Peter s

Looking good so far! I did a trio of these when first released. Awesome little kits but I had a few issues with the canopy fit... that was before I discovered Klear. That was also when I tended to put the canopy on at the end which is why the gap between canopy and plane looked so bad.

is that one drop of paint to four drops of alcohol just so i know when i get my airbrush Yeah... normally I make up a batch of about 1ml paint with 4ml alcohol & thats enough for a whole model easily. 1 drop to 4 drop is the same ratio. If you can't get pure ethanol pure isopropyl alcohol (surgical spirit) is easy enough. It smells more but it works fine. Your local pharmacy is probably much cheaper than a model shop! Like I said practice on something that doesn't matter and play with the mix until it works for you. Because model colour has quite thick pigment you'll probably find a dirt cheap brush works better than a pricey one

I'm mostly an acrylic person but "none acrylic" metal effects traditionally look better. Humbrol metalcote is amazing but dangerous near acrylic! My best advice would be use more solvent... if need be take a bit of the enamel into another container (working in a lab I have an infinite supply of 1.5ml polypropelene tubes) and add more enamel thinner. Metalcote dries out quickly and doesn't brush on smoothly. It uses a weird solvent too but seems lighter fluid compatible (and thats almost petrol) I've started using AK interactive metal waxes to finish off models and those are absolutely brilliant. They come in "toothpaste tubes". Don't attack acrylics and are easy to paint on.

PS have you tried spraying an alcohol based paint? Either Tamiya or Model COLOUR (not air... colour mixed 1 part paint 4 parts pure alcohol sprays well). You might find it dries almost instantly and you don't get paint creeping under the tape. I'd get a written-off kit or even a beer can and practice spraying and masking on that first. Not all masking tape is equal either.... the yellow tamiya stuff is the best I've tried. Some cheaper makes are basically useless.

Hi Clive, I suppose a cynic would say the fact the club has sold out means that good value or not its good business for airfix. My attitude was that if you say its £15 (I paid for the £25 pack and got the Kate but thats worth £10 easy) and it gets you 10% discount if you spend over £150 a year on the website you're winning. The club tokens are a nice bonus too. I've been building like a crazy person over lockdown and have something like 130 tokens (not ALL from this year 😆.... I hadn't redeemed a load when the club closed so its 2-3 years worth) Thats a LOT of free kits. My biggest problem with buying from Airfix is the low stock they seem to carry. That reduces the usefulness of the tokens. I had a similar "postage and RRP" issue with a Lancaster III last year. Jadlam racing models did it for £2 cheaper than Airfix list price (the club 10% would have made Airfix £1 cheaper.... but no club discount last year) but Jadlam did free P+P and Airfix didn't. If Airfix had more stock it would be easier to make fewer larger purchases and get past £50.

Its evil stuff.... I had a few models ruined when the paint blistered after I sprayed it. The one plus it has is being an amazing decal setting agent. Spray humbrol over decals and they soften and adhere brilliantly but I find it just too dangerous. I either airbrush a matt varnish now or use Vallejo or "the army painter". I noticed the Humbrol has a MUCH stronger smell so I suspect a lot more solvent in it.

If you've got a compressor you should be able to get the sort of chinese double action brush I use 99% of the time for £10-20. I don't thin Model Air unless I have a specific need to (blotches on late war German schemes for instance). I still screw models up. I recently did a Bf109-F (not airfix) so badly I took paint stripper to it (Xtraxcrlyic sell one that takes model air straight off) and started from scratch. There's usually something I'm not happy with on almost all of my models. Certainly I know the next one should be better. A4 Skyhawks and Beaufighters are my obsession. They SHOULD always look better than they turn out (even though they normally turn out OK)

Both very true. Its crazy how fast things moved.... I quite like putting the airfix models in historical context. I've a MkIII meteor to do ASAP which can be put side by side with a Gladiator: same company 4 years apart. Likewise I can put the Fury, Blenheim 1NF and soon-to-be back dated Beaufighter 1 side by side and say "1937, 1939, 1941". The only real fault I can find with the defiant is that it was never going to be practical for the gunner to escape. There should have been a floor hatch or some way of blowing off the top half of the turret roof for him.

Basic airbrushing is surprisingly easy to master This kit is £50 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Portable-Airbrush-Compressor-Kit-Dual-Action-Spray-Air-Brush-Tattoo-Nail-Tool/254510675081?_trkparms=ispr%3D1&hash=item3b4204b489:g:WBMAAOSwuSxfDtTI&amdata=enc%3AAQAFAAACcBaobrjLl8XobRIiIML1V4Imu%252Fn%252BzU5L90Z278x5ickkrDx%252B2NLp21dg6hHbHAkGMa8CoUUBbNkRmPLYXkx8RlAP92bGvr46RxKJknTEYJhSL6HkxFtxxDp52WVRYC3ZEZJEKjmoiWzL0RLXENzbfxUYVmG0fyD7ZGerQka6D6IeQRIwsQNqpaSeXVYcY836mGVMiTendNAj5NCM6XxNv3eYYUUVsTPym0WxJ3SlzuPZUPkten5Fxv%252B2EmzEtzBUFOagYlyh2aVd6kJ%252Bz4DKblKCfbZ0xl%252FyZ6t3kClxTcuO0cMXk3ZoFx8khEi63U1kpI%252Fpuq6Tqze%252FH2AYsJgjkham%252FLyLwVo8uFO%252Fum%252B4GeV%252BoBudWfFPgpvU5MzckZxM3%252BIaR8ax4SOZEE3azke6TDWKS0EUpZ5UcYgsCkHDKAKk1PfIlsvcp5dDceYXZiEy08mxnlo%252Bx7zlh8DaUAAUeqyeE%252BYcG7G%252FX680%252BC%252FQYjPWYbjq1ObACA4yeLWzBaJmLb9PiES3xu%252BLx5CUJYqH8R4zUiItwRkLysdMszRew0mjmxEABkUNeZYfRztFMQ0rvF%252BQPEXUmji7pLJ45HhkYRTE89p3mkdybiEbDWLlr3hKCpkvpItpTY2XfayI5NZ4A0yHcK5b9lmcg590EbLIO5oygViZW7Q%252Bv3kxAfFV3SNjK2jZdKeKeCCcYFr7EkUo4ZX05jWKr6kFhZdaJtWeCb92gTc37AS50UQhHvD0wusj61UBhtuEXxvBZHC7HFGdtab4fL3PLhhXLlYEeCJlaNaI833zDMe%252Bb5tgnuQUYOxAxiKx5jAoN9b180I7U3w7GA%253D%253D%7Ccksum%3A25451067508112d50b4e90e34e24b7d73caeccd63f27%7Campid%3APL_CLK%7Cclp%3A2334524 Thats 2 models in price. For brush painting I've always favoured Vallejo model colour because its a thicker pigment and formulation. You might just need more, thinner coats. Its counter-intuitive but often you get the best results from a wide flat brush rather than a fine one. A good primer might help too.

This is my tactic of last resort : It works very well on a modern Jet canopy or the small side windows in a helicopter or WW2 bomber. Much less well on the canopy of a WW2 prop-plane. Spray light coats of Tamiya "smoke" paint over the damaged clear bit. If you look at this real Sea King: https://83f969f2-a-62cb3a1a-s-sites.googlegroups.com/site/stingrayslistofrotorcraft/westland-sea-king--commando/Westland%20Sea%20King%20%20Commando.jpg?attachauth=ANoY7coEnaejFjxwDKni-pOxj7Jj2S-FueEDsbueV1i0aYjFDAkZ9n-t076WC6o77FkDXkIjhFkHKsL6ANIKVRYE9iulMq-aE0HJm0IXoIMwMHuj4GE7bWumCksaw0pOFPEEJ1KHW1Zi3oybMf4LZWmT1QbNpljuAk1S8-_YmyCIlNTnpl5fUAz2QeK6suPCYFAfl4dPNMsW9x4aNDd4pGedyWd2ijaQzlOCmxqNx71YmOPqBJPLbQ608w2xfqvmaim300wuSuH4El4qJiNn_HfeDbsn1Y7jZxiZuYbTBgfzrA00PzfNV50%3D&attredirects=0 The windows seem black and shiny on the ground. I intentionally used a coat or two of smoke on the side windows when I did the Commando version of the new tool Sea King last year

Just had my Vintage Classic SR79 trimotor arrive. I'm quite pleased by the look of it. I've had it on order for something like 20 months though! I found a very overpriced vintage Airfix Fiat G.50 on eBay so I'll build them as a double.

Anyone had their membership card yet? Unless I'm being dumb its the card that has the membership number not the initial pack.

Its a really good idea. I used to do this when I first started modelling aircraft as an adult. Finding a good backdrop on google images is quite easy. Dropping the planes onto the photo was hard. My wife is better at photoshop than me but between us what I used to do was hang the plane on fishing line in front of a plain background that is a completely different colour from any part of the plane. In the end it turned out flourescent green-yellow vinyl was best (like TV green-screen). You could then cut the plane out of the pic, drag it onto the photo then "flatten it" to make one image. Some worked a lot better than others but generally it was the cutting out and dragging that was a problem. An app that would recognise a plane shape and be easier to manipulate than photoshop would be brilliant but I suspect a fairly challenging technical matter and possibly quite expensive. Generally I've found I get a better effect with a good "real" backdrop but these are also quite expensive. Jessops the photo store used to do A3 blow ups of photos and some google images are high def enough that they blow up well. Here's a few of my photoshop pics from a long time ago. /media/tinymce_upload/3fd08e30db0b81342cd5f460885f1c06.jpg /media/tinymce_upload/d0e8a966f06608dc21f2e741c530747d.jpg /media/tinymce_upload/aed9319dc68c7d5b78b794b92624ffcc.jpg /media/tinymce_upload/1cda07364198f2e81c86ed466ae78156.jpg Airfix Club Mig-15... you can see the green-yellow backdrop through the canopy. /media/tinymce_upload/b3f2782f158d4f90b4c8896bd5b4d621.jpg The final one is an old Airfix 109-G attacking the real Sally-B in her memphis belle scheme. They're fun to do but time consuming.

/media/tinymce_upload/38990a5941240a6588c7cc9ccce37aec.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/feb592ccc18644283c303d81c422719d.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/dfce87d8edb76fc34e4983ed422b6810.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/1914c5fc0cbe6248b98b272501a9f616.jpg Same basic paints as used for the Whirlwind. The day fighter wasn't going to last long so little weathering. With the night fighter I tried to dull it down to make a black distemper effect as if day cammo had been overpainted. This ended up a bit too matt and I had a rare case of decal silvering. Not too bad but annoying. Lesson learnt. Dull it down AFTER the decals. /media/tinymce_upload/04639d5eb56fc42b4e90512e8e12f9ca.jpg Here's the finished day fighter: /media/tinymce_upload/dbe3c2c3055ecaf11e6c2614c3ccd5aa.JPG Turret locked forward as described earlier /media/tinymce_upload/5a0cae1307f1c954787b8437a0b66c36.JPG /media/tinymce_upload/d52dd6ff3af8b09432a25c5ecde802dd.JPG I went with the Airfix decal options for both builds although with the night fighter I added a red prop spinner and changed the side roundels to one without white simply because both made for a more interesting end result. One problem with trying to make a night fighter look realistic is that they tend to fly around in the dark.... thats hard to mock up in a photo: /media/tinymce_upload/c31547e009b12e8f7b5aee1d6948ea96.JPG I've done a few that should be photographed like this 😆 Here's take 2: /media/tinymce_upload/742326ad9ccee0fe92f0c84798e4ee55.JPG /media/tinymce_upload/3c7354b26ec0a08b5251516e53c725cf.JPG /media/tinymce_upload/dfb7368c8435938acd55b7c64e431613.JPG The silvering behind the DZ is horrible in this pic. Trying to do exhaust staining on a black plane wasn't hugely effective either /media/tinymce_upload/6347df2aa2b35c84a802b50cfb541e97.JPG I have a bigger night fighter project lined up to start ASAP and the lesson learnt is to NOT try and weather than one. A semi-gloss finish is probably going to work out better for me. The hard matt does give a contrast with the shinier prop though so I'll call this one a partial success.... you learn by practice and mistakes.

Given a magic wand and a choice of any career I could pick I'd be a historian not an immunologist. I'm not in the least bit put out that Dan Snow married my former colonels daughter (My CO was the richest man in England just to rub salt in the wounds...... ) I build models depicting subjects that interest me & as I read up it encourages more model building. Having built a JU-88 A4, Do-17 and He-111 P2 in the past few months you realise how poor their defensive armament was. Practically no protection against beam attacks and the guns that are provided are limited by the small number of crew. The flight engineer was expected to be a very busy man. The Germans made up for it to a degree by clever formation flying. A staggered vertical formation allowed the rear gunner on the He-111 to cover the belly of the plane above and behind and that one in turn could fire down on any plane attacking the lower one from behind. The idea of a turreted fighter which could fly alongside the bomber stream and fire a burst into the cockpit seems pretty sound to me.... clearly it did to the Air Ministry too. The defiant has a truly awful reputation, largely due to the insanity of using it as a day fighter in 11 group airspace. It was easy prey for 109s (what wasn't?) but when used as a nightfighter and withdrawn to 12 and 13 group airspace outside of 109 range it did well. The defiant shot down more enemy bombers during the Blitz of 40-41 than any other type. There's a myth it had no forward firing guns. This isn't quite true.... the turret could be locked forward with the guns at 16' angle to just clear the prop. The pilots stick had a fire button (although no gunsight was provided) so it was possible to approach an enemy bomber from behind and below and rake the underside of the fuselage. Very similar to the Luftwaffe schräge musik set up on their later war night fighters. The airfix 1/72 kit is a truly lovely model. So much so that I bought two. I wanted to do a night fighter to represent the Blitz end of the battle of Britain but felt the day fighter version was the other half of the story. All over black doesn't really suit my style of painting so doing them as a pair made for a better project. All photos to follow.......

/media/tinymce_upload/ac0af1c6a2c51e3d02570a3534b31bd2.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/945b7ac0d48a01a61208fb742da965cc.jpg As you can see simple but very clean And painted.... /media/tinymce_upload/a91f82438ad62bea5a28544c301d6c89.JPG/media/tinymce_upload/cbc2829a1560e0f4c52dff3aafd11e4a.JPG/media/tinymce_upload/a13c9f429964e1f6cebcce3a4a21adb9.JPG/media/tinymce_upload/dc2496c6906846aa42e624ec2973127c.JPG And the real thing.... /media/tinymce_upload/f52fbbdd0a2bdc37c8b36af64f50080c.jpg I'm not sure what state the moulds are now (or if they even exist) but if they can stamp out the kit in this condition it would be a great Vintage classic. I built the special hobby a few years ago and far prefered this one. Simpler but much more fun. BTW One BIG plus the Whirlwind had was those big engine pods under the wings. It was one of the best aircraft in WW2 to make a wheels up landing in.

The final He-111 pics have just been uploaded and are awaiting the mods. Before I started that one I rattled through a lot of relatively simple RAF builds. My goal was to build at least one of every type of aircraft that fought in the battle of Britain in 1/72 before lockdown ended. Fortunately for the UK lockdown has ended before I achieved this and I'm back at work full time so building has slowed. Still got a few to do not helped by the fact I had a few lucky finds on eBay so have added to my pile of potential BoB kits. The British definition of the BoB is late July to late Sept 1940. The German one is August to May 1941 (when the Blitz paused and the Luftwaffe went East). I've generally gone with the German times with a hard start of the Dunkirk evacuation to the Blitz as it lets me do a few more interesting types that weren't around at the height of the battle. One of these is the Westland Whirlwind. Often described as a failure I think it was allowed to fail because the powers that be knew the Typhoon (hardly an initial success) and the Mosquito were in the pipeline and it simply wouldn't be needed. Given the delay in getting the Typhoon into service this may have been a mistake. A twin engine fighter with good performance, bubble canopy & not much larger than a Spitfire and with 4x 20mm cannon was an impressive warbird in 1940. Unfortunately it used weird unreliable Peregrine engines (although I have heard it was theoretically possible to fit Alisons from a P40 although not merlins) and used 4x the alloy of a Spitfire. The metal requirement probably doomed it more than anything. I picked up the Airfix kit dated 1977 on eBay (for quite a bit.... ). Although as old as me its in arguably better shape and built up really nicely. Pluses were a very positive undercarriage, no flash and good part fit. The 40 year old decals were past it but I have many, many spares and an Xtradecal set of letters let me replicate one of the more famous brown/green versions. The cannon barrels in the kit were useless but easily replaced with 1mm plastic rod. As usual this was primarily done in Vallejo paints. Dark earth, my favoured 50/50 mix of BS dark green and US dk olive drab, Sky-S underneath and 1 wing in black. For some reason best known to the air ministry the order went out that from Nov 1940 until late Spring '41 (when the RAF started doing sweeps across N France) UK fighters resumed the early war practice of one black wing. The existing underside colour remained whatever it was so in this case Sky-S not White. I'll load all the pics as one post now.

I'll put this as an extra post because the Bf 109 is not an airfix and if the mods aren't happy I quite understand. The F model saw service in the battle of Britain from October 1940 onwards so its on my list. This was a kit so simple it was like Lego. I had so many problems getting the shades of grey "right" that at one point I stripped it back to bare plastic and started again. It worked out OK in the end. The He-111 taking a step back looks even more realistic. /media/tinymce_upload/d736ac0f33251183f6410907fcb6eb24.jpg Again "Signal" style. /media/tinymce_upload/7f35aef7d0de84cafb253ff0b6437352.JPG

I'll put this as an extra post because the Bf 109 is not an airfix and if the mods aren't happy I quite understand. The F model saw service in the battle of Britain from October 1940 onwards so its on my list. This was a kit so simple it was like Lego. I had so many problems getting the shades of grey "right" that at one point I stripped it back to bare plastic and started again. It worked out OK in the end. The He-111 taking a step back looks even more realistic. /media/tinymce_upload/d736ac0f33251183f6410907fcb6eb24.jpg Again "Signal" style. /media/tinymce_upload/7f35aef7d0de84cafb253ff0b6437352.JPG

And the final pics.... /media/tinymce_upload/aa98c3703b883af5f3b128beac5fb350.JPG/media/tinymce_upload/8ebbb6d98b90b073a5b36f740a2a1389.JPG Using my airbrush I can make the props spin but never both at once which is annoying. /media/tinymce_upload/6dc146198a91f3718ba9c99f2c87d088.JPG I've put a filter on this one to give it a "Signal magazine" style 1940s colour look. Its unfortunate that it was published as propaganda because some of the photos in surviving copies of that magazine are the ultimate source when I want to see what a real one looked like. /media/tinymce_upload/8af2843cccd5bd5b69e6c4118609d607.JPG Likewise in Black and white the panel shading isn't that obvious. If anything mine looks smarter than the real pics I uploaded. /media/tinymce_upload/96120dad4bb4b56fc3f1df08b599fa6a.JPG Underneath. I'm usually guilty of neglecting undersides but not this time. I used Mig pigments to dirty the tyres and because it would probably operate from a grass strip I flicked a thin mix of pigment and water onto the undersides to recreate some of the muck the wheels may kick up. Thats commonly done by WW1 aircraft modellers but not so much for WW2 planes. /media/tinymce_upload/bfe6b3e2e45e356d719fdb2787581033.JPG Got the prop spinning again. Believe it or not it took as long to paint the canopy frames as it did to build the original plane.... 2hrs. I had a couple of beers after that session. /media/tinymce_upload/daf6d2df05a6659b331668918a15d975.JPG With some figures for scale. /media/tinymce_upload/6ca51c0e68dcda1da1b95ba2e5e6e3ae.jpg And finally... I keep saying I'm a big fan of the 1960s Battle of Britain movie.... soooooo........ /media/tinymce_upload/1b52927e9c3ef3479787d332ede030af.JPG DAGGGA-DAGGGA-DAGGGA.......! I'm a very serious first aider and I've a huge box of expired dressings (still perfectly useful just not trustworthy once they're past the date) so the smoke is the cotton wool from one of those superglued onto a brass rod. Overall a truly superb kit. I'm not sure if its the best model I've done but its the best "big German" by far. My single criticism was the side windows. I'm not the first to say that either but the fit was terrible. LOTS of sanding and dry fitting. Fortunately the rest of the clear parts were a great fit but the nose is complex. Don't think of assembling it without a proper clear glue. I used Kristal Klear.

I've got some AK late war Luftwaffe shades and they're pretty good.

Its largely dependent on how clean the brush is, how appropriately thinned the paint is, whether you want a heavy "base" coat or you're doing some subtle late war german blotch pattern etc. For most work I used a £10 chinese double action with a needle 0.2, 0.25 or 0.3mm. Pressure about 20psi but if the brush needs a good clean and I'm just spraying a primer coat all over I've gone up to 50psi. As Paul Brown says some paints aren't exactly ideal for airbrushing and if they start to clog the nozzle it can be a real pain. Its one reason I avoid using really expensive super-fine airbrushes. If they clog and spit its totally counter productive.

I used to build/convert/sell 1/16 models normally RC. There's still a few in my loft along with loads of kit parts etc (either resin or tamiya-plastic). I got one down at Xmas after a few years up there and painted it up as a toy for my nephew. No problem at all even with cheapy chinese electronics and nothing was warped. I've got a reasonably well insulated house in Nottingham so the extremes of damp/cold/heat aren't as great as people living in parts of the US etc. The only bad idea about storing kits in the loft is that they often don't come out again. Moving my 1/16 stuff up there was a moment when I drew a line under that. I keep saying I might sell/build whats up there but there's no sign its happening any time soon.

Here's some real pics of in service He 111s. There's a reasonable amount of panel edge staining visible which given the dark upper colours and the old B+W pics is surprising. /media/tinymce_upload/5370b5cc29e537b89e1a709aba96822d.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/de658b2388b197dc2ea9d417de521b2f.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/ebe74f3333928a98b1951fd36e6c4ffd.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/88e709fd8c7c877023109b96ff4ce619.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/4ee07982c64deee310ba272674f689ea.jpg Sadly I can't find many original colour pics. Most seem to be post war CASA's

Thanks. Straight out of the bottle I'm not that keen on the Vallejos. They need "tweaking". Technically they work brilliantly but the RLM71 especially is very olive-brown. I've posted a link and a pic of the JU88 on the airfix aerodrome from last week (which iwaiting for moderation). That highlights how very similar the two upper shades are and also a surprising amount of staining around panel edges. The upper shades are a bit too similar for my liking but thats what the real thing looked like. I did the old tool JU88 that way and it virtually looks monocolour. Accurate but not such a pretty model. If I'm going to do 2-tone I want to see 2-tone at the end. I'm stretching this one a bit... A P2 at the height of the battle of Britain will be an old plane but warbird standards so its getting a slightly exaggerated weathering job and I can justify a bit more fading than might be realistically expected. I've always liked the 1960s movie "Battle of Britain" for that reason. Their Spitfires and Hurricanes especially are filthy. Maybe unrealistically so but they look like combat veterans not museum exhibits.