HubertB

Very thorough review, Fran. Extremely well done and interesting. It looks like this the book to buy to get started, or make real progress, on figure painting. Hubert

Although, whereas the Horten is a real replica of the original, the Mustang’s structural details are a bit fancy for the most part. Which does not make the kit any less impressive. Hubert

Nice B-24. Congrats ! Hubert (although I personally cannot unsee the flat wing airfoil and funky wing incidence )

Now, that’s a lot of wheels. How do you even make a turn pulling this ? Hubert

A reminder that the Lukgraph Friedrichshafen FF33L, a WWI seaplane is due soon. And the RWD 14b is even closer. And Lukgraph have announced a DH 90 Dragonfly . A little brother for the Dragon Rapide, wow ! All 3 above are 1/32, of course. Hubert

So purdy Hubert

Viewed from this angle, this is an impressive broadside, which certainly would have a British battlecruiser Commodore slightly worried ... Hubert

As I was looking for something else, I, literally, just unrolled a 1/32 drawing of the CF-100. I'd still be a taker, but , gawd, it is really a big, and I mean BIG, sob ... The other drawings in the same scale I unrolled at the same time looked small in comparison, even the EE Lightning ... Hubert

The day after I went to Shuttleworth for the Dragon Rapide, we went to the Newark Air Museum, and I had a photo spree on the Folland Gnat. Just another project still waiting to come to fruition. But, with - at last ! - the current interest in LSP trainers, who knows ? Anyway, here is the link to that album, of 282 pics only ( ) this time. If you wonder where the in-cockpit pics are coming from, no, they did not open the canopy, nor did they obligently cut the Gnat, for me. There was a section of the front cockpit, used for training purposes, I guess, displayed next to the Gnat, under the giant wing of a Fairey Gannet. https://hubertboillot.smugmug.com/Folland-Gnat-Walkaround-Newark-Air-Museum-052013 Hubert

When reviewing the pics, some of them are actually not relevant for the DH-89. The day we visited, they happened to have in the same hangar DH-86 Comet G-ACSS, the London-Melbourne race winner, going through some maintenance. So I took pics as well. The red wing, and all pics of black-enamelled retracting undercarriage are for the Comet, not the Dragon Rapide. I'll leave them as they are interesting as well, IMHO. So that makes 410 pics of the Rapide, and 11 of the Comet Hubert

I now regret to never have taken the plunge on the Skystreak, bot the Jetmads release and your sale, Mike. I am however like you on the Learjet, and have reserved one. And I'm game as well for the Skyrocket, and the Ouragan, and the Trident, if they ever come to fruition. I am still reserved about the X3. It looked spectacular, but ... Hubert

Thre is an excellent 1/32 (not 1/33) paper model of the Tu-95. Now, THAT would dwarf you, my friend Hubert

Some of you may know that I had initiated the project of releasing a 1/32 resin kit of the DH-89 Dragon Rapide. The project went as far as having a master created, then life, business and the ancillary choices associated with both came in the way. To cut a long story short, the - huge - step of moving from master to kit never came to fruition, all of my (un)doing . And then, Lukasz, of Lukgraph, had the very good idea of releasing its own kit, which was done last year, which folded definitely my project. Such is life ... In the preparation phase for this project, I, and the modeller producing the master, Martin Field, asked the Shuttleworth collection if we coud come, measure and photograph their Dragon Rapide, to which they graciously agreed, all for the price of just two entry tickets. I thank them again for their excellent welcome. We were able to crawl around, in and out of the Dragon Rapide, me with a camera, and Martin with a measuring tape, tees and squares. Attached is the link to the walkaround of the Shuttleworth Dragon Rapide I did that day, all 421 pics of it (which is why I did not download them directly on this site) I hope you will enjoy it. Hubert https://hubertboillot.smugmug.com/De-Havilland-DH-89-Dragon-Rapide-walkaround

Here’s a brave man tackling a great subject Hubert

And the engine ahead of the crew compartment ... Hubert

The forerunner of the Merkava ! Hubert

That is pushing the hub concept far far far far along ... Hubert

Man, I wish I could photoshop paint figures like you do . A fitting tribute to your outstanding build Hunert

Made an order (not modelling related) in January in the US. This was a "made-to-order" product. It took two weeks for production and flying to Portugal ... and close to 4 weeks to clear the customs in Lisbon . I should get it tomorrow or Friday. Patience you must have, young Padawan ... Hubert

Very nice work ! Hubert

Be careful what you ask for, Ernie I may have some spare prints asking for fresh Texan air ... Hubert

I have my Anycubic Photon available for a good price, if you’re interested. Nice printer, but with a risk of « wobble » on the Z-axis when printing long (along the Z-axis) parts (problem cured with the Photon S which has two rails for the Z-axis). But the shipping may be a killer anyway . You’ll find great deals on 3D printers on the US continent. For example here : https://www.3dprintersbay.com/anycubic-photon-s or here : https://ultimate3dprintingstore.com/collections/all-printers?view= or Amazon, of course. Mine is an Epax 1-N. Epax, Anycubic, Phrozen, Elegoo are safe names to go to (you need a SLA or DLP printer with UV-curing for small details). For 3D design, I’d recommend Fusion 360 (free licence for hobbyists/private use). Be aware that 3D design softwares need fairly robust hardware to run smoothly. Finally, the Anycubic washing/curing machine was a real bonus when going serious about regular prints. And finally, yes, being able to print transparencies is great news. Casting clear resin is effectively a nightmarish process. HTH Hubert

3D-printed transparencies: success at last ! This is the windscreen for the Mistery Ship. The part is 0,5 mm thick. It was printed (4 at the same time) on my printer with the following settings: - Phrozen SC-801 clear resin - 30 microns layer thickness - 120 seconds exposure time for the base (the one adhering to the platform), then 15 seconds per layer. After the print, rapid wash with ethanol, blow dry, then 15' curing in a 40W UV curing machine. Whilst perfectly clear when just printed, the resin develops a slight frost when curing. The following photos show the result. From left to right: 1. Windscreen as printed and cured 2. The same, but then Future (Johnson Klir in fact) applied with a brush 3. The windscreen, after some micromesh sanding on the outside (the inside was just not accessible as I wanted to keep the support for demonstration purposes), and subsequent application of Future with a brush. 4. Finally, the winscreen without any micromesh sanding, but with some Pebeo varnish (a Fine arts varnish for paintings) applied with a brush. Conclusions: 1) Micromeshing, and probably polishing the part after micro-sanding, is needed to restore full transparency. This is advised by Phrozen in their explanations 2) The Pebeo varnish wins hands down in terms of restoring transparency. It will also help to prevent yellowing of the resin over time. A much better result will also be obtained by airbrushing it, of course. 3) Above all : transparent parts can be printed and look like transparent parts. Yeahh ! Now, the sky is the limit 4) For this specific part and resin, I probably need to increase the thickness to 0.6 mm to get higher structural strength - but the Anycubic clear green was OK with 0.5 mm. I hope this will be of interest for you guys. Hubert

In this case, it is like the resin manufacturers want the printing process to be a nerdy thing « only for the initiated » To illustrate my point: most resins for DLP printers have a in-process curing time of 6 to 8 seconds for a 50 microns layer. in the case of the resin that is supposed to produce cristal-clear, non-yellowing parts (Phrozen SC-801 - not cheap at a minimum of 120 € for one liter) I finally found-out that the time setting was supposed to be ... 20 seconds ! You would think that they would write something down on the label ! Oh well, you live and learn as they say Hubert

For the time being, I am the guinea pig... So far, I have failed my print runs twice, with the resin sticking to the vat rather than the building plate. Opening rant: why are printer settings not more clearly indicated by resin manufacturers ? It seems like this is a more closely guarded secret than the code for the safe at Fort Knox ... Oh well, trial #3 tomorrow, with tweaked printer settings Hubert