Jboldt007

great thread. The Mirage III and its equivalents are the most beautiful planes in the world- more large scale kits if it the better.

i've found it interesting that the fuselage mounted Mg's on these planes often had their cross hair sights installed. in this case the double spandau's i presume. What, like the pilot was going to squint with one eye with one of them and line something up in heavy, cold induced winds with things shaking and oil splattering? I'm guessing most just let go with the lot when closing range and hoped for the best then high tailed it out of there...

I'm gaining a real appreciation for this era after having purchased some WnW kits - extreme experimentation, variety, and lots of elan and colourful livery. it amazes me that even during this early era most of the dynamics of flight were understood already - even compressibility. it's just that you had to do everything out of wood, canvas, and wire. Until the times of fly by wire, not much had really changed - mainly engine technology such as supercharging and monocoque bodies.

All time favourite jet...!

Beautiful build. Strangely there aren't allot of large scale P-47 options out there despite the the plane's popularity. Maybe because of its size! It's such an iconic bird though...

The Ju-88 has always been one of my "must builds" - i love the plane. But the problem is... at 1/32 ... it's huge... and most of the cool stuff is up front ... plus the Revell kit is reasonable. Anyway the false nose thing is bizarre. Someone mentioned the Pastor John conversion set. I was thinking Prester John ... but i think he was a mythical figure from the 12th century.

good point - it kind of morphed into that....

So about a year or two ago i bought a D-H9 Wing Nut Wings kit from a local retailer thinking ... i should just get one. They have [had] a stack which had been languishing for a while . Recently i decided to open it and fell in love with it and the whole WnW thing ... plus the era. i'm a newb but still... i dived in. I parked my other builds and decided to get more WnW kits but low and behold my retailer said someone came in an bought almost all the kits. THe buyer said that prices in online bids have been climbing and so decided to buy out what he could get. I see recently Hannants bought a stock of WnW kits which promply sold out. The thing is... i was hankering on an F.2a kit... not lightly considered,,, if my wife and daughters found out i would be in big trouble... but my birthday was approaching so i said what the heck. throw caution to the wind. Luckily the retailer found a late f.2a kit in the storeroom and gave me a great deal on it. So now... yikes... it's a beast. but so cool. i have to break up the sprues and then slowly bring them out and work in bits so that the girls become acclimatized.. it seems to work. Anyway to make my life more complicated i decided i wanted to do this one: Why? because (1) i don't see this build on-line and (2) it has the "early" "sedan and rumble seat" cockpit which i like and (3) the dazzle scheme looks like something i won't totally botch in terms of masking. So the problem? Well, sources aren't even sure it's even an F.2A (even though oddly enough the pilot flying the plane in this picture is known) It could be an F.3 or even F.5. Plus a definitive article by Adrian Vicary (you see I've become a Felixstowe flying boat expert in the last 48 hours) i think mistakenly suggests this might be N4087 (his renderings show a different plane as 4087- the "criss-cross" scheme noted in the WnW instructions as 4083- or 4087 may have been a similar scheme in a flight including 4083. But it's not this one). This "error" - if it is one - has been replicated in a number of sites saying it is 4087. Anyhow after some research i'm convinced this is an F.2a (not an F.3) and that, if one looks at the serial numbers, which aren't really legible, it seems that there's a '4' and a '5'. it could be a 4500 series. this might make sense as it could be one of 20 F.2a's delivered to Felixstowe in July, 2018. These ones, manufactured by Aircraft Manufacturing/ May, Harden, and May were delivered with the partially enclosed cockpit which were later converted to the "sedan and rumble seat" version like N4545 in the WnW instructions, which is a well known and photographed f.2a, and identical other than paint job to the subject above. If it was N4087, i think these in this series (up to 4099) have been recorded as being delivered with the "late" open cockpit as provided in the kit. So not the same. As to colours- Vicary notes this aircraft as being "white on green". Here's a rendering based on his sketch from a site: Again i don't think this is 4087. In any event - the green colour is also a matter of conjecture. it seems from contemporary accounts that wings on these planes were doped in what was likely PC10 (on the top) but also painted in a 'green maritime' grade paint described as close to the interwar NIVO paint... which... kind of looks like PC10. I have no reason to deviate from this on the basis that the rendering above may be meant to be the plane in the top photo - although the underside may have just been black. One thing - the photo at the top makes it look like the coaming right up to the front is CDL (clear doped) - and aft of the wings - but it's hard to say based on the photo. The scheme could be more like that depicted above. Any comments from Felixstowe experts welcome. I don't plan top start this for a while but don't want to muck it all up from the get go if there's a clear mistake in all this...

thanks - that's good to know re: buckles. i have no idea how to get "proper plane" ones but can get Gaspatch easily...

did you use something like Gaspatch turnbuckles and if so ... 1/32 or 1/48 ? Some say one should go withe smaller buckles for 1/32.

fantastic work - very creative. Love dioramas like this which call for allot of playful modelling.. recreating a scene and feel. We've all seen those tropical photos of decaying planes in shallow, blue water - very evocative. I like the story of how the scuba divers came about.

crazy good! A rigging monster. Great turnbuckles and weathering. The prop is really nice too.

great work - good job on the belts! I'm about 1/2 way through this kit too with some A/M products. It's a beast - some well known inaccuracies for sure ... but still fun...

yeah i'm coming around to EZ Line ... its amazing stuff because it holds in tension with even the lightest pull. Good to know it seems to last .. at least in the "shade". I went to my local hobby store which has a good selection of K&S wire and such but the thinnest steel rod (actually piano wire) is 0.38mm - below this you get into spooled wire. I've seen some very thin stainless steel rods online ... but very expensive.

actually the "hole" idea WnW had with thin steel wire ... maybe?

Thanks - after reading this... i went and rooted around in my stuff and found some K&S 0.35mm steel wire.... the thinnest i have. i dabble in large scale (1:20.3) rail stuff and i like the steel wire better than brass because... well... it's STEEL...and it doesn't kink or bend like brass plus one can blacken it easily. And it's stiffer. One needs a steel wire cutter (you'll ruin your standard clippers trying to cut the stuff otherwise) but it looks great. The only problem i see is that getting down to a scale rigging line for 1/32 means something thinner ... which one can get of course... but the thinner one gets the more the risk of it "bending" under gravity I assume? - it's not under tension so the line has to be stiff enough to not droop unrealistically? But maybe it's a consideration - certainly more work and angst than E-Z Line (which other than fingers and clippers is the one thing AC actually sticks too !)... the sections would need to be cut and fit pretty accurately ... but i don't relish the idea of having to re-rig something because of handling - or an aging of a synthetic line... but i don't know... i guess one has to try...

just bought the DFW C.V (late) kit retail too ... and the germans didn't seem to get into the funky rigging from what i can see.....

thanks - good to know - i knew that some rigging, on the wings, was flat (streamlined) but i didn't know how that works so this explains it and how the fastenings appear. THe kit i believe shows where the streamline rigging is (between the wings) although the ability probably to model the distinction is probably not that noticeable but should give the Prym stuff a look-see too. The kit notes the streamline rigging at scale would be 0.1 x 0.3 mm so certainly a flat profile...

lovely -great build. love the engine. I read an article about the PZL in Scale Modeller I think. Didn't the gun fire through the cowling (by design)?

in doing some research (looking at phots) it's pretty clear that there are only a handful of turnbuckles proper used on the DH.9. Most rigging seems to be crimped cables or such anchored to small points - the observation that, as WnW thought, these are too small to model, seems apt. i read that typical cables were approximately 4 to 5 mm on smaller British aircraft and 7mm on larger ones. The kit calls for 0.15mm lines which is about right for a 4 to 5mm cable. This is pretty thin on the model. I don't think i could even see this. I think the heavier EZ line stretched a bit would be good - the thin stuff i can't even see - it's thinner than a hair.

jeepers - missed this earlier . Out of this world ! can you describe some of the weathering techniques? Looks like some salt chipping/ masking? Love the underside upfront. I've just been getting into some Wingnut Wings kits and reading about the different liveries and colourings. The germans used a streaking camo application at times. is this what is depicted here? The prop is amazing too - is the wood grain a decal or is it painted? the wheels are crazy good . i love dirty planes.

i've always been entranced by this kit and this plane. Thanks for posting. great pre-shading and exhaust staining BTW. The undercarriage looks crazy - like a mosquito's ...

Never heard of the Gauntlet before! What a pretty plane! Great rigging and decals.

love it ! - perhaps my favourite jet. Love the exhaust with the blue metal tinge. Hand painted?

thanks - that's great!