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RCAF Avro Lancaster – Part One – The Second Lucky Chance
Well, you get lucky sometimes. I got lucky lots of times in practice – not so many in my second career. But one of the memorable ones in 2014 was a trip to Japan as a corporate guest. We were hauled around but occasionally let loose in the shops or cafes to give the tour…
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The Perils Of Isolation
One of the chief perils of isolation right now is the freedom it gives to you to do things: Your own way. As you are cut off from the scrutiny of others and their good advice, you can take bad advice from yourself. This is the general approach of people who make home-made gunpowder or…
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Shall I Admit It To Myself?
What is my limit of self-deception. Can I convince myself that I am a teen idol? Or will I have to settle for being the sort of idol that lives in a ruined temple with spiders and snakes? More to the point, shall I admit to myself that one of the cornerstone products that I…
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Time Warps Again
WRITTEN DURING THE AUSTRALIAN SUMMERTIME, WHICH IT IS NOT RIGHT NOW… Well, it’s the hot dry weather, isn’t it. You should see what the front door is doing. I used to think it was made from MDF board but now I suspect it started life as a Möbius strip. But back to the time warpage.…
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Savoia Marchetti S.79 Sparviero – Part Seven – Under New Management
A notable milestone; my first Lebanese aircraft. All courtesy of a colour photo taken sometime during 1949 of an S.79 taxiing out to a runway past a pair of contemporary piston-engined fighter planes of the Lebanese Air Force. That, and a couple more found lurking on the net of similar aircraft in the middle East.…
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Savoia Marchetti S.79 Sparviero – Part Six – It’s All A Whitewash
And all the better for it. Never mind whitewash in politics or on your back fence. When you whitewash a model it is a sign that you are getting somewhere. In this case it is Mr Base White 1000 diluted and blown on with a single-action airbrush. The white 1000 is about as good as…
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Savoia Marchetti S.79 Sparviero – Part Five – Deep In The Heart Of…
Not Texas. Deep in the heart of Northern Italy. At the Savoia Marchetti factory cementing together the S.79 bomber and being alternately impressed and horrified at the way it is going. Impressed? Look at the detail of the shock absorber on the tail wheel. Not really terribly visible from the outside, but sturdy enough to…
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Savoia Marchetti S.79 Sparviero – Part Four – The Green Of A Service Station
A service station on the Autostrada. At 4:35 PM on August 7th. With the door open and the smell of pasta sauce in the air. Not that watery sort of sauce – the real thick stuff. Well, you need to know what you want to do before you do it, or you’ll never know whether…
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Savoia Marchetti S.79 Sparviero – Part Three – Clearly…
I’ll bet you are the same as I – as you open any new kit box you approach the little sprue of clear plastic bits with fear and trembling. Trepidation. Horror and anxiety. It is the equivalent of meeting the computer date for the first time. You never know what you are going to get……
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Savoia Marchetti S.79 Sparviero – Part Two – Parts On The Sprue
Looking at parts on a sprue is a two-edged thing…part of you applauds the precision of the moulding and part of you groans at the decision to break a structure into component parts when sometimes it is not necessary. The three engines seen in last post are positive things – they have enough detail that…
The Little World
Close focus on the world of scale models
The Little World 