Zenrat's Flying Circus

zenrat · July 11, 2016, 02:34:12 AM

Quote from: NARSES2 on July 10, 2016, 07:00:12 AM
Quote from: zenrat on July 09, 2016, 06:16:49 PM
Southern House - the railway offices where I worked - is apparently architecturally interesting. Can't say I ever saw that.

Can't say I can see it either and I walk past regularly. Mind you I suppose you never do notice the things you walk past every day, plus when do you ever look at an entire building in your home town ? Visiting somewhere different you look at things, home town ? No chance

When I lived in Portsmouth I regularly rode my bicycle past the Tricorn centre Multi-Storey Car Park. I was a Neo-Brutalist structure which won a design award for best use of concrete when it was built in the 50's or 60's and then another award for ugliest building in Britain shortly before it was demolished in the 90's.

But I digress.

You like all the stencilling Cap'n? I think it's a bit much. Do the real things really have all those labels? Would you really be able to see them on a truly scaled model?
I put them all on because lots of them were printed with the yellow markings and also i've never put all the stencils on a plane before. Not sure i'd do it again on a 1/72 build.

Anyhoo, decaling is now complete except the wheel doors and the ventral drop tank pylon. Here's the poor old things acne riddled underbelly.

zenrat · July 14, 2016, 10:22:47 PM

I've been clearing out our "Office" prior to a lick of paint and new flooring. In doing so i've 'found' Mrs z's history of computing stash. Amongst the goodies she has an Olivetti M-21 Luggable (a mere 15kg - how far mobile computing has come!) complete with Word Perfect, Wordstar and Lotus 123 on 5 1/4 inch floppies complete with all the manuals.

Also a daisywheel printer, a 286 laptop, two desktop dictaphones (standard and mini cassette) and a typewriter.

scooter · July 15, 2016, 03:32:52 AM

Quote from: zenrat on July 11, 2016, 02:34:12 AMHere's the poor old things acne riddled underbelly.

This might help

NARSES2 · July 15, 2016, 07:14:58 AM

Quote from: zenrat on July 14, 2016, 10:22:47 PM
Word Perfect and Lotus 123

I continued to use them until the day I retired

Probably the last person in what was the old British Steel to do so. I didn't change when BS switched to MS stuff ( and there is a story to be told there

) and was sufficiently up the ladder to get away with it. Still prefer 123 if I'm honest seems a little more logical to me in some ways, but I do use Excel now and have almost got to the point where I don't swear at it quite as often as in the past

zenrat · July 15, 2016, 10:07:42 PM

To be honest I was quite happy with Windows 3.1 and whatever version of Office we had running on that back in the end days or British Rail/Birth of Railtrack.
While the hardware has got faster and more powerful with bigger memories I can't really see any improvements in Word or Excel.

NARSES2 · July 16, 2016, 05:06:20 AM

Quote from: zenrat on July 15, 2016, 10:07:42 PM

While the hardware has got faster and more powerful with bigger memories I can't really see any improvements in Word or Excel.

Very true and basically because they do what we want them to do. Sure they "play around" with them at times but they don't really add anything to them.

I've used They and Them so often in this post it will probably get flagged up at GCHQ

zenrat · July 17, 2016, 03:57:47 AM

I am convinced They change things simply to justify a new release rather than because it's required.

ASIO/GCHQ/NSA only flag They and Them when capitalised so your post should be OK.
Of course, you are communicating with me which opens a whole new can of worms.
If anyone asks you about the West Chiltington Popular Front deny everything...

Steel Penguin · July 17, 2016, 04:08:37 AM

Zenrat, I thought Them was the correct term to describe the giant ants beneath New Mexico, o well another week, another watch list.

NARSES2 · July 17, 2016, 06:45:31 AM

Quote from: zenrat on July 17, 2016, 03:57:47 AM
I am convinced They change things simply to justify a new release rather than because it's required.

Very much so

zenrat · July 20, 2016, 04:12:03 AM

Been thinking about Peacemakers. I'm pretty much set on RAF anti-flash white but got to thinking about adding Operation Musketeer stripes...

zenrat · July 30, 2016, 06:49:55 PM

Visitors from the UK - my sister, BiL, nephew & niece.
Modelling time will be very limited for the next two weeks.

zenrat · August 11, 2016, 05:54:21 PM

Family still here.
I did manage to sneak off and undercoat some parts yesterday though.

My brain has not been inactive though.
Perfect Plastic Putty - this seems very close in consistency and texture and ease of sanding to premixed acrylic wall crack filler (Spackle, Polyfilla if you will - I'm using it by the litre as i'm renovating the house) which is now thoroughly high tech and completely different to the old powder filler you mixed with water which I used on models as a kid and which was porous, pin holed and always fell out. When my PPP runs out I may try using some new school wall filler to see how it copes.

The 1/48 Me 262 in the stash I robbed the engines from for the Hover Car. Obviously this is in the wrong scale and so needs to be scaleorama'd into 1/72. I'm thinking propeller airliner or bomber. Maybe Mosquito nacelles, maybe He 111, maybe something else. Maybe a fighter canopy or maybe windows painted on?

And what next? The Wessex is finished and the Banshee isn't far. The red Phantom just needs the fiddley bits done so there is room for another aircraft build to move properly onto the bench. I haven't built anything large for a while so maybe it's time to commence properly on the TurboCat? The hard bit is done (PSR on the turboprop nacelles) so I can get on with adding detail into the fuselage. It'll be a civilian aircraft with a mostly white colour scheme which will be fun painting over Academy's black plastic.

Captain Canada · August 11, 2016, 06:44:06 PM

Turbocat ! Turbocat ! What ?

It's funny, as I recall the first time I had seen the extensive stencilling, and it was on a USAF F-4. I think it was a trainer type, but it still flew. I just liked the look of it !

zenrat · August 12, 2016, 01:05:25 AM

Quote from: Captain Canada on August 11, 2016, 06:44:06 PM
Turbocat ! Turbocat ! What ?

PR19_Kit · August 12, 2016, 01:12:25 AM

Quote from: zenrat on August 11, 2016, 05:54:21 PM

Perfect Plastic Putty - this seems very close in consistency and texture and ease of sanding to premixed acrylic wall crack filler (Spackle, Polyfilla if you will - I'm using it by the litre as i'm renovating the house) which is now thoroughly high tech and completely different to the old powder filler you mixed with water which I used on models as a kid and which was porous, pin holed and always fell out. When my PPP runs out I may try using some new school wall filler to see how it copes.

For years before the current range of 'super putties' became available many of used Fine Finish Polyfilla as a joint line filler etc. It's still available in UK although only in large tubs now. I found the tubs always went solid before I could build enough models to use up the tub, and for a while it was available in large tubes, but they seem to have gone now.