Category: subassembly
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Fairey Battle Mk I – Part Three – Got It Taped
I have been trying a new procedure in my aircraft builds; dry-taping. It is at the dry-fit stage and allows me to build up a phantom of the cemented assembly and add more parts to it. I can catch cockpits wedging the fuselage sides apart before committing to them – it is hard enough sanding…
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Fairey Battle Mk I – Part Two – The Paradox
How can a short-run moulder be so good at making injected parts… And then make so many bad resin ones; detailed resin panels that are meant to fit precisely. ” Meant ” is a curiously elastic word. I have been making two cockpit tubs from this Czech kit – they involve sides, back and top…
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Mitsubishi Babs – Part Two – Just When You Thought…
Just when you thought modelling could not become uglier…I had a good idea. The camouflage patterns for many aircraft are wavy, blobby things. You can spray them freehand or mask them, but in most cases of 1:72 planes, masking is better. I’ve tried many different ways of doing it, but settled upon the putty worms…
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FROG Stash Avenger – Part Three – The Avenger Meets The Blob
Sounds like the title of a Marvel Comics movie, doesn’t it? The problem was there to be solved – and it is one that has occurred on previous models of the Grumman TBF. The .50 machine gun needs to be installed in the turret and the turret installed in the fuselage before you close it…
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FROG Stash Avenger – Part Two – A Fine Frog
The reputation of older kits is low, but I think this can be undeserved judgement. This FROG moulding is all that one could decently want for the original cost and hits well above its weight at the stash price. The seams have met my expectations – and more importantly, the other parts they were designed…
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Dornier Do 27 – Part Three – Why Go To All That Trouble?
Why go to all the trouble of detailing the inside of a 1/72 scale model aircraft? a. When you are going to have the windows closed? And possibly obscured by the sort of crazing and hazing that desert storage conditions bring about? See Davis-Monthan or Hatzerim photos for this reference. b. When the parts are…
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Dornier Do 27 – Part Two – Open For Business
And if the business the Dornier Do 27 is engaged in is aerial observation…it is superbly designed. From the pilot’s seats you can see every blessed thing down and forwards while from the passenger’s benches you also have a completely open set of side hatches. This would be a good plane to leap out of…
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Painting With Perceived Wisdom
Or painting with rumour, advice, lies, advertisements, and blind faith. Pardon – that should be blind, stumbling faith. What could possibly go wrong? Painting white is tough. Painting red is tougher. Painting yellow worse. Painting silver worst of all. Woe is us, woe and wailing. And particularly if we listen to everyone else’s advice. And…
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Airspeed Oxford – Part Two – Pink Dot Special
You’ll note the pink dots on the wings and fuselage of the Airspeed Oxford – these are the lesions of Moulder’s Pox. It was a disease that afflicted scale models in the 1950’s and 60’s. It was caused by styrene mixtures that tended to shrink. This was exacerbated by pulling the sprue tree from the…
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The PE Pests
No, I’m not talking about the people down the club who can make perfect PE parts every time and cement them on with no problems. I admire them. I’m talking about the Bohemian types who dream up the extra-thin parts on the PE sheets and expect you to be able to manipulate them into components.…
The Little World 