As autumn and impending hernia surgery draws closer it it time to get the models out again.

Got the Phantom to finish and a massive stash to choose from.

Considering a Shackleton or Buccaneer next, but I may have accidentally bought an Italeri SR-71 yesterday.

Got the Tamiya Meteor and an Academy P47. Need a new airbrush and compressor first though.

I finally finished the Fokker Dr1 (Eduard 1:72).
Fiddly as.
Small too: about 2/3 the size of the Fokker Eindecker.
No – I am not rigging it.

View post on imgur.com

View post on imgur.com

No – I am not rigging it.

Bottler!

I haven’t touched any models since the clocks changed back in the spring.

My son has been doing a bit through the summer. He’s got into Warhammer but I’m letting him make and paint those with minimal input from me. He’s doing a good job.

We’re both off to the model show at Bovvy Tank Museum today.

@Harry_the_Spider good luck with the hernia op I had an inguinal hernia sorted 2 years ago!

@Harry_the_Spider good luck with the hernia op I had an inguinal hernia sorted 2 years ago!

Ta. Not looking forward to the discomfort, but am really excited about no manual labour for the foreseeable. Spent all summer weekends landscaping the garden. After this weekend the spade is in the shed until spring.

Got to finish my Phantom then I’m doing an SR 71. The build looks pretty straight forwards as there are not many parts (as long as it all goes together!) and the paint job should be a challenge as they discoloured quite severely.

We’re both off to the model show at Bovvy Tank Museum today.

Nice one. Their Youtube channel is superb. However, it did ultimately cost me something north of £600 in RC tanks :-/

A few AFVs from recent years

Got a bit more done, but it stopped being fun.

Will finish it tomorrow.

Done!

More here linky

Nice!

I bought all the stuff to do the Tamiya Sea Harrier at the start of the year but never got round to it.

I’ve since nicked a Matchbox model from my Dad to also do – can’t remember what it is). I think I will do that first and use it as a test bed for colour and painting techniques before attacking the Harrier.
Hopefully with the nights drawing in, I will find some more time to spend on them!

I really like the Extra Dark Sea Grey/White FAA colour scheme and you’ve done a really nice rendition of it on that Phantom!

The Devil will find kits for idle hands to do. Apparently.

Started this yesterday.

Made some progress.

Gloss and top side decals on. I’ll give it a few hours to dry then apple a matt coat.

Chuffed with that! Just go to wait for the replacement for the bit that I lost to turn up then I can finish it.

Nice !

Does it leak fuel everywhere like the real thing ?

Italeri or Revell?

I think I did the Revell kit back when it was labelled as Monogram, and I seem to remember it being about 15 pieces all together. Took me a afternoon to throw it together.

Italeri.

Other than the cockpit and landing gear/bays it is 14 pieces!

So I typed out a post yesterday and STW in its finest fashion decided to eat the ****’ thing…

Lets tray again.

@HtS The Phantom looks a very neat build. A shame the exhaust cans are so basic, but good work with the printed compressor blades! On the other hand, you’ve got the vents on the intake splitters that Airfix fail to provide. (guess what I’m building next!)

SR71 – How do you build stuff so quick? I’d still be waiting for the first coat of paint to try and you’ve smashed through the entire build! Nice work with the preshading. (I’m currently running at 6months+ per model!)

..which brings me onto…
Junkers Ju88 A-1; Revell 1/72







…and with a bit of a vintage feel…

…and ready to go out on the lash with some mates in that London…

They look fabulous!

Whilst I’ve been waiting for the missing bit to arrive for the SR71 I may have accidentally made half an F 14.

oops.

Paint ‘n’ Dirt.

The missing part has arrived, so I’ve finished it.

That is impressive…

Ta. It’s bloody enormous!

Bit of progress on the Tomcat.

Spent a miserable afternoon trying to get decals to wrap around the missiles. Anyway… job done.

Hasegawa F14 1/72

Done!

Very nice

Love the Sundowners Scheme on the F14. Did an F4 some time back with the same scheme, always looks good.

Nice kit, 👍

Thanks.

Odd isn’t it? Low visibility national markings and a bright red tail and shark mouth.
I suppose when it is carrying Phoenix missiles that can engage form 60 miles it doesn’t matter what colour you paint it.
Thank God for Micro-Sol. There is no way that the fin or shark decals would have gone down without it. The ones on the missiles wouldn’t behave, but I glossed them with Johnson’s floor polish rather than the Alclad that I used on the rest of it.
I’d like to do the Phantom too, but the build list is quite long and there are a load more arriving for my Birthday. A6 Intruder next!

A6 Intruder next!

The “Flying Chicken Drumstick”

In the miniature gaming world October is sometimes known as “Orktober” and used as an excuse to work on some orcs, orks, goblins and other things like that. This year I participated in Orktober by kitbashing something from a pile of terrain and various goblin models. I call it Waaagh Rokkit Ajax:

It’s pretty big, coming in at 23″ long. Building and painting it took up most of my free time in the past month and it has absolutely no gaming use but despite that I’m still really pleased with it!

I’ve uploaded quite a few photos to a Flickr album if you want to look at the various details and bits I managed to add to it.

That is fabulous!

Awesome work!

Progress.

Was presented with this as the cockpit on my Hasegawa A6 Intruder (with moulds that dated back to 1968).

Bodged some detail using spares and scraps into this.

Wow!!! That’s seriously impressive!!

I recently made a start on the Tamiya Sea Harrier. So far I’ve got the pilot & seat done and started the engine. It’s mostly hidden but I’m going to practice washes and dirt etc on it, so if I cock it up you can’t see it anyway.
I’m finding it takes ages when doing all the colours properly rather than just bodging it 🤣

I also need to work out the strategy for doing fuselage bits – which bits to stick on before painting and which to do afterwards. I don’t want to stick parts on & then find I’ve made it hard to paint.
Should have it finished by spring 😀. I’ll try to get some pics uploaded.

Wow!!! That’s seriously impressive!!

Thanks, but that’s a bit of a stretch!

I just wanted it to look better than the OOB offering as the canopy is massive, so everything is visible.

Two things

Thing one: Citadel paints: anyone use them? I tried the “air” version of one of their paints and it was a terrible globby mess. Nasty

Thing  Two: Black basing, Pre shading, Post shading…what are we all doing, how’s it going, whats working for you, what not working, what have you tried? tips and tricks?

I’m normally a pre-shader/post-shader mix, but I’m keen to try black basing…bit scared if I’m honest…

nickc Full Member
Thing one: Citadel paints: anyone use them? I tried the “air” version of one of their paints and it was a terrible globby mess. Nasty

I do, for miniature painting. They’re generally OK. As they come in pots rather than droppers I rarely use them for airbrushing though. I think I have two of their air paints and while I think they still needed a bit of thinning they performed adequately.

Generally, Citadel’s whites are usually poor or awful but they do some paints very well. Their reds tend to have much better coverage than a lot of the competition, their (acrylic) washes tend to be good, their metallic paints often have good coverage too. The orthodoxy in miniature painting is to work from a black undercoat so coverage is often considered an important metric!

PSA!

Airfix kits in The Middle of Lidl!

Starter sets with paint, glue and a brush for £6.99.

Not the same ones as you can get in Aldi.

Picked up a Mitsubishi Zero, which is a great little kit. They’ve got a Tiger and a Sherman Firefly too that look quite interesting. I may pick up a Tiger and make a diorama with a Hawker Typhoon that I’ve got in the stash.

They had a BF109 and a Folland Gnat with the “Yellowjacks” paint scheme too.

The only downside was that I was engaged by some “weird” in the checkout queue who wanted to talk to me about model kits. He must have seen me as a kindred spirit as I am a middle aged man who was buying nothing but Airfix and Pistachio nuts.

The current starter kit tanks are simpler versions than the regular kits. For example the starter kit Tiger has 39 parts and the regular (same scale) Tiger kit has 84. They could still be great kits but it’s worth bearing in mind if you’re after a particular level of build.

I think that this may apply to some of the other starter sets too. Looking at their web site Airfix seem to be in the process of rebranding their “regular kit + paints, brush & glue” sets as “gift sets” and using “starter set” for simpler kits, but the changeover isn’t complete yet, so some starter sets are simplified and some are regular kits.