Egilman

You doin' a Skeeter!.... Oh I'm in, definitely in! Beautiful job on the Beaufort....

Now you need a "Honey I shrunk the Aircraft Carrier!" to put it on.... {chuckle} (just don't tell her the size of the display case) Beautiful job brother... looks gorgeous...

Almost 4 feet long? do they make a cabinet big enough? {chuckle} I'm down for this one...

Your doing fine my friend.... Looks like you got the ideals of aftermarket down pat.... Nice job....

Two ways to do it Brother, (well actually three) two decent ones and one very difficult... #1 leave the idler return wheel off until it's time to put the track on and do them together... #2 Leave the sprocket off until it's time to put the track on, a bit more difficult than #1 but along the same lines... #3 Assemble the tracks around the complete suspension, this was always the most difficult method for me, I could never get the last track link connection to line up properly... I'm in my friend...

Looks to me like you got it down pat... The secret is to not spray directly at the edge, let the masking do it's thing... (and spray at low pressure) Excellent job! nothing like duplicating the actual way they did it in real life.... Well Done...

Of all the boneyards in the world {chuckle} The Foss Boatyard.... I got an opportunity to tour the SS Lady Washington when she was at Foss (Tacoma) getting restored.... Today, Foss's landing is a big shiny glass and steel museum.... I believe the original boatyard was at the head of what today is called Thea Foss Waterway.... And everyone in the nautical world should know the name of Foss.. As both a tug company and a tug builder... I'm in, I have to be, since your modeling a piece of my home counties history... Thank you...

Update: Well I went ahead and finished off the right side decals today... Tomorrow I have some parts arriving for her, Landing Gear doors, Speed Brake Doors & Metal landing gear... She's now ready for an overall final coat of future and then attaching the wings to the fuselage... and finishing details... Onwards....

Thanks everyone for the well wishes, it is much appreciated... The Admiral and I had a chance to talk out a few things this weekend and came to some resolutions.... As far as where I'm going to wind up, it is no different than before, it is where we all wind up eventually... Like Craig pointed out... And if I so choose I can look at it like I know the offramp I'll be taking from the highway of life on this rock, but it's up to me how long I take to get there... The Admirals suggestion was to get busy, I have models to build, lots of them and if I keep worrying about what might be I'll never get them done..... So I'm here for the duration my friends, And I'm done moping/worrying about it... The only thing I can do is keep pushing forward til the man above says it is time... And that he hasn't brought up to me... the rest we will deal with as it comes... So lets get back to modeling... the rest will work itself out... I have a beautiful bird sitting on my desk that needs my attention... Thank you all... EG

Coventry was raided 17 times during the war the first in June '40, the last raid being in June of '42.... When people talk about the bombing of Coventry they usually mean the raid of Nov 14/15th 1940... It was the first major firebombing of a major city during the war... (the Germans applied the same tactics in this raid they used to bomb Guernica during the Spanish Civil War) The bombing raid lasted for over 10 hrs continously... some 800 cannister bombs containing over 30k incendiaries were dropped over the city after an estimated 1200-1600 High explosive bombs ranging between 50kg and 500kg in weight. (roughly 500 tons) There is a story that the RAF was warned of the mission from Ultra intercepts and Churchill decided not to do anything about it to keep the decryption of Ultra messages secret, but the conspiracy is completely unfounded... The Ultra intercept happened Nov 9th, it was not decoded until Nov 11th and was concerning radio vectors that the Germans were using to guide bombers to their targets... It indicated three potential targets, Coventry being one of them... All efforts to figure out what the actual target was failed... 1:00 PM the afternoon of the 14th the radio beacons were detected but no specific direction were indicated by them... 3:00PM they were jammed by countermeasures but it made it clear that Coventry was the target... There was no "pre-warning" and there was no alert given at that time... At 6:15pm the first wave of Kampfgruder 100's HE-111's crossed the English coast but not riding the beam it could not be determined what their final destination was.... At 6:50pm it was decided that Coventry was the target and a yellow alert was sent at 7:02pm... The Yellow alert was upgraded to a red alert at 7:10pm and the sirens started.... 7:10pm Kampfgruder 100 started releasing it's first bombs... The raid continued until first light the next morning, 6:02am when Luftwaffe records state the last bomb was released.... The allclear was sounded at 6:17am.... The fires are reported to have burned for two days.... It wasn't the worst raid the Germans had committed, but it was the first major fire bombing raid of the war and as such it sticks in the mind.... And then there is that phoney conspiracy theory over Churchill deciding to allow Coventry to be bombed.... It was a devastating raid, the worst up to that point, but hardly the worst of the war is the truth of the matter... PS: by mid '43, most of the damage had been repaired....

It all came down to those radar stations along the coast, the Germans didn't know what they were at first but figured they had a lot to do with the success of Fighter command downing so many bombers that they decided to launch a campaign against them and vector fighter sweeps against the airfields where the Hurricanes and Spits were being flown from... towards the last few months, fighter command was down to less than 50 flyable crates, and yes they were crates mostly hastily repaired birds barely able to fly.... Every day the JU88's & 87's were bombing the radar stations... The Luftwaffe would knock the towers down and the RAF Fighter control were putting them back up, Finally the Luftwaffe had them where three of the sites were offline.... They ran out of parts for the antenna sets.... Which meant that Fighter command was unable to vector what few fighters they had against the german bomber formations... It was the darkest hour.... one more week of bombing the radar stations and sweeping the fighter fields would have left the island without any early warning or defenses in the air at all.... Then, inexplicably, Hitler ordered them to concentrate on the cities, predominantly because of the reduction in resistance the RAF was putting up... Not realizing that he had basically won the fight his reasoning was that bombing the cities would reduce British resolve to fight... One of the biggest miscalculations of the war... He gave the RAF a reprieve and a chance to rebuild, while at the same time hardening British resolve.... A lot of historians consider the war lost for the Germans from that point on.... And to be honest it was.... It was the RAF's finest hour.... Three years later, the Germans found out for themselves how effective fighter sweeps & a concentrated bombing campaign were against an airforce... The allies were using the same tactics that almost won the Battle of Britain for the Germans... Everyone likes to think it was the Royal Navy that kept the Germans out of England, tactically, no it wasn't, it was failing to secure air superiority that kept them out of England... They had it in their grasp and failed to realize it...

Yes one of the best war movies of all time... It shows the period of the RAF Fighter Command's greatest victory... Going from a hairsbreadth from extinction to eliminating the Luftwaffe from the skies of England.... Very few true stories tell such a tale.... Many do not know how close the Germans came to complete air superiority over England in 1940-41.... Their finest hour....

Brother, that is one of the best jobs of tonal masking I've ever seen, and the first using metallic's.... Very, Very well done... And thanks for showing the proper technique... Not too many know how to do it correctly... Very nice...

Thanks Lou... It's one of my favorites as well, I'm sure one can turn up on your shelf eventually, trust me, stranger things have happened.... As far as promised builds, RL sometimes has a way of making liars out of everyone... As well may be the case in my situation... I need to ask the doc some more direct questions about my situation, but it appears there may be a model yard sale in my future, cause clearly I'm never going to build everything I have... Right now I have some RL issues I need to deal with both legal and financial, and to be honest model building is taking a back seat to them... Need to make sure the admiral is taken care of before I'm unable to do it kind of stuff... When the muse and time returns I will finish up what I've started as much as I am able... But my dream projects probably will never be realized.... As time allows I will still plug along as always.... Life goes on so they say... So cheer up my friend Not going anywhere if I can help it... {chuckle} (I know your yanking my chain my friend, no worries) Will continue to post as able to... Carry on my friends... EG

Thanks Brother.. I don't know if I will do that much Ken, I was thinking about a mat of some type to highlight the aircraft but right now I have a few other issues to handle that have made themselves a priority...

Thank you Brothers, it is really appreciated....

I remember that one, was a bear not getting glue on the hinges... Mine was the retractable landing gear on the monogram F3F, geared to the prop, pull it out and the gear engages and when turned it raised/lowered the landing gear... There a lot of memorable kits from back then.... I agree with Alan, beautiful work....

Yep twin Lewis Guns, very effective and the last of the drum fed medium machine guns... And they represented the wooden guide vanes for the torpedo very well, they stabilized the torpedo while it was dropping from the aircraft and broke off when it entered the water.... Excellent work my friend.... Impressive...

I'm in Brother... The Beaufort was one tough aircraft, I can imagine the hell that was visited upon it to bring one down...

Absolutely! I second this technique for the same reasons... When you do a putty mask you shoot off the putty, not at it... Distance then dictates the sharpness of the edge allowing for the natural air current pattern to give you a soft edge... Distance determines how soft the edge is... Varying the size of the putty mask will also cause the softness of the edge to vary... It's an excellent technique for getting a natural edge for those sprayed on patterns.... As Craig says don't allow the paint to collect against the mask, it will pull off with the mask if that happens...

Yep, not as widely as it was in the 60's but still available from Wal Mart, Amazon and Crayola who now owns the rights to it... (you can also find it in Dollar Tree from time to time) I no longer use it, opting for a Blue Tack derivative from Lock-Tite that leaves nothing behind....

Oh yes, and the oil formulation they used in it to make it pliable would attack some paints as well... The trick was to find an overcoat that put a hard shell over the paint... How do you think future became the hard shell overcoat of choice... {chuckle} That's a part I also love about this hobby, the experimentation that goes on to find out what works... Keep on truckin' brother, looks like it's gonna be another stunner when done...

All the Mr. products are Gunze-Sangyo products...

Thank you Brothers.... Just want you all to know how much your support is appreciated... I went out and took a few more shots of the left side... Outside, since the Lord has graced us with beautiful sunny skies today.... I Never pass up the opportunity to enjoy such gifts... Here they are.... It never ceases to amaze me at how much better models look in direct sunlight.... Trying to figure out an appropriate backdrop for when I get her finished, I want her sitting in a semi-realistic setting... before I call her done... Anyway... Onwards... (snails pace yes, but still moving forward, no looking back) EG

Silly Putty is what we used for this type of masking in the old days before Blue Tack, and now AK getting into the act... Very old idea... But it's the only way to do some styles camouflage...