Fleet Air Arm Group Build

Darren, Excellent work on all accounts. You are a building machine! and I envy you in that. It takes me forever to do the smallest tasks. I'm glad you are building so many, so you'll be with us for awhile.

Frank, A link for the article I used when making my martlet is below. I can't vouch for its correctness (as I know next to nothing) but I take it as being accurate and it explains in pretty good detail what changes to make to the Tamiya Wildcat for a martlet.

http://fleetairarmsig.netfirms.com/articles/martlet/scottspencer-martlet/martlet.html

Leon 

bobbaily wrote:

Very nice job on the invasion stripes Darren.  I'm trying to build up the courage to try them on my build.

Thanks Bob!

I know what you mean.....I know you are building the hasegawa kit but you might find this useful.

Here's how I marked out my stripes: 

Find a point on the wing/fuselage to start from, i.e. outer edge of first white stripe. make another mark 5cm (50mm) away from tht point. This gives you the outer edge of the last white stripe.

Now mark out each of the 5cm between the two points. You now have 5 stripes equal and to scale. Just remember to cut your masking tape to 1cm stripes and you should'nt go far wrong.

Hope this helps, 

Dave, Rick thanks for your kind words.

Y'know Dave we really are building quite a task force between us all, shame we don't have a 1/48 carrier to display them on!

 BTW,

I have had some good news concerning my Lynx, someone from a UK forum has offered to donate a spare set of doors. Looks like its my lucky day!

Looking good Darren.

regards,  Rick

Darren(tango) - Nice looking Spitfire. It comes up well considering the amount of critisism it received in reviews.

The Lynx looks good as well! Pity about the doors, but these things are sent to try as aren't they. More rum is definately needed to get over the problem.

The detail on the Firefly is straight from the box, I have added nothing to the kit parts! Thats why I like the kit so much, all I may need to add is some cabling for the radios in the rear compartment. The only problems I have found so far is that the surface had a weird texture to it which I fixed with 1200 grit wet and dry and the rivets/dzus fasteners were not all formed correctly. Some of the fasteners were barely formed indents, others were proud of the fuselage and then some just right. I just had to drill them out to a consistent depth with a fine drill bit.

Frank, I use Humbrol 78 for the main colour with the wash being Hu78 with Matt black added and then thinned whilst the highlights are Hu78 with matt white added. I did about four different shades of lightened Hu78 for the weathering.

I just realized that with all of the types of prop driven aircraft being made we could just about do a raid on the Tirpitz! Corsairs, Barracuda's, Firefly's, Seafire's and I think even Hellcats were involved in there at some stage as well. I have the Lancaster in 1/48 with the Grandslam so the Tirpitz could be in trouble.

Well Roy, we we all have to sample some of your award winning home brew on the next shore leave.

This GB just gets better and better........Cheers!

wyoroy wrote:

Since you guys mention drinks and I know this is off subject , but I'm an accomplished home brewer.  Won a few 1st places medals Roy

Awesome!  Congrats! 

Since you guys mention drinks and I know this is off subject , but I'm an accomplished home brewer.  Won a few 1^st places medals

Roy

  I think the stripes look great.

Roy

Thanks Frank!

Between you and me I love fighters with invasion stripes but hate painting them! I hope mine looks OK when I'm done.

Woohoo!

Great job so far on that Hellcat!  Nice thing about the nature of invasion stripes is that they were temporary, so one can get away with a few lil' spots.  Some of the photos I have seen show them painted on by hand without masks and with brushes- looked very poor as a result.

And speaking of industrious.........

More horrid butchery from the workshop. I managed to get the invasion stripes onto my Hellcat today. The wings turned out quite well but the fuselage bands are a little ropey, so I will tidy them up later. When thats done, I'll mask it all off and start putting the camo pattern on.

Also, I have just opened up the Corsair and well........I've started construction already! Got the interior green sprayed on and will start on the instruments tomorrow. I was going to get some extra's for this one, but I recon after taking a look at the last Tamiya Corsair that I built, OOB will do.

........which means I can treat myself to those resin goodies for my Sea Fury.

Daywalker wrote:

Can you believe it?  Over 500 posts and 6000 views and we just started the build a week ago!

Thats got to make us the most industrious group build on this site! I recon that calls for a drink, first round is on me Frank.

Daywalker wrote:

Darren- Sorry to hear about your poor lil' lynx.  Maybe the crew took the doors off 'cuz it was too hot inside the cabin?

Mmmm........that just might work.............

wyoroy wrote:

Can it be put back together?  Or is it a hopeless mess?  The doors that is.

Thanks for your kind words As for the doors, they are a lost cause. But one must never lose hope. I'm asking around on some of the UK forums if anyone may just have some spares.

You never know.....

Darren-

Sorry to hear about your poor lil' lynx.  Maybe the crew took the doors off 'cuz it was too hot inside the cabin?

Can it be put back together?  Or is it a hopeless mess?  The doors that is.

I like it!  Your model skills are way past mine. Great job

Roy

Poor little Lynx...........

Hey lads.......bad news. I have ruined the Lynx! I was finishing off when I decided to tidy up the front crew doors and disaster struck. Both doors came off in peices!

So I have asked around for some spares. Until then, this is how she looks. Shame, I was quite pleased with this one until I messed it up.

Frank,

thank you mate! I certainly am having a cold one after my son goes to bed.

Cheers buddy!

Darren-

Way to go!  I am so glad to see this one finished up.  You really did a nice job especially considering all of the headaches you encountered during the painting / finishing process.  Well done!  Now, sit back and enjoy a cold one!

Finished my Spitfire!

I know its not part of our GB....but please indulge me. 

This is the 1/48 Airfix Spitfire Mk.IX, its not the best kit in the world, but then again I'm not the best model builder either.

Built OOB, with the following slight improvements......Full re-scribe,drilled out exhausts,dropped elevator's, new rudder and PE seat harness. Feel free to criticise/rip to shreds etc........

Hey Dave,

your work on the Firefly is most impressive! Is all that detail straight from the box?

I have never seen a Grand Pheonix kit before, I'd be very interested to learn much more about this kit. Please, please keep the updates coming. 

Looks good so far Dave.  I agree that the Grand Phoenix kit is one of the best limited run kits I've had the pleasure to build. 

Regards,  Rick

Dave-

Your cockpit looks great!  What color of green did you use there?  I really like the shade.