Amateurmodeller

Finished today, Revell's new tool FW-190 F8, with Eduard Brassin Cockpit (which is brilliant), and HGW Fabric belts which I only bought when I lost one of the PE belts from the Brassin set.  The kit is about a 7 of 10 - Nice detail in places, but some parts especially the control surfaces are simplified. I also had issues with the Undercarriage snapping. I had to drill and pin the main landing gear struts. Painted with Gunze throughout, with Oil weathering Peter

Finished today, this is the Tamiya 1/32nd Spitfire VIII kit with extras from Barracuda, Eduard, Master, Quickboost and Radub. Constructed as one of 152 Sqdn's mounts from Burma in late 1944. Painted mainly with Gunze Aqueous paints, and weathered with pastels and oils. Mostly loved this kit, but the Engine cowlings are a pain ( might be due to the AM rocker covers), and some of the swappable parts are basically pointless. Also you are left with holes to fit the slipper tank. I am happy how it's turned out though. Peter

The personal mount of Col. Paul Douglas, commander of 388 TFW, "Arkansas Traveller II", complete with his 8 kills from WWII. This is the Tamiya 1/32nd F-4E Early, with Rhinomodel Seamless intakes, Avionix Cockpit, Eduard Placards and Stencil Masks, Master Pitot tubes, Quickboost FOD covers and finally the CAM Decals. Homemade RBF Tags (thanks Mish!) I have to say this is one of the few builds with Aftermarket where everything was worth while - I especially liked the stencil masks rather than using decals for the stencils as they look better, and are way more fun to do than decals. The Avionix pit is also very nice, and unlike a Aires resin actually gives good fitting instructions too. The only negative is the fuselage had a slight twist, probably from the hacking about to get the seamless intakes to fit, but it throws off the stabilators slightly. Painted with Gunze throughout apart from the metalwork which is just about every shade of Alclad. Weathered lightly with ...

Academy 1/32nd F-16I Sufa With Eduard Etched Belts and External set Finished this on Monday - I have very mixed feelings about this kit, it's very impressive but it's also somewhat variable. Being made out of a mix of kits the plastic and details are slightly variable, which makes things more interesting. The fit isn't bad, but does need fettling in places, and some of the engineering could be better. The Eduard seatbelt set is great, but the External set is completely pointless - the Afterburner parts which was the main reason that I got it simply didn't fit, being too wide to fit in the jet exhaust. Peter

Well the epic build is over - this took forever ( 6 months ), with a 3 month break while I had to source a replacement canopy. Built using the Kit decals (which weren't great being honest), Aires Cockpit which is nice and fits, Eduard External etch set which has some great bits and some pointless bits, Orion vinyl MDC cord which is great if very fiddly and finally HGW Fabric Remove Before Flight tags which are nice. It's a nice kit, but is very fiddly in parts and a bit of a pain to assemble. It's a nice size for a 1/32nd Jet though, not too big. Painted with Gunze Aqueous throughout, weathered with oils and true-earth and pigments. build thread is available  here Comments welcomed as always  Peter

Oblt. Ludwig Franzisket, Stab I./JG 27, Ain-el-Gazala airfield, Lybia, June 1941 Eduard 1/32nd Profipack kit, built OOB, painted with Gunze Aqueous paints, weathered with Pigments, Oils and Mig and AK potions. Great kit and good fun. Build thread is available  here Comments welcomed as always. Peter

Really pissed off with Trumpeter at the moment - got to the stage of fitting the canopies to my 1/32nd Harrier, opened up the packaging and found this : All that from a sealed bag, still with all the parts wrapped in bubble wrap. I've contacted Trumpeter directly and via facebook with no response other than being told to arrange to make my own copy of the parts - bit difficult with clear parts.  So i'm left with an unbuildable £80 kit, and a £19 cockpit and £15 of Photo etch - not happy, and will be avoiding Trumpeter kits now.