Category: 1:72 scale
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What Does A Free Model Teach You?
If chance brings a free model kit to your bench, what should you do? a. Thank the donor profusely. b. Bear it away unopened and when alone, look inside. c. Whatever the state of the contents, do not panic. There might be gold or iron pyrites in there, and you may have to actually build…
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Grumman Tracker – Part Three – A Bonnie Aircraft
Bonnie, but not magnificent… The Idea Model Company Grumman S2F-1 model that came to me at a low price has proved to be an excellent bargain. It might not have the precision of a Hasegawa or Tamiya product, but it is here, now, and has built up to a good stand-off model. The Royal Canadian…
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Grumman Tracker – Part Two – Do You Goo?
Yes, I do – particularly when I am making Idea Model, Minicraft, Mistercraft, or Novo kits. It is a natural reaction to the sight of gaping crevasses. I should be a quivering mess in Antarctica. At my workbench I am just barely controlled. It was not always thus. As a child builder I would have…
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Grumman Tracker – Part One – The Started Kit
Kits that have been started by another modeller are traditionally lower priced than pristine ones. I suppose this would be reversed if the original builder was Leonardo da Vinci, but so few of his plastic models seem to have survived the Reformation… I got this aircraft kit from the clearance of a legacy stash and…
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Mitsubishi Betty – Part Three -Tour Of Inspection
Orders to Ground Crew: Rabaul 17 April, 1943 Prepare G4M1 bomber serial 323 for inspection tour by Admiral Yamamoto tomorrow. Aircraft is to be cleaned thoroughly including all windows. Make sure the defensive tail armament is in correct working order. The side positions may be left closed. As the flight will be leaving at 0600…
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Mitsubishi Betty – Part Two – Not-So-Ghostly Seam
I wondered what that cracking noise was… It was the top fuselage seam giving way. I must have flexed a wing too much and surpassed the tensile strength of the thin cement used to seal the fuselage. Well that’s what undercoat painting is designed to catch – the flaw that occurs before you add a…
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Mitsubishi Betty – Part One – Flying Cigar
The Mitsubishi G4M bomber – the Betty – was given this nickname because of the fuselage. It featured an almost constant cylindrical shape aft of the wing roots and terminated in many models in a rounded tailpiece. This model kit contains this shape, thought he specific aircraft being modelled had the round-off removed to give…
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Curtiss H16 – Part Six – Long Yellow Wings
And a remarkable scale model. The history of the Curtiss H16, as well as the British-built Felixstowe types, is available on the net. They were patrol birds in the WW1 period and undoubtedly endured very hard service over the waters. It is not surprising that so few have survived to become museum exhibits. This Roden…
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Curtiss H16 – Part Five – Wing Walking Without A Safety Net
With my heart in my mouth and my underwear screwed up tight… I set out to put 12 inter-plane struts on the lower wing of the Curtiss – all 12 upright and at the same angle. The way I did it was to use three old foam-board shapes I had made when doing an Airfix…
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Curtiss H16 – Part Four – Donks Are Shön
With my sincere apologies to Wayne Newton… These two donks have been the most complex engines I’ve yet seen in a 1:72 kit. The fuel pipes and cooling assembly alone should have frightened me away, but I was too foolish to run. Over a couple of weeks the constituent parts have been cemented on –…
The Little World 