John Symmons

Hi null_null98. That's a very nice Vampire model and very well built. I especially like the shade of silver; suitably dull. You might not know that the Vampire was, like the Mosquito, was built of wood. so therefore was painted silver which would have quickly become dull like your model. I used to lived almost just over the road from DeHaviland's Leaverston (The engine factory) and remember seeing a few on their open days. (1950's). It always amazed my just how close they were to the ground. Also nice to see you haven't accentuated the panel lines. Well done again and keep them coming. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom..

Ah Ha. Nice to see someone knows his colour theory (Gary800) It's quite common for laymen to get confused with relected light as in paints, and transmitted light.. Jeff you correct that a none starboard lght would best be shown as blue or as Gary suggested a more cyan colour, of course the port light would be red or a pinkish red or dark crimson when not lit. Also remember red is a colour that is notoriuosly not very light fast, I once had on old Sunbeam Talbot that the rear lights had faded so much that they glowed orange. I finally had to paint the insides with with a translusent red. Hope this helps. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom PS. Did you know there is no such colour as Browm. Just look at a rainbow you won't see Brown anywhere. Brown is actually and unsatureated orange tone. Always gave us problems in the printing industry. JtP

Hi All. Firstly, a quick shout-out to Aussie Jeff for: Thanks for that. Well I'm back with my opinionated self. I see my last posting was way back in March. A lot has happened since then. My doctor saw that i hadn't seen the cardiologist who did my by-passes about 14 years ago. So, my doctor thought it was only prudent to get an appointment. He was right Well I'm sure you can sort-of guess the result. Seems I’d developed a slight heart beat irregularity that he wasn’t too happy about but tests found I’d also developed an aneurism in my aorta that he was definitely not happy with. They tried to check it out further but my arteries weren’t in a good enough state for it to be successful. They said I was cardiovascular cluster; not good. My cardiologist is a bit of a wizard and was willing to give it a go with a special stent from Germany. I call him Gandalf. This was just as the Covid-19 thing started, not the best of times to have anything like this to happen. After a week in hospital, mainly waiting for the stent to clear SA customs, I was sent home. This kind of thing really makes you re-evaluate your life it also makes you a bit crabby. Luckily, I now live alone. Then my computer died on me. Several months later I finally managed to get a new computer. Big learning curve from my old XP based one to Windows 10. I also lost all my old programs so now have to use Office which I hate; much prefer the old Serif Page-Plus. Finally managed to get the internet back and today got my E-Mail back up and found I’d lost my Airfix pass-word. But Airfix allowed me to reset my password, so, guys I’m back. Not done much modelling as the hospital stay etc sort-of killed my concentration and Mo-Jo. Due to a family thing I had to consolidate my stash, and ended up clearing out all my old kits, Airfix, Frog, Matchbox, Revel, Lindberg, LS etc. The three Dragon Arado Ar 234 versions and the Do 335 also went as I knew I’d never build them (Way too complicated for me now with my limited concentration span.) Also, to go was the Academy Graf Spee, the Limited edition one with all the PE and metal barrels. I’d made the normal release one and to be honest I was disgusted with it. Basically, it wasn’t a bad kit, but it wasn’t the Graf Spee, there were too many odd inaccuracies, possibly the worst being the absence of the amidship cutters and davits, and the open secondary turrets, even the plastic railing could be forgiven except for the gaps. And the masts were wrong again. These details were available in the 1970’s so why are they appearing in a modern kit. No excuse. Pity really as I was looking forward to making that model. Anyway, enough of a rant. Good to see there’s now a Pandemic Special posting so maybe I can post some of the finished models I managed to make just before the ‘lock-down’ or during it. Unfortunately, none are Airfix and a few are still waiting for my Mo-Jo to return. Here in SA we’re now into level one so model shops are opening again and some models I’d ordered last year have finally arrived, mainly 1/72 Roden armour and I saw an ACE model of a WW1 artillery piece. Look interesting ACE have improved their moulding; it’s now digital;? and a great improvement from some of their earlier moulds. Well that’s about it for now. I’ll be posting in the usual forums and catching up on the replies were ever I can. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi Pair of Pliers (PoP) While i'm no expert on any WW2 infantry uniforms, but if you check out Vallejo paints you'll find several German infantry colours and a Ruian uniform colour, these could be a good starting point. Another useful guide is the box art of Zvezda models especially the art of tactic series. Remember uniforms like any other paint schemes do not stay pristene especially when used in battle, this is especially true for infantry uniforms, so I wouldn't be too pedantic about colours being too uniform (excuse the pum) unless you're doing a parade diorama. Possibly your best bet is to use Google, unfortunately that will not give you any specific paint numbers. Hope this helps. Remember we do this for fun. John the Pom

Hi Ratch Is that a bus discuised as a tank or a tank discuised as a bus? That barn or Black-Smiths building / diorama looks very interesting; an chance of some info on it? Remember we do tis for fun John the Pom PS. Great Photos everyone JtP

Hi T2B Good luck It's actually not a bad kit' the lopping off the nose can be a bit frought as the replacement's fit can be suspect. I actually did a build of this kit (Airfix red box) a few years ago you might find it useful. What really impressed me was the fit of the wings to the fuselage, something I think Tamagwa would be proud of, pity Airfix haven't used that method more frequently. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom PS. The tail wheel is in two halves with a hollow in the center of the tyre tread. JtP

Hi Cliverdee To my knowledge humbrol paint have no direct equietent to colours used by the US navy. There are other companies that do specialize in these colours such as WEM & Atlatic models. I built the Tamiya USS Missouri of 1955 / 45 fit and they gave two schemes measures 22 and 2232D I've included the Tamiya schemes with their paint colours and mixes.. Althgough theses schemes and other schemes given should be taken with a large pinch of salt as in 1942 to 1944 paint wasn't of the highest priority and most ships had to use local paint as & where & what they could. So much so that you could easily find ships with a muiltitude of various blues dabbed all over then that them looked like blue patch-work quilts. So unless you want your ship to be pristen you can use plenty of artisic lience. Good luck and would love to see some finished results. Tamaya's painting measuries 22 & 2232D. /media/tinymce_upload/3d15242a0b8284db903c1a1a19def3da.jpg /media/tinymce_upload/4e7e9ac4d5058a8d6faafaef8296e7fe.jpg Hope this helps. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Again a nice clean built as expected from you, wel done. At least it looks the part. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Well done PMM, good to see theNimrodis sitll arond even ifit's rearly seen. Looks to be a goog clean build and up to your excalelt standards. Nice one and thanks for sharing it with us. Keep em coming. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

I think you'll find this is the original box art when first released. /media/tinymce_upload/3e6ce9d863de78ffdc42df0af287b599.jpg Remember we do this for fun John nthe Pom

Late in the war there were evan cases of new armour being in such need that they were even dispacted still in thry red oxide under-cout sometimes with tins of paint for the crew or maintaince people to apply as they saw fit. I think contrution of the Panza III was treminated at the end of 1943 or early 44 all futher production centering on the StugIII. remember we do this for fun John The Pom

Hi All Been missing for the oast month due to internet problems and a few health issues, but now back again. Visited two LMS's and ended up with an ICM Bf 109e-4 Night fighter, first glacnce look good, very much on a par with the Airfis issue but sans crew. Also scored some, what I thought was 600 scale railings,second hand for R 175 ( that's about 9 pounds) but on closer inspection there were two frets at 1:350 scale. It includes some gun shields and some gratings or floater baskets? I've know idea what kit they're ment for but I can still use them on some of my #%) scale ships lurking in my stash. Quite a bargin I thought. Pic of the 109 & the PE fret /media/tinymce_upload/5ead31eceba78831381b82db3436b8e7.jpg /media/tinymce_upload/cb6057d2568756d7600cfeb1445edda5.jpg Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi Kidge I can only find the information below; it's from a old Altmark decal sheet of the Luftwaffer Battle of Britian Campaign series. Hope it helps. /media/tinymce_upload/8efdfc8d336d493ee7ba71a596a94153.jpg Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi Amots. Here in South Africa wig or hair pieces are commonly used. For rigging aircraft I find this ideal as it's very fine and straight, freely available and extremely cheap. I'm sure these hair pieces must be available in the UK ans USA and most other countries. The other thing is invisable thread usually found at haberdashers. Actually if you really look around you can find all sorts of things in haberdashers and material shops that are useful in model making, such as fine netting useful for camouflage netting. Hope this helps and good luck. Love to see some results of your finished models Rember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi JBH 1977. There are several answers to your problem but I like Peter S above ask why do you need a spinning prop? Unless you would like it to spin for photographic reasons. Years ago manufactures tried to include many movable features as it added to the "play value", but usually at the expense of accuracy, luckily that era has seemed to have passed. If something moves or "works" someone; usually you; WILL play with it and it WILL break. Propeller blade are notoriously difficult to repair. Thankfully today we have few moving parts; propellers being the exception; these have been replaced with multi positional parts, like flaps and undercarriages. Personally I usually glue the prop in a fixed position or make it movable or pos-able without it freely spinning for photographic reasons. Having said all that I recently build an old Hasagawa kit of the Kawanishi H6K4 flying boat and wanted to add the propellers last as they were very delicate and could easily be damaged when masking and airbrushing such a large model ( wing span over 500 mm ). The problem was the propeller axils were moulded with the propellers. These I removed and replaced with 2 mm Evergreen styrene rod, drilled out the engine hole and the propeller to accept the new axils with the axils trapped between the two rows of cylinder banks leaving about 1.5 mm protruding from the engine crank-case to allow me to glue the props on later. This allowed me to airbrush the model only blanking off the engine fronts, and also to paint the propellers with ease. Only two of the props ended up movable on the finished model, the other two I must have used too much glue as they ended up solid. Hope this helps and would love to see some of your finish results. Remember there’s no such thing as a bad model we’ve all made models that others might think are OK but we cringe at the thought of someone seeing the result; like my build of the Airfix Graf Spee; it’s all part of the learning curve. I’ve included a diagram below that hopefully helps explain what I’ve just written. As they say a picture is worth a thousand words. /media/tinymce_upload/a10a765a2b9edeb411720daf4773f389.jpg Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Nice one Paul B. I acquired this re-release a few months back and it's been itching to be started in my stash since then. Maybe your posting will give me the push to to dig it out and give it a go. Again thanks for the post and keep them coming. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi Cliverdee. I did a complete build posting on both the the Airfix E.II and E.III Eindecker kits, posted 18 Feb 2019 that included rigging both aircraft. It was posted in the Aircraft forum. You might find that posting helpfull. I rigged mine with non-elastic thread as it's unavailable in SA. You'll find it a great advantage to drill right through the wing locations with a 0.3 or 0.5 mm drill. As I said in the posting these aircraft are possibly the best ones to start with if you're new to rigging WW1 aircraft. Hope this helps, and would love to hear how you got on, and maybe see some photos. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Agreed I feel that as Airfix is the predominant British producer of plastic kits it's almost expected that they should be the predominant producer of Royal Navy ships which they once were but in the 600th scale. They have already dipped their toes in the 350 scale and now with so much interest in the Queen Elizabeth and the Prince of Wales carriers Airfix could be sitting on a real money maker. But one does wonder if Trumpeter hasn't already started on this ship as they do seem to have a penchant for producing aircraft carrier kits. I just hope that if Airfix do decide to do the QE and P&W that they give them a decent air complement or make add-on aircraft availabe, also incrude some deck handling equipment. I'm sure the after market boys will quickly come up with various photo etch sets. Then hopefully Airfix might turn their hands to some of the other great and famous Royal Navy ships from the past. We can always live in hope. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi David Glad to be of help and hope the profile was of some use. Good luck with the sea-scape, there's quite a few different ways shown on the various modelling channels "Scae-a-thon" posted an interesting on using silver foil you might like to try. Looking forward to eventually seeing the finished HMS Belfast. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi David. Good luck with the Airfix HMS Belfast, not the easiest of kit to finish. The colours that airfix give are for December 1943 when she fought in the battle of the North Cape. The version I hav the paint guide is all but useless dur to ink bleeding when it was printed. To be honest the kit sort-of scares me a bit is why I haven't started mine. While a visit to HMS Belfast in London is well worth a visit and highly recommended if you're interested in RN warships, it'll be of little use to you in building the Airfix kit as her has fit changed considerablely since 1943, but as I said still well worh the visit. That deck colour should be Home Fleet Dark Grey, you might try Humbrol 32 Dark grey or even Humbrol 27 Sea Grey although the later might be a bit light,or you could try one of the various shades of dark greys in the Vallejo range from position 163 to 167 personally I feel 163 Dark Sea Green or 166 Dark Grey would be a good place to start. Below is a plan profile of HMS Belfast as she appeared in 1943. Hope this helps, and would love to see the finished model on this forum. /media/tinymce_upload/b0df929e81d660ecd01f74f518f1e96d.jpg Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi Tenaki. Firstly welcome to the forum. You've hit on a common problem with yellow paint, it seem to be common with most if not all manufactures of model paints affecting both acrylics and enamels. I've doing some Japanese WW2 aircraft at present and this problem has cropped up painting the wing ID panels. About the only way around this is to prime or base coat with white and then airbrush several coats of yellow. If you're brush painting base coat with white then try Vallejo Yellow Ochre (70.913 Position 121) this has a much better covering power, then finish with a top coat of trainer yellow. Hope this helps and hope to see and hear about your results. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Quick visit to Clown's my LMS just to check if anything I've ordered is available and all I could get was The Airfix Me262 night fighter but at an exorpitant price of over 800 Rand which equates to 46 quid & 50 p how does that compare in the UK? Ordered it anyway for next year Also came away with another Airfix Air-Sea Rescue Lanch still at the same price as the one I brought two years ago , You win some and you lose some???? Anyway I now no longer have to decide which version to build I can do both. This was prompted by the build posting of James Mower. Last year I bit the bulit and brought the Revell re-ishue of they very ancient 1/96 scale Cutty Sark; now that's a scarey kit; so I decided on a practice piece first and the Academy 1/350 scale Cutty Sark seem to fit the bill perfectly, and at a mere 120 rand( About 6 pound 50P seemed a bargin. So when I've finally waded my way through my stash of very old WW2 Japanese aircraft I think it'll be time for a change of pace for something nautical. /media/tinymce_upload/b1658e3f60c849c65c6b260227a997b2.jpg Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi Ratch. Seem I'm joining you in the Napoleonoic era; managed to find the French baggage wagon which with a modicom of mods could easily be turned into a WW1 era wagon as the basic design hadn't really changed since Roman times. Maybe I'll do one in the correct livery. Just for the fun of it as it really the rider that sets it in the time period. /media/tinymce_upload/982ef6f8213fd8366d502bca233f8bd9.jpg Remember we dothis for fun John the Pom

Hi James Will be following this build closely as I have one I've been threatening to build for sometime, but was very undecided as to which version to build. I've even toyed with getting a second one thar's been loitering in the corner of the bottom shelf at my LMS. Maybe next year?? I built the "E"? "S" Boat two years ago and was very inpressed with the kit (except the hull / deck fit.) and now I'm also looking for a re-release of the Vosper. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom

Hi Martin62 Looks like you're going to be a very busy guy. Would love to hear and see how you go with these builds. It's usually reccond that the late 60's and early 70's were the Golden Age of modelling, but with all these superb kits coming out from all the manufactures, including Airfix, it seems we're luckily having a New Golden Age. Good luck with your modelling and keep them coming. Remember we do this for fun John the Pom