February 2025

I know, it's actually now March. I have almost published this blog three times but keep holding off to add one more thing. Time to get it out.

It has been very cold through much of the last month. The last week of January through the first week of February was very cold. This was followed by a few days of mild weather before we plunged back into the deep freeze for another 10 days. Not much dog walking but lots of model building. The last week or so has been very warm such that almost all the snow, except for shaded areas, is gone. We were even warmer than Austin for a couple days!

Riley can't resist socks and underwear. He has been lethargic, and just not himself the last week. Wednesday night he barfed up a pair of underwear and then a sock. We were hopeful that was it but it was clear the next day he still wasn't himself. So off we went to the emergency dog hospital. X-rays didn't find anything but they kept him for observation. 10:30 that night he threw up another pair of underwear. After a large vet bill, he's back to his normal, goofy self. We haven't a clue where he found his latest "snacks" but will have to work harder to secure any consumables.

We were fortunate to have all three kids home again in February, even if just for a few days. Nicholas arrived in Calgary on January 29th, after spending 10 days in Asia with Daniel. He had planned to return to Edmonton on the 31st, but the weather north of Red Deer was poor, with travel not advised. The weather improved on the 1st, but an accident near Airdrie shut down the highway for the day. Then it turned cold again, so he chose to stay in Calgary and work remotely. Daniel returned to Calgary at 1:30 am on February 5th after a month in Asia. After catching up on sleep, he spent much of the next day packing to head back to his new, permanent job with Tesla in Austin. He had a really early morning flight, on February 7th, as he needed to return early to obtain a Texas driver’s license and organize his new room. Finally, Christine was pulling all-nighters during this time, preparing for a final presentation on the 6th. She was concerned because this professor doesn't give out marks higher than a B. She aced it and received an A-!!!! We were thrilled to see them all again and incredibly proud of all they are achieving.

Christine's architecture program has historically held an extra second year spring term in Barcelona, and she was really looking forward to it. This year, for the first time, the UofC offered additional sessions in Zurich and Tokyo. These two new options proved so popular that Barcelona didn't have sufficient interest to proceed and was cancelled. Heartbroken, she debated staying in Calgary for the spring term but decided she would regret not going with her classmates. She landed on Zurich, and will head out in mid-May. She is now busy building travel plans before and after the program.

No house painting yet. Marie has been quilting, and doing some sorting in the quilting room. We pulled out the existing wall mounted TV stand and installed 2 additional Ikea cubby hole shelving units, giving her enough new storage for all her material. The TV, which proved a heavy brute, was then lifted onto the top of the new shelves. A few more days will have the room all sorted, and then it will likely be time for painting. Except it won't be. One of Marie's Fort McMurray quilting friends was on her way home until her connecting flight was cancelled. Marie went out to pick her up and they spent the day shopping. Her friend was rescheduled on a later flight, but by then they had planned a road trip back north so Marie could go quilting. Her friend left on the rescheduled flight, while Marie headed north the next morning. Marie still isn't back so painting appears to be delayed until next week.

The motor on my spray booth exhaust fan has been running hot. It has been getting so hot it can't be touched after a moderate spray session. Everything was taken apart, inspected, cleaned and lubricated, and then put back together. The motor now ran quieter but was still hot. Time to replace it. Except replacing a 30+ year old motor proved no easy matter, even in Calgary and with access to internet shopping. The original vendor could no longer be found, and alternates would require modification to fit the existing blower. Like the motor, the blower was also no longer available, and replacement blower/motor combinations were much more expensive than remembered. Internet sites listed an alternate Dayton blower/motor combination but that proved to be out of production. A fortunate accident found an alternate to the alternate, which Dayton was still producing, available for a much more reasonable price. It was a duplicate in specs, including in size, and was expected to be a drop in replacement. When it arrived two weeks later, it was unpacked and the dimensions confirmed to be the same. The old one was removed, and the new one fit into place. Except it wouldn't fit. Try as I might, I could also no longer get the just removed blower to fit back into place. Uncertain what was being missed, an unexpected three hour session ensued to fit the new blower. Everything is now in place and the spray booth is back in operation.

RCAF 707

As mentioned in the previous blog, the kit engines are known to have issues. Test fits revealed a poor fit between the engine pylon and the wing, and confirmed a noticeable nose-high attitude. Some careful bending helped reduce, but not completely eliminate, the nose-high problem. The next step involved extensive sanding along the top of the pylon, which further improved the alignment. Eventually, it became necessary to add shims at the front of the pylon to force the nose down. This worked but disrupted the pylon fit, creating large gaps at the front of the pylon. These gaps also resulted in very weak pylon-to-wing joints, so pins were installed into the pylon to try to strengthen the joint.

Milliput epoxy putty was used to build up the front of the pylon and restore some strength. I haven't used Milliput before so it was a learning experience. It is a two part epoxy putty that needs to be mixed and then thoroughly kneaded to blend the two components. Thin putty worms were rolled out and pushed into the pylon gaps . A wet finger was then used to contour and smooth the putty to the approximate shape. The putty hardens in about 4 hours, and sanded out really nicely. Mr. Dissolved putty was then used to fill any remaining gaps and refine the shape.

At this point, I will suggest you don't drop your model. Sadly, it resulted in one wing joint cracking, the other wing breaking completely free, and damage to three engine to wing joints. A couple hours were needed for repairs.

Photo 1 - Engines are supposed to be in line with the fuselage rather than nose high

Photo 2 - That's better but there are some big gaps to sort out.

Photo 3 - The worst gap before.

Photo 4 - Milliput applied

Photo 5 - The finished pylons

Photo 6 - Primed

The initial primer coat was applied. The fuselage seams appeared good, as did the wing and stabilizer seams, but additional work is required around the cockpit to blend in the windshield insert. The primer also revealed that the engine pylon joints remain quite rough and need further attention.

Photo 1 - Primer applied.

Photo 2 - Probably the worst of the required pylon repairs.

Photo 3 - Third and final prime

After the third prime, the engine pylon joints looked better. I convinced myself that they were good enough to move to final paint. I was hopeful that the colour separation, between the wing to pylon joint, would hide any remaining blemishes. Paint would prove optimistic.

Photos of the real planes show the engines with multiple colours of silver. My preferred practice would be to paint the engines early, and then leave them masked while the other colours were applied. I was justifiably nervous the engine pylon joints weren't strong enough for masking removal, so reversed normal practice and painted the wings first, leaving the engines to the end to minimize engine masking. The hope was that the multi-colour panels could then be achieved with smaller, less destructive, strips of tape. It required that everything but the engines had to be masked, but it worked out as intended.

Photo 1 - White primer applied to upper fuselage and tail

Photo 2 - White areas masked and red high visibility areas painted

Photo 3 - Grey areas painted. Masking for silver in progress.

Photos 4&5 - Lots of masking. Silver complete.

Photo 6 - Final engine masking for the dark silver panels

With the masking removed, everything looked good from a distance. Closer inspection showed ghost seams on the fuselage, and the engine pylon to wing joints were simply ugly. I really want to get started on the next builds - see below - but these are too annoying. Time for repairs.

Most of the ghost seams on the top of the fuselage simply sanded out. The bottom had a couple of persistent seams that needed putty. Then on to the engines and pylons. Mr. Dissolved Putty was applied into the joints with a toothpick and then sanded out using thin sanding twigs. The concept was sound in theory but didn't work as well in practice. The putty seemed to interact with the silver paint, and refused to harden. After two days, the putty was still soft. Impatient, sanding started, and proved slow and frustrating, as the rubbery putty simply gummed up the sanding twigs. It took a couple of hours of labourious effort, and a lot of sanding twigs, before the sanding was finally complete. A shot of primer showed all but a couple of small spots had been improved. Now to begin the process of restoring the damaged paint.

As I finished repainting the grey, I caught my glove on the tail pitot, dropping the plane and breaking an engine free of the wing. Sigh. More repairs.

Photo 1 - Crud

Photo 2 - Recovery in progress

Photo 3 - Repairs complete.

Tape free for the first time in a while! A couple of minor repairs and then it's on to decals.

Bristol Bolingbroke

Last month, the yellow paint was applied, but it took an extremely long time to dry. It ultimately required 6 days to dry sufficiently for sanding. Once dry, dust and fuzz were removed through sanding, and the paint was smoothed using 4000 grit sponges, followed by polishing with Tamiya red compound. The resulting finish was smooth enough to proceed directly to decalling.

The decals came from ROP, a company I had not heard of before. I was disappointed to see, after a closer look, that the black numerals weren’t very crisp. The edges of the numbers should have been nice, straight lines. These weren’t, and in a couple of spots, they had what appeared to be small triangles jutting out. I debated cutting masks but decided to give them a try and see how it went.

The decals released from the paper faster than anything I had ever used. They were essentially free as soon as the backing paper was wet. The first decal applied was a large, underwing serial numbers. It proved to be very thin, and stuck fast the second it was on the model. Copious amounts of Micro Sol got it to move, but caused it to crack in several spots. The bits were pieced back together but would require touchup with black paint. Flooding the model with Micro Sol allowed the rest of the decals to be applied without issue, though one of the under wing roundels broke up along an outer edge. The decals responded well to Micro Set, but upper wing roundels would need to be sliced with a sharp blade to get them to settle down into the panel lines.

Once the decals had dried, the model was sprayed with gloss clear in preparation for oil paint weathering. Photos of BCATP planes show them to have been well maintained and kept very clean, so weathering was kept light. A dilute wash of Payne’s Grey was applied to the panel lines and around details. Some dark pastel was applied on to the engine cowlings to represent general oil grime and stains.

The front of the engine cowls was actually part of the exhaust collection system. Many models are built with them painted copper, perhaps to emulate restored examples like the Blenheim at Nanton. Some sources suggest that these areas were actually painted black, with a heat resistant paint, since the cowls could get so hot they could glow red at night. Not a good thing when you are trying to hide from enemy fighters. Period photos show that BCATP Blenheim cowls ranged from light to very dark. I doubt a training plane in Canada needed the cowls painted for night time protection. But I would expect that they became very hot and discoloured. After appropriate masking, various Alclad metal colours were used to represent hot metal. This was transitioned to flat black towards the back of the exhaust stacks.

Final weathering, using dark pastels to represent the oil stains, exhaust, and traffic on the upper wing walkway, were applied. A semi gloss clear coat, to suggest that the plane was well maintained, was finally applied to finish the build.

Photo 1 - Details attached. Ready for final flat clear coat

And with that, the model is finished. I enjoyed building this one. It has a number of mistakes, if you look closely, but I am happy with how it turned out. Enjoy the pictures.

Fokker Super Universal

After all the scribing on the 707, I decided to get back to the Fokker. The wing had previously been primed to highlight earlier scribing errors. These were filled in with superglue and sanded smooth. A fresh coat of primer was applied to make it easier to see areas needing to be rescribed.

G-CASK has yellow wings and horizontal stabilizers. Following the example of the Blenheim, these areas were primed in pink before painting the yellow. As expected, the primer showed several areas on the tail still needed work. The tail surfaces had been pinned to the fuselage, but the joint wasn't very strong, and even gentle sanding caused the joint to fail several more times. Thin CA wicked into the crack finally solved the problem, with the added benefit it left relatively little glue to clean up on the surrounding surfaces. A new coat of pink primer was applied to cover the repairs.

White decals are notorious for allowing the underlying colour to show through, especially with dark colours like a blue fuselage. Nervous about the strength of the tail joint, reverse masks were used with the expectation they would be easier to remove than a full positive mask. The vertical tail and fuselage sides were sprayed white, and then letter masks applied.

Photo 1 - Pretty in pink. Pink primer used in preparation for yellow

Photo 2 - Fuselage masks in place

Photo 3 - More tape. Top registration letters masked

Photo 4 - Corrected letter masks applied and sprayed. Much happier with how that looks.

Photo 5 - Masks removed

Photo 6 - Starboard side masks didn't pull away cleanly.

I couldn't put my finger on it but something about the lettering bothered me. The G-C on the left seemed okay, as shown in the third picture above, but the ASK letters on the right seem too widely spaced. I compared the top wing letter placement to as many pictures and drawings as I had. The placement of the A and the K matched the references, so everything was left to be revisited in the morning.

It still looked wrong in the morning. There was something about the letters and/or spacing that wasn't right. And then I finally saw it. Reference pictures showed a different font. The pictures showed a smooth, flowing letter style, while the masks were more a stencil, similar to the USAF style letters. The masks had been cut from a set of aftermarket decals without checking accuracy.

Try as I might, the actual font could not be matched by any of the normal methods. After a couple hours trying, new letters were created by tracing an existing drawing. The drawing only shows the fuselage lettering, so the top letters were done by scaling the fuselage letters up. Another hour and a new set of masks were ready.

I have a difficult time applying blue paint. It seems to take so many coats to get decent coverage, and this time was no different. Thicker paint can become brittle, as was found when removing the starboard side masks, and the masks didn't pull up cleanly - see photo 6 above. Some thought is needed to figure out how to repair the rough letters.

Next Builds

TL;DR. Time to talk about next builds for anyone that has made it this far. I have been very indecisive about the next builds. Normally, I have a pretty good idea of what I want to build next. For some reason, I have been all over the place, changing my mind after picking something and starting research. In a moment of inspiration, I let the boys pick something while they were home. I shouldn’t be surprised but both went to the area where the biggest boxes are kept. Nicholas picked my second biggest model, an Airfix 1/24 Spitfire Mk.IXc. Daniel picked out a 1/48 Magic Factory A-4M Skyhawk. Good choices. Now, what markings to chose?

The Skyhawk is easy. I have always liked the Skyhawk, since I built and played with a “damaged” Lindbergh kit 50 years ago. The RCAF didn’t use Skyhawks, so it didn’t meet my Canadian criteria, until recently, when the Canadian company Top Aces bought a number of ex-Israeli A-4N planes for use in aggressor training. Magic Factory is a new manufacturer, with this kit coming out about a year ago. It was immediately purchased with the intent of building a Top Aces plane. Decals were purchased from Above & Below Graphics, and a resin exhaust nozzle was ordered to model the most noticeable external difference between the M and N models. Now I just have to work out the best way to paint it.

Markings for the Airfix Spitfire are a little more difficult. The kit includes markings for six different aircraft, including one for a 402 Squadron plane flow by Ian Keltie, and one flown by Johnny Johnson when he was Wing Commander of the Canadian Spitfire squadrons. Both are good choices, but I have three different kits with markings for Johnny Johnson. I have wanted to build a Spitfire for George Beurling, Canada’s leading ace in WWII. He flew with 403 squadron, so it would tie in nicely with my desire to build all the planes used by that squadron. But his plane had very distinctive kill markings, and I am not sure how to do them without commercial decals. A set of 1/24 decals is available but they are $25 US and postage is almost as much, which pretty much stops that idea in its tracks. Digging through my decal pile, I rediscovered that I have the appropriate markings in 1/72 and1/48, but the kill markings are for 1/48 and 1/32 scales. So perhaps I will do my 1/32 Spitfire for Beurling.

There aren't a lot of 403 Squadron pictures available. Searching the internet tends to find the same pictures of planes and pilots over and over again. While researching the just finished Spitfire Mk.I in 403 squadron markings, several pictures that have stuck with me, and I went back to find them. One was a young pilot, sitting on the rear of his plane, holding a small black dog. Another was a colourized picture of a young pilot, looking directly into the camera, wearing his life vest, with his name visible on one side of the life vest.

The pilot in both pictures is William Thompson Lane, from Sudbury, Ontario. He was one of three brothers, all who the joined the war effort. He enlisted with the RCAF in December, 1940, part of a group of friends that joined the same day. He received his wings in October 1941 and was sent overseas. He initially joined 61 OTU before joining 402 Squadron in June 1942. He was transferred to 403 Squadron on 10th August 1942. He was shot down and died on on May 15th, 1943, while flying Spitfire Mk.IX BR986, coded KH-Z, in a flight over France. He was buried at the Canadian Cemetery in Dieppe. He was only 21.

The photo on the left doesn't have a date. The photo of him holding the pup was taken in mid May 1943, just days before he was killed.

All three Lane brothers were to serve Canada. His older brother also served in the RCAF, and had been killed 2 years earlier flying as an observer in a Whitley. In a cruel twist, his younger brother, visiting from the Royal Canadian Engineers, watched William's last take off. The 403 Squadron Operations Record Book notes it was “rather hard to have to tell him that Willie was missing.”

I have not found any other information about William Lane. He was not a famous fighter ace, and did not receive any medals or citations. He was simply a young man, probably enticed by the excitement of the war, who paid the ultimate sacrifice for his county. I can't help but think he died younger than my boys are now. This model will be built in remembrance of him.

Thanks for reading to the end. Stay safe .