Category: American aircraft
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Vultee Vanguard – Part One – Stash Sale Star
The acquisition of a Vultee Vanguard was one of those serendipitous moments – a stash was being thinned, the sales day was ending, the owner was marking things down, and I had $ 15 left. Now the painful part – the decision whether to assign this one to the USAAF, the RCAF, or the Nationalist…
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Who Decided My Childhood?
No, I don’t mean my parents or the school teachers or the rock and roll industry – I mean who decided which prototypes to make into the plastic models that I built? Bear in mind it was a childhood in a part of North America that was under both American and British influence. Airfix, FROG,…
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Courage, Mon Brave!
When it is right – defend it. When it is wrong – admit it. And when it looks like hell, strip it off and start again. There are times when our reach exceeds our grasp. I have just printed a set of decals with the inkjet that would cover most of an air tanker. They…
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Northrop Gamma – Part Three – Texaco Sky Chief
From the layout of the wing and tail – the position of the cockpit – and the size of the engine, this must have been a hot, sweet, ship to fly. And the same specs must have made it right pig to land. I was thrilled with the appearance of the model as it was…
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Northrop Gamma – Part Two – A Silver Ghost
The instructions to paint an aircraft ” silver ” or “aluminium ” are often all you get from a maker in their colour call-out. I did not expect much more from the Williams company for this kit. But which silver – and which aluminium? I count four different Mr Hobby, 7 different Mr. Color, and…
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Northrop Gamma – Part One – Inter-war Special
Newcastle Song Day. And I didn’t let the chance go by. This was the first time I had seen a Williams kit – though I had read about them in Scalemetes. The impression I got was that they were rather garage-kit like. This vanished when I opened the box at the club’s stash sale and…
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F-16A – Part Three – In Every State Except…
In every state of the Union and nearly every country of the world, the heading image would raise little interest; it’s a toy airplane with a lead weight glued in the nose. In California, I suspect, it would cause sirens to wail and lawyers to leap from their kennels. Lead! A known carcinogen! A dangerous…
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F-16A – Part Two – The Staged Build
I am constructing this aircraft model on the Fortnight System. It is opened and worked upon at the Cambridge Public Library during a meeting of the Historic Modelling Friends – a rather informal group of retirees who have been granted permission to use the library’s function room of a Saturday afternoon. As the room contains…
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F-16A – Part One – The Day Of The Dead Decal…
Is there any more disheartening a sight than a sheet of decals that is older than most of your relatives – and even more wrinkled? You stare it it hoping it will come back to life but eventually you bury it in a coffin filled with the earth of its country… and hope that it…
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Convair Atlas D – Part Three – The Beast
The advantage of building to a common scale is the insight it provides you into the relative size of things. Prior to this build I had no idea these first-generation ICBMs were so large. My mind saw the toys of my childhood – the Cape Canaveral set gave totally false impressions. But then I went…
The Little World 