PREZNOTES Seattle Chapter Newsipms-seattle.org/newsletters/2001Newsletters/2001...Fleet Air Arm 7...

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Seattle Chapter IPMS-USANovember 2001

In This Issue

CMR Supermarine Seafang 3New to the Eastside? 7Correction 7Fleet Air Arm 7Italeri Su-37 Berkut 8Hasegawa Ju 87D Stuka 9Revell UPS Ford Taurus 10French Translations 11Banner USS Arizona 11Sword Vought V-173 12SciFan Photos 14Golden Age Stars of IPMS 16

PREZNOTES

Continued on page 15

Well, the M’s didn’t make it to the bigshow and consequently, I’ve been able tospend a lot of time lately at the workbench.It was too distracting trying to model andwatch simultaneously what was perhapsthe finest season ever of the pure essenceof baseball. No egos - just a team effort byall hands - doing all the things required toachieve 116 wins. It was quite a ride. So,my background noise whilst modelinglately has been some really good (and bad)movies. Modeling to movies such as NoHighway in the Sky with James Stewart istremendously enjoyable. Since I’ve seenthe movie a few dozen times, I don’t haveto watch it to know what’s going on. I’llglance at the TV to see the Reindeer, andto watch his character (Theodore Honey, ascientist at the Royal Aircraft Establish-ment, and a bit of a “boffin”, who postu-lates a theory that the tail will fall off thenew Reindeer airliner) try to find hisapartment. I enjoy modeling with a smileon my face. And, a model of the Reindeerwould be really cool in 1/72nd scale...

As I write this I have three resin kits on mydesk (which is probably why I need somehumorous background noise!). They are aCollectAire X-15, a Ft Duquesne MilitaryMiniatures AirCav figure, and my projectfor the MOF, the F2G-1 Corsair. The X-15 isbeing built for a customer and it’s one ofthe first all resin aircraft I’ve built. Theparts fit has been OK (just), the castingshave a number of bubbles that requiredwork and all the extremely fragile parts arecast in resin as well. Ewww. I’ve had toscratch build landing gear, vent tubes,some interior bits and more. Dealing withCA adhesive to glue major parts of a modeltogether is a royal pain. You have to firstmake sure the part is aligned, and then gluethe parts. As Homer Simpson would say,“D’oh!”

The AirCav figure, actually 101stSpaceborne, 2010, is a neat little figurefrom Ft Duquesne Military Miniatures. Isaw a number of them built at the Dallas

convention last year and just had to haveone. It’s a “let the imagination run a bitwild” sort of figure, and it’s given me achance to work on my oil techniques, aswell as dry brushing and washes. The F2Gis actually proceeding quite handily (knockwood). I took the Pend Oreille Model KitsF2G, threw away their horrible wings andmated the fuselage to the Tamiya F4U kitwings. Slow and easy, and not too manyheadaches, the biggest difficulty so farwas to get the POMK interior bits grounddown far enough to fit into their fuselage.It’s nearly ready for paint.

A few weeks ago I attended the SciFan2001 model show hosted by GalaxyHobbies. It was a two-day show and therewere over 150 models of science fictionnature at the show. Star Trek, 2001, Lostin Space, and Star Wars spacecraft,Gundam figures, monsters, robots,creatures and all things imaginable were ondisplay. It is certainly a unique area of ourhobby and made for a very interestingmodel contest. I’m glad I didn’t have tojudge the figures (over 50, split into twocategories). A special category was tobuild something out of the AMT Amtronic

SEATTLE CHAPTER CONTACTS

President: Vice President: Treasurer: Editor:Terry Moore Keith Laird Norm Filer Robert Allen3612 - 201st Pl. S.W. 528 South 2nd Ave. 16510 N.E. 99th 12534 NE 128th Way #E3Lynnwood, WA 98036 Kent, WA 98032 Redmond, WA 98052 Kirkland, WA 98034Ph: 425-774-6343 Ph: 253-854-9148 Ph: 425-885-7213 Ph: [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

IPMS Seattle Web Site (Webmasters, Jon Fincher & Tracy White): http://www.ipms-seattle.org

Public Disclaimers, Information, and Appeals for Help

This is the official publication of the Seattle Chapter, IPMS-USA. As such, it serves as the voice for our Chapter, and depends largelyupon the generous contributions of our members for articles, comments, club news, and anything else involving plastic scale modeling andassociated subjects. Our meetings are generally held each month, (see below for actual meeting dates), at the North Bellevue Community/SeniorCenter, 4063-148th Ave Ne, in Bellevue. See the back page for a map. Our meetings begin at 10:00 AM, except as noted, and usually last for twoto three hours. Our meetings are very informal, and are open to any interested plastic modeler, regardless of interests. Modelers are encouraged tobring their models to the meetings. Subscriptions to the newsletter are included with the Chapter dues. Dues are $24 a year, and may be paid toNorm Filer, our Treasurer. (See address above). We also highly recommend our members join and support IPMS-USA, the national organization.See below for form. Any of the members listed above will gladly assist you with further information about the Chapter or Society.

The views and opinions expressed in this newsletter are those of the individual writers, and do not constitute the official position of theChapter or IPMS-USA. You are encouraged to submit any material for this newsletter to the editor. He will gladly work with you and see thatyour material is put into print and included in the newsletter, no matter your level of writing experience or computer expertise. The newsletter iscurrently being edited using a PC, and PageMaker 6.5. Any Word or WordPerfect document for the PC would be suitable for publication. Articlescan also be submitted via e-mail, to the editor’s address above. Deadline for submission of articles is generally twelve days prior to the nextmeeting - earlier would be appreciated! Please call me at 425-823-4658 if you have any questions.

If you use or reprint the material contained in the newsletter, we would appreciate attribution both to the author and the sourcedocument. Our newsletter is prepared with one thing in mind; this is information for our members, and all fellow modelers, and is prepared andprinted in the newsletter in order to expand the skills and knowledge of those fellow modelers.

Upcoming Meeting DatesThe rest of the IPMS/Seattle 2001 meeting schedule is as follows. To avoid conflicts with previously scheduled IPMS events, andother events, please note that some of our meeting days fall on the third Saturday of the month, not the traditional second Saturday.We suggest that you keep this information in a readily accessable place. All meetings begin at 10:00 AM, except for the Decembermeeting, which starts at 9am.

November 10 (2nd Saturday) December 8 (2nd Saturday)note: The December meeting is on the 8th, not the 15th as previously reported

IPMS Seattle Chapter Newsletter


CMR 1/72nd ScaleSupermarine Seafang

FR.32

by Ted Holowchuk

The Seafang was the navalized version ofSupermarine’s Spiteful. They were the endof the Spitfire/Seafire line; 17 Spitefuls and18 Seafangs were built. It is claimed that aSeafang achieved a speed of 494 MPH;making it, if the claim is valid, the fastestpropeller-driven aircraft ever built in theUK. The Spiteful/Seafang has been aptlydescribed as, “A Spitfire too far.” Anotherdistinction it has is that its wing wasadopted for Supermarine’s Attacker jetfighter. The Seafang was powered by aRolls Royce Griffon 89 engine driving twothree-bladed contra-rotating propellers.This aircraft was the final piston-enginednaval fighter built by Supermarine. Thewriting was on the wall - the jets werecoming. This particular aircraft, Seafang FR32, VB895, was flown by noted test pilotMike Lithgow in May 1947 during decklanding trials on HMS Illustrious.

The Kit

The instructions are on two European A4size sheets. The first has an explodeddrawing of the model with arrows pointingto the (approximate) locations of the parts,along with a couple of notes. The secondsheet has a side and a front view drawingon one side of the sheet and drawings ofboth sides and of the top and bottom ofthe aircraft for decal placement on theother. Colors are called out by FS number. Ilike that. Also included is a brief historicalnote about this aircraft and its pilot.

The kit parts are all resin pieces of varyingquality. The fuselage halves, spinner andwings are made from a medium gray resinand are a little crude. The fuselage halvesare of slightly different lengths and thecross sections at the front are not the sameon each half. Noticeably, the humps overthe cylinder heads are quite different inshape and location on the two fuselage

halves. This ought to be fun! The panellines don’t match from the left to the rightfuselage halves. The wing roots areslightly staggered from both a top viewand a front view. Each wing is slightlydifferent in length, panel lines, gunlocations and wheel wells. There are “pot-

hole” sized rivetindentations on thewings and fuselage.

The rest of the resinparts are a light tancolor. Some of theseseem to be of betterquality than the gray

parts. Could the masters have been madeby two or three different guys who didn’ttalk to each other or compare parts?

One note: The wheels/tires master had tohave come from an injection-molded kit,because the resin parts have ejection pinmarks on the tires! Hmmm; very interest-ing. The rest of the resin parts were goodto so-so. The seat looks awfully big for 1/72nd; we will see. Two vacuform canopiesare included. That’s a good idea.

The decals are printed by MPD. They lookgood, with all the markings needed for thisone aircraft. The register of the roundelsseems to be a bit out, but it is late at night,and it may just be an illusion. We will see;maybe I’m just losing it.

The Build

I began by washing all theparts. The gray resin partshad an unusually slipperyfeel that I did not like.

Fuselage and Propeller

Inspection of the innerfuselage revealed sparsedetail with some of theribbing broken or missing.Some air bubbles were alsoevident in the resin. Thebroken/missing ribbingwas replaced with strip

styrene and the bubble holes were filledwith putty and super glue. I sanded anddry fitted the floor and the rear bulkhead.Oh yeah - the seat; it still looked too bigand it took up a lot of room. To hedge mybet I dug a Cooper Details Spitfire seat outof my parts box.

The cockpit was painted with InteriorGreen, FS34227, as specified by theinstructions. When dry, these parts wereoil color washed, dry brushed and dull-coated ready for installation. I also paintedboth seats.

The instrument panel looked nice, but wasalso too big. I carved material out fromunder the coaming with a rotary bit. Becareful; you don’t want to go through. Iwonder how I know about that? The panelstill didn’t fit, so a little filing and sandingon its ends fixed that. The panel waspainted dark gray, washed with black oilcolor, and dry brushed with off-white andsilver. I picked out knobs, switches andsuch with red, yellow, and silver then dull-coated the whole thing. When dry, I useddrops of clear epoxy for the glass faces ofthe instruments. The panel finished upnicely and looked good.


The floor and rear bulkhead were gluedinto one fuselage half with a gob of epoxyputty. A little fiddling with the fuselagehalves resulted in a reasonable fit of theseparts. The instrument panel was glued intothe same half with epoxy. More proddingand adjusting produced a decent fit.

I used an old trick of mine to make aremovable propeller assembly. I drilled intothe back of the spinner and epoxied alength of 1/16" brass tubing in the hole. Iused a homemade fixture to center the propshaft, and keep it at 90° to the spinner backplate.

Before gluing the fuselage halves together,a large gob of epoxy putty was jammedinto the nose of each fuselage half toprepare the nose for the propeller assem-bly. The fuselage halves were glued usingepoxy and super glue, working slowly,trying to get as good a fit as possible. Thefuselage halves, of different lengths,remember, were aligned on the cockpit,resulting in the nose and tail being slightlyoff. After the fuselage was glued up andthe nose trued up, an oversize prop shafthole was drilled in the epoxy in the nose. Alength of 3/32" brass tubing was epoxiedinto the oversize hole. The spinner/propshaft was slipped into the 3/32" tubing andmoved around until the spinner satsquarely on the nose. This was done usingthe old “Mark One Eyeball” system. Wheneverything was lined up as well aspossible, the spinner/prop shaft wasremoved and everything was left to reallyset up. The epoxy putty takes about 15minutes to set up. It worked pretty welland resulted in a reasonable fit. However,some filling, filing and sanding wereneeded to get a decent transition from thespinner to the nose.

That brass tube in the nose was also usedto hold the model while painting andworking on it. See photo. In addition to thework stand in the photo I used a tool,which consists of lengths of 1/16"diameter wire stuck into each end of awood handle. The wire on one end wasslipped into the nose in order to handholdthe model while painting. When done, the

wire on the other end was stuck into a holein a piece of scrap wood. This let themodel sit nice and safe while drying.

Oh! Oh! I forgot: Before gluing thefuselage halves together, I did a dry fit andtape-up of the halves to check the wingroot and tailplane fit. I measured, markedand cut off about 1/16" from the longerwing. Maybe I should have added 1/16" tothe shorter wing. Both the wings andtailplanes are butt jointed to the fuselageand I don’t trust the strength of this typeof joint. I measured and drilled holes intothe ends of the wings and tailplanes.Oversize holes were drilled into thefuselage halves to match the locations ofthe holes in the wings and tailplanes. Theoversize holes allow adjustment for a goodfit when glued.

All the fuselage’s differences in length,configuration, bulge shapes, etc., noted inthe beginning, then came back to hauntme. The nose/spinner area was carved andsanded to a reasonable contour andprofile. Filing and sanding brought the tailsection area together. All those potholesized rivets were filled and replaced withprick marks made with a pointed scriber.The panel lines were re-engraved tostraighten and line them up. The verticalpanel lines did not line up over the top, orunder the bottom, of the fuselage from leftto right. “Darn it!” I said. What now? Iknow. There will be no panel lines over thetop, or under the bottom, of the fuselage.Solved that one.

I left those engine bulges until lastbecause I’m a coward. They were awful. Iputtied, filled, filed and sanded ad nau-seam until they still were not right, butwere better and as good as they weregoing to get. The exhaust locations wererevised slightly and the good-looking kitexhausts fitted into their slots.

The rudder top and bottom units wereglued together. The tail hook hole wasdrilled out. The whole vertical tail wassanded and rescribed. Holes were drilledinto the bottom of the fin and into the topof the fuselage. Short lengths of wire wereused to strengthen the joint by gluingthem into those holes and using epoxy toglue the tail unit onto the fuselage. Theslow setting epoxy let me use the oldeyeball to adjust the parts for as reason-able a fit as I could get.

Wings and Tail

I rechecked the wings for size and configu-ration. Some filing and sanding soon hadthem looking kind of similar, except for thescribed lines, cannon locations and wheelwells, which were different on each wing. Icut off the cannons and drilled the front ofeach cannon fairing to accept appropri-ately sized metal tubing for the actualcannon barrel. Each was chucked in aDremel tool and sanded round, eliminatingthe as-cast oval cross sections. The wingswere measured and marked to locate thecannons. Holes were drilled at eachlocation to accept a length of plastic rodthe diameter of the base of the cannonfairings. The rod was glued into the holesto create the stubs of the cannon fairingsand putty and primer were used to build upa small fillet around the base of each stub.All scribed lines were filled and the wingswere rescribed. My limited references didnot indicate where the panel lines shouldbe. I chickened out and only scribed theaileron and gun bay panel lines. Thesewere supposed to be laminar flow wingsand so, like the Mustang, should have noother panel lines showing.

The tailplanes were rechecked and a littletrimming and sanding resulted in good fit.


They were also different left and right, butnot as bad as the wings, so I left themuncorrected. The panel lines seemed toline up pretty well from left to right.

I attached one wing at a time adjusting thewing pins in the oversize fuselage holes.The first wing joint was allowed to curebefore I started the second one. I checkedand rechecked from every direction to getas good a fit and alignment as possible.It’s as good as I could get it. Not great.Still slightly out of whack, but that’s what Ihad to work with.

A similar process was repeated with thetailplanes, squaring them up with thewings and the vertical tail.When all the parts were set and the epoxyhad cured, I used filler, files and sandpaperto trim the fit of the wing and tailplaneroots. The cannons were now glued ontotheir stubs using pins and epoxy.

Turning my attention to the underside ofthe model, I was not surprised to find thatthe wheel wells were still different inshape, size and location. No miracle hadcorrected their problems while I wasn’tlooking. After careful consideration and afew choice phrases, I left them alone.

The underwing radiators were trimmed tofit the wings in a reasonable manner. Thelanding gear struts, wheels and gearcovers were cleaned and painted.

The cockpit was masked off and all partswere primed with my favorite automotive

primer. All parts were then rechecked.More filling, filing, sanding and chasing ofpanel lines was needed. This whole prime-sand-prime process was repeated a fewtimes on the main assembly trying hard to

make a silk purse out ofthis sow’s ear. By the time Ihad finished, it didn’t looktoo bad, as long as youdidn’t look too closely.

Canopy

I cut the canopy from thesurrounding material andthen cut the windscreenfrom the canopy. I cutalong the frameworkmolded into the part andfound that the framing

between the canopy and the windscreenwas not square with the canopy centerline.Also, the base edges of both sides of thecanopy/windscreen were slightly flaredand not symmetrical side-to-side. I swear Icut the parts correctly on the indicatedframe lines. What else? At this point I wasready to round file the whole thing. But,having made a commitment to Chris tobuild this thing, I instead went into theWTH Spares and After Market Departmentlooking for possible replacement clearparts. No luck! So I took a deep breath andwent to work on the kit parts. First I dippedthe clear parts in Future floor wax threetimes trying to clear up the slightly cloudy,rough, vacuformed parts. When dry, thewindscreen was glued to the fuselage withtiny drops of super glue and then a liberalapplication of white glue was applied asboth a bond and gap filler. When dry, Imasked the clear parts with Bare Metal Foiland the new Tamiya masking tape. Alightly sprayed coat of black primer wasapplied to the framing of the clear parts inpreparation for the final external color. Alittle sanding of the windscreen-to-fuselage fillet had this area looking prettygood.

Painting

Believe it or not - this thing was now readyto paint! The underside, gear doors and

radiators were painted with the recom-mended Sky, FS34583. When dry the Skycolor was masked off and the top of theaircraft and the spinner were painted ExtraDark Sea Gray, FS36099. The masking wasremoved and the whole thing was sprayedwith a couple of light coats of clear glossauto lacquer. Hallelujah! Decal time! Lightcould be seen at the end of the tunnel. Orwas that the headlight of an oncominglocomotive? The decals were great; easyto apply, good coverage and no silvering.What else could I ask for? The onlyproblem was me. In order to touch up alittle paint glitch near the canopy area Imanaged to let a piece of tape touch theroundel on the right side of the fuselageand lifted off a fairly large piece of thedecal. “Oh darn!”, I said. After muchswearing, and thinking, I ended up handpainting most of that roundel. It was anoncoming locomotive!

Back To The Propeller

I drilled out the blade holes at the pointsmarked by small indentations molded intothe spinners. The blades had already beencleaned up, thinned and painted dark graywith yellow tips. I made a fixture to alignthe blades in their proper 120° spacing. Iused epoxy glue again to give me someworking time. This process takes quitesome time, but allows me to positionthings just right. But - the prop holes that Ihad drilled in the marked positions on thespinner were not positioned 120° apart likemy fixture was. I guess I should havechecked first and used my fixture to locatethe prop holes instead of trusting CMR tohave gotten it right. Darn! I was stuck withthe holes I had already drilled, so I madethe best job of it that I could and fudgedthe blade positioning around until they alllooked right, even though they werewrong. I finally completed this job andlooking it over, rather pleased with mywork, I dropped it and broke off a blade.Aaargh! I redrilled the hole and remountedthe blade. And, would you believe? Idropped it again and had to replaceanother broken blade. But, anyway, it wasnow finished and ready for installation.


Painting Resumes

While I had been working on the prop

assembly I had also been spraying a fewcoats of clear gloss auto lacquer onto thepainted model to build up some thicknessover the decals. When dry I lightly sandedthe decal areas to eliminate the decaledges. Another final coat of clear glosswas applied to check my sanding. Whenthis was dry I lightly buffed the model withScotch-Brite and sprayed everything witha light coat of clear semi-gloss autolacquer for my final finish.

Final Assembly

It was now time to remove the masking andproceed with final assembly. The rear edgeof the windscreen was still not square.Some very fiddly, fine cutting with a sharpscalpel resulted in a much better look. Imade, painted and installed the rolloverframework behind the cockpit; none wasincluded in the kit. I made and installed astick and a gunsight. The kit seat wouldnot fit into the finished cockpit. No way!The Cooper Details seat that I had paintedas a backup went in just fine and looksgreat. White glue was used to fit thecanopy in a slid-back position. A shortlength of monofilament nylon was used forthe VHF antenna on top of the fuselagebehind the cockpit.

I turned the beast over to fit and glue theradiators into their locations. The fit wasnot great. A little filler, Sculpey, waspushed into the gaps, cleaned up with a

toothpick and touched upwith the Sky color paint.

The landing gear wasattached next. The wheelswere glued on and theaircraft was turned over andput down on its landinggear. It promptly squattedas the wheels splayed outsideways like an old duck.Now what? The resinlanding gear yokes weretoo weak to support theweight of the model. I madereplacements for the largegear doorsfrom .010"

sheet brass and made thema bit longer than theyshould have been. Thesewere super glued into thewheel wells at the top,that’s what the extra lengthwas for. The lower endswere then glued to thesmall wheel covers, whichwere glued to the lowergear yoke making a verysturdy structure that doeshold up the model.Throughout this wholeprocess I was constantly tweaking andprodding the parts to get a reasonablelooking fit and alignment.

The arrestor hook, pitot tube, tailwheel,and tailwheel doors were glued on. Thewing tip lights were painted on. Thecamera window behind the cockpit on theleft was painted dark gray and glosscoated. What was next? There were noparts left. I was finished! The damnedthing didn’t look too bad. Not a prizewin-ner, but an acceptable model. Boy, I suredon’t want to do something like this again.

To the best of my knowledge this is theonly 1/72nd Seafang kit around [Actually,

Magna Models also make a resin Seafang- ED] so, I guess, this is it. Overall, it’s areal tough build with all the problemsencountered, aside from my own ham-handed ways.

I am pleased that someone has put a kit ofthis unusual subject on the market but Imust say, having had a little experiencemyself with making masters and with resincasting, that a little more time and carespent taking care of the details of master-ing the parts would have resulted in adynamite kit of a rare aircraft. As it is, ifyou want a Seafang, have a go at it - andgood luck. This kit is not for the faint ofheart. A good supply of time, diligence,effort and vocabulary will be an asset.

Remember - model building is fun.

References

Spitfire - A Complete Fighting History:Alfred Price, Promotional Reprint Co.,Enderby, UK, 1991, ISBN 1-85648-0151.

Spitfire - The Story Of A Famous Fighter:Bruce Robertson, Harleyford Pubs., Ltd.,Letchworth, UK, 1960.

FineScale Modeler Magazine, March1998: Jack Smith’s article “Modeling TheSupermarine Spiteful”

[Thanks once again to Chris Banyai-Riepl and www.internetmodeler.com - ED}


New to the Eastside?

by Bob LaBouy

I know from talking with several membersthat coming to our new Bellevue meetinglocation is a daunting, if not rewardingexperience. Many of our newer membersand guests don’t know that we actuallymet on the east side of the lake previously,in the old Bellevue library, the MercerIsland Community Center, and the LutherBurbank County Park until space concernsforced us to look elsewhere.

Not to worry. Relax, one doesn’t have tohave a BMW, drink nothing but Starbucksand shop exclusively at Nordstrom’s toenjoy life in the “new” communities on theEastside of Lake Washington. Aside fromthe clean, beautiful, well lit, and nicelyfurnished meeting location at the NorthBellevue Senior Center, driving to ourmeetings is now a bit less challenging formany of us (though I note sadly that a fewof our senior members are having troublejust finding Bellevue in general, thoughrumor has it they are busy laying out along line of popcorn and bits of coloredstring for future reference and routemarking….). One other friendly aspect ofour new meeting place is that we now havepaved parking close by and aside from nothaving to jump over small bodies of waterand mud, one doesn’t have to take theobstacle course approach to watching forand missing the numerous Canada Goose“calling cards” which seem to be every-where in the Interbay location.

Restaurants, bookstores and hobby shopsgalore! One of the nicest aspects of ourmeeting in the Eastside’s largest commu-nity is the ready access to a large numberof “resources.” These include not only theever popular places to eat, drink and bemerry (both before and after our meetings)including every name of restaurant youcan name and almost all types of food. Thefood court at the Crossroads mall hasfoods from at least 6-8 different countriesin one common location. Combined with aMichaels (art supplies, etc.), the Daily

Planet magazine shop, Barnes and Noble,and Half Price Books, this is a “one stop”Mecca for many of us modelers. Most ofthese places are within a mile or two, canbe driven to quickly and offer goodparking access. Aside from the two largeBarnes and Noble bookstores in Bellevue,there is a large Borders in Redmond’sTown Center mall, and Half Price Books inboth Bellevue’s Crossroads center andnearby in Redmond.

If you leave the meeting and just have tohave another “hobby shop fix,” you havethe options of a HobbyTown USA shop indowntown Redmond, Inside Gateway justsouth of our meeting location (off 148th asit is crossed by NE 20th), Abernathy’sNorthwest Hobbies (a bit further down thehill, just north of NE 20th at 130th NE) andEastside Trains in downtown Kirkland.Hopefully we will continue to be pamperedby both Kevin (Supply Depot) and Emil(Skyway Models) at our meetings. Butsometimes you have to have a quick fix ofenamel, some Floquil paints, some brassfor detailing or look over the numerousthings those trains guys are modelingwith—these shops should solve yourdilemma easily.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but if youfeel lonely, somewhat lost, confused orjust don’t know where to go on theEastside, please ask someone at a meeting.I have lived on the Eastside since 1960(most of the time at least) and feel comfort-able and would love to assist you infeeling at home in this area as well.

Latte, anyone?

Correction

In last month’s Seattle Chapter News, therewas a selection of photos from the IPMSVancouver show. Unfortunately, two armormodels, on Page 13, of a Panzer IV and aSDKFZ 263, were miscredited. These wereactually models built by Bill Glinski, in1/72nd scale. My apologies.

Book Review - Fleet AirArm: British Carrier Avia-

tion 1939-1945 by RonMackay

review by Robert Allen

Squadron/Signal publications rarely divertfrom their established format. Whether theIn Action, and Walk Around series, or theirphoto books on various air forces/units,you pretty much know what you’re goingto get – relatively inexpensive paperbacksprinted on good paper, full of photos anddrawings, and fairly light on text.

Britain’s Fleet Air Arm has long been theforgotten Allied air force of World WarTwo. Compared with either the Royal AirForce or the US Navy’s air arm, the FAAhas taken something of a back seat. Yettheir activities were both important andwide ranging, despite being handicappedby inadequate equipment, especially at thestart of the war. The Admiralty did not gaincontrol of the FAA from the RAF until1937; until then, naval aircraft had been anafterthought to land-based aircraft,meaning that at the start of the war, the



Italeri 1/72nd Scale SukhoiSu-37 Berkut

by Bill Osborn

While sitting in my cave the other day,contemplating life in general and modelingin particular, I started to think (always abad sign), why it is that most of us willtake a great kit and try to make it better.The people who put out the kit did a firstrate job. Well, most of the time,anyway. But can we build it justthe way it comes out of the box?Heck no, we buy aftermarketresin and photo-etched goodiesthat can triple the price of the kit.Sometimes, the new parts are notas good as we think they shouldbe, so we buy another brand onthe chance that maybe thoseparts will be better.

Then we get out our referencematerial, and right there inglorious color is the inspirationto build the kit. But wait, what’s this? Iwant to build an “A” model like the pictureshows, and the kit is the “B” model! Andwhen the subject is at rest, all kinds ofthings happen. The flaps hang down, andthe elevators don’t sit the same way theydo when the power is on. So what do wedo? We grab our trusty razor saw and hackaway at the great kit we just spent thewife’s last month’s lotto winnings on. Thisbrings me to the reason I started this taleof woe…

At this year’s IPMS Seattle show inBallard, I picked a copy of Soviet X-Planes. On the cover is a great flying shotof the Su-37 Berkut (which is Russian for“the plans are upside down.”) There are anumber of good photos in the book, sobeing a fan of strange, and Russian,aircraft, this fit right in. It wasn’t too longafterwards that Zvezda came out with anSu-37. All right! I had a quick look at thekit, and thought I’d wait for the rumored

Italeri kit. When it arrived, it was the samekit, with better decals. More on that later.

After starting the kit, my wife and I wentup to the Vancouver show. While visitingwith John Tarvin at Burnaby Hobbies, Ifound a new book on the MiG MFI and Su-37. This is a great book on what couldhave given our air force pause if thingshadn’t turned out as they did. Anyway,with all the information on hand, justbuilding the kit from the box didn’t seem to

do the airplane justice. Out came the razorsaw, and the hacking began.

First, a few words about the kit. It’s a basickit, without much detail. It is (or was) aclassified project. The parts are clean, andthe leading and trailing edges are thin. Partfit is good, but the instructions should befollowed. The cockpit tub is very basicwith only an FBW stick, instrument panel,and a seat I didn’t use. Decals wereprovided for the side consoles and panel.The canopy is in three sections, and fit thebody quite well.

Now here’s where the saw comes in. All ofthe ground photos show that when thepower is off, everything sags. Flaps,ailerons, horizontals, and canards all hangdown like Granny’s wash. The means thecontrols must be hydraulic, or they’rereally loose. So off came the flaps and theailerons. Next to go were the mountingtabs for the horizontals. They attach at the

side of the body, but should hinge on theaft end of the body next to the burnercans. This led to filling the slot on the sideof the body and working with the horizon-tal hinge area. After getting the horizontalsto the proper angles, another problemshowed up. It seems that there is a verticalfairing that is attached to the horizontals,which slides into the verticals as the tail isactuated. Well, that shouldn’t be too big amatter. The easy way to model this wouldbe to just shape and trim a new part to fit.That would be the easy way, but it’s notthe way I did it. The base of the tail shouldbe wider, to allow the aft fairing to slipinside. The quickest way is to slather on agoodly layer of filler, and smooth it outwith a fine file and a sanding stick. Youmust wait until the filler is really dry to dothe shaping, or you’ll get a god-awfulmess.

Most of the parts are the way they shouldbe; as I said, it’s a very basic kit. Thewheels are round, meaning the upper andlower molds match, always a plus. Some ofthe probes, and the nose spike, are verydelicate, but they look good. You can haveany number of color schemes as long asit’s flat black with white antenna panels.Information in the new book indicates thatthe flat black was not just to look good. Ithid features that the Russians didn’t wantknown. It seems to work quite well; thereare very few small things that show up.

The decals are sharp and on register. Theproblem is that there are not enough ofthem. The aircraft still uses red stars in sixlocations, which are given on the sheet.The rest of the sheet contains aircraftnumbers, Sukhoi logos, something inCyrillic script, and four stylized Russianflag strips that go on the wing tips andouter vertical fins. That’s the problem.They should also be on the underside ofthe wings, and on the side of the intakes. Italso seems that after the first flights,



Hasegawa 1/48th ScaleJunkers Ju 87D-5 Stuka

by Hal A. Marshman Sr., BayColony Historical Modelers

I purchased this kit to build the Stukafeatured on the back cover of Squadron/Signal’s special on the Hungarian airForce, a very colorful and unusual bird.The kit represents the extended wingtip ofthe Ju 87D. Before I get any further intothe review, let me say that Hasegawa usestheir molds to the fullest extent, and closeexamination will reveal that the basic partsare common with the –B and –G birds, andenough details are on separate sprues toprovide the subtype changes. In this case,the wingtips were extended the requisiteamount by Hasegawa, but will need yourattention to put to rights. The joint work iscrude; we have come to expect better fromthis manufacturer.

The model is cast in easy to work withlight gray plastic, with all panel detailsengraved. All castings are very much toscale, and quite well done.

The clear parts are very thin and very clear.Bear in mind that many of the canopybraces are on the inside only, andHasegawa has represented this well.Besides the individual stackable canopyparts, you will find a landing light lens, acover for the RDF unit, and a bomb-aimer’swindow, which may be discarded, as it isnot needed.

The late Ju 87 landing gear is well done,with the leather/canvas oleo cover boldlycast. The gear legs have the sirenmountings cast on, and the instructionstell you to remove them. The wheelsthemselves are well done, but notweighted. The tail wheel assembly is a neatlittle casting.

The main bomb, wing bombs, and bombracks are excellent. The twin barrel Mg. 81

cockpit machine gun is good as far as itgoes. Hasegawa’s instructions are unclearon how to display the gun sight racks, ifthe rear canopy is slid open. Unlike the –Bbird, the machine gun does not slide backwith the canopy. I’ve seen photos of –Dand –G birds with the rear canopy in theaft position, with the sight trees and sightsin view. My question is, how the blazes arethey rigged to slide back with the canopy,but not the gun? If anyone knows theanswer to this, please advise!

Hasegawa provides a separate sprue withthe wide-bladed props utilized by the Ju87D, but bear in mind these are more thanlikely wooden bladed, and as such shouldbe painted RLM 66 or 02, not the usualshade of 70 Black Green.

The interior is most acceptable, with verylittle to be done, other than the seat beltsand buckles. Be careful with the bucket

frame for the observer’s seat. This littlegem is very delicate, and must be handledaccordingly. Lots of detail is in this interiorfor the dry brush fanatic.

Decals are comprehensive, with markingsfor one of Hans Ulrich Rudel’s planes, andanother Russian front item with a half-and-half snow camouflage over the basic 70/71scheme. The latter has very unusualseparation lines.

I’m glad I bought this kit. Other than thosementioned above, I had very few fitproblems. Many of the above commentsare applicable to the entire HasegawaStuka range.


Revell Profinish #88 DaleJarrett NASCAR UPS Ford

Taurus Stock Car

by Don Norton, IPMS LakesRegion Scale Modelers

Well, the world has come to an end. I’mbuilding car models. Okay, it’s not thatbad, I just need to try something differentevery now and then.

In the last few months I have developedsomewhat of an interest in NASCAR, andit seemed natural this would carry over tomy modeling hobby. I’ve built a couple ofthe pre-decorated car kits, with stickers,and thought they weren’t much more thantoys. Now with this kit I make a step up toreal modeling.

This kit, of the 2001 Dale Jarrett UPS car, ispre-decorated; the body comes in whiteand dark brown, with yellow trim. Thewindows have the braces and mountingspainted black, but instead of stickers, weare now using real decals. Other improve-ments include an opening hood thatreveals a passable engine, detailed interior,and a driver figure of Dale himself. Notbad.

I had no reference material on Dale’s car,so I looked on the UPS website[www.ups.racing.com – ED], which isconveniently given on the rear of the car. Ifound a wealth of photos of Dale and thecar, and a few were of use to me in model-ing the vehicle, so I printed them in color.Researching most military vehicles is noproblem to me, I have a pretty good library

at home, but the car posed some problems.I wanted a good shot of the engine, so Icould see the colors and wiring details, butnone were available. The instructions gavesome rudimentary painting details, but theframe and interior was molded in red, andthey did not indicate to paint it gray, thecolor in all the website photos. To confusethe issue, I found photos of the unveilingof the UPS car that showed some red in theinterior, such as the roll bars. It is notunusual to paint elements of these carsdifferent colors, or add different decora-tions to the body in different races, andthere is not just “one” car, but severaldifferent bodies, frames, and engines.

So, since I couldn’t find thedefinitive references Iwanted, I decided to build ageneric UPS car that wouldlook good on my shelf. Iassembled the frame andinterior and painted itmedium gray, the color inmost of the photos. The fireextinguisher is red, and thepadding on the roll bars isblack. A few other details arepainted silver or black andcalled out in the instructions.The engine was simplistic,but looked okay, so I painted it gunmetalwith silver and black details.

Dale’s uniform is white and brown withsponsors’ patches on sleeve and chest. Ipainted him flat white, and his lower halfdark brown. The stripes on his legs andarms are decals, as are the seat belt. Useplenty of decal setting solution and it willturn out fine. I did some touch-ups withwhite and black after the decals had set.The racing helmet has a complicated one-piece decal and I was unsure of how thiswould go on, but I slathered the Solvaseton and the decal became one with thehelmet. It looks great. I glued Dale to theseat and placed the seat in its place. Withthe soft rubber safety net on the driver’swindow, you can’t see much of the figure

anyway, but he looks good sitting in there.Other details in the interior were added,including the gearshift and air duct hoses.The hoses are soft rubber, and theirlocation is rather vague.

The Goodyear Eagle tires are nicely done,with screen-printed markings. The enginerequired a little creative twisting andshoving to get it into place. I glued in theradiator and then found I couldn’t get theradiator hose to fit. In frustration, I left thispart off, if Dale ever starts this car up, it’sgoing to overheat immediately. Everyone isforbidden to open the hood anyway, Idon’t know if the engine is the right color.

To finish up the body, the excellent decalswere placed, and they responded well tothe Solvaset. The decals were not totallyopaque, the ones on the chocolate brownareas aren’t pure white, but overall, I likethe decals much better than the stickers onthe previous kits I built. Finally, I screwedthe body and chassis together. It wasdone.

The lines of the car look accurate com-pared to photos and I’m pleased with theend result. I’m a fan of Dale Jarrett andUPS (they bring me models and all kinds ofneat stuff). I’d recommend this kit tomodelers who had some experience, and Ithink a modeler who had good referencesor a basic knowledge of NASCAR vehiclescould do up a knockout version of this car.


French Translation Charts -Part One

by Jacob Russell and JimSchubert

My primary area of modeling interest isaircraft and in the past year I have discov-ered the superb French language publica-tions Replic and Wing Masters. Thequality of the models and the standard ofthe photography in these two publicationsis among the highest to be found any-where. Unfortunately, unless the readerunderstands French he or she is at a lossbecause there is no English to be found ineither of these excellent publications.Quelle catastrophe!

I had the privilege of translating someFrench reference material for Jim Schubertearlier this year, and he and I agreed that itmight be useful to compile some French/English translation charts for thosecurious about what’s actually written inthese magazines. This will be a two-partarticle. Part One, compiled by Jim, is atranslation chart of Aircraft Nomenclature.Part Two, to be published in next month’snewsletter, will be a translation chart ofmodeling tools, products and techniques.Jim And I both hope that this informationis useful and informative. Bonne chance!

FRENCH/ENGLISH AVIATION TERMS

Aileron...AileronAuto Pilot...Pilot AutomatiqueBody...FuselageCeiling (altitude)...PlafondCockpit …Habitacle, also ReduiterElevator...ProfundeurEngine...MoteurFin…DeriveFirst flight...Premier VolFlap...VoletInstrument Panel...Tableau de bordJet Engine...ReacteurLength...LongeurLongeron...Longeron

Machine Gun...MitrailleurMaximum Range...Autonomie maximaleMaximum Speed...Vitesse maximaleNacelle...NacellePropeller...Aero heliceRudder...DirectionSeat...SiegeSpan (wing)...EnvergureSpeed brakes...AerofreinsStabilizer...StabilisateurSupercharger...CompresseurUndercarriage Train...d’atterissageWing...AileNo Parking…Estationment ici est interdit

(It’s translations like this last one that aredriving even the French to useEnglish!)

Sans blague! No kidding!

Banner 1/350th Scale USSArizona

by a mystery author, Quad CitiesScale Modeler’s Society

There has been some discussion that theBanner USS Arizona kit is just a scaling upof the old Revell 1/426th scale kit, but thisdoes not appear to be true. The hull on theBanner kit is two pieces, one from thewaterline down, and one piece from waterline to deck, with no railing details. TheRevell kit has two pieces split down the

center from bow to stern, and the hull isfrom keel to deck. It also has molded onrails and over size portholes. The maindeck on the Banner kit is three pieces. Thefirst piece is the deck forward of thenumber one gun turret, the second piece isthe main deck hull piece and has mountsfor all the main gun turrets, and the thirdpiece is aft of rear turret to stern. Bycomparison, the Revell Arizona’s maindeck is molded in only two pieces. TheBanner second deck is very different fromthe Revell in the layout of the gun shields,stack mount and lifeboat mounts. TheRevell kit has no life boat mounts on thisdeck and no deck planking details. TheBanner main gun turrets have separatebarrels; the Revell turrets are molded as asingle piece. The secondary armament ismore detailed on the Banner kit.

Detail differences also exist on the stacks.Both are similar in layout, but differ in acouple of ways. Revell has searchlights onthe stack, while Banner does not. TheRevell kit is more like the Arizona prior toher refit in 1939, and has biplanes on thecatapults. The Banner kit is more like theArizona was after her refit, and has VoughtKingfishers on the catapults. So I wouldsay the Banner is a totally new version ofthe USS Arizona, and is correct as she wason Dec 7, 1941. The only things I haveseen on the Banner kit that I don’t like area big seam along the broadside gun deck,and anchor chains molded into the deck.


Sword 1/72nd Scale VoughtV-173 Flying Pancake

by Jim Schubert

History

Being an old guy I read the Obituaries andPassages sections of my daily newspapersalong with the news, editorials, andcomics. On Sunday, May 12, 1996, I readwith interest that “Charles HortonZimmerman, 88, an aerospace pioneer atNASA’s Langley Research Center diedMay 5, 1996, at Hampton, Virginia.” That’sall it said. Well, if you dig aviation history,you’ll know a bit about Mr. Zimmerman’s“aerospace pioneering.” You’ll know, forone thing, that the concept and design ofthe airplane that is the subject of thisreview was his.

While employed by the NACA,Zimmerman experimented on his owntime and with his own funds with lowaspect ratio¹ flying wings. Spurred byan informal 1933 intra-NACA competi-tion for the design of a “safe” lightplane, Zimmerman refined his ideas,focusing on that objective. His designwon the competition. It featured largediameter, counter-rotating² propellers atthe leading edge tips of a wing with anaspect ratio of about 1. The left handprop rotated counter-clockwise, viewedfrom the rear, and the right hand proprotated clockwise to “unscrew” theefficiency robbing vortices that spiral offthe tips of any wing in forward motion.High-pressure air from under the wingspilling over the tips into the low-pressurearea above the wing creates these counter-rotating vortices, which spiral downstreamin the wake of the wing. The tip vorticesspiral clockwise at the left tip and counter-clockwise at the right tip. You will noticethat Zimmerman’s propellers counter-rotatein an opposite sense to the rotation of thewing tip vortices. Suppressing the wing tipvortices increases the efficiency of a wing.The “Winglets” that you see on thewingtips of modern jet airliners are amechanically static means of partially

achieving the same objective. InZimmerman’s design the wing tip vortices,in the process of being mitigated, alsostraighten out the prop wash of eachpropeller. Propeller placement and wingform thus produce three benefits: 1. Amore efficient wing due to greatly dimin-ished tip vortices, 2. A wing almostcompletely buried in straightened propwash providing both lift and positivecontrol at very low air speeds and veryhigh angles of attack; and 3. More thrustfrom the near straight prop wash.

Zimmerman won the competition, butNACA considered the design too radicalfor acceptance by industry or the public.Two other designs from the competitionwere released to industry for development.Fred Weick’s became the well-knownErcoupe and the other became the littleknown Stearman-Hammond Model Y-1

Safety Plane. Zimmerman continued workon his own with models to prove, andfurther refine, his concept.

Chance Vought took an interest inZimmerman’s ideas in 1937 and invited himto join the Vought firm as a consultant. Thefirst fruit of this union was Vought ModelV-162, an electrically powered captive part-scale flying wing. Model V-173, “Zimmer’sSkimmer” was proposed to the US Navy’sBureau of Aeronautics in 1939 as a vehicleto study the STOL and general flightcharacteristics of an airplane of thisconfiguration. BuAer, following theirreview and approval of drawings and data,

executed a development contract withVought. BuAer assigned s/n 02978 andwork started in Stratford, Connecticut onthis flying saucer. It has a wingspan of 23feet, is 26 feet long and is powered by twoContinental Model A-80, 80-hp, sixcylinder, horizontally opposed, air cooledengines swinging 16-foot diametercounter-rotating propellers. It is oftraditional wood and fabric construction.

BuAer gave Vought (now merged withSikorsky to become Vought Sikorsky) aRequest For Proposal (RFP) in January1942 for a STOL, carrier fighter based onthe unflown V-173. Vought Sikorskyassigned model number VS-315 to thisproject, which ultimately became theXF5U-1. But that’s another story andanother model - by Hasegawa in 1/72ndscale - for another time.

V-173 first flew November 23,1942 in the hands of BooneGuyton, Vought’s Chief TestPilot. Maximum speed was only138 MPH as V-173 was woefullyunderpowered. In still air V-173required a mere 200-foot take offrun and a landing roll of only 50feet. It was fully controllable,under power, at angles of attackup to 45°. As the plane waspitched up it did not stall; itsettled very gently under fullcontrol about all three axes. Thepilot balancing thrust and pitchcould control the rate of this

settling quite easily. It could not be madeto spin while under power.

V-173 made (sources vary) either 171 or190 flights, accumulating 131.8 flight hoursthrough its last flight on June 30, 1947. Itwas stored intact, and occasionally shown,at Naval Air Station - Norfolk and was laterremoved to storage for the NASM at SilverHill where it awaits restoration and display.Boone Guyton made 54 of V-173’s flights.Richard Burroughs, another Vought testpilot, along with a number of Navy pilotsall flew V-173. Col. Charles A. Lindbergh isreputed to have made flight number 34, butone of my sources disputes this.


The Kit

S. Fleicsher did the accurate and attractiverendering on the top of Sword’s standardflimsy, end-opening, crushable box. Thebottom of the box has color profiles of theairplane in its two slightly different mainconfigurations. The first is sans wheelpants and with white star-in-blue roundelnational insignia. The second has wheelpants and blue outlined white bars addedto the insignia.

The box contains one tree of 14 very goodlooking parts, injection molded in amedium hard, styrene of medium graycolor, 18 well cast resin parts, twovacuformed clear parts (the windscreen/hood and the lower nose glazing), a smallwell printed decal sheet with, inter alia, thetwo styles of national insignia, and asingle folded European A4 size sheet ofinstructions. The instruction sheet has abrief historical note by Chris Hughes, aparts map, a four-step assembly sequence,a painting guide for the airplane in its finalconfiguration, a color guide, and a colorkey.

All four injection molded wheel pants partsin the review kit had easily filled sink marksin their outer surfaces. One of the resinparts was broken as usual. I have neverreviewed a Czech kit in which at least oneof the resin parts was not broken. Come onguys - quality control is the name of the

game these days. Careful packing intostout top-opening boxes would reducebreakage. Hint, hint.

If you assemble your models out-of-the-box, this kit will be a quick build for you.The only correction required for a veryaccurate model is to shorten and widen theslots in the spinners for the prop blades. Ifyou suffer from AMS, you’ll need to addthe small fixed fairing on each main landinggear leg that blends with the diagonal

struts when the oleos areextended in flight.

Un-panted wheels are notincluded for the firstconfiguration of theplane illustrated on theback of the box so if youchoose to do thisconfiguration, you’llhave to raid your sparesbox for appropriatewheels. You’ll also haveto rescribe the“ailevators” to addseparate elevators andyou’ll have to delete thebig elevators in thetrailing edge of the wing

proper.

The prop blades, being hinged, conedbackwards quite a bit when the airplanewas parked. This is best shown in thephoto at the top of page 7 in Steve Ginter’sbook, referenced below.

I like this kit. It’s simple and almost dead-accurate out-of-the-box and it is certainlyan interesting oddball type. It is my kind ofairplane. Remember to check your refer-ences very carefully if you choose todeviate from the configuration provided inthe kit. The differences were few, subtleand important. Score another hit for Sword.Good on you lads.

References

Naval Fighters Number Twenty One -Chance Vought V-173 and XF5U-1 FlyingPancakes: Steve Ginter, Steve Ginter

Books, Simi Valley, CA, 1992, ISBN 0-942612-21-3.

Aviation History Magazine, September1997: Stan Soloman article – “When APancake Flew”.

Scale Aircraft Modeler Magazine, Vol. 3,#2, Fall 1975: Wayne Moyer article –“Flying Flapjack”.

Historical Aviation Album, Volume 8:Arthur L. Schoeni article – “Vought XF5U-1 Flying Flapjack”.

Air Enthusiast Magazine, June 1973:uncredited article – “The UntossedPancake”.

Wings/Airpower, Issue unknown: FrancisJ. Allen article – “The First Flying Saucer”.

Time/Life Aviation Series - Designers AndTest Pilots.

The Aircraft Treasures of Silver Hill:Walter J. Boyne, Rawson Associates, NewYork, 1982, ISBN 0-89256-216-1

Aeroplane Monthly Magazine, November1975.

¹ Aspect Ratio: The square of the wing-span divided by the wing area. Thus thegreater the wingspan in relation to thewing chord, the higher is the aspect ratioand, conversely, the less the wingspan inrelation to the wing chord the lower is theaspect ratio. Some sailplanes have aspectratios in excess of 15, while Concorde, andsome delta-winged fighters, have aspectratios of less than 2.

² Counter-Rotating vs. Contra-Rotating:Things are counter-rotating when theyrotate in opposite directions on parallelaxes. Things are contra-rotating when theyrotate in opposite directions on the sameaxis. The P-38 and P-82, for example, hadcounter-rotating propellers, whilst theBoeing XF8B-1 and Westland Wyvern hadcontra-rotating propellers.


Photos from SciFan 2001

courtesy of www.galaxyhobby.com


Preznotes from page 1

automobile, a kit released in the late ‘60sand recently re-released. There were threecompleted for the show: a NY taxi, a KingCounty Police (by yours truly), and amodern/retro Batmobile (center left, pageopposite). One modeler took a number ofthe old Aurora monster kits, did a lot ofreworking and resculpting to producesome really nice models. He even paintedsome of them in black and white, just liketheir movie counterparts. However, thebest model at the show was a StarshipEnterprise “D”, which the modeler hadadded interior and engine lights (top left,page opposite). Amazing! I conducted twoairbrush seminars, and there was also aseminar on casting parts. Bob and his staffput on a good show and all the prizewin-ners received cash awards in addition totheir ribbons. It was a fun show and Galaxyalready has plans for a show next October.Start building! On the opposite page are afew photos taken by Galaxy Hobbies of theSciFan contest.

Well it’s time to go. As Theodore Honeysaid: “ Uh,Uh, Uh.....Th, the t-t-tail is goingto f-f-fall off this aeroplane...”. Use yourimagination.

Oh yes, last but not least, at the Novembermeeting, try not to show up before 10am.Our time in the facility is from 10am to 1pm.We can set up our tables and such at10:01, after the other group is through.Thank you (besides, they are armed!).

See you at the meeting,

��

Fleet Air Arm from page 7

FAA was mainly equipped with biplanes. Itwasn’t until the middle of the war, whenAmerican Lend-Lease aircraft and a fewnewer British types became available thatthe FAA had much to work with. That theyaccomplished so much with obsolete orunsuitable aircraft is a testimony to theskill and courage of the crews.

Mackay’s book consists of 64 pages, eightof which are devoted to color profiles, withthe back cover featuring five WW2-eracolor photos. His text is short but func-tional, giving a brief overview of FAAoperations. Brief is the operative word –the Bismarck operation is covered in twoparagraphs, and Taranto in one! Theemphasis is where it should be, on thephotos. They are well chosen and laid-out,with often only two or three to a page,allowing details to be seen. As withvirtually every naval aviation book, thereis a lot of photos of prangs – I guess that’swhen people got their cameras out!

Squadron/Signal has improved its previ-ously dismal proofreading over the pastfew years. There are fewer typos, althoughthe Fulmar is credited with a top speed of256 mph on page 9, and 280 mph on page17. One irritating habit is the convention ofputting ship’s names in capitals rather thanitalics. Each first mention of a ship oraircraft type in the text is also accompaniedby putting the name in bold, which isn’t abad idea for a book without an index.

How useful is this book to modelers?There are some great ideas for models (theall-black Swordfish with full D-Day stripesis tempting), many photos offer details,and the author gives color informationwhere possible, both the official Britishpaint names and the FS equivalents, whichis a nice touch. The color profiles are goodbut not outstanding – and what is a 1920s-era Blackburn Blackburn, one of the ugliestaircraft ever built, doing in here at all?

Fleet Air Arm is a useful introduction tothe subject, and because of its price, iswell worth picking up. And then if you getinterested, you can check out the IPMSFAA SIG web site at http://www.faasig.orgfor the specifics…

yellow warning strips were added to theintakes. There are also a lot of small yellowsquares, a few red ones, and some lightblue dots scattered over the airplane.

Come to think of it, I know a fella who hasan ALPS printer, and makes his owndecals. Maybe if I sweet-talk a little I cancon him into overcoming the omissions inthe decal sheet.

I don’t know about dimensions. I seldomcheck unless something doesn’t look right,and this model looks right. It’s big, not as

massive as the MiG MFI, but a littlelonger. If this keeps up I’m going tohave a fair representation of theRussian Air Force. Please, a Bear,somebody, anybody. Well, almostanybody…

Su-37 Berkut from page 8


Meeting Reminder Saturday, November 1010 AM

North Bellevue Community/Senior Center4063-148th Ave NE, Bellevue

Directions: From Seattle or from I-405, take 520 East tothe 148th Ave NE exit. Take the 148th Ave North exit(the second of the two 148th Ave. exits) and continuenorth on 148th until you reach the Senior Center. TheSenior Center will be on your left. The Center itself isnot easily visible from the road, but there is a signpostin the median.

Golden Age Stars of IPMS#17

Some movie stars have careers. Othershave one moment in the sun – or in thiscase, the ever-dark night of film noir. AnnSavage worked steadily for a decade in the‘40s and early ‘50s, in grade B thrillers andwesterns, but it will always be for one rolethat she’ll be remembered. You couldn’tfind a less likely candidate for film immor-tality than 1945’s Detour. Made on abudget only slightly larger than that of thisnewsletter, Detour compressed theessence of the entire film noir genre intoone fast-paced descent into blackmail andbetrayal. It wasn’t just over an hour longbecause of any artistic decision – thedirector couldn’t afford to shoot any morefilm…

At the heart (if it has one) of Detour liesAnn Savage’s portrayal of Vera, simply the

nastiest, most connivingfemme fatale ever put onscreen. Vera bounces from oneextreme to another, petulant,manipulative, and alwayslooking out for number one.Not all of it may be strictlyacting; Savage reportedly gother screen name because ofher temper. It’s a performancefor the ages, and Savagenever matched it. She marriedher agent and retired in the

mid-1950s, but after his death in 1969, shediscovered a new passion – flying.

Savage’s Piper PA-24-250 Comanche iswhat gets her into this series. Savage stillattends the occasional film convention inher late 70s, finally getting the respect thateluded her while she was active. I have noidea whether she flies herself to them…

Due to overwhelming demand (well, oneperson asked me), here’s an index of all thestars featured so far in this series...

# Name Mo Yr

1 Heather Angel 9 992 Barbara Stanwyck 11 993 Hedy Lamarr 12 994 Olivia de Havilland 3 005 Lupe Velez 5 006 Jennifer Connelly 6 007 Merle Oberon 7 008 Carole Lombard 9 009 Marilyn Monroe 11 0010 Patricia Neal 1 0111 Joan Fontaine 2 0112 Ella Raines 4 0113 Linda Darnell 5 0114 Anne Francis 6 0115 Terry Moore 7 0116 Ursula Meissner 8 0117 Ann Savage 11 01

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