Narses2's Blog - or what I'm slowly making progress on

[NARSES2]

Paula Wilcox was in "Man about the House" and that series spawned two spin offs - "Robin's Nest" and "George and Mildred".  Both spin offs have aged badly and I loved them as a kid.

Ah, yep that was the one, I'll correct my error

[NARSES2]

Very little progress as been busy so hopefully this weekend.

Was at St Georges this morning and as it was a lovely day I thought I'd stroll up to Jane's Trains as mentioned above. Just my luck it was closed  Not sure if it doesn't open until latter as it was relatively early or might be summer holidays, but they did have a fair bit of Airfix stuff in the window amongst all the trains so worth a visit next time I'm at St Georges.

Anyway as my train was cancelled (broken down) and it was 40 mins for the next one I jumped on a bus home instead. Didn't even know it ran that way but it just pulled up as if by magic  So another nostalgic trip through those areas where a fair bit of my "wasted youth" was spent  Figg's Marsh, Mitcham, Fair Green (and the fair was in) The Common, both the Red and Blue pubs at either end of the measured mile are closed now, indeed one has gone completely. Factory Lane and the Mitcham Rd estate - ah memories 

[NARSES2]

Progress at last, despite the Olympics. I'm not really in to it, apart from the cycling which I've always liked, but find myself watching sports I would never have dreamt of watching before, like Freestyle Dressage !

Anyway the Flapjack has had her transfers. I'd have pitied the poor USN guy who given the USN's directions for applying markings guide was then presented with a Flapjack.  They drove me mad. The Hasegawa ones as usual took an age to separate from the backing paper, leaving a white dollop behind when they did and then had the cheek to stick to the first thing they glimpsed. The spares box ones decided to come off the backing immediately and curl up and go to sleep  Still done now.

The XP-42 now looks like an airplane. I think the plastic is the AML kit. Soft plastic and thick sprue gates, but once cleaned up the parts are a very good fit, bodes well for the Mohawk and 109D I have in the stash. Kora's resin is a good fit to it as well

The XP-54 now has the component parts done they just need assembling. Fuselage, wings, twin booms and tail. Always fun  The fuselage when trial fitted to the wings looks very Starwars'ish so maybe my pilot will be an Arapaho Native American called Skywalker  I will post a pic. once done so you can see.

[DogfighterZen]

The XP-54 now has the component parts done they just need assembling. Fuselage, wings, twin booms and tail. Always fun  The fuselage when trial fitted to the wings looks very Starwars'ish so maybe my pilot will be an Arapaho Native American called Skywalker  I will post a pic. once done so you can see.

Please do so, sounds interesting!

[zenrat]

Just looking at the box (Chris used it to post me a bagged Sea Fury) makes me excited about seeing this done.

[NARSES2]

OK couple of progress pics. as promised.

First the XP-42 still in the process of having her nose fixed.



Now the Swoose Goose. I have to say the wing to fusalage pod fit was superb. It would have put many a main stream producer to shame, and it's quite an old Planet kit.

See what I mean about the Starwar's fighter thing ? Maybe it's where the idea came from ? 

[NARSES2]

I was a little worried by the thought of fitting the Swoose Goose booms as they will require a lot of psr on what is likely to be a fragile joint. Looking for something to strengthen it I found nothing suitable. Sprue was to narrow a diameter and an old biro was to broad. Then a thought hit me, old style rawlplugs. Found a couple exactly the right size to hold the parts together and provide strength for the psr. 

[NARSES2]

Progress to greater and lesser degrees

The XP-42 has had some more psr and her rudder re-fixed. Can probably think in terms of some primer on the plastic/resin boundaries now.

The XP-54 has had her booms fitted and they will need a fair bit of fettling, so I need to break out the Miliput again.

The Flapjack is finished  However I've made a right howler with the transfers  I thought I followed the instructions and indeed it took a while to figure out where I'd gone wrong, but I think I know where now. The boo boo will become obvious when I post the pics up in the next couple of days. It can be fixed and if I take the model on tour it will be. Anyway I now know what not to do when the second one gets built next year.

Finally there are now various Defiant sub-assemblies on the bench drying and awaiting paint.

[NARSES2]

Here's some pics of the latest progress. The 54's tailplane will be fun. Needs extending as the booms are to wide apart, not much but enough. As far as I can tell I've got the booms straight and parallel so it night be the kit ?

[Dizzyfugu]

Just a side note - IIRC, the P-54's tail booms were not parallel - the distance between them was deciling towards the stabilizer; check this here:



Sometimes, reality is more weird than the whiffy idea? 

[Captain Canada]

Those are both looking good Chris ! Looking forward to seeing more. Does look rather Star Wars. Big machine !

[NARSES2]

Cheers Dizzy, that's helpfull

[NARSES2]

Some progress.

The XP-42 has started to have numerous etch grills ? attached to the wings. I need to read up some more on this, but I'm assuming they were attempts to solve the horrendous engine overheating problems the thing had ?

The XP-54 is in the middle of some quite intensive Miliput work which will drag on I think.

So I've started on a new tool Airfix Defiant which will just be a paint wif and is going together very well and very quickly  I've built one and still have a couple more in the stash one of which is for a more extensive planned wif.

[NARSES2]

Defiant is basically built and has had her undersides painted

[Captain Canada]

Sounds like we";;be seeing some finished pics any minute now !