Recent content by stona

Number four of five of these little 1/72 scale fighters done! This a Spitfire IX, operated by No. 312 (Czechoslovak) Squadron. I did not expect the special markings to obscure the national markings - something expressly forbidden - but found a photo that shows that this was indeed the case.

Number three of five - A P-51 in the markings of one flown by George Preddy, though the knowledgeable will notice that this is not the correct aircraft for these markings. This is an OOB exercise, so it is what it is!

Next of the five in the D-Day fighter set is done. It's supposed to be Priller's Fw 190 A-8, but only came with an option for four wing cannon. It's Priller's machine with two bonus cannons! Next up is the American D-Day fighter, a P-51.

It's been a while, but as someone who usually works in larger scales I have found myself in 1/72 scale recently. First, a D-Day build. It is Glider No.1, a Horsa glider and the first to land at the Benouville (now Pegasus) Bridge, shortly after midnight on 6 June 1944. On board this glider...

Squadron Leader Mark Long. RIP.

Looks like MK356, operated by the BBMF. There will be a military investigation rather than one by the AAIB.

Be careful not to confuse the 3./JG 21 and later 9./JG 54 devil's head with the very similar emblem of 2./JG 26 (before the colour was changed). People who should know better have done so :)

Here's something unusual for me, it's Russian, even if it's really American. It's a P-39 Q-30 Airacobra of 213 GIAP of the 22 GIAD (Guard Air Fighter Division) of the VVS in early 1945, when the white diagonal recognition marking (and white nose) were introduced. I don't know much about the VVS...

I took my car for a service today, knowing I had a slow puncture, and Audi tried to charge me £167.16 for this. I got it fixed at a local tyre place (shout out to Plume Tyres) for the princely sum of £23.50. I'm obviously not annoyed at a saving of £143.66, but at Audi. A lot of people would...

This story annoyed me today. "The remains of a Second World War pilot missing since he embarked from north Africa on a mission in a bomber jet on July 1943 have been discovered in a painstaking forensic investigation eight decades later. The B-25 Mitchell bomber departed Tunisia to attack the...

And surely the Germans had the fuels, they just couldn't build the engines to make the most of them. The reason they were running de-rated engines was not because of the fuels.

What if Galland came down in an English field in late August 1940? He had about twenty victories which can't be taken away but the rest of his illustrious career? His ruthless self promotion after the war? Etc., etc. None of that would have been possible while he kicked his heels for four and a...

Bruce Guthro of Scottish band Runrig has died at just 62 years-old. Bruce himself was a Canadian from Nova Scotia, so it seems quite appropriate that he enjoyed a career with a Scottish band. I did one tour with Runrig many years ago, somewhere around 2000. They enjoyed success in the UK and...

I took a swing at something outside my comfort zone, something Japanese. It's the A5M 'Claude' from the 1/32 and not exactly brilliant Special Hobby kit. I tried to get the yellowed aluminium dope finish for which these Japanese aircraft were known, but without overdoing it. This was as...

There has been much hullabaloo about the new(ish) Kotare 1/32 scale Spitfires, so I thought I'd build one. It's a very nice kit, well engineered and with a superb fit. It also comes with a very complete and well researched instruction booklet. For my money it's better than the Tamiya uber-kits...