Merry Christmas and happy new year! We had a wonderful Christmas this year.
Christine finished her fall term December 12, with a final presentation of her term project. The project was a combined transportation hub in downtown Calgary, including transit bus and LRT, with potential to include intercity transportation modes. It was a mad rush to finish everything, with several all nighters needed. Marie and I helped with the final details on the model, installing flocking grass and planting trees. It was the first time I have used flocking and I was impressed by the result.
The boys arrived home late on December 21. Daniel flew into Edmonton on the 20th to sort out his possessions in Edmonton. Then he and Nicholas drove down to Calgary on Saturday. Jill, Nicholas’ girlfriend, arrived late on the 26th. It is very good to have everyone home for Christmas.
Our new kitchen table and chairs were supposed to arrive the end of November but shipping issues and confusion in delivery dates pushed it back to December 12. Except only the table arrived. The delivery crew didn't know anything about chairs. It was the second delivery error, as a previously scheduled date to deliver the chairs failed to happen. Marie contacted the store and was told the earliest delivery date would be January. We had sold the old table and chairs earlier that afternoon, which left us in a pickle, with no chairs at all, especially with the boys coming home for Christmas. Marie, very politely but firmly, told the vendor that wasn't acceptable, and they would find a way to have the chairs delivered next day. Something must have clicked, as she received 4 follow up phone calls, including head office, apologizing. Magically, the chairs were delivered the next day. The new table looks good and the extra size will be handy for Christmas activities.
We attended a Philharmonic Christmas concert at the Grace Presbyterian Church on December 10. It was a great setting and a fantastic concert.
It has been a busy month for future travel, with two cruises booked. The first is a Panama Canal trip, from Ft. Lauderdale to Santiago in October 2025, on board a Viking Expedition ship. It will include an extension that will let us ride a Peruvian train and see Machu Pichu. The other trip is thru the Scandinavian countries, starting in Amsterdam and includes Oslo, Stockholm, Copenhagen and Helsinki. That trip is in the fall of 2026.
There was lots of visiting and entertaining over the holidays. Marie went into full holiday mode this year, wanting everything to be perfect for our first year in the new home. Decorating was more difficult than usual, as she had to find new homes for everything. In the end, our home looked wonderful and festive.
Looking forward, the boys and Jill head out the weekend of January 4th. Nicholas heads back to Edmonton, and Daniel heads to the far east for an epic 4 week back pack trip. Nicholas will Join him later in the month, and they will spend their 24th birthday together in Thailand. Daniel gets back to Calgary on February 5th, then heads to Austin to start full time with Tesla on the 7th. Christine begins her winter term the 2nd week of January. It will be a busy time, as this term includes a spring session, with 3 months of instruction based out of Barcelona. Feels like a road trip to Spain coming on.
Marie wants to repaint the living, dining and kitchen areas after Christmas. The walls are currently a dark blue, which looks really good but is too dark given these rooms don’t get much direct sunlight. The plan is to repaint them in a Dove White. I am thinking it will take a couple weeks, start to finish, so probably not much modelling in January.
Tamiya Spitfire
The fuselage roundels have been masked and painted. The port side turned out really well but the starboard side mask lifted yellow and blue paint. Repairs were attempted by restoring the masks and repainting but it didn’t work very well. Rather than attempt another repair, I decided to go with the kit decals. The painted roundels were gently sanded down and the camouflage colours restored. Even with sanding, the outlines of the painted roundel was still faintly visible.
I also had paint lift when removing the wing roundels masks. I don’t recall previously having issues with Tamiya acrylics sticking to the mask material, but it is clearly what happened. Repairs were made by restoring the masks and repainting. This time the repair was more effective and should look okay after weathering.
Sorting out placement of the squadron code letters was next. Online resources indicate that RAF fuselage code letters should be 48” high unless the fuselage was too small, and then smaller letters could be used. The three kit schemes had code letters that varied from 24” to 48”, with the 48” letters clearly being too large on the small Spitfire fuselage. Looking at later marks of Spitfire suggested that 22” - 36” letters were more common. Checking out decals from other kits I had seemed to confirm that 36” (ish) was more typical.
With that was sorted, the next question was letter location. It appears that the fuselage roundels were directly opposite each other on the fuselage. RAF regulations preferred that the squadron code letters - KH in this case - should be together and on the left when read left to right. The airplane letter - N for this example - would be on the right side of the roundel. That works relatively well on the starboard side, where the aircraft letter fits under the canopy, but things get crowded on the port side, where the two squadron letters end up crowded under the canopy. I was under the impression that the squadron letters were centered on a line that ran through the roundel, but there was simply no way that would work on the port side, as the letters would end up in the canopy. There are examples of Spitfires with the forward letters dropped down to clear the canopy, but that didn’t look right to me. Eventually it dawned on me that many Spitfires appeared to have the bottom of the letters aligned with the bottom of the roundel. That worked much better and allowed everything to fit. Masks were adjusted, recut and the code letters and serial numbers painted.
Photo 1 - Squadron codes and serial number masked and painted. Look carefully and you can see the faint outline of the overpainted roundel.
Photos 2&3 - Decals complete.
Photos 4&5 - First stage of weathering complete.
Decals were sealed with a layer of clear gloss. Weathering was started with a overall wash of thin oil paints, in this case “starship filth”. The wash was allowed to dry to an hour and then gently wiped off with paper towel and Q-Tips. The model was left a couple days for the wash to dry, then sprayed with a clear matte coat. Weathering resumed using pastel chalks, mainly browns, greys and blacks. Wear along panel lines and the cockpit area was created using a light grey paint applied with a fine tip brush. Once dry, silver paint was sparing applied to repaint areas where the paint had been worn down to bare metal. Gun powder and exhaust stains were created using the various colours of chaulk.
With weather complete, the final bits and pieces were added. The exhausts were painted in several silver/metal colours, then highlighted with chaulk. Wing tip navigation lights were created using silver and then clear red/green paint. The antenna was added and rigging placed using fine EZ-Line. Canopy masks were removed, and the permanent canopy pieces were installed. The front armoured glass went missing after painting, so an alternate part was painted and added to the front of the windscreen. And with that, the 403 Squadron Spitfire Mk.I was complete.
Fokker Super Universal
There has been no progress on the Fokker since last update. The next step is to rescribed the repaired panel lines on the wings. It is a task I don’t like, mainly because I am not very good at it and end up have to redo it several times. I will need to grit my teeth and get this kit redoing.
Next up. 1/72 Airfix Fairchild (Canadian Vickers) Bolingbroke (Bristol Blenheim MkIVf)
Next up on the bench will be a 1/72 Fairchild Bolingbroke, using the Airfix Blenheim Mk.IVf kit.
This is what Airfix has to say about the Blenheim in the kit’s instructions:
The first of the Bristol Blenheim series of light bombers flew as early at 1935. Capable of speeds comparable to the biplane fighters of the day, the Blenheim seemed a modern machine but by the outbreak of the Second World War fighter development had rendered the Blenheim vulnerable. First seeing service in France, the Blenheim Mk.I was defended by a single machine gun in the turret and a fixed machine gun in the wing and although later versions of the Mark IV featured twin turret runs as well as a ventral turret under the nose, the Blenheim was always vulnerable to fighter attack. The later Mk.IV featured a radically different nose, giving the bomb aimed more room, but otherwise the basic design remained unchanged. The Blenheim served in Europe, North Africa, and in the Far east and was a versatile machine, even used a heavy fighter with an underbelly arrangement of 4 machine guns.
Diggin through references and the internet fleshed out Airfix’s basic history. The plane was conceived as the Bristol Type 142, making quite the splash when it was introduced April 1935. Designed in response to a challenge by Lord Rothermore, to create the fastest commercial aircraft in Europe, the 142 was faster than any aircraft then in the RAF inventory. The Air Ministry, recognizing the type’s potential, soon placed orders for use as a bomber, with deliveries of the Mk.I model beginning in March 1937. The plane, designed as a commercial airliner, had a number of shortcomings in military service, most notably was the extremely cramped nose position of the bombardier/navigator. A nose extension, along with increased armament, bigger fuel tanks, and more powerful engines, made the plane more useable but came at the cost of reduced load capacity and speed. The improved plane, designated as the Blenheim Mk.IV, formed the backbone of RAF bomber command, and saw extensive use in the first 18 months of the war. Rapid improvements in fighter design meant the Blenheim became increasingly vulnerable to fighter attack, and it suffered heavy losses in France. It was withdrawn from bomber service as soon as newer designs became available, transferring over to coastal patrol and training roles.
There seems to be considerable confusion around the origins of the Bolingbroke. I had understood that it was a derivative of the Blenheim Mk.IV, and there is considerable published resources that support this. There are also references that indicate the Bolingbroke is a Canadianization of the Blenheim Mk.IV, with changes made by Fairchild to adapt the Mk.IV to better suit RCAF needs. Carl Vincent, a noted Canadian aviation author, provides a more complicated history. He indicates that the Bolingbroke was conceived when Bristish Coastal Command, recognizing a need to develop a more modern general reconnaissance aircraft, requested Bristol in 1936 to revise their Blenheim Mk.I to create an aircraft more suitable for its needs. The new plane, to be known as the Bolingbroke Mk.I, was to have a number of improvements over the Blenheim Mk.I, including a new, extended nose, to improve the Mk.I’s very limited cockpit visibility. Other major changes included four crew instead of three, addition of cabin heaters, incorporation of deicing boots, addition of a dingy for overwater missions, and conversion to more readily powerful Mercury XV engines. Canada and Australia became interested in the new plane, and placed orders for 18 and 40 aircraft respectively, as they also began to modernize their air forces. The new nose designed proved problematic for Bristol, delaying work on the Bristol Beaufort bomber, which in turn caused the British government to cancel the Bolingbroke in 1937. Coastal Command is directed to instead order the Lockheed Hudson. Canada, with an uncharacteristic firmness, refuses to accept the cancellation, and pursuades Bristol to continue development. Fairchild Aircraft of Montreal was awarded a license to construct the Bolingbroke, and began preparing for production. Bristol finally solved the nose vibration problems and the drawings are passed to Fairchild to construct the 18 Canadian aircraft. Canadian production is slow to get underway, with the first plane ready to fly in 1938. Design problems and issues with the wing castings provided by Bristol cause considerable rework, so that the first production Bolingbroke I didn’t enter service until September 1939. Meanwhile, the RAF, impressed by the Bolingbroke I design, directed Bristol to build a bomber version, to be called the Blenheim MK.IV. With work already done by Bristol on the Bolingbroke, the new Mk.IV bomber entered service in 1938, a full year sooner than the Bolingbroke.
The initial 18 Canadian Bolingbroke Mk.I aircraft were taken on strength in 1939 and assigned to No 8 Squadron at Sydney, Nova Scotia as replacements for Vickers Deltas. The aircraft used P&W Junior Wasp engines, similar in power to the Mercury engines used on the Blenheim Mk.I, but totally inadequate for the heavier Bolingbroke. Crews quickly discovered that the underpowered Bolinbroke I couldn’t maintain altitude, on a single engine, with a full load. Desparate for aircraft, additional Bolingbrokes were ordered, but with the more powerful Mercury XV engines. This solved the power problems, and was used on all aircraft after the initial order of 18. A total of 627 Bolingbrokes were eventually built by Fairchild, serving as patrol aircraft with No 8, 115, 147 and 163 Squadrons on both coasts as well as in Alaska. Overseas use included service with No 404, 406 and 407 Squadrons as bombers and night fighters. But by far the most common use was with the BCATP, where it served with distinction as pilot, navigation and gunnery trainers at multiple locations across Canada.
The aircraft to be modelled will be Bolingbroke Mk.IV 9896, an overall all yellow trainer in service with the BCATP at Lethbridge. From the Caspir website:
Delivered to long term storage.
To No. 4 Training Command on 13 July 1942, for use by No. 8 Bombing & Gunnery School at Lethbridge, Alberta.
Pending disposal from 21 November 1944.
To No. 2 Air Command on 1 December 1944, still pending disposal.
Stored by Maintenance Command at No. 1 Reserve Equipment Maintenance Unit. Hulk acquired by RAF in 1974, and parts used to rebuild another Bolingbroke (reported as 13308?) Remains to Canadian Museum of Flight in Langley, BC, stored there in 2010.
For those interested in learning more, or have time on their hands, you can learn more about the Bolingbroke at the following links:
Caspir - AC - Bolingbroke
Silverhawk Author http://silverhawkauthor.com/post/canadian-warplanes-3-bristol-blenheim-and-fairchild-bolingbroke
A surprising number of Bolingbrokes have survived. After the war, the Canadian Government sold many now surplus airplanes for pennies on the dollar. Farmers often bought the surplus aircraft for the parts, metal, and lubricants, with many planes converted to chicken coops, storage sheds, or simply left in fields. Years later, the decaying hulks have become more valuable and sought out by collectors and museums. A number of Bolingbrokes have been restored, with the closest being at the Bomber Command Museum in Nanton. This aircraft, repainted as a Blenheim Mk.IV, is a Bolingbroke from the BCATP. A flying Blenheim Mk.I in England is actually a Canadian made Bolingbroke, transported back to England and extensively backdated.
The Airfix kit requires no modifications to represent a Bolingbroke. The most visible difference, the "camel humps" engine fairings required by the larger engines, are included in the kit. Online forums suggest this was done unintentionally when Airfix scanned a restored Blenheim Mk.IV in England that was actually a repainted Bolingbroke.
Already starting to think about what should come next. I have been toying with the idea of a RCAF CC-137 Husky, the Canadian version of the 707. Other possibilities include a RCAF Dash 7, a RCAF Cessna Crane, or a Canadair CL-215 water bomber. Send me a note if you have any preferences.
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