This post, and these words, were optimistically titled on May 22. Here's hoping....
It is now mid August, and we have moved into our new Calgary house. The move is complete but far from finished. We have been in Calgary for about 6 weeks. Most of the house has been unpacked and set up with the notable exceptions of Marie’s and my hobby areas. Probably 80% of the boxes are unpacked. Marie has done a great job sorting out the main floor, especially the kitchen and living room. It’s getting closer to being home, but as Marie has told a couple people, it still feels like we are living in a vacation rental.
The move itself went well. There are no longer any movers based in Fort McMurray, and no one will come up to do an estimate. It is instead all done over the phone and using video and pictures. We knew the cost estimate was low but it was still a shock when the final bill came in. They had estimated 1 day to pack and 1 day to unload. It actually took 3 days to pack and 2 days to unload. The truck was so full that they had to load mattresses and the patio dining table onto the truck’s back doors! Final scale tally was a staggering 31,000 lbs. The McMurray moving crew was excellent. The Calgary crew were a little rougher, both in appearance and physically. There wasn’t much damage but what did happened likely was a result of the Calgary crew’s rougher unloading.
The house has a lot of features we aren’t used to or familiar with. The central vac works but we generally prefer our little handheld Dyson over lugging the central vac system’s big hose around. The water softener didn’t have any instructions. It’s an old Sears model but surprisingly you can still look up the manual. The steam shower had no directions but turned out to be really simple to use. The theater room was pure trial and error, taking 2 full days to figure out and get set up. The sprinkler system clearly hadn’t been used for some time, and needed a service visit to get it back into operation. The hot tub was a slimy mess of cold water when we opened the lid two weeks after moving in. That was an unpleasant surprise, and needed a lot of work to get it back into operation. It still isn’t working properly and a service tech is coming next week to look at the pump and heater.
The former owners had let the yard go wild, so a lot of time has been spent cleaning the yard up and literally hacking plants down. I have filled our large green bin - it’s the same size as our curbside garbage bin - three times and I’m probably not finished trimming. The worst was probably the 4cm diameter tree that was growing through the gas meter piping!
The yard wasn’t fenced when we moved in and we were anxious to get a fence installed for the dogs. Most of the prep and approvals was done before we left McMurray, so the fencers were ready to start the day after we arrived in Calgary. The fence was installed in 2 days and the dogs are happy with their new yard.
Getting cable hooked up and a security system installed was equally fast. Shaw was here the first day, on an appointment booked a month before we arrived. The tech was a couple hours late but quickly had cable and internet running. Telus arrived on our second day, also on an appointment booked a month in advanced, and had the existing system converted and new devices installed within a couple hours. We are now cutting edge, with internet access and video surveillance!
Getting a shed has been a much slower process. The architectural guidelines prevent installing a resin Canadian Tire special. Comparing prices of raw materials against kits and installed sheds quickly showed there was little advantage to building it myself. That’s until you try and book a company to fabricate and install your shed. Eight to ten weeks seems to be the standard timeline, and that slipped an additional 2 weeks once we booked. The actual install date then kept jumping ahead, from the end of September to mid September, and now will be installed next Tuesday. I am looking forward to getting a large amount of stuff out of the garage and into the new shed. After that it should finally make it possible to start setting up the garage. It will be so nice to have access to all my tools again.
The house interior was generally well looked after. As boxes were unloaded I noted paint cans tucked in closets and storage areas all over the house. The movers left a number of dings in the walls, and I was hopeful that we had appropriate paint to allow touch up repairs. Bringing all the paint cans together resulted in 15 different cans. The existing interior house colours are primarily dark blue and light grey. That didn’t seem too difficult until a search of the paint cans found 4 different blues and 6 different greys! It took some experimenting but I eventually figured out where 3 of the 4 blues were used, and 2 of the 6 greys. The mover’s dings are now repaired but I have found a couple others that need to be done.
Over the last couple of weeks, we have got the rest of the house and yard sorted enough that Marie and I have both been able to start looking at our respective hobby areas. Marie has gotten the bigger items set up and her sewing machine is operating. She has resumed quilting while still unpacking the remaining boxes. I started the process by clearing out my new hobby room so I could assess the space and get the large pieces of furniture in place. Several arrangements were tried before landing on the version shown in the pictures below. A trip to IKEA resulted in new shelving and a new rolling cabinet to store hobby paints. With shelving up, I started unpacking the built models. I’ve probably now got about 60% of the models unpacked and on the shelves. There has been some damaged, mostly to landing gear and antennas, that has been easily repaired. Our realtor recommended a guy to install a new spray booth exhaust vent but getting hold of him has been an experience. He was supposed to show up last week but I never heard from him. Fingers crossed we connect this week and I can get the spray booth back in operation. I am hopeful that I will be able to get back to modelling in the next couple of weeks. The railroad space is still full of boxes but I think I can get at it soon. The old railroad was transported from McMurray in three sections, and form the core of the new layout. The movers took the control panels off when they moved the sections so there is going to be some work to sort out the wires and get them reconnected.
Photo 1 - The starting point. What the hobby room looked like after the movers had all the boxes moved in.
Photo 2 - The hobby room has been emptied out, ready to set things up
Photo 3 - Furniture has been set up and shelves are in place. Starting to unpack built models to display
And that’s a quick summary of the last 10 weeks.
I haven’t found the box containing the models under construction but they will be in one of the five built models boxes still to be unpacked. The summary below was written back in May and describes where things were left when the hobby bench was packed up.
RCAF C-130J Hercules
The plane was painted with Model Master "Air Mobility Grey". Model Master is so easy to spray and get good results. It's unfortunate it was discontinued.
They might look the same, but look hard enough at pictures and you will find there are differences between the kit's USAF markings and what has been used on the RCAF planes. The most obvious was the size and shape of the walkways. Naturally, I packed my spare masking tape two days before realizing this. I was nervous I would run out of tape.
Turns out that wasn't the only masking. Looking closely at my pictures, the gear bays and door interiors were white, the exhaust shields were black, the tail radar sensor was black, the engine intake lips and port side panels above the main gear were silver, and the underside of the engines were white.
I got a little overspray on the fuselage while painting the tail radar sensor. I attempted to polish it out with 4000 grit sandpaper but the paint was so thin I burned through to the plastic after two swipes. A quick spray restored everything and it was good as new.
Photo 1 - Walkways masked and ready for painting.
Photo 2 - A lot of masking and painting was needed for an “all grey” airplane.
Photo 3 - Painting complete.
I decided to call a stop to building on June 1. Continuing work was causing too much disruption to packing, and things I didn't think i need but found I did were already packed. So the Hercules will be carefully packed up, to be restarted in the fall.
Here's how it looked before being packed up.
What to build next?
With the Hercules nearing completion, it’s time to think about what to build next. It’s been long enough since I built the last float plane that the pain of installing floats has faded. Before leaving McMurray, I had a Fairchild 71 and a Fokker Super Universal set out. I really like the look of these 1/72 Aeroportos resin kits, so will take a shot at building the Super Universal as G-CASK, a Punch Dickens’ Canadian Airways plane that was a regular visitor to Fort McMurray. The kids will know it as the plane shape on the side of the Dickensfield school. And yes, Dickensfield is named after Punch Dickens.
Now that we are in Calgary, I think it appropriate to start something with a Calgary theme. There are many different options, but I really want to get started on something from RCAF 403 City of Calgary squadron. It was the first RCAF overseas squadron stood up in WWII, and continues to this day as a helicopter training squadron based in New Brunswick. By chance, I had previously built an RCAF Tomahawk in 403 colours, the first planes the squadron used. I think it appropriate to continue in sequence, so the next plane will be the 1/48 Tamiya Spitfire Mk1.
1/48 Tamiya Spitfire MkI
There are several stories interwoven with this choice. As noted above, I had previously build the 1/48 Airfix Curtiss Tomahawk in 403 colours. Three Canadian squadrons flew the Tomahawk, and in truth, I really wanted to build it as a 414 Squadron plane, after the photo below, but was unable to locate the appropriate decals. I stumbled across a set of Iliad Decals that included an RCAF plane, and so built my first 403 Squadron aircraft.
414 Squadron Tomahawks over England
403 Squadron Tomahawks patrolling over England
Several years ago, while on vacation in Kelowna, I was mentally preparing my wishlist before visiting Fine Scale Hobbies in Pentiction. This was a wonderful hobby shop, with a fantastic selection of kits, generally including all the hot new releases I was reading about in the magazines. The 1/48 Tamiya Spitfire MkI was just out, and was getting fantastic reviews. I was salivating over the idea of getting one, but the RCAF didn’t fly the MkI. I already had too many unbuilt kits in the stash, and was trying to limit new purchases to my self imposed Canadian theme. So the new Spitfire was out.
But I really wanted one. So, given it was 6 am and no one else was awake, I spent some time googling MkI Spitfires. It turns out that the RCAF actually did have a MkI, and only 1, on strength. It was a test aircraft, loaned to the RCAF by the RAF, for evaluation purposes. By chance, as I continued googling, I came across a reference to 403 Squadron. It took some digging but I eventually found a list of all aircraft types used by the squadron, including Spitfire Mkl’s!
Continued reading discovered that 403 Squadron was the City of Calgary Squadron, once of several RCAF squadrons adopted by Canadian cities. I was aware that several RCAF squadrons had city affiliations, most notably the post war B-25s associated with the City of Edmonton and City of Saskatoon, but hadn’t realized it was a more wide spread practice, or that there was a squadron associated with Calgary. That really piqued my interest, and a plan was hatched to model 403 Squadron aircraft as a Canadian sub theme. If you are interested, and have a lot of time, you can find some really great info and history at the following 2 sites
https://www.rcafassociation.ca/heritage/history/rcaf-and-the-crucible-of-war/403-squadron/
This site covers the squadrons formation and history, including access to operational logs and a list of aircraft types
https://rcaf403squadron.wordpress.com
This site tends to focus on the people and stories associated with the squadron’s pilots and crews
Try as I might, I could not find any pictures of 403 Squadron Mk.1 Spitfires. I have found a list of serial numbers and registrations so will be able to ensure the markings are technically correct. There are no decals available so it will be necessary to create paint masks. That’s a good enough start. Fine Scale Hobbies did indeed have the new Tamiya Spitfire kit, and with all my new found knowledge about 403 Squadron, it was justifiably purchased.
And that marks the end of a blog that spans three months and two cities. The next blog, consisting of research into the next builds, is already half written. I am guessing it will likely be mid September before I have made enough progress on the current builds to justify sending out an update.
Until then, take care and stay safe.
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