Fighting Them on the Beaches - Miles Magister "Maggie-bomber"

[Putty Animal]

 

We must fight on, whatever happens.
I should count it a privilege to be dead if Hitler rules England. I had not thought I should have to live through such awful days...

From the diary of Sir Alexander Cadogan, Permanent Under Secretary of the Foreign Office

 

 

How grim things must have seemed then.  It is sobering to imagine the uncertainty of the times, even with our own present troubles.  Civilization was on the brink, and it is frightful to think where we would be now as a people, as a species, if things had gone the other way.

I'm always interested to read the accounts from people which were written at that time, unfiltered by years or a lifetime of hindsight.  One aircraft that for me embodies that period of dark uncertainty and impending peril was the benign little Miles Magister, hastily modified to carry a clutch of anti-personnel bombs beneath its wings.  When the invasion came, these fragile, under-powered trainers would be sent out as part of a last desperate all-or-nothing defense of Britain.

 

I had the ex-Frog Novo Magister as a kid, and I loved that little bird.  I must have painted it in a dozen different liveries in its time.  The last being an overall  coat of Humbrol 11 "Silver Fox".  Traces of which remained on the armrest of my mother's favourite armchair for more than a decade after...  

 

I've long hoped to do another Magister, but these days I'm deeply embedded in the cult of 1/144.  Apart from an unobtainable resin from Japan, there aren't any of the little buggers to be had.  If I really wanted a Magister (and I did) the only hope was to do one from scratch.

 

So here goes...
 

The first bit was the keel.  I found a bit of evergreen styrene and cut a strip representing the bottom of the fuselage and bent it to a curve that matched the drawings.

 

 

Not very exciting, but its the most important bit. I made sure the taper at the back was okay then added two sidewalls of .35mm styrene. A "roof" of 2mm sheet was also cut and some undersized openings for the cockpits were drilled out. I tried to get this piece as seamless a fit as I could, but there's nothing to locate it to yet so I'll need to flush it in properly later.

 

 

The upper fuselage decking got rounded off with a file and I laminated some scrap styrene for the cowling. The long bit sticking out the front is a temporary handle that will get cut off later. Making the part from laminations rather than a solid piece is easier, as you can use the seams as a guide to ensure you don't start filing the piece out of alignment.

 

 

 

Then it was time to bur out the inside of the decking.  Brrr!

 

 

Once the piece is thinned down you can shape the edges of the cockpit much more easily. 

 

 

The next evening I added a dummy tail and taped the bits together for a captain cook. The cowling was beginning to take shape by this time too.

 

 

 

With that part in hand it was on to the wings. 

 

 I started off with a parallel strip of 3mm styrene and cut it to the width of the centre section. This got double sided taped to a block that was held in a vice. Then I went at it two-handed with a big coarse file that was about 30cm long. I rounded the leading edge first. Then worked over the back. Flipping the piece over and sticking the wing down again with a fresh bit of tape makes it easy to shape the wing evenly. It took about 40 minutes to get the basic shape.

 

 

 

 

The wing(s) are marked with some scalpel lines and two deep score marks underneath where I'll bend them to create the dihedral. Then the excess is sliced off.

 

 

Then it was back on the block with some tape to shape the outer wing panels. Once this is done the styrene is easily tidied up by wet sanding.
A piece of the centre section was cut away to accommodate the fuselage, but I left a bridge running between the two wings to preserve their alignment. A corresponding notch was cut out of the lower fuselage.  Somebody once said I was a frustrated carpenter. They may have been right!

 

 

The fit isn't going to set the world on fire, but its okay.

 

 

 

Adding more soon!

Edited August 29, 2020 by Putty Animal

[MarkSH]

Very nice scratch building.

[Heather Kay]

Wow! A micro mini Maggie! Good work.

[Ozzy]

Top scratch building.

[AdrianMF]

Very neat! The cowling is a tricky shape and nicely captured.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[Brandy]

I'm not a 144 fan, but this is a wonderful "how to" guide. I will keep your methods secure (or as secure as they can be) in my head for future reference. I'm certain they will come in useful!

Great stuff, and she's looking every bit a Maggie!

 

Ian 

[Putty Animal]

Thanks for the kind words!  It's coming along, despite my appalling clumsiness.  I'll add some more shots soon. 

 

[Murdo]

Fabulous build! Watching with great admiration!

[lasermonkey]

Outstanding! I'll be watching this one, for sure!

[Putty Animal]

We just got stuck in and compared notes later...
Sergeant Jim Hallowes, May 1940
 

The cockpits got a bit of detail.  I haven't a lot to go on with the placement of objects. Particularly with the position where the two wing spars carry through. Plus the height of the seats and their relative location to the hole in the back wall where the Sutton harnesses feed through. It took a bit of messing around to work these out. 
 

Eventually I was able to find the right spot. You can guess at how many goes I had at it by some of the still-visible score lines in the wings.

 

 

 

The rear walls of each cockpit were made and embossed with the little oval hole that the harnesses poke into. These got glued to the roof piece of the fuselage, while majority of other stuff will be added to the lower half. There's a prominent rim around many RAF cockpit interiors at about elbow height. The magister has this too and I was able to use it to advantage to disguise the interior join between the upper and lower halves of the fuselage. You can just make it out in the shot below.
 

 

 

 

The seats are jammed between the rear wall and the wing spars, so there isn't much room for error. I tried plunge moulding them but the result was pretty poor. I eventually opted to make them from scored and bent styrene instead which worked out much better.

 

 

 

[Putty Animal]

 

...a complete and utter shambles. There was no intelligence. Everything appeared to be ad hoc.

Flight Lieutenant Frederick Rosier, May 1940
 

 

My long suffering Mrs Putty often remarks upon my apparently odd fascination for creating miniatures, and how cruel it is that this urge should choose to manifest itself in a person so innately clumsy as I  (but you walked into a door twice today darling...  I saw you!).

 

Whenever I stand thus accused, I usually just square my shoulders, raise my chin a little higher and walk haughtily away.  More often than not catching my toe on a protruding piece of furniture or tripping over the lounge room rug as I retreat back to my designated safe zone...

 

 

I've been working away at the Magister over the last few weeks, but at times have been spectacularly uncoordinated which has slowed me down quite a bit.

Making the most of my time in lockdown I endeavoured to get some paint on the interior. I dragged the compressor and associated bits out to the balcony to spray the green. I was all thumbs that day and was dropping things and making repeated trips back inside to retrieve things which I had forgotten.  

At one point I was squatting down next to the compressor, peering closely at the model and trying to deliver as precise an aim of paint as possible to the area between the seats. I went to stand up, not realising that I was standing on the airbrush hose. As I straightened up I was suddenly halted by the short length of hose that protruded from beneath my foot, which caused me to loose balance and drop back down abruptly. The cup full of well thinned Tamiya XF-71 suffered no such inconvenience and continued on its upward trajectory to meet me on the way down...

Nasty, horrible tasting stuff.

In my efforts to get cleaned up I also managed spill the remaining paint out of the airbrush, and tip over the still-open jar of paint onto the timber deck.  Forcing me to use the best part of a $30 bottle of levelling thinner in trying to scrub it off before a curious Mrs P came out to see what I was up to...  

 

Below are some shots of the interior with the green on (didn't take any of the green on me). The rear walls were in situ and hard to reach, which left a lot of paint on the outside that had to be removed later.

 

 

Still some fingerprints there from my paint soaked hands.  

 

 

After making the floor, seat, instrument panel and spars and bulkheads, I had grand plans to add plenty more detail over the coming week.  Alas though, I had to admit that if I did, none of it would really visible at all.   So I did a bit of shading and contented myself with two sets of seat harnesses made from painted cigarette paper.  Working in 1/144 scale, one packet of these should last me a lifetime.  Or rather less if I ever took up smoking again.  

 

 

 

Got the headrest on too, which makes the whole thing look a bit more identifiable.

 

 

Need to tidy up a bit now and start thinking about the wingroot and tail feathers...

 

[Pete in Lincs]

What a lovely little thing. And with a how to masterclass to boot. Shame about your woes and the mouthwash incident.

In the memoirs of a BoB pilot (Al Deere?) he says that the Squadron Adjutant, (who'd fought in WW1) wanted a 'Pop at the Hun'.

So he was flown up the Channel in the Squadron 'Maggie'. He then emptied his Revolver in the direction of France and was flown home a happy man!

[Putty Animal]

I think I read something about that.  There was another one attached to Sailor Malan's squadron if I recall correctly, which was flown over to occupied France by a fellow called Leathart to rescue their stranded CO after the evacuation.  I tried to find the codes for that aircraft but didn't have any luck.

[Putty Animal]

 

This is an appeal to all workers in the aircraft industry. Urgently we ask for the fullest
output this week and next … I want to reach all of you with my words: the work you do
this week, fortifies and strengthens the front of battle next week. 

Lord Beaverbrook

 

Cracking on.  I'm hoping to get back to a Blenheim Mk If that has been on the shelf of doom after this, and if possible I'd like to get them both into the GB.

I made the tail unit from .5mm styrene sheet and detailed it with rib tapes and hinge lines.  The wings got attached at last too and I built up the wing root fairings with thinned down Tamiya white putty. Mixing with thinners into a smooth consistency, you can float it on with a fine brush in such a way as to get it to naturally adopt the right contours. The main trick is not to work each layer too long to ensure that you maintain a smooth texture. The thinners causes the putty to stick extremely well, but it also causes it to shrink too. So a few coats are required to build up the shape. Only a little bit of sanding is needed afterwards.

 

I noticed I'd left the wings a little thick at the tips, so a bit of reshaping was needed.  Fortunately it went okay though.

 

 

All wasn't smooth sailing though.  Still suffering from another attack of the clumsies, I did the sanding this morning prior to giving the whole thing a shot of primer. My opening swipe with the rolled up piece of wet and dry paper was more like an uppercut, and I batted the poor little Magister out of my hands and sent it flying. It was nowhere to be seen, and I leaned far out over the side of my rickety chair to try and see where it had gone...

It seemed to have vanished. Then to my horror I saw that it had landed between the seat of my chair and the wobbly plastic armrest, and wedged itself firmly between the two! The full force of the chair was bearing down on the space between the cockpits and I could not get it free. It was only by pulling hard downwards on the armrest and pulling at a wingtip with a pair of tweezers that I was able to coax it free.

By a miracle, the weight of the chair's armrest came down right on the bulkhead between the two cockpits. Which prevented the thin styrene shell from being crushed. After sanding out a small dent and counting my blessings, I headed out to the balcony for a bit of a prime. Very careful to avoid stepping on the airbrush hose this time.

 

 

I also started thinking about the undercarriage. These are OMG delicate in 1/144, and as I was making the bits I was wondering if it was even going to work.

I decided to try something different and instead of soldering up the undercarriage in full, I endeavoured to detail one wheel and attach the forks to it - then cast it in resin. That way I can drill right into the tyre to insert the remainder of the undercarriage leg, ensuring a good strong joint. Well, that's the plan anyway!

 

 

I shaped the fork so that the legs had a slight taper, then prepared to attach it to the wheel. It promptly pinged out of my tweezers and was lost to the Hun carpet. 

Fortunately I still had the other one that was still stuck on the end of a long piece of brass tube.   Using it as a handle I attached the wheel and trimmed the whole unit off after the glue had set.  To ensure the wheel didn't go the same way as the first, I stuck some tape to the end to make it less aerodynamic and easier to find if the worst happened*

 

 

*It did, but I found it!

 

 

 

Edited August 4, 2020 by Putty Animal

[Pete in Lincs]

10 hours ago, Putty Animal said:

By a miracle, the weight of the chair's armrest came down right on the bulkhead between the two cockpits.

Altogether now, PHEW!

It looks lovely in primer. I'll take half a dozen in trainer yellow. Non consecutive serial numbers. Obviously.

Not sure about bomb racks. I'll get back to you....

[Cookenbacher]

This is modelling from another world, fantastic stuff.

[TonyW]

A joy to read. Looking forward to more.

 

Tony.

 

 

[Putty Animal]

Cheers!  I'll add more soon. 

Pete, I'm not sure about the bomb racks either.  In truth I would have preferred a pure trainer too, but I thought I would be drummed out of the GB for not sticking to the guidelines for participating aircraft.  Preproducing the monkey bars and 8x 25lb bombs is going to be tricky.

[Putty Animal]

 

Production is definitely falling, regardless of what reports you may be getting, and with transportation smashed up the way it is,

the present production output will continue to fall.
My own feeling is that they [the British] are in a bad way. I cannot impress upon you strongly enough my complete lack of confidence

in the entire British conduct of this war.

United States Ambassador Joseph Kennedy, 27 September 1940

 

 

Pfft...!  Up yours Mr Kennedy.  Up yours I say!  Production continues, regardless of what reports you may be getting.  

 

The tailplane attached at last and the fillets ahead of it were added from thin styrene sheet. The vertical stabiliser was added after, and the battle to blend it in commenced. There are also some raised strips on the Magister wings that cover the joint between the inner and outer sections. These were masked and sprayed with primer to build up some height. Makes for a nice detail.

 

 

I also fussed around with the cowling.  Still some more work to do there however.

 

 

Did some very light scribing too. The ailerons on Magisters look quite smooth in real life so I left them as they were.

 

 

Dymo tape is way too large for 1/144, so I use thin strips of Scotch tape (810D) as a guide while scribing.  The idea usually being to only scribe the primer and not the plastic beneath it.    Pretty happy with the result! 

 

 

[Torbjorn]

”Scribe the primer” - thanks for this neat idea, shall remember that one. 

—

 

Sinply stunning results so far. I for one am eager to see how you will manufacture the ordnance.

[Murdo]

Looking absolutely terrific!!!

 

[Cookenbacher]

Yes, such elegant scratch work.

[Putty Animal]

11 hours ago, Torbjorn said:

”Scribe the primer” - thanks for this neat idea, shall remember that one. 

—

 

Sinply stunning results so far. I for one am eager to see how you will manufacture the ordnance.

I'm kind of wondering how I'm going to do that too.  The bombs will be alright, but the frame that they hang from is going to be something else...  

 

[PeterB]

Hi,

 

I have come across 25lb practice bombs and incendiary bombs but my book of "British Explosive Ordnance" only lists a 20lb fragmentation/anti personnel bomb, not that it will make any great difference at this scale!. Should be fun.

 

Pete

[Torbjorn]

10 hours ago, Putty Animal said:

I'm kind of wondering how I'm going to do that too.  The bombs will be alright, but the frame that they hang from is going to be something else...  

 

That does look daunting.  Are etch or paper possibilities?