The Little World

And from the corpse has risen a new and shining phoenix. I, for one, am delighted.

When I commenced a new Airfix bomber kit – one of last year’s releases – I was blown away in just one day of assembly – the level of detail moulded into the parts was outstanding and the sensible division of the structure made the dry assembly and small-surface gluing a real pleasure.

The cockpit tub – or in this case the cockpit and bombardier’s deck – was complex enough to require at least ten parts and you could have been forgiven for feeling real fear as you tried the assembly into one half of the fuselage and gingerly offered the second half up for a fit. In the case of 90% of the Czech and other makers, this was the point at which you hauled out the chainsaw and started to hack bits off the sides of the tub. With Airfix it all just slipped into place and there were no pressure points or gaps to squeeze.

Then again, you looked at the wing roots fitting to the fuselage and where you might have had a Polish trench, the Airfix wing slipped snugly onto the wing spars and there was no need for filler. A similar situation on the tailplane – it was a real pleasure to get the airframe to a basic lock-up position. Oh, you had to be methodical and remember to include all the items intended for the interior – including a lead weight – but there were no impediments. The people who closed a fuselage and then used super-thin cement to weld it could certainly practice this – those of us who used a thicker cement had it even easier.

This kit also had a sensible landing gear – struts that were easy to glue in and had adequate support once slotted on. No wavering, wobbly cages.

Let us hope that the Airfix fortunes continue to rise and that we get more of this quality work in the future.