Lancfan's Monty's Messenger build ***FINISHED***

[lancfan]

This build will use the 1/72 scale Aeroclub Miles M38 Messenger kit in the markings of RG333, the aircraft used by General Bernard Law Montgomery after D-Day.

David.

[JohnRatzenberger]

I know Monty & Ike had some issues but I didn't know Ike had demoted him

[lancfan]

Mess up corrected, cheers for the heads up John.

David.

[splash]

What are the Aeroclub vac form kits like to build?

Regards Splash

[lancfan]

I have only built one Splash, the Gannet AEW conversion and that went Ok, some of the white metal parts were slightly wrong and needed replacing with new parts from Miliput.


David.

[splash]

Is RG333 the one with the invasion stripes?

[lancfan]

Yes it is Splash, there is a survivor in these colours with the same serial but it is not the original aircraft.


David.

[Stuart]

I used to maintain a Messenger - they're lovely little aeroplanes.

[lancfan]

well it's start day, I will begin this one on Tuesday.

David.

[Nigel Foster]

I recently built the Pavla model of this aircraft, having found one at the same time in the same shop as the vacform. Talk about two buses coming at once.
They are both like rocking horse droppings.

The Pavla aircraft was really hard work for a small aircraft, so I wish you good luck with the vacform.
The biggest problem I had was just how small everything is. Three tail wheels to this point. Painting the invasion stripes was fun because of the flaps. If I did it again I would find some decals.

Montgomery was not promoted to Field Marshal until almost three months after D Day as I understand it.
Thus in the summer of 1944 it was a 4 Star aircraft so to speak.

Nigel

[lancfan]

The vac formed sheet and other parts ready to begin tomorrow.


David.

[lancfan]

The main airframe parts have been separated from the sheet and will now be sanded down to reveal the joint faces.


David.

[lancfan]

Being such a small model this did not need a sanding face of any size and this was done one-handed with a piece of sandpaper held against the worktop, small parts were simply rubbed against a sanding block to the same effect. The tailplane upper half was so thin that I did not bother cutting out and sanding the thin and flat lower half, I simply glued the top surface to a piece of 10 thou card to complete the tailplane. with the sanding done construction could now begin, the fuselage and wing halves have here been glued together to get the ball rolling.


The instructions call for both the cockpit and wing openings to be cut away before assembly, I didn't fancy this as it would be quite weak in this state so to keep the fuselage rigid I just cut away the wing opening at this stage, I then fitted a plastic card rear cabin bulkhead and the kit IP.


The wing was then glued to the fuselage and left to dry.


The kit had one visible fault in that the engine cooling outlet at the rear of the cowling was wrongly placed under the fuselage level with the wing leading edge, to correct this a small section (shaded) was cut away to be replaced with a piece of plastic card to level it with the wing.



David.

[lancfan]

The wing root fairings have been blended in with filler and sanded smooth.


David.

[lancfan]

The cockpit opening is here being cut back to the correct line using the canopy as a guide, when that is done the canopy will be trimmed to fit for later and the cockpit can then be fitted out.


David.