The Little World

Relax. This isn’t a political philosophy book. It’s still about plastic airplanes.

The warped Airfix Beaufighter fuselage has been tamed. It took all day to do what might have been accomplished in a half hour, but we were on lockdown and time was elastic.

The warp in the fuselage also warped the perception of how the rest of the aircraft parts were going to fit – frankly I was not expecting anything good. But I set about fettling and trimming at each individual point of the fuselage halves so that separately they would meet and fuse. Then I took them one at a time – nose, mid-upper, upper tail, and finally lower tail. Each section was MEK’ed together under clamp or tape pressure – each section contributing to the join of the next one. There was a good half hour to hour between each operation.

In the end the warp forces cancelled each other out and I had a straight fuselage. I locked it in with the one-piece horizontal stabiliser and left it overnight. In the morning I could ease the cockpit tray with the wing spars in, seal it with the belly pan, and then try the wings. Gloriosky, Joe! They fitted square and flush and needed minimal filling.

The wheel wells could be occluded with the kit’s closed covers – on a temporary basis – and the rest of the holes plugged with foam. A wash with meths and a jury-rigged sling that fitted in the rocket holes and then a coat of primer.

The bottom paint is AK Sky. A wonderful paint. Went on as smooth as silk. The top will eventually be a mixture of Extra Dark Sea Grey and Dark Sea Grey from Mr. Color. But the next time I get to visit Melbourne I am going to seriously look at laying in a stock of the AK paints.