Canadian GB -ALL SUBJECTS- (Sept 01 - to whenever finished)

Looking good!

Looks great so far Jay. Should be a keeper.

Regards, Rick

Thanks guys. This beaufighter has been quite fun to fix up so far. I hope the Bolingbroke will go as smoothly. I won't have to re-do the engines for that one though.

I just found something else I have to fix.
I was sanding the fuselage belly seam and I got to the underside of the tail and it struck me as being nice and smooth, then I realised;
"Wait a minute! The beaufighter has a tail wheel! Where does it go!"
In my filling and sanding I had obliterated the hole for the tail wheel. [:0] The kit only had a little hole and not a recessed compartment for the retractable wheel, that is why I missed it. darned Airfix!
Almost done the engines now and will be glueing them on after I get the wheel bays done.

I don't think the beaufighter had a retractable wheel did it? Probably why there is no wheel well. Looking forward to some more pics Jay.

I finally pulled out some of my modelling stuff a couple of nights ago after the big move. Felt good to get back into it after 3 weeks.

Beaufighters had a retractable tail wheel... Except for the ones made by Airfix .

Regards, Rick

QUOTE: Originally posted by rjkplasticmod Beaufighters had a retractable tail wheel... Except for the ones made by Airfix . Regards, Rick

Ouch, that sucks. Looks like Jay has some work to do.

Yes they had a retractable tail wheel. Oh well, This kit is becoming more and more detailed (I'm not complaining, really, I'm not).

I think I'll try to keep the Boly as simple as possible, aside from detailing the glass nose and turret.

I'd like to join.

I have a 1/48 Hobby Craft Tutor just waiting to be built. I think I'll keep it in the snowbirds paint too!

Awesome Jeff, and Welcome. I'm looking forward to seeing the good ol' snowbird Tutor. I think your the only one doing a snow bird.!

Jeff, glad to see another Tutor fan. I am building stock from the box with maybe the addition of seat belts. What are your plans.


Lou
Greenwood, NS
Canada

Probably OOB. I'm just finishing a tomcat and was deciding whether I wanted to start the Acadamy Hornet or the Tutor next.

I'll have to look a little closer at it soon!

BUMP
17 days till kick-off!

Might be a little slow out of the gate on this one Jay. I have a couple of projects to finish up first and I want to see some reviews on that new Hasegawa Lancaster kit before I shell out a lot of dough. Someone in the aircraft forum already dissed it but that was only one opinion.

There is a vehicle parade tomorrow here in Vernon of WWII vehicles (about 30 I hear). I have no idea what kind of vehicles they have but I'm bringing my camera!

Talk about bringing the camera that parade sounds real sweet. I went to the Nanton lancaster museum back in July and have some great photos of their Lancaster and Blenheim/bolingbroke, I just have to re-organize them for submitting on-line.

Also I have a good friend who is the education director at the Calgary Areospace museum and I spend 2 hours there yesterday and he let me into some of the aircraft. I got some good photo's of their Harvard, Anson mk2 and Barkley Grow. They are in the process of restoring/building a hurricane and have a full size replica of a Sopwith Triplane. I'll try to spend some time this week and organize the photos and send you a link to my photobucket page. If there is anyone else here who wants the link let me know and I'll post it here.
To see the museum's website check out
http://www.asmac.ab.ca/

Oh yeah, I may be a little slow too as I have my Pearl Harbour Zero and the Beaufighter. They seem to be really lagging. I've been going in spurts lately, a bit here and there and not a whole lot of progress at once.

Thanks for the links Jay and I'll be looking forward to those pictures when you get around to "organizing" them.

I was searching around the web the other day and guess what I found.



This is a pic of the nose art of my uncle's Halifax. The web site also had the serial number of the plane. Up until then all I had was the code # PT-O. I feel like I just won the Stanely Cup!!!! Now I just have to try to duplicate that picture and figure out how to make it into a decal.

COOL! I don't know if I should be telling you this but the Calgary Aerospace Museum has a reference library and I seem to think they have a book on bomber command nose art. Maybe your uncle's Halifax is in it? This begs a question though, aren't you going to do a Lancaster that was flown by your uncle? or did the Lanc have the same nose art?

My Uncle's unit were upgrading to the Lanc the week the war ended. I hope to do both the Lanc and the Halifax someday. Don't know if the Lanc got any nose art on it before they were sent home. His unit was scheduled to be sent to the pacific but the war ended before that happened.

An update on the "scary" Airfix CF-18 I ordered:

The kit doesn't look bad overall, but I have to tell you, the ejection seat is 100% pathetic. I've seen WWI biplane seats that looked more like an ejection seat than this. Fortunately the pilot is pretty well molded for 1/72, so I'll put him in there and maybe scratchbuild a couple of the items at the very top of the seat.

There's not much flash on the parts, there are some pin marks and such, but that's what God made white glue for.

One thing that really steamed me is the decals. The box claims that you can build four versions (hi-vis Marine, lo-vis Gulf War marine, Navy and Canadian) but there are only decals for the Marine birds. Looking at the instructions, I found that there are deacls referred to that are not one the sheet, so there must be a second sheet. The folks at Squadron checked their pallet and said there was only one sheet in each kit, but they agree with me that something's fishy. They promised to get back to me. Despite Squadron's great reputation, I'm betting Airfix has been screwing this up for years, otherwise how would you produce a whole pallet of kits missing a decal sheet?

And besides, I ordered the RCAF 80th anniversary deacl set from Leading Edge. This is going to be one pretty bird. I also got a set for a CAF C-47 in 1:144 scale, and it is a gorgeous scheme.

Hopefully the Leading Edge set will be here before go time. I'm champing at the bit.

I've had this kit on my bench top for about a year and a half waiting to be finished. It's actually almost ready to paint but for the longest time haven't been able to bring myself to finish it. In terms of outline, it's pretty good but what a dog in terms of fit. All the filling and sanding I did has obliterated most of the panel lines. This one reason why I haven't finished it; I'm not looking forward to re-drawing the panel lines.

On my model, I added some strip styrene to the inside flap edges of the wings to get that proper step in the trailing edge outline. I also added some spare tail fins from the Hasegawa kit so that's a big improvement.

I was going to use the Leading Edge sheet for 425 squadron's 60th Anniversary markings but it seems a waste to use a great decal sheet on a not so great model kit. Who knows though. It could be just what this kit needs. Maybe I will finish it and present here as a "side project".

BTW, my kit is the 1990 issue and has the decal sheet for VFA-15 Valions and CAF 439 SQN but no Marine markings.

well, Im looking forward to getting started on this, but still havent made up my mind on a subject. recently ordered a couple sheets from ipms canada, so who knows! im thinking it might be fun to do Beurlings' spitfire... Decisions, decisions...

MAtt-alberta - One of Beurling's Spitfires would be cool. Which one would you do, RAF 249, RCAF 403 or RCAF 412?

since i have a tamiya Vb I'd be doing the 249 trop version. according to what Ive read, he shot down 3 109's in this plane in one sortie in sept '42. thats good enough for me!

This is a bit off topic - but I can't think where else to ask.
As I stated earlier on I will be moving to Canada within the next 12 months (to Nelson, BC - no big towns nearby). For those that read this who live in Canada - where do you get your models/supplies from? I haven't really found a Canadian website that compares to the likes of Squadron (US) or Hannants (UK) yet. Does such a store exist? Would there be customs problems if I was to buy from the US? Thanks in advance.

hi paul, there is an outfir called great models here in edmonton that does mail order. also an outfit called hobby wholesale, both of them are primarily rc stuff, but also have lots and lots of kits and supplies. i have ordered from squadron before and didnt have any problems, but who knows when it comes to customs. sometimes they might hit ya with a duty charge for apparently no reason, but it hasnt happened to me before. i did a quick search and there is a games workshop in nelson, they do those warhammer type things mostly, but may be able to order stuff for you.
http://www.edmontonplus.ca/portal/infosite/35107/1.html
http://www.greathobbies.com/

Paul, there are few guys here in the build that are from central BC (Ithink there is one from Kelowna and Razordws is from Vernon). They may know of shops in that area.
Calgary is a little closer than Edmonton. No I haven't ordered anything mail -order from these guys (I live in Calgary) but they have a great selection in-store and could probably get you anything you need.
http://members.shaw.ca/unclebills/
http://www3.telus.net/invader/
The two above are strictly palstic stuff, Uncle Bills is really good. Rick Chin there is a great guy. The following are mainly RC but also have a huge selecetion of Plastic and supplies/accessories.
http://www.modelland.com/
http://www.pmhobbycraft.ca/
I have bought stuff from all four and their prices are reasonable for Canadian suppliers.
Good luck!

Paul, the main one here in the interior is BC Shaver and Hobby but there main store is in Victoria. They have a web page with contact info at http://www.bcshaver.com/

I know there are some other large outfits in Vancouver but I have never used them for mail order. I'm fairly new in BC, originally from Manitoba. I have used both Squadron and Greatmodels to mailorder stuff and they both worked fine. Canada customs is very hit and miss although I've been told that the larger your order the more likely you'll get hit. The other very important thing to remember is to use the post office and not UPS or any other courier service. I tried using UPS once because their shipping costs were lower than the Post office. However... they charge a flat rate of $30 Canadian to clear your package through customs ! OUCH!!! Lesson learned!! The post office will charge $5 (EDIT plus the customs charge) if it has to go through customs. I've had orders under $20 that have just gone straight through with no charge.

Good luck with the move!!

Hey Jay! just popped in to say I haven't forgotten about ya or the GB... things have been hectic lately with the startup of several big projects at work... all I have time for when I come home is to get on here. I just rechecked the times for the GB and I think I can fit it in.. not sure what I will build yet but saw a few decent kits down at the LHS that would go good in Canadian markings... (all WWII stuff)

I'll let you know when I have the kit in my hands!!

Tom, Tom, Tom... Still can't say no to a cool GB can you? Glad to have you aboard.

QUOTE: Originally posted by jboutin Uncle Bills is really good. Rick Chin there is a great guy.

I second that, this place is chock full of plastic goodness, wall to wall. and Rick is one of the good guys.