GusMac

Lovely faded look to the paintwork.

Should have sent that plan to Rog before he started his house build! No modelling room though.... 😁

Brilliant work Kriss. To paint that in 1/72 is very impressive.

Great choice Peter. Do love the IsraDecal books.

Bit more progress on the Hitachi excavator. Got the chassis painted and chipped - looks a bit OTT at the moment but once it's weathered I'm hoping it'll be fine. Also started on assembling the main body. Needs 30g in the rear according to the instructions to counterbalance the arm, so this old barrel connector from a scrapped scanner at work was just the job. Glued in with 5 minute epoxy just to make sure it doesn't rattle about later on.

Anyone do a 1/35 Isambard Kingdom Brunel?

Sensible idea to do the surgery now Scott. My father is basically housebound now and can just about shuffle around with a walking frame as his back has basically collapsed and he has stenoses at multiple levels. He's lost about 5 inches in height but at 84 it's far too late for the surgical option. He had the chance 20 years ago and decided against and is now regretting it.

We really miss having a cat around as we've had at least one since we got married 30 plus years ago but a kitten or rescue will have to wait until our old, grumpy Jack Russell is gone. She just about tolerates us in the house but certainly wouldn't welcome any new residents.

The bushes break up the rocks nicely.

Funny you commenting on this Maru as I just came straight from the BBC article you posted about the Brabazon and it definitely has some similarities with the Conny.

Sorry to hear that Peter. Glad it wasn't a DVT as that runs the risk of PE and worse. Hope the antibiotics get on top of it quickly.

Just stunning PE work at that scale. Glad you've got it well anchored - I'd be paranoid about sneezing and blowing it to kingdom come!

Bit more progress on the Hitachi excavator. Arm has been painted and chipped - undercoat of dark rust, then two layers of chipping fluid after a layer of white then the final top coat of orange. Gives a nice appearance of some of the chips just going through to the undercoat rather than right through to the metal. The chassis base is now assembled and has had a coat of primer since the photo was taken.

He had bought himself that swanky looking RV, so hopefully he's just making the most of it in the summer.

Looks great. Really unusual cammo as well to add to the attraction.

All the best Scott, hope you get it all sorted out soon.

Got the main components of the excavator arm assembled. Everything goes together smoothly. The hard part will be making sure the hydraulic rams are still moveable after primer which is up next. Then it's a base layer of dark rust, chipping fluid and the top coat of orange.

Another beautiful result Kriss. The paintwork is superb and a testament to your skills.

Interested to see how this goes. The Tamiya Chieftain was the first kit I built when I got back into the hobby for some peace and quiet when the sprogs were little.

Pity about the missing canopy. I once did that with my wife's engagement ring and we found it 3 years later - I was not popular! The digital cammo looks really good and I wouldn't have noticed about the colours if you hadn't mentioned it.

Looks amazing. Love the water pouring out of the front tanks.

Looks damn good to me,

Weathering on the wheels and tyres looks so good.

So, after finishing the Viggen I wasn't sure what to do next. I wanted something simple to just throw up OOB and toyed with the Eduard 1/48 Mig21 but decided I wanted to do that proper justice, so ended up with this. Started by getting the cab assembled. It's the Hasegawa Hitachi Zaxis digger which is something completely outside my previous experience but I thought it would be a bit different. Everything so far fits very well. I didn't fancy masking off and painting all the glass frames given this is supposed to be a quick, easy build, so went with the kit decals which are ok but have quite wide carrier margins which are visible at some angles. I did try trimming them on the rear window but the decal then fell apart when trying to move it into place, so left them on all the bigger ones.

Glad the build is taking your mind off your sad loss. We lost one of ours on Armistice Day last November and I still miss him like hell. They just get under your skin so much.