Shaun's Bodging Bench * replaced for 2018*

[ShaunW]

Many thanks for the further very kind words and that is a great photo Ian. The Swordfish is the first fully rigged biplane that I've built for about 20 years (the last bipe I built was a Fokker DVII on here a few years ago, but of course the Fokker has little in the way of rigging due to its cantilever wings) and I have built very few over the many years that I have been modelling. Bipes make for great looking models but in my experience can be very time consuming and fiddly.

[hayabusa]

Vintage build ... with accuracy ... Congrats !

[ShaunW]

Many thanks Pawell, I hope to have the model finished this week.

[johnsan]

Love your Stringbag, Shawn. Very nice clean build. Impressive first go at rigging. Be careful. Biplanes can be very addictive.

[ShaunW]

Many thanks John. After all the fiddling with the rigging I feel it might be a while before another biplane passes over the Bodging Bench!

Just time for a quick update before we go on our hols. After a hectic week's building I have now finished the Swordfish. The rudder and elevators were rigged up with stretched sprue after attaching control horns made from off cuts of plastic card. In addition, I added a fuselage footstep out of 0.5mm Plastruct rod and torpedo sighting bars on the front fuselage struts made from stretched sprue before attaching the torpedo, wheels and prop. In addition I also decide to scratch build a replacement rear machine gun as the one suppied in the kit is weedy beyond belief. The gun was made from plastic card for the body and hand grip, with the magazine made from plastic rod and the barrels from 0.5mm Plastruct rod. I realised that the madness had finally set in when I decided to add sights made from stretched sprue and a pitot assembly from plastic card and stretched sprue which was attached to the left hand side wing strut. I decided it was time to call it a day and finished the model off with a stretched sprue antenna wire which was tensioned by waving a hot pin underneath it once it had been secured to the aerial posts. I will post up more pics on the aviation section when I get back.










All in all, this was an enjoyable if somewhat fiddly project.

Thanks for looking.

[iggie]

That Stringbag is a delight to behold, more so for the age of the kit and the scratch-building involved. Love the Lewis gun especially!
Superb work Shaun

[Marek]

beautiful!

[shangos70]

Lovely bit of work Shaun.

[Stuart]

A superb build as always Shaun - a 1st class job.

[mjatx]

Awesome work, Shaun. The rigging, paint, and scratch-building are really fantastic! I'm happy when I can get one of those somewhat decent, but you've really nailed the whole thing. Great job.

[splash]

Fantastic work on the Stringbag.

[Old_Tonto]

Top build. Rigging makes me panic!

[giulio_gobbi]

It's a Swordfish, from every angle.
Nice to see, lovely build.

[ShaunW]

Many thanks for your kind words gents, I really appreciate the encouragement. I haven't kept up with my blogging on here recently as I've been busy preparing models for SMW at Telford, catching up on jobs around the house that I have been avoiding for ages and, ahem, looking for a job. Hopefully before long I will be able to show you my now completed Westland Lynx. Currently I am focused on my Ark Royal build - there is quite a bit to do and time is running out!

[jssel]

One seriously fine build