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End of a difficult year, time for a little summary. I make models for individual customer orders, so I build a lot of them during the year. Therefore, I will only show you some of my works. Good 2021 to all of you, stay healthy. REGARDS FROM POLAND.

This morning, the last thank God of 2020, dawned cold and very frosty. We had already planned a 5 mile walk with friends starting at a local village, Fifehead Magdalen. We passed a small church and my attention was drawn to this headstone: because of Jane, the artist (I do a bit of amateur daubing!) and Rupert. So I investigated Rupert further: Quite a character, he went on to have a distinguished career post-war. Those Fairey Battle pilots were incredibly brave during the Battle of France, they knew beforehand that their obsolete, slow aircraft were easy prey to Bf109s and ground flak, but they still pressed home their attacks. The IWM has a recorded audio history of the man: https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/80015010 Happy New Year everybody.....HEALTH and Happiness in 2021!!

My last completion in what's proved to be a surprisingly productive year! Special Hobby's He100 is a kit I've wanted to have a go of for a while, for no other reason than the HE100 looks super cool. The kit is one of SH's early offerings in the larger scale, so its not quite as polished as their current stuff. The build was straight forwards, lots of cleaning up and carving of parts. I threw in some imagineered details to busy up the cockpit and main wheel well. A few AIRSCALE placards around the place bring the cockpit to life. HGW belts. Lots of clunkiness around the airframe that just wanted some fettling. Here the left wing trailing edge has been sanded down in thickness, compared to the RH The intake under the spinner is depicted in the kit by a lattice shaped piece of plastic. I opened the duct up and stuck in the guide fins. I wasnt happy with lines of the nose, and spent a bit of time carving, filing and sanding down the nose to give it a more streamlined look, as close as I could to depicting the real thing. The spinner also got a lot of heft removed to make it more pointy. Check out other reviews and builds of this kit to see the difference. The entire kit was rescribed and riveted. My usual Internet trawl for reference pics/drawings, not surprisingly, didn't turn up much for this rare aircraft, so I again resorted to imagineering to determine where rivet lines would most likely go. I used MRP paints for this build, and started with a usual black base, and filling in the colours to break up the monotony. A light weathering, kit decals and then all the details, and the final product looked like this. Upon completion, I was suprised at how small the He100 was. Compared to the FW190, it looks almost dainty. Id always imagined it to be a smidge larger the the 190, but in fact its closer to ME109 size. Happy New Year, everyone! Denzil

Well it's been a while. Work and other things have taken my time then this lockdown thing made me finish the kit I'd started in January 2020. I didn't have the where with all to do a build document TBH and I apologise for that but here's my take on the old warhorse, just in time for the end of 2020. I've painted it in the kit given KG54 Totenkopf-Geschwader and imagined it having just landed from a bombing raid over England in 1940 and waiting for a reload and a refuel. Not much time for cleaning down so it's a tad mucky. I've used the Eduard interior and exterior PE kits and HGW seatbelts as well as the Profimodeller oxygen system (never again!) Many thanks for having a peek. I'm starting teh Xmas pressie of the Airfix 1:24 F6F 5 Hellcat on New Years Day. Build progress promised!

Tamiya's 1/6 Honda CRF 1000L Africa Twin. One of the fastest builds I've done in years. I started the end of this August and finished the end of November. A typical Tamiya kit with amazing fit and lots of metal parts including the front fork tubes, lots of nuts and bolts, and bags of different coloured and sizes of screws.The kit comes with decals for two different colour schemes and masks to complete each scheme. I initially intended to build the Pearl White machine but switched to the Victory Red option part way through the build. The wheel rims should be semi-gloss black for the red scheme but the gold rims for the white option look very nice on the red bike too. The hand guards on the handle bars should be semi-gloss black for a red bike as well but seeing as I wanted to do the bike up as I'd want it I went with red for those instead. Other than adding some additional nut and bolt detail that was missing on the kit I did very little extra. I did, however, add the brake fluid level sight glass and it's bezel to the front brake master cylinder and scribed a line all the way around the top of the master cylinder to represent the lid. I also used thin strips of Tamiya's tape to represent the cable ties as per photos. The tape was permanently secured by very carefully applying extra thin CA and then painting the tape with Tamiya Rubber Black. No markings for the switches on the handle bar controls come with the kit so they were cobbled together from a number of different decals sheets. The white "START" letters for the starter button, for instance, were sourced from a 1/48 Phantom data stencil sheet and applied individually to get "START". The symbol on the horn button was made up of 4 separate pieces of decal. In 1/6th scale it didn't look right to have the buttons bare so the extra work was well worth the effort to me. The rear wheel drive chain is made up of individual links and is a Tamiya Detail-Up accessory for this kit. It's a big improvement on the kit supplied two piece chain. Paint used was primarily Tamiya's spray lacquers decanted and applied with my airbrush. I also used quite a bit of Alclad Polished Aluminium and Chrome. Cheers, Wolf .........and Happy New Year to you all!

I am a gluten for punishment. Having put the Albatros on hold due to an error on my behalf, being sorted by the great generosity of LSP members, I broke out my Growler and have cut some plastic, modified some bits and got it underway. I plan to make it into an RAAF 6 Squadron jet. Little did I know that all of the aftermarket for this kit is way out of production and not available anywhere. Hence my requests on the Traders Board. I am desperately seeking the Eduard Growler phot-etch to cut up for the cockpit and the Steel Beach resin with the Satellite antenna on the top of the fuselage spine. Enough growling at myself - here is the kit so far. I've cut the kit ECS vents out and added the QB resin. Finally got to use my Proxon drill stand. Just added a bit of Tamiya White filler around the edges. New vents under the outlets on the LEX just rear of the cockpit. Looks like I need to adjust the one on the far left. Just editing the post after noticing how thick the top of the vent is. I will rip it all of and sand down that thick edge. Modified the WSO's IP cover but still need to add a little bit more detail. Sanded off the hugely oversize fin mounted formation lights from both sides of each fin. My new David Union sander was mighty for this job. Just paid for itself I reckon. First pic is the original outside of one fin and the second is the clean skin. It will be easy to add some detail under the lights that is not as drag producing. This is the inside of the port fin. Filled in the gun vents under the nose - the Growler doesn't have a gun. Looks pretty smooth but final work will be done once the forward fuselage bits are joined. Closed up the avionics bays on both sides. I'm not a fan of open panels. Discovered an uneven surface all the way along the panel line not only along the bottom edge of the door but all the way along that line to the rear of the part. One side was slightly higher than the other on both sides of the fuselage. Definitely not there on the real McCoy. I've got Harold's ECM pods to replace the absolute rubbish that the kit provides. Still lots of little fiddly bits to go and of course keeping my fingers crossed some kind modellers has some spare parts that they won't be using, otherwise some serious scratch building will be in my future. Reid Air Publications updated Super Hornet Guide is my main reference along with some photos of the RAAF jets from various sources, including some of my own photos from Avalon International Air Show in early 2019. I should have taken some more. Happy modelling in the new year folks.

Final build of 'Annus horribilis' 2020 (horrible year) For the rigging I've used Prym elastic tread and a couple of flat fishing wire. Scratched access ladder. The passager figures, will have to wait till next year... Cheers: Kent

Thanks all. I'm still working away on the big cat. The internals of the engine bearers were smoothed after the brass rings were added to the front of the bearers and smoothed in. Everything was smoothed out as much as it was ever going to be, and a layer of Mr Surfacer 1500 black was laid down: Next some MRP interior green was shot on those same areas: Then, some Tamiya black enamel was added grunge things up a bit: Finally, I sprayed some yellow on the engine oil tanks. I know there was a chance these were GSB or possibly even NMF but I think the likelihood of the tanks being painted in some capacity is high, but I really like the visibility and how they stand out in yellow, so that was it. I applied some MRP-142 orange yellow to the tanks after spraying the bases of two of them in interior green. SUPER bright, and SUPER glossy: They do fit in situ very well though and dont hinder the fit of the nacelle at all: After unmasking the green bases on the two rear most tanks, I proceeded to mask off and paint some MRP black on the raised strap areas. After that, I applied some Tamiya black enamel wash. I followed that up with some MRP flat clear, as all 4 of the tanks turned out extremely glossy. Easy to see which tank had the flat applied: I will apply some aluminum finish straps to the raised strap areas to finish these off, then will move onto the oil lines and connections leading to the tanks themselves. Cheers!

Some more work on the pilot's pedestal getting the bomb door open/ close mechanism added along with hydraulic lines. Just need to add the lines to the lower fuselage and connect them up to the lines above and I'll call the fuselage floor done and ready for colour. Happy New Year everyone. Regards. Andy

Those new year/new project/new cutting-mat feels! Special Hobby's Fiat G50. Just a cool looking plane, and I'm going to finish it as the aircraft depicted in the box art, so it should be a lovely challenging paint session. The contents of the box are miles ahead of SH's Heinkell He100 (Which I've just finished), being crisp and well detailed. This kit comprises plastic, resin and photo etched parts, all quite well detailed, albeit all requiring some cleaning up to some degree. I'll be using MRP paints for as much as I can, hopefully I've deciphered STORMO!'s colour guide accurately! This is the scheme I'll be having a crack at. Should be fun. Cue the Fiat A74 radial engine noises! Denzil.

Hello everyone, since sometimes they come back, here I am to present my "PROJECT". As the title suggests, I am working on one of the latest Airfix products, which for my part was much awaited. It is my wife's gift for Christmas 2019 for which I have been holding the kit for a year. I must admit that I was rather disappointed especially with regard to the level of detail which, given the scale and the price, I find unacceptable, I do not want to get into the usual modeling talk regarding this topic so I will limit myself to exposing the various improvements. First of all here are the various aftermarket that I found for this model, I think I will add something else but I want to design and print the various pieces with my resin 3D printer (Anycubic Photon 3D for those interested). THE KIT AND AFTERMARKET ANYZ upgrade for the engine (power cables, spark plugs and various line connectors) of excellent workmanship, brass pipes from MASTER, seatbelts from HGW (fantastic is an understatement), Decal from AEROCRAFT MODELS to be integrated with those of the kit(maybe cockpit detail fromAIRSCALE. Now the comparison between the various pieces of the kit and the one I printed in resin they are not the definitive pieces as over the past few months I have refined the details, so be satisfied with the quality of the prints and photos made with flash and in hurry Here's what I mean by poor quality of the kit, ok the limits of plastic, but here they are not wasted (even if looking at the presentation videos it seemed that they had done a superlative job. Front and rear cylinders; I gave it a coat of paint as I am using a black resin so the details remain a little more visible The evolution of the main body of the engine, at the bottom the one proposed by the kit completely wrong as a size in fact it does not enter the cylinder ring so you have to reduce it by at least 1.5 mm even here I do not understand how they could have been so wrong. The one on the top right is the semi-final shape as it lacks the housing holes for the cylinders detail absent in the kit Crank case reduction in comparison distributors Bendix magneto Now some renderings of the morore with all the pieces already designed and some images of the pieces ready for resin printing All this is the result of hundreds of photos found on the net, technical drawings, maintenance and overhaul manuals of the Pratt & withney R2800-10W, tests and retries both in 3D and in print to arrive at a more acceptable detail result as the scale 1 : 24 does not forgive and risks making everything very toy. That's all for now, any help with photos, documents etc. is always welcome.

Hello friends, At the end of the year, I managed to finish a plane that I love. It was a birthday present from a dear friend, whom I thank once again for the gift. This is my vision for this aircraft. Except for the data stencils, everything is painted! Fully painted with MRP. HAPPY NEW YEAR! L-29 DELFIN, Romania, around 1968

2020 has just under a couple of hours left for us down under (and to the east a bit). 2020 was well, quite forgettable, but this was a great online community throughout. I finished a few large scale kits, and hope to finish a few more next year. I hope you all have a great new year! Grant

My last completed model of 2020 I am always fascinating about the German "what if" subjects and this jet is my most favorite one. I am thinking about getting another kit for different paint scheme. Since the kit did not come with boarding ladder, I scratch-built one from mini bamboo sticks from dollar store. I also added couple figures from my spare box. I did not glue the gun panels, so all 4 canons can be seen with the panels off.

You never really know when creative inspiration will strike. Back in November of 2019, I started a (now defunct) build thread for building a pair of P-47D Thunderbolts - the Razorback from Trumpeter, and this kit from Hasegawa. Despite the best intentions, the Trumpeter kit fought me all the way, the ignition wiring on this kit turned out like garbage, and so I shelved the whole project. The Trumpeter kit went on my son's ceiling with a cursory finish and this one hit the shelf of doom. Every now and then, I'd pull it off the shelf and do a bit here and there. I kept putting it back on the shelf because I'd intended to do a natural metal finish bird (even bought the decals) and, try as I might, I just don't like NMF on WWII aircraft. To each their own, but to me, they're just boring. So, after cracking the canopy on the absolutely craptacular Special Hobby Brewster Buffalo I was working on, I shelved that and pulled this out. Sometime between 2019 and pulling this off the shelf of doom, I'd picked up a Cameo Silhouette mask cutter, so now I had a lot more marking options available to me. I decided to poke around the web to see if I could find an OD green bubble top P-47. Ultimately, I found several including this one. And creative inspiration struck. Ladies and gentlemen, meet Capt. Arthur Bux. He flew with the 61st Fighter Squadron of the 56th Fighter Group (the famed Zemke's Wolfpack) from Boxted England. I'm not sure exactly what it was that caught my eye, but I decided this would be the paint scheme I would pursue. Checking various sources shows that there's considerable debate about the finish of this particular Thunderbolt. Is it OD Green? RAF Dark Green? Black as some of the 56th's later aircraft? We'll likely never know, so I went with something that landed (pun intended) somewhere between US OD green and RAF Dark Green. The further I got into the build, the more I realized that I wanted not just to recreate the aircraft, but the whole scene itself. So, I pulled a figure from the Tamiya 1/32 Mustang kit I had, mated it with a 1/35 head from some rando Dragon kit in the spares bin (I never realized how hard it is to find a head without headgear that's not wearing an utterly dour expression) and custom-sculpted the right arm and leg to more closely match Capt. Bux's pose. It's not perfect, but I'm pretty happy with it since sculpting is something I just started doing. As to the rest of the build, this is Hasegawa kit 08077 (the Gabreski boxing) and it's ... okay. The step at the bottom of the fuselage & cowl annoys me somewhat and the wing roots were not a great fit. Back in 2019 I had built the flaps in the down position, only to realize that I'd need to break them and rework them to put them in the up position to match the photo. Ultimately, that turned out pretty well. I ended up redoing all of the ignition wiring, so that was a hoot. The Thunderbolt has roughly 700 cylinders with 16 spark plugs each. The ground work includes a sandpaper tarmac and good old fashioned dirt with static grass thrown in for fun. Chocks are ChuckD custom shop work. Anyway, I hope you like it as, despite the fits and starts, I'm really happy with how this turned out overall. Doubly happy because it wraps up my builds for the year 2020, and I'm jazzed to end 2020 (of all years) on a bit of a high note. Enjoy!

Happy and better New Year !

Thanks guys for the tip. Serve me right for not participating more often...lol! Hopefully the picture will now appear.

Hi all, The 'Aviattic' supplied wood effect fuselage and tail unit decals have now been applied. Not too easily carried out as the decals need to be accurately cut out from their sheets as they're not 'cookie' cut. They've all been gloss coated as the next step is to apply the 'HGW Models' nail head decals. Then it'll be adding the remaining decals and all of the photo-etch details, Mike

seems we will get it soon posted on britmodeller https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=4060993670581933&set=gm.3781274165265431

LOL...ok Now you know!

Final update for this year - engine is completed - painted anti-slippery lines, removed masks and covered model with Future It's drying till next year. Happy New year to every one!!!

Thanks guys! I really enjoy the conversations! Thanks Vincent! That makes total sense to me! Thanks Kirby! References are key and I was lucky to have had lots of references thrown my way during this build! Thanks Alan! I love your rendition of Red 10! Since I have a Silhouette Portrait, I make my own masks. I've already designed a set for this build and have tested them out on my paint mule when I was trying a light-on-dark mottle technique.

If anyone is looking for some great reference on this kit, I would very much recommend the HMH Publications "Duke Hawkins: The SAAB Viggen" book. Bought mine a couple of weeks ago..... just superb. Lots of cockpit close-ups, wheel-wells, etc. Chris. PS: I have no association with HMH Publications, other than I've bought several of their books and they get better with each title.

Not the new year yet here in canada its 9:46 ami do have a question. Being almost done with my current build. I can make a run for the finish and make it the last kit of 2020 or finish it tomorrow and be the first kit of 2021! Man i have deep issues

Images of the finished model in the two proposed versions:

Hey all- doors are coming together-

Main page, click on menu, then contacts, fill in the form, really easy, used it a couple of times, small fee and postage. Happy hunting!

All- Moving right along! If you haven't considered picking up one of these kits, do it! It's a fun build. Nothing fancy, no frills, but neat, and goes together extremely well! Hoping to finish seam work in the next week or so, and then I might start laying down some paint. Stay tuned! As always, comments and critiques are most welcome. - Dennis S. Thornton, CO USA

Hi all, The model is supplied with decals for the various nail lines on the fuselage, produced by 'HGW Models'. These are intended to be applied onto the wood effect decals. These nail line decals will shown on lighter coloured surfaces, such as on the unpainted fuselage of an Albatros or Roland fighter. However, they are more or less invisible on a darker background, such as the wood effect decals used on this version of the 'Balilla'. Therefore instead of using the decals, I used a 'Rosie the Riveter' (0.75 mm) to create by hand the nail lines, using the decal illustration as a guide. Then wearing a cotton glove, dipped a finger into Dark Earth pigment powder ('Flory Models') and rub the pigment over the fuselage. Finally a light sealing coat of 'Alclad' Aqua Gloss (ALC-600) was airbrushed over the fuselage, Mike

Next up was the registration numbers. Per the decal sheet the American Airlines "AA" logo is dark blue, not black like the reg code.

Ooohhh....this one: It's nice!!

True enough, but HpH has nothing to do with Lemkits. Kev

Perfect pictures Max, we almost have the same sort of surroundings, especially with this frosty layer it looks very beautiful.!!

Oooh now THAT will look cool!!

Rapid Prototyping, eh? The term means relative to making the thing from first principles, where instead of a week, you'd be looking at a month! None of these printing processes are very fast, especially if you want quantities of more than one. But they are FANTASTIC! And to make the most of them, learn some CAD and do your own designs. And none of that whiney ' Ooo, I can't' nonsense !! You are modellers! Download some free CAD software and give it a go. You might surprise yourselves. You won't surprise me! NOW! Go On! Git downloading and looking out some tutorials!! What are you waiting for?! Tim

This tow tractor is the typical "jack of all trades" present in all air bases in the world, easily adaptable for all functions.

We still have a bit over 12 hours of 2020 left here in Germany. It will be a quiet ringing in of the new year, that hopefully will be better than the old one! I wish everyone all the best for 2021. Ernest

Happy New Year everyone from a very icy UK. Cheers Dennis

First the seat modifications. I decided to put some cushions in. i have seen this on pictures and in some 1/32 builds and it gives some nice colour to the cockpit wgen painted

Thanks to Modelpig, and Happy New Year to all.

Tom, Damian, and Gaz, Thanks gentlemen! I wish it was real. I really enjoyed my bike when I had one. Now I'm quite content with my old MB SLK230. Almost as much fun but far more comfortable when it rains, LOL!

At the risk of spamming....here’s the differential/suspension design as of now. Not sure I’ll finish the design this year with only 14 hours to go! Dry fit on the dummy hull: On the hull itself.

Right then, here's the modification I did to the kit doughnut panel. I used 0.25 mm Evergreen strip laid multiple times to get a tight fit that would keep the exhaust duct centred. Like this: The nozzle was painted Steel on the outside of the nozzle flaps and Tamiya Deck Tan and Buff and a mix for some variation. FInally, weathered with a Van Dyke Brown oil paint wash and some streaks.

I have thought about this over the years, but never really found someone who would have the interest in the gift. I would enjoy making something for someone, if I actually knew someone who would want a model. Most of the people I seem to be around kind of laugh and giggle thinking it's silly for a grown man to play with children's toys. That type of thing. If they built one, they would understand it's not quite like that at all!

Home straight. Canopy just in place, not glued yet as I need to open it and its also a touch undersize for the Hasegawa pit (Revell hood). Also needs a few more bits added and weathering done, but I've done the exhaust stains. Aaron

I started off working back on the engine bearers. After a while I started noticing (and have previously, but didn't dawn on me) that my left arm and hand were cramping up and getting very tired after all the work on the F7F. It got me thinking what she actually weighs now! Maybe not the biggest model Ive ever built, but for sure going to be the heaviest. Heading toward 2 lbs, and not even near done adding resin: The brass engine rings have been added to the engine bearers and blended in. They do add a lot of strength and rigidity. First up on the docket was getting the engine rear cases fitted to the engine bodies, so I can easily slide the engines out as needed when working on the exhausts. This was accomplished by "keying" each engine rear to its respective engine, so that each engine would sit where it needed to be (glued in the engine bearers after detailing) and always at the correct angle. It will be much easier to make the exhausts, as well as paint and detail the exhaust stains. I drilled two holes in each engine and corresponding holes in the rear of each engine so that each would only fit one way, as to not mix them up. I then inserted some small brass tubing in the engine rears, and a 1 size larger corresponding tubing in the engine rear. Turned out pretty well I thought: Nice and tight connection! Then I started looking at the instructions, and looking at the previous HpH build I've been using as a guide.................... I had the blasted rear engine parts on up-side down!! Yikes. So back to the drawing board! I filed the two offset holes in each engine, and re-drilled holes to accept the brass rod in the opposite site, so the engine rears were facing the correct way. It didnt take quite as long as I had thought, but all turned out well in the end. The brass tubing keeps the engine rears on to the engines night and tightly, which will aid in getting the exhausts in the exact right place when the time comes. After the new connections were drilled and glued, the engines will actually be supported by the engine bearers instead of the firewall, just like the read deal: All for now, as Im technically off till Monday, but all of next week all I have to do is "be available" but am not required to be at keyboard, so am hoping to get some more significant progress completed. Cheers all, and happy holidays!

Hi all, Just a few progress shots of the internals of the fuselage. There's still a lot to do yet. Control rods and some wiring, seat harness, machine guns, engine fit, oil tank, gun synchronisation gear etc. Also the final finish and weathering. Mike

Hi all, I've been working on the preparation of the fuselage internals. The fuselage is moulded as a single piece, so has to be worked through the available openings. The forward bulkhead frame needed to be reduce in width as the front of the fuselage was too wide to fit the photo-etch front frame. The supplied photo-etch sheet is, to say the least, comprehensive and highly detailed with many tiny components. Fortunately some parts are also supplied as resin, if you don't want the 'challenge' of building the photo-etch parts. Fortunately it's not necessary to build the aileron and additional flight controls, as both would be completely hidden under the pilot's seat and can't be seen. However the engine controls can be seen so need to be built. The throttle quadrant alone is made up of 15 separate pieces. This model is definitely not for the photo-etch faint hearted. Anyway, now it's on to the painting phase, Mike

oh jeez, forgot I started this..sorry gang I finished it, its not great but its done. The kit and I fought every step...part of me wants to do it again to really show this kit who's boss lol Yes I know one side of the flag is backwards, the were printed that way...facepalm