Category: 1:72 scale
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The Kiddy Model And the Adult Modeller

Sometimes it’s hard to resist being a kid – particularly when you are in a hobby shop that also sells toys. You know you’re in there for a serious adult purpose ( like buying toy airplane kits ) but part of you is still a child and wants to buy toy airplanes… I mean it…
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When You See A Dead End Street…

There are lots of different sorts of streets and roads out in the Big World – so it shouldn’t be too much of a surprise that there can also be a variety in the Little World. And amongst that variety is the dead-end street – the no through road or cul de sac of modelling.…
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Modelling To A Theme – Building For A Purpose

I have a confession to make. I have a mental condition that permeates my life. It has affected me ever since childhood and makes itself felt in everything I do. It is sometimes a good thing and sometimes bad…but I have come to realise what it is and to accept it. It is the need…
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And A Tip Of The Hatlo Hat* To…

Wayne Robinson. Who read my piece on canopy painting and replied – alerting me to a very good English drafting pen that could be used to apply precise paint lines to models. I went to the site he quoted, looked it over and spied one line in their advertisement that looked interesting. They compared their…
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$ 20 A Donk

I’m just back from the hobby shop with three pots of paint and a new kit for the stash. It wasn’t an impulse buy – I have had it on the acquisition roster for some time, and just wanted to see what was available around town before I opened the wallet. I’d also asked around…
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I Am In Several Minds

And they talk to each other in different voices. If only I could get some of them to start contributing towards paying the electricity bill… The current debate centers around painting the frames of aircraft canopies in 1/72 scale. I’ve tried a number of different ways of doing this and not yet found the ideal…
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Four Legs Good – Two Legs Bad

Forgive me the George Orwellianism – I have been wrestling with the devil and it has affected my mind. I’ll be right after cocktail hour. The task for last night – while the glue for the canopies of the Hampden was setting – was the reconditioning of a Nakajima Hayate. You can play with the…
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Lockheed P-38 – Part Six – The Dirty Bluebird

As I’ve written before, every new build is a chance to have a new experience. This one has been my baptism in how to change horses in mid-stream, how to concentrate the mind, and how to make a deliberately dirty mess. I hasten to add that I already know how to make an accidentally dirty…
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Lockheed P-38 – Part Five – The Wild Blue Yonder

What do you do when you discover that you are going the wrong way? If you are Douglas Corrigan you just keep on going and hope to hit Ireland eventually. If you are me, you stop and see if you can turn around. I stopped after I did some more research on the RAAF’s only…
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Lockheed P-38 – Part Four – The Drive Shaft

The Hobby Boss model of the Lockheed P-38 Lightning has something I have not seen before on any plastic model airplane – it has a driveshaft. Or put more accurately, it has two. All the other models I’ve encountered have had just the opposite – a precise hole in the crankcase or nose where a…
