OTDAEABT Contest - Maly Modelarz - Bristol Beaufort

[dansls1]

Ok - so now I have to admit more of my dorkiness. After finding out that the Lysander had a different squadron designation on the cover than the actual kit indicated, I took a look and the kit is plane OA-F. Now the link to the other model above (which doesn't work, if you try it you need to remove the '):' - or go here), has the designation as OA-X. Now, again I don't have any references to indicate whether F/O K. Campbell's fateful plane was F or X - but at least we're in the correct squadron

[Gharbad]

I love that canopy!
Great job, and hopefully your cats won't get a hold of that radar you have to build

[ashevilleangler]

Very nice job on the canopy! Since the spit had such a minimal interior I thought it best to keep it as covered as possible. As for the cats they used to chew everything as kittens but not so much now. In any case the roll top desk helps a lot as long as I remember to close it each night.
Cecil

[Don Boose]

It looks great, Dan. What did you use for the transparent material and what did you use to adhere it to the paper?

Don

[dansls1]

The transparent material is simple transparency paper used for overhead projectors. I went to my local office place (Office Depot, IIRC) and was able to buy individual sheets from their printing center - like $4 for 3 sheets, should last a while.
Here's a link to the glue I use for clear bits - http://www.gravesrc.com/JOZR5007_JOZ...p/jozr5007.htm . I found it in the hobby shop by the RC models. It's a similar consistency to aileens, only less tacky. It's somewhat difficult to work with because of that, but it's clear, and if you clean it after it starts to set but before it's completely dry, it gums up nicely and wipes off.

[Don Boose]

Thanks, Dan. I have used RCZ56 for adhering canopies and windows to stick and tissue models. Just discovered that my bottle is dried up, so the URL comes in very handy. May be able to get a couple packages of Excel No.11 blades at the same time -- the Maly paper dulls blades very quickly, even with the occasional use of a Sharpy.

This is a very nice build you are putting together and (naturally) I like the historical research you have done here and on the Lysander.

Don

[dansls1]

Originally Posted by boosed

This is a very nice build you are putting together and (naturally) I like the historical research you have done here and on the Lysander.

Don

Thanks. It's interesting, while I had never really paid much attention to the Beaufort before this build, it has definitely grown on me. If I get to the point where I have a block on what to build in the future, I can definitely see taking the scan of this kit, cleaning it up color-wise (I've found some mis-match from page to page) and printing a version on new cardstock to put together a cleaner build. While I'm not saying I'm half-assing this build, I definitely could do better with newer paper and a bit more time spent on the details. As is I'm really going to have to push to meet the OT deadline.

As far as the research, it's amazing what you can do with a little time on the internet. For somebody like yourself who is used to spending hours scouring books for vague references here and there to piece things together, it must be a huge boon that you can find somebody somewhere who has posted up information about almost any topic you can imagine. It also must seem like cheating :D. Obviously you can't trust everything you read - but depending on the amount of detail you actually need, there's quite a bit of helpful information available to anybody with 30 minutes and a web search tool

[Don Boose]

Dan -- Yes. Sometimes it seems like cheating, and there is a lot of misinformation on the Web, but the huge and growing range of documents and information available via computer is a real benefit. You soon get a feel for the reliable sites and where there are specialists and enthusiasts sharing information, as in this forum, misinformation soon comes to light and is usually corrected.

I do still love to browse through books and work through documentary materials -- it's like touching history. In August 1995, I was at the National Archives, doing research for an article about the establishment of the 38th Parallel in Korea (http://carlisle-www.army.mil/usawc/Parameters/1995/boose.htm). It was at the time of the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of V-J Day and I got a real thrill out of reading hand-written notes by General Marshall and Admirals King and Leahy and holding in my hand the message from General MacArthur advising the JCS that he was entering Tokyo Bay aboard USS Missouri for the surrender ceremony.

This takes us well off the subject of your Beaufort, but your comments on Internet research got me to reminiscing.

I'm in my AWC office today, reviewing a student thesis, but hope to get back to my Hampden this afternoon. I got the wing framework cut out and assembled last night and put the nose greenhouse together. Unfortunately, I ended up with one very visible gap where two of the panels come together and, although I had scanned the model before cutting it up, my printer refuses to print out a color that matches the gray that represents the Perspex. It makes me understand how MM has driven John Bowden to insane imprecations.

Best wishes on the continuing Beaufort build.

Don

[dansls1]

Ok - some pictures of where I'm at on this one. First 3 show the botch job on the nose (actually, could be worse, but could also be better), 4th shows some of the page to page color variation on this one, and the last is an overall view of where she stands right now.

[cjwalas]

Woo Hoo! I really like the look of this one, Dan. I know it's a simple and dated representation, but you're doing a great job on it and considering many of the other MM problems, the nose looks great! Are you running into design problems or is it mostly the paper quality (or lack thereof)? I see the typical creasing (though not bad), but is that wing mount area a total mess or are there pieces that actually fit there?
Chris