The Little World

I cannot decide now that the Grumman Widgeon is done and sitting on the photo floor, whether I enjoyed myself building it or not.

If you go by the mis-fitting engines, nacelles, windscreen, and landing gear, it was a misery. If you looked at the wing, fuselage, and tail assemblies as they mated, it wasn’t too bad. The paint finish was a lot of fun to do and went on just as planned. And the decals coped with the rivets pretty well after a number of Micro Sol baths and some poking of relief holes.

I was reminded a lot of the Airfix Grumman Duck that I built as a Royal Mail Canada plane. The silver brings out the riveting to best advantage and some bright colour helps. The Portuguese example I found on the net had either a black hull under the waterline or the clean green you see here.

But you want to have your wits about you and be cold sober when you try to set up the wing floats on four ill-fitting spars…

Thank goodness the Portuguese did not go in for exotic lettering or stencils  – the museum example is fairly bare. But it, like this Widgeon, is brightly polished. Someone must have figured out how to hold it by the clean end…

Note: No wonder I am ambivalent about this kit. Scalemates seems to say that it is 60 years old this year. Time to pension it off, I suspect.