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George Tufnail
48 articles

1968 boxing of the 1/72 scale Airfix Handley-Page Hampden.

August 26, 2016 · in Aviation · · 14 · 2.9K

I built this old school kit in an old school style. No putty, so there are seams, but I didn't want to sand off all of the rivets! I used my airbrush to apply the Dark Earth and Dark Green RAF Camo, but the decals were unusable, so I went with bright yellow for the undersides instead of the more usual black, and depicted a machine from a Torpedo Training Unit, circa 1940. The markings came from the spares book, and all the paints are Testors Model Master Enamels. There is no interior with this kit, other than four seats and a blank instrument panel, so I added the four classic hunched over crewmen. Not that it matters very much. You can't really see through the thick armored glass anyway. The aerials are fine smoke coloured quilting monofilament, with super glue blobs for insulators. I like it, and I hope you do too!

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7  Awesome

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14 responses

  1. Well...your "old school" techniques turned out quite well, George (I like it, too).

  2. Old school well done. My that glass sure is thick.

  3. Very nice. Oh, to gave one in 1/48... 🙂

  4. Rivets are cool, Great job

  5. Paul, you and me both! The classic flying frying pan- try saying that several times. Or tadpole, or suitcase.
    Airfix! Who but! Yeah, I know them Valom folks have one, but I suspect it's like the Swirdfish/Albacore situation, I.E., it won't replace Auntie Airfix.
    Bravo, George! Good to see one, the old girl deserves some recognition

  6. Nice work George , great to see the old school Airfix kits . You may have seen my version of the same kit a few weeks ago ,I didn't go for the traditional colour scheme either , did you have fun masking all those clear parts ?
    N.

  7. Lovely! I love these old Airfix kits and have tons of them in the stash, including this one. That yellow bottom is an eye-catcher, and I may follow suit on mine. You're absolutely right about trying to save the rivet detail - it's just kinda what makes an old Airfix kit! One suggestion might be to use several layers of Mr. Surfacer brushed over some of those seams, and then cleaned off with 91% alcohol and a q-tip. It may not totally eliminate some of the larger gaps, but will help to fill them in so they're not as noticeable.

  8. Amazing work. One old old-school trick you can use when doing this kind of a model is to fill the seams with white glue. It won't get everything nice and smooth like putty, but it will fill the seams and there's no sanding necessary, just a wipe-down.

  9. 🙂 ... Greetings ... 🙂 :
    That is one aircraft model not seen much ( my personal opinion ).
    Nice work on that model George.

  10. Lovely looking Hampden, George, that's the way to build these classic Airfix kits.

  11. Nice work, George! I still love all of those Airfix RAF bombers.

  12. Very nice job on an old kit!

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