Category: Civil aircraft
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Westland Wallace – Part Five – Swuping Aviation Corporation
No-one who sees the Westland Wallace owned by Generalissimo Stein Kai Shek can doubt that the province of Swuping is progressive. Other areas are still under the conservative rule of the warlords and cliques but Swuping is firmly headed into the Twentieth Century. Once the minor setbacks of invasions from the Nationalists, the Communists, and…
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Westland Wallace – Part Two – In West You Build Model
In Russia, model build you! It certainly builds your basic modelling skills, as well as your stoicism. The ill-fitting parts, flash, and suspect plastic make sure of that. This kit started in 1964 as a FROG Trailblazer, and the trail has long since been lost – overgrown in weeds. Even when explored by a small…
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Westland Wallace – Part One – An Unconsidered Trifle
This model kit was an overlooked box in the estate stash that came to our modelling club. But not overlooked for long. I looked it over, and decided building it was the best way of remembering the old club mate who had relinquished it. I suspect he had plans for it as an RAAF aircraft…
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Hillson Praga Air Baby – Part Four – It Was A Good Idea At The Time…
Plywood wing, tube-frame fuselage, tiny 4-cylinder engine. What could possibly go wrong? Well you have to hand it to Hillson Praga. They were stylish. The little Air Baby looks good from many angles, and if the history of the type in Australia is to be believed, the three examples that got here were successful. Part…
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Hillson Praga Air Baby – Part Three – See What You Get When You Listen To Yourself
Particularly when it is the voice of experience and has arrived at wisdom through previous bad decisions. The Australian civil registration code on this plane is on clear decal film – the sort that the Czechs do well. The sheet is finely-printed and seems to be in register, but I know from past jobs that…
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Hillson Praga Air Baby – Part One – So Niche
Okay. Beats Me. Who in Prague has ever heard of Australia? Well, someone did. They sent out three of these little light planes before WW2 – probably because they had a manufacturing deal going with Manchester. The kit is on two sprue trees – one clear and one silvered. A tiny rime of flash but…
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Ruritania Poste – Part Five B – RT-AFR
Purists amongst the aviation game may wonder at the slight anhedral exhibited by RT-AFR …the new SM.79 that Ruritania Poste has added to the African mail route. The answer is simple. The Savoia Marchetti is depressed. Wartime service for the Italians and now having to fly over cannibals and savage lions of post-war Africa …and…
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Ruritania Post – Part Three – Aviation Réchaufee
No one can accuse the Ruritanian people of being wasteful – they are not profligate in any way. Nor can they be ignored as engineers and scientists – any nation that concocts brandy and aviation fuel from turnips must be accorded a good deal of respect. Thus it is not surprise to see that the…
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Handley Page Jetstream – Part Four – Beinbruch Air Ambulance
If you look carefully you can find a use for everything. This was the principle behind the acquisition of the Handley Page Jetstream aircraft that were to have been a part of the USAF transport fleet. Eventually rejected by the US Air Force due to delays and engine problems, the medical turbo props were sold…
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Handley Page Jetstream – Part Three – Big Body And Tiny Wings
I was always puzzled by two aircraft; the Douglas X-3 Stiletto and the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter. They were fabulous looking and built for speed, but the tiny size of the wings always suggested that they just couldn’t lift themselves. There were troubles galore when they overloaded the F-104 but otherwise they seemed to work. But…
The Little World 