Obviously there’s almost no interior detail but that was part of the fun of it, in some ways it was more satisfying to build than the much newer Academy kit.

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Perfect for the inflight ceiling posture

 

An unfeasible amount of heavy masse needed if you wanted to pop her on her wheels

 

And although this is be-blistered by rivets the rear third of the Catalina's wings is fabric covered

 

Nothing wrong with the rivets on her per se though, rivets are a fact of life on these birds

 

Cosford_2014_045.jpg

 

This is the Danish Cat from Cosford, somebody we know has more than a few pictures of that one for reference should they be wanted...

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I’ve always fancied giving one of these big belly landers a go but never quite got round it. Happily I can now live vicariously through your thread.

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oooh a cat. lovely. :cat: There is this one I did a while back for a group build.

The academy one but the same scale.    She's a lovely aeroplane, just don't forget LOTS OF NOSE WEIGHT!!!!! :D

 

I'll pull up a stool.

 

Johnny

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2 hours ago, CedB said:

Oooh, oooh, and ejector pin marks in all the wrong places?

 

49828830106_03f0bfd1c3_z.jpg

 

Airfix there very nicely catching him midway through mutating into a Bigsworth board...

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17 minutes ago, The Spadgent said:

The academy one but the same scale.    She's a lovely aeroplane, just don't forget LOTS OF NOSE WEIGHT!!!!!

And then even more

 

If you were daft enough not to hang it up alongside the Sunderland or Nimrod...

 

Just saying

 

(if you hang it up do not, for the sake of your ceiling add lots of nose weight)

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4 hours ago, Terry1954 said:

A Catalina, great subject, and look I'm on page one and near the front!

 

Always had a mind to do one of these as a Danish bird similar to the one at Cosford I saw last year.

 

The Coastal Command sheme is a nice choice.

 

Terry

My plan for my kit as well. The Cosford example has the later higher tail and of course the clipper nose. However, the Danes also operated the earlier version of the Catalina as depicted in the Airfix kit. Looking forward to this Ced.

 

Martian

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Found it, not that it was hard, just I wasn't looking, that'll me, though with social distancing as practised these days, its not the social event it might have been. :( I'm guessing this will run to more than 5 pages then. :) 

Steve.

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7 minutes ago, TheyJammedKenny! said:

It actually doesn't look too bad for 1964.  The cockpit transparency worries me, though.  Did Squadron or Falcon ever do a vacform replacement?  Otherwise I'm all for it.  Another heavy!

Yes, but for the Revell kit in Falcon set #11 USN aircraft & for the Academy/Minicraft PBY in an individual Squadron set.

Steve.

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