Completed Review - Airfix Hawker Typhoon Ib (A02041)

Scale: 1:72, RRP - £9.99

The last time I'd written about this build was prior to starting the decals. I'd decided to opt for the option depicted on the box art, that of Typhoon MP126, in the markings it carried when flown by Squadron Leader Gerald Stapleton of No.247 Squadron.

In past builds I've found the quality of Airfix's decals to be very good but I had some real problems with those included in this kit. I had several break up on me, including one of the serial numbers, without which I could not complete the build. I don't know if this was a one off, lack of practice on my part or if they were bad decals, although I suspect it was more a case of the first two rather than the latter. Fortunately I had a spare set and they were applied without any further bother, indeed that could said for the rest of the build.

Weathering was once again mostly done by applying Flory Model washes. My previous builds had been very dirty, using the Dark Dirt wash. This time I wanted to refine the weathering. For the undersides I applied a Grey Wash and then for the upper sides I mixed the Grey Wash with Dark Dirt (about a 2:1 ratio) and this gave a more subtle look, which was exactly what I was aiming for.

For the first time I attempted to use oil paints to apply oil streaks but found at this scale I couldn't really get a noticeable, and realistic enough effect. Exhaust marks were airbrushed using Tamiya Smoke, X-19, and dirt was applied to the undersides in small quantities using Flory Models Sand wash.

Again this was another excellent kit from Airfix which I thoroughly enjoyed building. It looks accurate in terms of the detail and shape, and there are two notable decal options. Once I slowed down and started taking some care it went together without any real problems. Although I deviated from the instructions, I don't think that's absolutely necessary, just take care with the flexible lower wing part and you'll be fine.

And that was about it. On a personal note I think this is the best model I've built so far, surpassing my previous build, the Airfix Defiant in the same scale. I think I achieved a more realistic finish, it just took me much longer than I would have liked.

Overall Build Score: 4 out of 5, an excellent release from Airfix with the full options, in-flight or on the ground, open or closed cockpit and pilot figure. Fairly straight forward to build, accurate and with interesting decal options, what more could you ask for?

Purchase:
Enjoyed reading this article? A purchase using the links below will help maintain this blog.

Looking Ahead: The Aircraft Wish List For 2017

Around this time of year you will no doubt be seeing plenty of "New Year Resolution" posts, this post is one and at the same time isn't one of those type of posts.

After last year in which I completed just one kit and suffered a significant loss of motivation I've taken some time to reflect on what I want to achieve this year and come up with an "ideal" world list (actually, it's 3 lists) which I'm hoping will give me a sense of direction but not be so strict as to become too much of a chore to complete.

I've decided to break down the builds into 3 categories, ideally if I can complete one build from each to a reasonably high (for me) standard then I'll consider 2017 a success. Realistically I need to tackle some of the kits I currently own before buying new ones, so some of listed won't become an option until I complete others.

Category 1: Out of the box builds

My, as of yet incomplete, Typhoon build showed me that I don't have to buy photo-etch and resin extras to actually have a build that is both enjoyable while providing a sense of achievement and progress at the same time.

We're very fortunate that these days we have a good choice when it comes to out of the box builds. As I want to build these models in flight, to keep things straight forward as possible, the Airfix range is ideal as they always seem to give you the option of both, something I wish all manufacturers would do.

• Airfix 1:72 Spitfire Mk.I/IIa (Owned)
• Airfix 1:72 Bf 109E-7/Trop (Owned)
• Airifx 1:72 Hurricane Mk.I (New Purchase)
• Airifx 1:72 P-51D Mustang (New Purchase)

Category 2: Detailed Builds

The next level of build involves a bit more detail, here I want to more work on the cockpit, either resin replacement work or photo-etch enhancement, or both. In such cases the canopy will be open so the aircraft will be modelled as it were on the ground and I will also consider building a display base.

• Eduard 1:72 Spitfire Mk.IXc (Owned)

There's only one aircraft in this list, however I own more than one of these kits so I could, if I excel myself, possibly build more than one of the same aircraft.

Category 3: Conversion builds

The final category is the most involved and challenging as it goes beyond the standard detailing and requires conversion work such as resin engines, super detailed interiors and so on. The kits I have in mind are:

• Tamiya Mosquito FB Mk.VI (Owned)
• Tamiya P-47D Thunderbolt converted to a P-47M (New Purchase)

As I've said this is an an "ideal" world list but I think it will be useful to look back after a year and see if this list helped me focus. Of course I won't just be building aircraft so there will still be builds that aren't on this list, and hopefully some miniature painting as well.

Time to get 2017 started then!

Build Review - Airfix Hawker Typhoon Ib (A02041) – Part 2

For me one of the main objectives of this build was learning to paint late WWII RAF colours correctly. My initial attempt on an Airfix Spitfire had not gone according to plan. Having finally built a Typhoon to my satisfaction I was determined that this time I would get the painting right.

I started by undercoating in a light Tamiya Grey and by pre-shading the panel lines with a flat black. I'm still not 100% convinced that this is worth doing.

Pre-shading

While it seemed to have some effect on the lower, and lighter, surfaces of this particular model it didn't really seem to make much difference on the upper, camouflaged, surfaces. Also I felt that with effect could also be achieved by post-shading and by washes later in the build.

On to painting proper and the undersides. The actual colour for the undersides of RAF aircraft is called Medium Sea Grey. To achieve this I used the following:

1. A base coat of Vallejo MA (Model Air) Barley Grey (71.051). I tried to make sure some of the black panel lines showed through.
2. Vallejo MA Pale Blue Grey (71.046) to the centre of each panel.
3. A thin coat, sprayed at lower pressure, of Vallejo MA Medium Sea Grey (71.049) to selected panel lines to add a slight bit of variation.

RAF Medium Sea Grey & Invasion Stripes

Another objective of this build had been the airbrushing of D-Day invasion stripes. Although this kit came with decals many don't so I thought this would be a good time to practice. The colours used were:

1. An mix of Vallejo MA White and Aged White (71.001 & 71.132). How much depends on how yellow you want it to look. This was applied over the whole area and then masked off in order for the black to be sprayed. It really pays to make sure the masking is tight here, especially in the numerous panel lines.
2. The black was Tamiya Nato Black (XF-69). I prefer using this shade of black at this scale as it's a muted black compared to the XF-1 Black which looks too bright to me.

And with that the lower surfaces were done. I hadn't done the rear invasion stripes yet, as they overlapped onto the upper camouflaged areas.

For the upper surfaces the RAF colours are Ocean Grey and Dark Green. I decided this time to use Tamiya's RAF colours as my starting point (XF81, 82 & 83). If you look the instructions for older Tamiya kits you will see they were all mixes. These are more recent paints which Tamiya brought out to be used with their 1:32 scale Spitfire kits

Starting with the Ocean Grey, this was applied all over and highlighted in the areas that wouldn't be covered with the Dark Green.

1. Tamiya Ocean Grey 2 (XF-82) was mixed with slight amount of Medium Sea Grey (XF-83). The main reason for adding the Meduim Sea Grey was that I felt the base surface with black pre-shade was a bit too dark. Without the pre-shade I would have probably used The Ocean Grey on it's own.
2. I then highlighted panel lines etc with Vallejo MA Barley Grey (71.051). Unfortunately the picture below was taken in bad light and doesn't really show this well.

RAF Ocean Grey

For the Dark Green:

1. I put down a coat of Tamiya Field Grey (XF-65) with a small amount of Dark Green 2 (XF-81). The reason for this was it muted the blue tones from the grey which I was spraying on top of. In previous attempts the green seemed a bit off if I just used XF-81 over the Ocean Grey.
2. I then highlighted the green by using Dark Green (XF-81) on it's own. Of course if you choose to spray each colour over the undercoat, rather than spray an all over Ocean Grey coat, you could probably use this colour on it's own.

RAF Dark Green & Invasion Stripes

The Sky coloured band was then added to the rear fuselage, this was simply Tamiya Sky (XF-21). The invasion stripes were painted the same as before. The one thing I will say is that I found the invasion stripes to the rear fuselage incredibly difficult to do. Getting them straight took numerous attempts due to the curvature of the surface I was applying them to and it used far too much masking tape. It was not helped by the fact that the whole model was masked at this point and fairly hard to judge their position when I had very little of the model exposed.

In the end I had to remove the excess paint with a wooden toothpick in order to get them straight. With hindsight I think would be better to do this first and then mask off the whole invasion band area and spray the camouflage around it.

Despite this last bit killing my enthusiasm for some time I have to say I'm satisfied with the result. I achieved the two things I wanted to, spraying accurate RAF colours and spraying the invasion stripes.

Now onto the decals.

Motivation and Me – How to keep on Modelling?

Recently I’ve noticed a steady slump in my modelling output, as you can tell, there’s not been much in the way of blog posts over the last few months.

This isn’t the first time, I tend to get moments where I lose the drive to build or paint models. Away from that I’m still enjoying looking at models, reading about them, maintaining my Pinterest and so on. I’m just not building or painting.

This time it seems to have been the slow and, if I’m honest, the somewhat tedious painting of my Airfix Typhoon combined with a few other aircraft builds that just aren’t capturing my imagination like Tamiya’s 1:72 scale A6M5 Zero. Don’t get me wrong, the Typhoon and Zero are a fantastic kits, just my desire to paint at the invasion stripes and markings on the Typhoon slowed the build right down to the point where it stopped and I’m just not that passionate about Japanese WWII aircraft.

So how do I get my motivation back

Looking on the internet and most suggestions (such as this from Dakka Dakka) suggest a structured and almost work like approach to working through a block. I’ve considered setting time aside and making myself do something each day, but that’s not working for me as I don’t like such a structured approach even at the best of times.

For me my approach has always been less structured, I like to try many things, my hobby output is often driven by my curiosity and desire to experiment with ideas. However this may actually be contributing to the loss of motivation as it inevitably leads to a large number of unfinished projects which can seem a bit overwhelming when deciding some of them need to be finished. I am pleased however that I’ve not continued buying many kits in the hope that one would spark my imagination as that leads to an overwhelming stash, a problem which I’ve written about before, and which leads me to a similar loss of motivation.

Skyrim
Source: Bethesda Softworks

Away from modelling I’m still finding time for, and enjoying, my other interests. I’ve read more books in the last few months than I normally would and last week I rediscovered the computer game Skyrim which can certainly consume a large amount of my hobby time. Interestingly enough even these non-modelling hobbies are managing to provide inspiration for future modelling projects.

Realistically I think the desire will come back at some point, and I suspect it’ll involve something new rather than forcing myself to complete one of the many unfinished projects. I just don’t want to leave it too long though as I feel I will start to unlearn some of the things I’ve spent so long learning in the first place. I just need to get curious about something hobby related or have a sudden flash of inspiration and then things should snowball from there.

Too Many Shades Of Grey (And Green) - Late War RAF Camouflage

It now been a considerable time since I actually completed a model aircraft, 5 months in fact. One satisfying part of that particular build was that I finally managed to replicate the early WWII RAF camouflage scheme of dark earth and dark green.

So that just left the late war scheme, which replaced the dark earth, (brown), with ocean grey as the air battle moved out over the English Channel and beyond. Should be pretty straight forward you'd have thought, so with that in mind I decided to give it a try.

I decided I would try two kits at the same time, both built straight out of the box as the main objective was the colour scheme. The kits, Airfix's 1:72 Hawker Typhoon IIb (A02041) and the Sptifire MK.IXc (A02065A). I'd picked them both up at the Home Bargain Store in the UK which had been selling off Airfix kits for less than half price at £2.99 each.

As well as the RAF camouflage I also wanted to compare pre-shading and not, and I wanted to try airbrushing invasion stripes rather than using decals.

Before I could start on the exterior there was the small matter of the interiors, and there was quite a difference between the two. The Spitfire was absolutely basic, which was surprising for a kit released in 2009 and for a kit which actually had some nice exterior details and fine panel lines which couldn't be said for all Airfix kits at that time.

The Typhoon on the other hand seemed almost over engineered. The cockpit floor also consisted of the wheel wells. The instrument panel, rear panel, seat and air intake all had to be fitted between the two halves of the fuselage meaning it took several goes of adding a piece, letting it dry, adding another and so on. It certainly looks good, but it seemed like it required a little more effort that was perhaps necessary.

After that it was a case of assembling the wings. The lower part of the wings left awful joints at the sides of the air intake and a huge step at the rear which would require considerable filling.

So while all that filling and sanding was going on I decided to get on with painting the Spitfire (the Spitfire went together easily).

I started by pre-shading with Vallejo Model Air Black, 71.057 and then painted the undersides with Barley White 71.051 which was highlighted with thinned coat of Pale Blue Grey 71.046.

Moving onto the upper sides I couldn't really find a suitable shade for Ocean Grey so I mixed Tamiya XF-18, XF-21, XF-24 to a ratio of 1:2:2 and sprayed the whole topside. I then started on the green by using Vallejo Model Air 71.016 over sprayed with 71.017 as I'd used for my early war scheme. My reasoning was that RAF aircraft used the same green throughout the war so I could just re-use the previous colours.

But this didn't look right. Was it because I was spraying green over a grey base coat, rather than dark earth? Quite probably, so I tried to correct it and things then went from bad to worse. Then I realised actually my Ocean grey was too dark anyway. Time to get the paint stripper out.

How not to do RAF Camouflage

So once again, I'd failed with Vallejo Model Air colours and to be honest, I'm getting a bit tired of this. OK, so my Tamiya mix hadn't worked out either, I can probably correct that though. However I then realised Tamiya had extended their paint range and introduced three RAF late war colours, XF-81, 82, 83 so tomorrow I'm going to pick them up.

Still, at least I had the Typhoon to fall back on. Except there was a problem. It turns out that the lower wing piece I'd mentioned was quite flexible and so the wheel covers wouldn't fit without considerable trimming and I was planning on depicting the aircraft in flight.

Good thing I bought two Typhoons...

New Box, Old Mould - The Pitfalls of Kit Selection

A few days ago I was involved in an on-line discussion regarding the re-issuing of old moulds which I thought I'd revisit on this blog.

The discussion started with a commenter's experience of building, in their words, the awful Airfix 1:48 scale Hawker Fury, which contains plastic from 1980. It then turned to whether or not it was an underhand tactic by model makers to sell kits that are well past their sell-by date and is such practice unfair on customers?

New Box, Old Plastic

To start with lets look at things from the model companies point of view. They have a product to sell, they exist to make money. Straight forward and to point I know, but that is the reality and I see little point in blaming them. It's easy for us to shift the blame to them, to call them underhand but in the end it's up to us, as customers, to make informed choices.  If we do then we won't be buying the inferior products and they will cease to sell them.

Certain companies seem to have different approaches to re-boxes, in my experience they are:

• Academy - For years Academy have been producing budget kits of a mixed quality. In recent years they've started releasing more expensive and higher quality kits but I've not yet seen any of their range retired. They've changed the catalogue numbers of some their older kits but released them exactly the same as before so I'm not even sure that counts as re-boxing them.
• Airfix - The near bankrupt Airfix of a few years ago quite obviously couldn't afford to do much else other than sell their old models. But now there's been a significant cull of older models. Although some still remain I suspect that there will be replacements in the pipeline.
• Eduard - A newer manufacturer with an emphasis on quality. There kits seem to retired fairly quickly.
• Hasegawa - It feels like Hasegawa never change. I've bought many of their kits and sold them all on, never actually building a single one. Alongside their steady range of new releases new box, old model seems to be what they do.
• Revell - The re-box kings. I rarely buy Revell models for the reason so many of them are so old, and in many case not even their models to begin with. I think their recent Star Wars licence will keep them earning for the foreseeable future along with the loyalty of the American market toward the old Monogram kits. But Revell just isn't a name that's associated with quality in my opinion. Which is a shame, because the few new kits they make are actually very good, if you can find them.
•  Tamiya - Like Hasegawa they never seem to change, we see a few new kits each year which are of a high standard. However their older models were years ahead of their competitors when they first came out so they seem to still hold their own against today's kits. Interesting in my preferred scale, 1:72, I have noticed a reduction in the range recently (mostly the Italeri kits they re-boxed for the Asian market) so they obviously feel some of the older kits are no longer of a high enough quality.

I do believe it's no coincidence that that model kits have moved in terms of quality so much in the last 10 or so years alongside the growth of the internet side of scale modelling. By participating in forums and groups, by writing blogs and posting photographs and so on, are we already driving the change so many of us desire?

And then there are on-line resources such as Scalemates. This site is a model kit database which gives a complete time-line of many kits, allowing us to see just how old the plastic inside that box is.

One counterargument I often hear is the argument that bad kits will put off beginners from continuing with the hobby. I can see the point, after the first kit I built for this blog you may wonder why I continued. Well I do believe this is a hobby that requires a certain amount of perseverance and patience anyway. Anyone who quits after one setback will never be a modeller, so that's one reason. Secondly the majority of model companies have already figured this out which is why we have the starter kit. These are the kits I always see younger modellers with in my local hobby shop. Interestingly this seems more common among companies targeting Western audiences, maybe those beginners in Asia have the character I referred to in my first point or maybe model making is more embedded in their culture?

So with all that in mind I guess it's time to wrap this post up. To finish I will say, if you really do want to build an Airfix 1:48 scale Hawker Fury from 1980 now's your chance. I very much doubt this kit will be around for much longer.

Completed Review - Tamiya Supermarine Spitfire Mk.Vb/Mk.Vb Trop (60756) - Part 2

Continuing from Part 1, let talk about decals. In fact, bear with me, I'm going to rave about a decal sheet. Yes really!

The decals in question are from Xtradecal, set X72187. I have never seen such a comprehensive set of decals with an equally comprehensive instruction sheet.


This particular set contains decals for a Spitfire Mark 5s only, there are a total of 12 options, from both the European and African theatres. As well as roundels and identification numbers there's a huge number of stencils and demarcation lines. I think, if you choose carefully, you can probably get five or six complete aircraft from this set.

Application was fairly straight forward although some of the long and very thin decals for the "don't walk" lines pushed my decal skills to the limit. It took me the best part of a week (in the evenings) to apply them, mostly, due to the number of them.

Now in previous builds this would be me about done, but with this build I'd decided it was time to raise my game. I wanted the panel lines to show and some weathering, especially as this was an aircraft in use and in flight.

After spraying the whole model with a gloss coat it was time to apply a wash. The wash I'd chosen was from Flory Models. After watching the tutorial video on their website, several times, I got stuck into the whole wash process. The actual moment of applying the wash is well captured in my Instgram post taken at the point where I was really wondering what I'd done.

However, it all turned out well and so the build was complete. For me it was most satisfying, the kit was excellent and I'd managed to move my modelling on to the next level. It's no competition winner but for me it marks a significant step forward. Take a look at the pictures below and see what you think.

With the final picture I'm reminded of something I'd forgot to previously mention. This kit doesn't allow for a "wheels up" option. The wheels you see actually come from an Airfix kit (the one I sacrificed as a paint tester) and they fitted perfectly.

And so onto the final matter of my score for this kit

Overall Build Score: 4.5 out of 5, another excellent Tamiya kit as to be expected. A good choice of variants exemplified by the 3 types of air filters and 2 canopies included in the box. If I had to pick a fault it's the lack of choice when it comes to portraying the aircraft in flight.

Build Review - Tamiya Supermarine Spitfire Mk.Vb/Mk.Vb Trop (60756) - Part 1

Time to get back on track with my aircraft building, where better to start than with another Tamiya kit. The kit, Tamiya's 1:72 Spitfire Mk.Vb/Mk.Vb Trop (kit number 60756) in a North African colour scheme.

Assembly, as so often it the case begins with the cockpit and the two halves of the fuselage. For a change I'd decided not to use a photo-etch set, this model was going to be in flight and so a pilot would be filling the cockpit space. Having said that I think the interior of the kit was reasonably well detailed as is, you can see from the picture below.

The out of the box interior

Cockpit & (Airfix) pilot

The pilot figure was taken from my spares box, in this case an Airfix pilot. Tamiya, for some reason, don't include pilot figures in their 1:72 kits (although this may have changed since their latest F-16 releases at this scale). I find this a little odd, as the 1:48 scale kits, of which some of the 1:72 scale kits are scaled down versions of, do contain pilot figures.

With the insides painted, using a home-brew interior green mix, it was time to assemble the two halves and the cockpit.

This was done by gluing the two halves together and pushing the cockpit assembly up through the bottom. This works well and prevents an uneven cockpit. By comparison I was building an older Airfix Spitfire at the same time. This model used the typical method of trying to glue a floor piece in-between the two halves and it sank leaving it uneven and consigning the model to being used for testing paint colours.

I decided that as this was a model in flight it would need to look used and so wanted to use the hairspray method of weathering and so selected areas were sprayed silver.

To be honest this didn't really work and I'm at a bit of a loss as to why. Not enough hairspray? Too much paint over the top? Either way, in the end only a small part of the wing roots weathered but it look OK. The rest was touched in using a Citadel silver paint.

On to the painting, starting with the underside. I used Vallejo's UK Azure (71.108) but felt that this was too blue. I over sprayed that with a 50/50 coat of UK Azure and Pale Blue Grey (71.046) and this seemed to be a better match.

I've written before about problems with the accuracy of Vallejo's colours and once again this proved to be an issue. I had bought the Vallejo RAF Desert colours box set and that was why I'd chosen a desert colour scheme. However the colour were, once again, not even close. I tried mix after mix with no success before giving up and deciding to use Tamiya paints. This for me wasn't a decision taken lightly as I'd had mixed success with Tamiya paints, finding them too watery, especially combined with my masking.


However my fears were unfounded, I managed to use them and use them well (for me). No paint leaked under my masks which was result! So Vallejo's loss is Tamiya's gain, in the future I won't be quite so afraid of using them.

Colours were straight from instruction sheet. Middle stone sprayed over the whole upper surface, this was a 1:1 mix of XF-59, Desert Yellow and XF-60, Dark Yellow. I then masked of the areas that were to retain this colour and over sprayed the Dark Earth colour. This too was a mix, 1:1 of XF-52, Flat Earth and XF-64 Red Brown.

With the painting done, the next step was the decals, which I'll write about next time.

I Never Thought I'd See The Day When...

This last weekend I decided to have one of those moments we all have when we suddenly realise the stash is getting a bit large and maybe something has to go. Naturally I thought this would involve a selection of "vintage" kits being put to one side ready to be listed on eBay. But something unexpected happened.

If you're a regular reader you'll know that I've not really had a bad word to say about Tamiya kits and to a certain extent that's still the case. But this weekend the unthinkable happened and one of my pristine Tamiya kits ended up on the "for sale" pile! The kit in question is Tamiya's 1:72 Messerschmitt Bf-109E-4/7.

Tamiya's Bf 109E-4/7 Trop

 
Sometime ago I wrote an in-box review of two Bf-109 kits, one from Airfix, the other from Zvezda. I didn't include the Tamiya kit because I figured it would be a forgone conclusion that it's a good kit. And that's the thing, it is. I'm sure it'll go together well, the three colour schemes are interesting  and the addition of three spinners is typical of Tamiya's attention to detail. OK so the fuselage shape is a few millimetres out, not noticeable to the naked eye, but that's forgiveable in my opinion.

Why is it going? Well it is better than Zvezda's offering, but the more I think about it, the more impressed I am with the Airfix kit. And it's not just their Bf-109, they just keep on delivering excellent kits with each round of releases. And when you also consider my first ever review (titled: "The Worst Kit You'll Ever Build?") was of an Airfix kit, I can't help but be impressed by the continual improvement from Airfix, so all credit to them. (Revell take note, it is possible to invest time and effort into producing high quality budget kits, rather than buying up other people's old kits).

So there you go, I never thought I see the day when I'd sell a Tamiya kit over an Airfix one.

What's On The Workbench? #4

As you might have guessed by now, my "What's On The Workbench" posts are mostly filler posts when not much progress has been made on my current projects.

So what's on the workbench?

To start with, Academy's Me 163B is now assembled and has been base coated in Vallejo Model Air's silver. I had a bit of trouble with the horizontal join around the nose, which took a couple of attempts to fill to a point where I was happy with it, but it's now there.

Why a silver base coat? Well I intend to try the hairspray technique of weathering so I want the silver to show through the paint scheme. I believe the wings of the Me 163 were wooden but I decided to keep a uniform base colour so when I add further layers they too stay uniform in colour.

However I'm not going to try a previously untried technique on this model so I've quickly mocked up an old scrap kit, in this case an Airfix Spitfire, with a two colour camouflage scheme to practice on.

Again I used a silver base coat followed by a coat of Tamiya semi-gloss clear from a spray can. Once this had dried I airbrushed hairspray over the whole model, let it dry, before over spraying the camouflage scheme.

So now I just need this to dry before applying warm water and attempting to rub off some of the paint. If it works, then I intend to repeat the process on the Me 163.

Building a 1:72 Scale Base

Just a quick post to show a base I've been working on for my Tamiya P-51D. I decide that I wanted to add some context to the model, rather than just having it standing on a shelf on it's own.

So the base of my base was one of Trumpeter's display cases, the 170mm square one. To this I added some very fine sand, airbrushed brown. Then I added several packs of Bregun's 1:72 PSP Marsden matting. This proved to be somewhat awkward, if you want to use this stuff then I recommend a smooth surface, the fine sand made it hard work.

I airbrushed another coat of brown paint over the whole base, a slightly lighter shade than before before drybrushing the PSP with Citadel Chainmail. Then the PSP was washed heavily with brown Citadel inks ensuring all the holes in the PSP were brown rather than silver. Oil stains were added by leaving a large pool of brown ink to dry.

Then I added brown flock around the PSP and green static grass. Wheel chocks were made from a wooden cocktail stick, the paper drop tanks were from my spares box (probably from an Academy kit).

Finishing touches included a tool box and tools from Bregun and the pilot figure which came from CMKs USAAF Korean War pilots set (F72 110). The CMK figure was nicely detailed for the scale, I highly recommend this set.

So far I'd say it's about 90% done, just a few more bits to add. So to finish this post, a few pictures with the P-51D Mustang.

One Today - Miniatures In Detail's First Birthday!

It's one year today since this blog started so I thought I'd spend a bit of time reflecting before looking forward to the next year. The intention of this blog was to chart my return to scale modelling and at that it has succeeded. It was certainly a mixed year, a wide range of projects were attempted, there was a mix of success and failure.

Highlights included Tamiya's F/P-51D which I believe is my best build to date and Airfix's A6M2b Zero which came just at a time when I felt I was never going to get anywhere. There was also the unexpected return to fantasy miniatures and a first try at 1:48 scale military figures which I hope will lead to future projects.

Success!

Outside of this blog I've have been surprised by the success of my Pinterest page which I've been using to link to inspiration photos and articles I've found on the internet while researching projects.

As for the lowlights, there were a few failed projects, but the main one was my failure to complete all but one of the models I mentioned in my first post (two were started and subsequently abandoned, two remain un-started). This was partly due to my inexperience and not really having much focus, essentially I based this to-do list on what kits I had available at the time.

Failure! One out of five completed, two half completed...

I think part of the reason was that I wanted to attempt so much that I never really found any focus for the majority of this year, but this period of discovery has led me to realise that I'm finally finding areas of interest.

So what are they? Aircraft wise, I found a growing interest in US Second World War aircraft (but not just in US service), leading through to late war experimental aircraft and early cold war aircraft from all nations.

Which brings us back to the present day, with a clearer idea of what I like I can write another, hopefully more focused, to-do list for the coming year and be more successful this time round!

The To - Do List - 2014/15

In no particular order:

1. Another Tamiya kit, I want to carry on from my most successful build to date. A good part of that success was due to the fact I was building such a quality kit, it makes sense to build another.
2. An Eduard Profipack. After using Eduard detail sets for many of my builds it's time I tried the full package, Eduard plastic with Eduard photo-etch.
3. A Luftwaffe WWII experimental / jet fighter. A long time area of personal interest (I'll write more about that later) that I've yet to visit in model form.
4. An early Cold War era jet. A newer area of interest that has followed on from my interest in WWII jets. I'm aware I could chose Tamiya's F-84G Thunderjet (I've had my eye on it for a while now) and count this build towards No. 1 as well, but I would prefer that it doesn't.
5. A sci-fi scale model. Of course I'm hoping this will involve successfully finishing the Fine Molds TIE fighter which I couldn't resist starting a few days ago.

If I achieve some success with these targets, and time allows, then I'd like to attempt a 1:48 scale military project, probably starting out with a small vehicle to accompany the figures I've already attempted.

And finally I've like to at least continue painting miniatures. However I've found it difficult to stay inspired and focused so realistically I think I will be miniature painting between the modelling projects for now. At the moment I'm completely out of practice but who knows maybe this time next year, I'll be painting more of them as well as having completed plenty of scale model projects!

As for you my readers, I hope you've enjoyed this past year as much I have and I hope to continue sharing my journey with you into the next year (and beyond).

Completed Review – Tamiya MiG 21 (61602)

Scale: 1:72, RRP - £3.99

A while back I attempted to build one of Tamiya's largely forgotten series of 1:100 aircraft, in this case a MiG-17 which if I'm honest was a less than impressive build. So as a result I've largely forgotten this series until I saw some for sale at the Shropshire Scale Model Show the other week. As they were selling for £2.99 each I thought I might well give them another go.

The MiG-21 is a fighter I've always found interesting, back from the days when aircraft designers still tried to build aircraft that resembled sci-fi rocket ships and so I was keen to see how this one would build.

Opening up the kit and the parts looked good, to my untrained eye it certainly looked like a MiG-21. There are a choice of 4 markings, (two Soviet, one Polish, one Vietnamese) all in silver, so in reality it's a case of painting it up and then just choosing which decals to apply.

As builds go it was absolutely straight forward as there aren't many parts at this scale. Cockpit detail consists of a seat, which once the canopy is on is all you'll see anyway. Apart from that you have choice of wheels up or down. Unlike the MiG-19 the missile pylons and missiles were much less of a struggle to attach which was a relief

 Paint wise I used a base coat of Tamiya AS-12 (spray) and then masked individual panels and airbrushed them with Tamiya X-11. This was mostly down to the fact that these two colours were only silvers I had! A coat of semi-gloss spray and then on with the decals, I decided to go for the Vietnamese variant.

As it happens I know a bit about this particular aircraft, 4326, it's one of several on display outside the Hanoi Aircraft Defence Museum, it's well known as a "Phantom Killer" and among its pilots it counts Nguyen Van Coc, the highest scoring ace of the war. It is actually a MiG-21PF and because the painting instructions weren't quite accurate I made some changes. I referred to the more accurate painting instructions for Academy's 1:48 MiG-21PF kit, of which this aircraft is one of the options to build.

The changes were, a dark green nose cone, and the fin at the rear (rather than black) and the cockpit colour which I changed to that awful Russian interior turquoise. It a shame there aren't any decals for the kill markings that adorn the nose of this aircraft, I guess this version will have to be an early version!

I really enjoyed this build, it was quick, fairly simple but still, the end result is a model that I think looks really nice when on display. It's now got me looking for one in my preferred 1:72 scale!


Overall Build Score: 3 out of 5, a simple and yet good looking kit that was a breeze to build. Let down only slightly by the lazy painting instructions.

What's On The Workbench? #1

What's on the workbench?

Due the (chaotic) way I approach my modelling it means that I'm usually working on numerous things and completing only a few of them. Of course they're the ones this blog tends to focus on and the others, they get left behind. This means that as far as the blog has been concerned it sometimes appears that I'm doing nothing at times!

With that in mind I've decided to take a look at some of currently in-progress models that I'm working on and maybe this'll be a more regular feature of this blog.

First up is a purchase from last week's Shropshire scale model show, Tamiya's 1:100 scale MiG-21.

I been a bit undecided about this range since building the MiG-17, however I saw several of these kits for sale at £3 each and thought I'd have another try. So far I have to say the MiG-21 looks a better kit than the MiG-17. The main purpose of this build will be, at a later date, practising shading and weathering a model with a metallic finish.

Next is Tamiya's 1:48 Citroen 11CV, a classic car of the WWII era.

I've been thinking of branching out in quarter scale vehicles for a while but wasn't good enough with an airbrush to paint them. I'd picked this kit up from a local model shop's closing down sale many months ago and stashed it away since then. Rather than going full on into tank building I thought this would be a good starting point for me to familiarise myself with vehicles in this scale, with the added bonus of already enjoying figure painting at this scale.

As to be expected it's the usual level of detail I've come to expect from Tamiya. I hope I can do it some justice when it comes to painting it, my growing confidence when using an airbrush means that this is certainly more likely than it was when I first bought this kit!

Finally, a base. I really like seeing models on display bases and so thought I'd try creating an airfield base. I've used one Trumpeters display cases in this case.

I've added very fine sand onto a layer of PVA glue and now I'm waiting a few days for it to dry before attempting to add a coat of paint to seal it (and then finally drybrushing it). The PSP plates are from Brengun (1:72 scale) and hopefully they'll figure somewhere in the display.

So that's what's on my workbench! Until the next time.