Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
In my job lot pile of recently bought kits, there was a battered looking box for a FROG Wessex Mk 1. It was the original 1963 boxing and it looked like it. I have previously built a FROG Wessex as well as two Matchbox versions and since I quite like building helicopters, I thought I would give it a go.
When I opened the box, I saw that all was not as I had expected. Inside, there were four fuselage halves, i.e. enough to build two models. There were also rotor blades for two models. There was even one flight deck floor and one bulkhead. There were a few cut out decals,. That, however, was it. Yes, I had done it again. That left a bit of scratch building and spares hunting to be done. Time to reach for my favourite building material, i.e. some low grade O ’n N (or to translate, some Odds and Ends).
I carved a flight deck canopy in balsa wood and moulded two new canopies. They are not perfect, especially at the sides, but it was the best I could do. I made the nose clear areas in the same way. I used clear plastic card for the windows. The rest of the flight deck, i.e. seats, control sticks, instrument panels etc. came from plastic card,, as did the missing bulkhead.
The undercarriage was made from more O ‘n N, in this case, hypodermic needles, plastic tube etc.. The wheels came from the spares box, sanded and modified to look like something reasonable. The tail undercarriage gear was also scratch built, twice.
Although I had the main and tail rotor blades, there was no rotor head gear. So that too had to be scratch built. Let’s be charitable and say that the results are functional with limited attention paid to the number of rivets.
The exhausts were made from tubes of something. They are the parts with which I am least satisfied.
I added some semblance of a rescue crane and hook to one model. Grab handles were made from wire and windscreen wipers from stretched sprue.
I decided to paint them in completely different colour schemes. The dark blue is not quite right as it should probably have more of a greyish tinge – or perhaps the greyish tinge came as a result of weathering. The ‘brown’ model was painted using a sand colour.
Decals came mostly from odd bits. They are, to use my favourite copout word, ‘illustrative’, though hopefully not too inaccurate. There does seem to have been quite a variety of markings applied to the many versions of the Wessex.
I folded back one set of rotors but left the others extended, partly for the variety and of course, also to save on storage space.
The end results were pleasing enough. The total cost of each model worked out at about 50p which seemed like money well spent. Goodness knows what is in any of the other boxes in this job lot pile.
When I opened the box, I saw that all was not as I had expected. Inside, there were four fuselage halves, i.e. enough to build two models. There were also rotor blades for two models. There was even one flight deck floor and one bulkhead. There were a few cut out decals,. That, however, was it. Yes, I had done it again. That left a bit of scratch building and spares hunting to be done. Time to reach for my favourite building material, i.e. some low grade O ’n N (or to translate, some Odds and Ends).
I carved a flight deck canopy in balsa wood and moulded two new canopies. They are not perfect, especially at the sides, but it was the best I could do. I made the nose clear areas in the same way. I used clear plastic card for the windows. The rest of the flight deck, i.e. seats, control sticks, instrument panels etc. came from plastic card,, as did the missing bulkhead.
The undercarriage was made from more O ‘n N, in this case, hypodermic needles, plastic tube etc.. The wheels came from the spares box, sanded and modified to look like something reasonable. The tail undercarriage gear was also scratch built, twice.
Although I had the main and tail rotor blades, there was no rotor head gear. So that too had to be scratch built. Let’s be charitable and say that the results are functional with limited attention paid to the number of rivets.
The exhausts were made from tubes of something. They are the parts with which I am least satisfied.
I added some semblance of a rescue crane and hook to one model. Grab handles were made from wire and windscreen wipers from stretched sprue.
I decided to paint them in completely different colour schemes. The dark blue is not quite right as it should probably have more of a greyish tinge – or perhaps the greyish tinge came as a result of weathering. The ‘brown’ model was painted using a sand colour.
Decals came mostly from odd bits. They are, to use my favourite copout word, ‘illustrative’, though hopefully not too inaccurate. There does seem to have been quite a variety of markings applied to the many versions of the Wessex.
I folded back one set of rotors but left the others extended, partly for the variety and of course, also to save on storage space.
The end results were pleasing enough. The total cost of each model worked out at about 50p which seemed like money well spent. Goodness knows what is in any of the other boxes in this job lot pile.
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
Another couple of amazing rescues....top work!
Best wishes
Jim
If you can walk away from a landing, it's a good landing. If you use the airplane the next day, it's an outstanding landing
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Jim
If you can walk away from a landing, it's a good landing. If you use the airplane the next day, it's an outstanding landing
"Never put off till tomorrow, what you can do the day after tomorrow"
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
Great work, one of my favourite helos.
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
Excellent work as always, Vacant, two great builds of this old FROG classic involving some excellent scratch building and canopy moulding.
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
This be witchcraft!! The things you can achieve with odds and ends astounds me. Well done.
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
Another pair of miracles. These models look better than the original Frog offerings from the box. Those rotor heads look very realistic. Definitely an improvement in addition to rescue.
- gnomemeansgnome
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
Nice!
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
Given the starting materials, those are Works of Art!
Cheers,
David
Cheers,
David
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
You CAN make Princes from Frogs! ....well, Vacant can.
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Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
I don't know how you do it (even though you do tell us). Beautiful work as usual.
Re: Westland Wessex; FROG 1/72
Amazing work. One of my favourite helicopters as well.
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