HubertB

An now you get why all these people were hoarding toilet paper rolls. Being stuck at home with kids and your regular - or legal - best half must be pretty sh#%!ty stuff for a lot of people Hubert

Actually, I just saw on the news some footage of what is going on in Italy. One funeral company alone received 64 deceased today. No mass grave, but an impressive line of coffins ... A relative was saying that the funerals were scheduled some three weeks later, because even the churches were overcrowded and missing priests ... It really does not look like an exercise ... Hubert

Marketing genius ! Hubert

You mean, no ? Now that’s tough Hubert

Well, I’m sick with the decision I had to make today ... Since the French government enforced strict quarantine and confinement yesterday, a lot of my customers have shut down their factories. I decided to shut mine down, but it is frankly not clear whether this was necessary. The French politicians keep the verbatim vague enough so that you can interpret it both ways. I guess it’s a way not to be accountable in the future ... In the meantime, 8 employees and a shareholder in major economic uncertainty Hubert

Not sure about AM, but one (usual) word of warning. The Aires cockpit is most likely too wide. For the Italeri kit, it was some 3mm+ too wide to fit ... Hubert

+1 ! H7bert

I think I found one ! In 1934, PZL attended the Paris Airshow with the prototype P11/IV, with the Mercury engine, in a show livery of white and red trim. Hereafter are two pics, shown applying Fair Use principles. On the first pic, the P11 is in the back, whilst the P24 prototype is in the forefront. Plus a link to the digital imaging forum Military-meshes.com, where a Polish member did 3D renderings. http://www.military-meshes.com/forum/showthread.php?7392-PZL-P-11c/page4 And, also, for nostalgia’s sake for our friends who lived behind the Iron Curtain, an excerpt of a color profile published in Plany Modelarskie #91, in 1979. The colors are wrong, as the aircraft was white (logical to have a display Polish aircraft in Polish colors), but I am sure someone (Martinn ?) will have fond memories of these publications. The smell and touch of the paper alone are unique. One last comment. The #IV prototype was later re-engined with a Gnome-Rhone Mistral engine, being a prototype for Romanian exports, but in Paris it had the Mercury. So, now, I am itching to get started. Only a lumbago prevents me from sitting long in front of the bench Hubert

Very fine monofilament (like 3lb fishing line) will work better than stretched sprue. It is easy to glue at both ends. And to make it taught, just pass underneath an incandescent matchstick (or toothpick). It will straighten like magic ! And will be inherently stronger more resilient to the occasional knock or wandering finger than stretched sprue ... Hubert

Hey guys, It finally dawned on me that we have the solution at hand : we are men, and we are real modellers. There are two things real men AND modellers don’t need: maps and building instructions. If I start using the instruction sheets of the kits in my stash, I am good for a few years of whatever plague we have to face.Eureka ! Hubert

Anyone know or have pics of a PZL P11c in more colourful markings than the plain boring khaki/light blue-gray ? I was considering HN-NBN, a civilianised PZL P11 flown in Hungary between 1940 and 1944, but this is an «a » version, which would require butchering the IBG fuselage to be accurate (engine higher by 4 mm, cockpit moved forward by 9.5 mm, new fin and rudder, and overall length decreased by 6.3 mm, including by moving the engine slightly back. All doable, but a lot of work and possibilities to ruin the nice surface detail of the IBG kit, so a non-starter in the end ... But this khaki is oh so boring Hubert

This is becoming a multimillion views meme

Ernie, I thought you were a friend ... I’ll have to reconsider my feelings now Hubert

Well, so good for the benefits of technology ... That iPad is no good either for the purpose Hubert

I went to the garden for a check of alternatives ... banana tree : sounds promising... but I have none ; pine tree : not sure, but still a lot surer that cactus ... I confirm I’m in deep s#%t ! Hubert

I think it’s fair to say that if I cannot get my normal re-supply of TP next time I go shopping, then I’m gonna be in the s#%t ! Hubert

So flights from Continental Europe to the US are suspended because « Europe is the new China » when it comes to Covid-19, but not flights from the UK, whose Prime Minister reckoned today that the number of infected people is likely between 5000 and 10000 ... So I guess a Brexit-Covid-19 is less infectious or lethal than an EU-Covid-19. I love it when true science is driving Public Health decisions Hubert

Just going back to the facts, and a bit of history first. The « Spanish flu » (H1N1 coronavirus) of 1918-1919 killed between 50 and 100 million people, i.e. between 2.5 and 5.0 % of the world population. Btw, it is called « Spanish flu » because Spain was the first country where its impact was realised and measured statistically. Its origin is alleged - without certainty - from the Boston area, but some suppose that it was brought back there by an American contingent coming back from the Guandong area ... Anyway, the virus had a mutation in the fall of 1918, where its lethality and transmissibility was multiplied by 10 to 30. This to say that, even though the Public Health management conditions and coordination of the era were less than nowadays : 1) coronavirus pandemics (Covid-19 is now called a pandemic by the WHO) are to be taken seriously 2) it just takes an incompetent government, who does not want to measure really the infection or get the number of tests to detect those, or pretend its an overblown hoax, to have an epidemic get out of hand in a flash (yes, I am thinking of some governments in particular, ) But yes, the media are overplaying it somewhat - when others are downplaying it - and creating some psychosis in the populations of the world. It is however, from the real scientists and people whose job is to follow these epidemics, totally wrong to compare Covid-19 to the seasonal flu epidemics, because it is 3 times more infectious than the flu, and 10 times more lethal - and a mortality rate of > 15% among a class age is a really serious threat. The flu kills more people each year because millions are infected, rather than thousands, and we seem to care less and not get the media all hyped-up on it because we have gotten used to these seasonal outbreaks, and health organisations have developed preemptive actions like vaccines, which do not exist yet, nor are likely to exist for another 18 months, for Covid-19. And consider also that a developed country like Italy ( in the world’s top-ten economies ) has reached a point where the health system is already overloaded to the point that they lack the resources to take care of all the ill people, and MAKING A DELIBERATE CHOICE of « letting go » some of the Covid-19-affected people - basically the above-85 ... We should be happy that some responsible people have learned the lessons of the Spanish flu and put in place the early-warning measures to avoid any such recurrence. The recommended measures ARE disrupting the world somewhat, and the media hype is multiplying the disruptive factors even more. Airlines cancel flight by the thousands, companies are affected by supply-lines disruptions, markets are in a panic mode ... But imagine what it would like with an outbreak of Spanish flu magnitude, in a world where travel has been multiplied by probably 1000 in the last Century ... I take the media-flow with a pinch of salt, but still take the recommended precautions and will reconsider if my travels are necessary. I will not live in an apocalyptic shelter for that, but will not take it lightly either. And, finally, I feel that in the coming years, we will have more Covid-19 outbreaks, and will in the end get used to it, just like with the seasonal flu ... Just my Hubert

Received yesterday #2 of my 2020 « To-buy » list ... The resin pilot inside, and the Master MG barrels are nice additions. Plus the box has an extra version depicted on the box art, slightly less boring than the ones in the standard box : it has white « gull-wing » stripes on the wing top. And the inside is drop-dead gorgeous Hubert

Totally agree, but beauty is a derivative of function here ... in short, it’s cool Hubert

So good to see something that is not laden with guns and bombs (although this one was lethal for bugs, and, indirectly, birds ... ) Looks like a nice kit and a nice complement to my resin 1/32 Wilga ... Hubert

No, home in Portugal. Patricia and I envision going down under for our 10th wedding anniversary, but that’s not before 2023 Hubert

Well, the hull inside is also almost kayak-sized (1.35 meter or 53 inches to be precise) Hubert

In another thread, I mentioned how weak I was, piling up a number of « must buys » on my 2020 shopping list. Well, I got the first of those, a rather smallish box, that fits nicely on my bench Me very happy Hubert

Congrats on the #1 ... ... and enjoy your modelling time until then ... by experience, it then shrinks like snow in the sun for the following 20 or more years ! Hubert