The Little World

John Evans bought this model from Stanbridge’s model shop may years ago. Unfortunately neither John, Jack, nor the shop still exist. But that doesn’t stop us from remembering them fondly.

My part in this will be to build up the MPM model of the Lockheed Vega Model 5. I suspect that John planned it to be a plane that had links to Australia in WW2. Impressed for service in 1942 from a local Western Australian airline it logged few flying hours before being scrapped in 1945.

My intention for it is quite different, as I have been internetting as hard as I can to see what it did overseas.

Note: The kit as boxed has civilian and military decals and either one of these would make a dandy result straight from the bag. I’m just being perverse, eh?

The basic plastic is MPM Czech softy. The moulding free of flash or sinkholes. The parts breakdown not too onerous – I’ll still be cobbling up landing gear from three separate struts and a wheel. At least the gear legs and struts fit into dedicated fairings and I can pin them in.

The construction of the fuselage is entirely self-contained once the halves meet – the interior is russet leather in the preserved museum specimens. Easy to reproduce, but the option of the two open doors has not been taken up. It’s not that they do not look good – it’s just that you have to hack open the fuselage halves to do it and the edge of the door frames would be rather ragged. I intend for the side of the fuselage to sport the Canadian Airways Loose Goose.

I wonder if there will be another Vega ever turn up to use those red Shell decals?