vince14

The Italeri McLaren is a re-pop of the ancient Protar kit, so it's not worth bothering with unless you really want a 1/12 MP4/2C. The Meng kit will almost certainly be both significantly cheaper and less complex than the MFH kit.

Like the JetMads Viggen, the price is a reflection on the cost of doing short-run kits to an acceptable standard these days (and to be fair, the price point isn't that far off what some WNW kits go for nowadays). I suspect it'll be a far easier build than the Balilla as well, but if you're only really comfortable with injection molded kits then it's probably not for you. I've ordered two (one standard and one special edition) because I'm lucky enough to have the disposable income to do so, and I'm happy to support small producers like Aviattic.

The pre-order for those who are Aviattic's Patreon subscribers or who registered their interest in advance has just opened - Richard says that the pre-order for everyone else will open up later in April. He's hoping to dispatch the first kits in Autumn/Winter this year.

Ha, I've got one of those I was thinking of selling - I'll let you have it for a mere £200..!

SAC have a set that provides the tail wheel assembly in white metal, and Reskit have sets that include the wheel itself in resin. Or maybe try contacting Fly?

The cost of running WNW was certainly a major part of the problem, but there were also other issues surrounding the closure. I think the Gene de Marco debacle probably made some of PJ's legal and business associates take a long hard look at his pet projects. There was also an implication that the New Zealand tax payer may have been subsidising TVAL and WNW (to an extent) through grants given by the NZ government to PJ's film companies i.e. money that was supposed to fund film making actually ended up subsidising WNW and TVAL. Ultimately, I'm not sure we'll ever get the full story behind the closure. All those 'in the know' are not talking, either because they still work for PJ or are under NDA.

There were contractual issues with some Chinese firms which led to the Dr.I and Lancaster being released by Border and Meng - I suspect that as they had never been released by WNW PJ might have had less of an issue with them, and it solved some legal wrangling. The reasons for WNW's closure are complicated, too long to go into here, and not well understood outside of PJ, former WNW staff, and Weta, but suffice to say that the cost of WNW was not the primary reason for the closure.

I’m not so sure - from his film career he was very possessive about things like sets and them getting into other people’s hands. IIRC he had most of the sets, costumes etc. from the LotR movies destroyed so that they couldn’t be used in other films. Well at least we have CSM, Lukgraph, and Roden all releasing new WWI kits, and I think the first two manufacturers are getting very close to WNW standard. The Gotha G.IV and the FE2 seem to be the most sought after kits, followed by the SE.5. These three are the ones attracting premium prices - I have two each of the Gotha and FE2, and three SE.5’s in the stash, for the price they’re going for maybe I should sell a couple!

Looks like the WNW website has bitten the dust. It's now giving a 503 error, which most likely means that the server is down. Could be an ISP issue, but it could also well be that they've decided not to renew the site. If it truly has gone for good, then it's a real shame as it contained lots of useful information.

He's not entirely misinformed. The two fuselage halves of my Viggen kit were of different sizes - not by a massive amount, overall about 5-6mm, but enough that fixing it would have been a lot of trouble (if not nigh-on impossible). I know of at least one other forum member who had the same problem. The hot water trick didn't work as the front half was cast undersize. I'm not some rookie, either - I've been building resin kits for the best part of 20 years now. The good news is that Jetmads were more than happy to replace my defective fuselage, and now everything will fit together just fine.

Isn't patience supposed to be one of the key skills required for modelling?

Looks like they're planning on other releases of the base kit - two different engines and props, as well as two different upper wings, are included in the box.

It's because of Tamiya and the Panther kit. When Yoshio Tamiya decided to get into producing plastic model kits in the mid-1950's he created the Panther tank kit (Tamiya's second ever plastic kit), but he had to allow for the required space for a motor and 2 x B-type batteries. Tamiya then decided to produce more tank kits after the success of the Panther. When it was measured the Panther came out close to 1/35 scale, so that's what the Tamiya kit designers used for subsequent kits. When other model manufacturers got into the military vehicle game from the late 1950's onwards, Tamiya had already established 1/35 as the preferred scale, so everyone used that. So, essentially, it wasn't so much a considered corporate decision but a slightly haphazard, practical one to allow for motorisation of the Panther kit.

You've answered your own question, then - if it will always look 'off' to you, there's no point in doing it.

If you're going to be posting pics on modelling forums of the completed project, then you might get some feedback about the different scales. If, however, it's just going to sit in your house and only be seen by friends and family, then absolutely no-one will give a hoot that the scales are off by 10%.

There's a couple of ground crew figures from CMK: https://www.hannants.co.uk/product/CMF32082?result-token=iJ5c0

Makes you realise that there are only a few pure modellers out there - the rest of us are just kit assemblers.

IIRC most differences probably wouldn't be too difficult to model - French instruments, Vickers gun offset to port with a small windscreen to the right of the gun, slightly different cowling panels etc. The way the bombs were loaded and stored in the fuselage was also different on French-built machines. The very early French aircraft came from British stocks and had RAF wires instead of cables. I think the French used the Le Rhone 9Jb engine, and the British used the Clerget 9Z but I'd have to check my references. The other thing to note about French-built 'Strutters' - they were not clear-doped/beige as is often depicted. They were either aluminium-doped or camouflaged.

It's getting closer...looks like Richard is hoping to open pre-orders soon! https://www.aviattic.co.uk/aviattic-pfalz-dviii---pre-order.html

Yep, once you get a technique that works for you rigging is no more difficult than most other aspects of modelling. Looking forward to the 'Strutter' (sorry @Sabrejet!), I'm hoping they'll also release a French version as well - which was actually more numerous than the original British version.

From my various secret sources, I've obtained an image taken from inside the 'car sized' object, just as the F-22 fired:

The UK's Channel 4 has a show called 'Travel Man', a sort of comedy travel guide - they went to Dublin recently, and if you can access it from the Czech Republic you can watch the show here: https://www.channel4.com/programmes/travel-man-48-hours-in/on-demand/70460-002 Aircraft wise, the last time I was there the National Museum in Dublin had a Miles Magister and a T.11 Vampire. About 15km outside of Dublin on the N7 is the Irish Air Corps museum at Casement Aerodrome, Baldonnel - that has a lot more aircraft, but visits are by appointment only: https://www.militaryheritage.ie/research-guide/military-museums/irish-aer-corps-museum-heritage-project/ I'll be honest, though - apart from the pubs, I've always found Dublin to be rather boring. Might be different on St. Patrick's Day.

Has anyone heard from the Jetmads guys? As they're in Istanbul, I'm assuming they're OK...

I know of someone who had to have an emergency extention for their university final dissertation - called 'Where's Bin Laden? the Use of Bogeymen in Western Geo-Political Discourse' - because the CIA found and killed Osama on the day of the deadline.

They were hit by a cyber attack a couple of weeks ago, they're still in the process of restoring service.