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Squadron…Scramble!The 2015 Anniversary Diorama. Well, here I go again! With the keyboard just cooling down from the Messines Epic, I’ve just been reminded that this July is the 75th Anniversary of one of the most pivotal episodes in British history – The Battle of Britain! With that in mind, coming (I mean starting) soon will be my second commemorative diorama, to be entitled simply “Squadron…SCRAMBLE!”Again, 1/72 in scale (I’ve got six months for this one until the anniversary), I’m going to be working almost exclusively in Airfix kits with a couple of more modern up-grades thrown in for good measure and once again, a whole load of scratch building! I’ve got the basic layout worked out in my head at the moment, the base will be the same size as Messines (but a whole lot flatter!) but I am hoping to have a multi-level effect like the bunker gave in Messines. The overall ‘look’ of the diorama is going to be based on various scenes from the epic movie “The Battle of Britain” which is why I’ve just sent off for my first item of research – a copy of the film on DVD. Less than £4 on ebay! (I was quite chuffed with that!) Many of the kits I will need are also on ebay too so at the moment I’m keeping an eye on the cheapest offers, time for some ‘sniping’ soon I think! Also another quick visit to the old garage workroom – I think there’s a large roll of nice looking grass effect flock paper down there! As soon as I’ve got some concrete plans and a drawing I’ll be getting started, until then, does anybody know if Spits and Hurris operated from the same airfields during the battle? Happy Modelling to All. Robin First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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If your last dio is anything to go by, this is going to be amazing!! Will be certainly watching this build, I love the film, and it will give you loads of ideas. Looking forward to seeing your first pictures! And yes, Spits and Hurricanes operated from the same airfields.
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Rank: Super-Elite Groups: Registered
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Sounds fantastic Robin Will this be a general airfield BoB dio or will you be going for accuracy, ie the correct squadron markings for a particular airfield? Steve
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Rank: Pro Groups: Joined: 24/08/2009 Posts: 48,051 Points: -13,308
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Certainly Duxford had Hurricane and Spitfire Squadrons aspart of the 'Big Wing'...
The Big Wing involved sending up 3-5 squadrons together, to overwhelm the enemy. It’s first outing was on September 9th, when Duxford’s three squadrons, acting in concert, attempted to intercept a large force of German bombers. However, the squadrons arrived late, though 11 enemy aircraft were claimed shot down. Subsequently two more squadrons were added to the Duxford Wing – 302 Squadron with Hurricanes and Polish pilots, and Spitfires from No.611 Auxiliary Squadron. On 15 September 1940 this combined force of 60 Hurricanes and Spitfires intercepted a large German attack and prevented many of them from reaching London. The victories that day – across Southern England – turned the tide of the Battle of Britain, and 15th September became the official Battle of Britain day to commemorate the Battle. However, the Big Wing tactics practised from Duxford were a source of bitter controversy between 11 and 12 Groups, and often led to 11 Group’s airfields to the south being left undefended, since the time taken to put together such a large formation delayed arrival over the airfields.
BoB airfields.. http://en.wikipedia.org/...le_of_Britain_airfields
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Rank: Pro Groups: Joined: 24/08/2009 Posts: 48,051 Points: -13,308
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Wow!! This sounds very interesting Robin and I'll most definitely be tuning in to this when you start it - really looking forward to it!!
Kev
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Thanks indeed to all the above for those quick replies, very helpful! As to the markings, I'm in two minds at the moment, I'd like to go for the 'absolute accuracy' side of it but if the aircraft markings shown in the film coincide with actual squadrons that took part in the battle, I might be accurate to both! Now I need to go through all my aircraft reference books again, (still trying to find a shelf for all the WW1 books I collected!!) Thanks again m8s Robin First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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Hi again to All! Interesting Fact No.1During the filming of the Battle of Britain, the pilots flying the 200 aircraft bought or hired for the film, fired off more rounds of ammo (blanks of course) than the actual combatants did during the real battle!This is a quick update just to let you know I’m still working on this! My DVD of the Battle of Britain movie arrived on Friday and I’ve been avidly watching it through, (all the way once and now going over the relevant parts I need). This diorama will be an amalgamation of scenes from the movie with elements taken from the smaller airfields and some from the bigger Manston location. The overall plan for the diorama is shown in the final coloured diagram below but this is open to a great many little alterations along the way! The first viewing confirmed a sinking feeling I had ever since Mr T posted that excellent ‘Making of the film’ link (which I also watched right though as well!) In my (obviously failing) memory, I had recollections of the dispersal hut from which the chap would be yelling “Scramble!” being a wooden thing. There IS a “wooden thing” in the movie, I got that bit right, but that was the clubhouse of the Flying Club to which one of the squadrons was sent to avoid the German bombing (“damp and full of dead flies!” The actual building I need to build is possibly the Biggin Hill one, which isn’t wood at all – it’s flaming red brick! So there’s three ways in which a red brick structure can be built in 1/72 scale – firstly there’s printed colour paper, the larger scale (1/12th) version of which is often used on dolls houses, then there’s brick embossed plasticard sheeting. This can be made to look pretty good with a skilful paint job and subtle weathering and this was a possibility at first. Then there is a third method – if the original is built of red bricks – build the model version in red bricks too. Yes, I mean individual ceramic bricks, a 1/72 scale version baked in a kiln just like the full size original . So that’s what I’ll be doing for this project (and no, I’ve never done this before but it should be fun – I hope!) I’ve now sent off for a pack of 2000 red bricks ( please let that be enough!) from a company called Juweela on ebay. They come in packs of 100, 500, 2000 and 5000 as far as I can see, the 2000 pack costs £8.25 plus 4.75 p&p. The 5000 pack is about £15 or so with the same postage. What I plan to do is to construct a plasticard inner former onto a base and then build the walls up with the individual bricks until the section I’m creating is complete at which point the structure will be (very carefully) removed from the former to leave the freestanding walls. I’ve been freezing the video at good points in the film so I can count the number of courses of bricks to give me the correct size of the building (hopefully!). The first scrappy diagram shown below are the notes I made whilst watching the paused film to grab the most important details. I thought it might better illustrate the thought processes involved in transferring something off the movie and on to the diorama. The whole building, including the corrugated roof (I knew that corrugated sheet maker would come in handy again!) is painted in Green and Earth camouflage and the interior walls are pale green up to around the window height and a cream colour above that. Fortunately I’m not building the whole thing as you can see from the diagram, only the part enclosed by the red dotted line, why will become clear when I can put the overall plan of the model together. ( That was written before I put the overall plan of the model together - Duh! ) Suffice it to say at this early stage I will be having part of the Dispersal Hut, a couple of Mk1 Spitfires with their cockpits open and waiting, a zig zag bomb shelter trench (taken from the Manston scenes), a fuel bowser and an ambulance and an AA position (either a Bofors if there’s enough room or a twin Lewis mount if there isn’t). I’m also hoping (space permitting again) for half a Hurricane (but NOT right down the middle this time!) and the Fire Engine plus a lot of pilots and ground crew. I’ve ordered some lovely figures for that part from Belgium, but they will need a crash course in English first – they’re being converted from Luftewaffe personnel! The one thing I’ve already learned from the planning stage is that there is a hell of a difference between building a WW1 trench scene and a WW2 airfield scene on the same sized base. The trench diorama can cram as much into it as you can fit, but with the airfield, regardless of scale, most of an airfield is quite literally –air! You just can’t park aircraft wingtip to wingtip and still have a realistic looking environment. Aircraft need space around them for the ground crew to operate in or it just looks like a factory production line, not a front line operational squadron. That’s why the Hurricane has lost her tail. If I can fit her in, she’ll have various panels removed as the ‘Erks’ give her the full service. So that’s the current state of affairs, some parts are on order, I’ll need to get a couple sheets of the thicker green foam board I think to allow for the slit trenches and I’m after some kits on ebay as we speak. STOP PRESS… Just won the auctions for a MkI Spitfire @ £2.99 and the RAF Refuelling Set at £5.00 (both plus postage). One more Spit and the Hurricane, and the RAF Emergency Set to go, plus maybe a nice PE starting trolley from a site Mr T put me on to. I’ve never used PE in my life so that should be interesting! Be back when I’ve won some more auctions! ‘Till then, Happy Modelling to you All. Robin Plymouth57 attached the following image(s): First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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Rank: Pro Groups: Joined: 24/08/2009 Posts: 48,051 Points: -13,308
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By 'eck Robin, you don't do things by halves do ya!!
I can hear you saying "I'm gonna get this scene right if it kills me .... even if I have to build it brick by brick!!"
This is going to be another enthralling series of instalments from you Robin on the road to another fantastic diorama and I'm going to be looking forward to and watching every single episode!!
Thanks for the entertainment Robin, very much appreciated!!
Kev
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Wow another big diorama. can't wait to see what you do with this Jase “Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.” -Mark Twain
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Rank: Vice-Master Groups: Registered
Joined: 26/05/2014 Posts: 912 Points: 2,773 Location: East Sussex UK
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Looking forward to seeing this Robin, as ever no doubt the attention to detail will be incredible. regards Paul Building: DelPrado HMS Victory. Building: DeAgostini Sovereign Of The Seas.
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Rank: Super-Elite Groups: Registered
Joined: 30/01/2013 Posts: 4,604 Points: 13,607 Location: Monmouthshire UK
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Really looking forward to this one Robin, the plan is fantastic Just one question, will the walls of the hut be 2 layers of bricks with a cavity between? Steve
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Hi Robin, can only believe this will also end up being a build to behold, will be following as usual so will simply say, good luck with it all.... Regards Alan
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Rank: Master Groups: Registered
Joined: 30/03/2011 Posts: 1,344 Points: 4,079 Location: Bryanston, Johannesburg. RSA
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I do believe we are in for a treat with this one Robin, good hunting and building, will be following this one closely. Rgds, Hans "It's okay to make mistakes. mistakes are our teachers - they help us to to learn, even if it is painfully" Current Build: Endeavour Cross section,D51 Completed: HMS Victory Under the bench: Endeavour x 2,Sovereign of the Seas, Akagi and The Black Pearl!HMS Victory Cross Section
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Hi again to All! Many thanks for all your support and kind words! Firstly: Nem: I'd have liked to 'breeze it' with a hut built of bigger concrete brieze blocks (of which there IS one in the movie, but I couldn't find any 1/72 scale blocks! Kev: Brick by brick it's going to have to be! (but it should be fun trying to replicate the original, and I haven't tried this method before!) Jase: Yes, I know I said the next one would be considerably smaller, this took me a little by surprise too! Paul, Alan and Hans: Many thanks again and I'll be trying my best to cram in as many cheapies as I can again! And finally Stevie: NO!, NO! AND AGAIN NO! I'm still miffed at you for saying how far you went with your Mayflower! Now I've HAD to cut off the third deck too! My Airfix Spitfire has now arrived (the first of the two) so the next instalment will be a short 'In-house' review of the kit and a list of the upgrades I'm hoping to put in both of them. Bye 'till then! Robin First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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Rank: Pro Groups: Joined: 24/08/2009 Posts: 48,051 Points: -13,308
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Tally-ho Robin, looks like the making of a great plan in mind
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Hello Robin, just a thought, but could you not make breeze blocks from polystyrene packing? I had a parcel with some of the fine textured, and it looks just like scale breeze blocks.
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Hi to All! Many apologies for the delay in coming back, at the moment my PC is down with a really nasty virus that came straight through the 'up to date' anti-virus program!! Its put a bit of a stop on the schedules, I was going to be doing a review and start on the two Spitfires but the photo pages for the review and the reference material I'd got together for the cockpits is all locked up inside the damned computer! Fortunately I do have my trusty Netbook which, unlike it's name would suggest, has never been connected to the web so at the moment I've switched over to continuing with the Dispersal Hut construction. As you can probably imagine, peering into a screen about the size of a large paperback book with a keyboard to match is - challenging! I visit my two times previous elderly ex-employer three mornings a week to help him with his emails and such and I'm frantically typing this out on his machine at the moment! Hopefully I'll have the first instalment of the Hut ready to put on this Thursday so please come back soon. In the meantime I'm trying all available avenues to get rid of the virus that doesn't involve a trip to the local computer shop! So see you all soon. And Nem, you're absolutely right about the block method. The construction would have been almost exactly the same as the Messines Bunker - I just didn't think of that! Ah well, too late now, I'm about a 1000 bricks in and still going! Robin First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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Rank: Vice-Master Groups: Registered
Joined: 26/05/2014 Posts: 912 Points: 2,773 Location: East Sussex UK
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Looking forward to it Robin. Building: DelPrado HMS Victory. Building: DeAgostini Sovereign Of The Seas.
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Many thanks for that Paul! Well here goes my first attempt at a 'long distance diary'! Photos 1 and 2 illustrate the tiny size of the Juweela ceramic bricks. Normally the penny shot does the trick but in this case even that didn’t do the shot justice! In Photo 2 the same bricks are shown in the palm of my hand! Before the building work can begin, some of the microscopic things may need a little clean up work, but more on that a little later. The first job was to work out the actual size that the Dispersal Hut would have to be. This was accomplished by freeze framing various shots of the hut from the Battle of Britain film DVD and literally counting the bricks from one end to the other. With the number of bricks worked out, I could then carefully place individual bricks in a line (up against a steel ruler) to work out the overall length in 1/72 scale. Photo 3 shows the full length of the wall, the model will be slightly shorter than this, approximately half way between the last two pillars. With the length secured, the next job was to determine the height of the walls. Photo 4 shows a part of the plasticard building jig being used to form a channel for the bricks to be placed edge on as they would be in the wall. As it turned out, trying to place 29 bricks together proved a little difficult, after 10 or more, the stack of bricks would suddenly pop out of the channel! After the third attempt I just measured the 10, doubled it and added another 9 to get the final height for the wall! Now that I had both measurements, I could make up the pre-formed wall jig as seen in Photo 5. The jig is made out of a form of thick plasticard, but not, as far as I’m aware, one available in model shops! Many years ago my brother used to work in the local Boots warehouse (Boots the high street shop that is, NOT a warehouse full of boots!) Back then Boots used to stock records and Cds and the racks of music were separated by glossy black plastic dividers made of - that’s right, shiny black plasticard! When the stores were re-designed all of that lovely plastic was thrown away, well, some of it was! Most of my stock is A5 sized but somewhere out in the garage workroom I’m sure I’ve still got some pristine A4 as well. The first task was to cut out an ‘L’ shaped base on which to build the actual wall. In the film, the Dispersal Hut is sat on a concrete pad and the ‘L’ base will become the part of the pad which shows beyond the wall. You can just make out two pencil lines along the short side of the ‘L’, the one on the left is the full width of the hut, the other one marks the part of the hut which will actually feature in the model. The pad was fixed to the melamine board by a series of small holes drilled through the plasticard with a brass pin threaded through a length of yellow wire insulation and hammered in tight. When it comes time to remove the finished hut, the pins can be pulled out by gripping the insulation with pliers. Also seen in Photo 5 is the wall former in two sections. I was originally going to cut out the door and windows but in the end it was easier to glue thicker plasticard formers in place and brick around them as will be seen later. Using the mini set square, the two wall sections were glued together and once dry placed inside the ‘L’ at which point the remaining rectangular part of the base (also pre-drilled for the pins) was pushed in place to securely wedge the walls in position. (As seen in Photo 8). As I mentioned earlier, some of the myriad bricks will need a little cleaning up before use. Over half of them are perfectly good to use straight away, but the rest may have a tiny ‘rim’ of ceramic material left over from the moulding process. For most of them, this is just a tiny little knob sticking out on one or more sides. If you are making a wall ‘freehand’ then this tiny ridge is irrelevant and can be ignored. If, like me however, you are using a former to place the bricks up to, then any protruding edge will force the brick out of alignment and needs to be removed. Photo 6 illustrates a ‘naughty brick’ with the little knobs and also a complete rim around the bottom. I began by actually filing and sanding the rims away but in the end discovered that it was far simpler to just run a safety razor blade down the sides to clean up the edges as seen in Photo 7. In Photo 8, the wall building begins. At this point there is no sign of the door opening in the wall, there is a concrete step outside of the raised floor level which is three bricks up from the ground. I started from the small end wall in the corner and worked outwards in both directions. Note the corner ‘pillar’ which is matched by a further three along the length of the hut, (the end wall would have had a central pillar if the model hut had extended that far!) According to the Juweela instructions, the bricks can be glued with either ‘standard model cement’ or tile cement (grout?) It would be interesting to try the tile cement but in this case I decided to go with a super glue gel, (a Poundshop pack of three to be exact). Once the first layer or course of bricks was down, I found the best method was to apply a little bead of gel with a cocktail stick on either side of the brick joint as shown in Photo 9. The beauty of the glossy plasticard is that the inevitable bleed through of super glue onto the wall former doesn’t have a good grip on the shiny surface and after every row of bricks the former can be flexed free. The one thing that becomes apparent when building the wall is that not all the bricks are exactly the same size depth wise. Some are a little thinner and the odd one is a little thicker. This means that after each row of bricks is finished, a check has to be made to see if any ‘lumps and bumps’ are visible. Usually there’s not too much to bother about, a thinner block can be put right with a thicker drop of gel but a thicker one will need to be sanded down before the next row goes on top. After some various trials, the best tool for this turned out to be the Poundshop emery board nail files as seen in Photo 10. The bricks are quite soft and can be sanded down easily. They can also be cut to size for half bricks etc by simply pressing down on the top with a safety razor blade, much in the same way that the full size bricks are cut with a hammer and chisel ( something I’ve never been that good at!) As you can see, there’s quite a bit of brick dust produced which needs to be removed before the wall former can go back into the channel again. Many years ago I bought a ’mini dust buster’ type of tool, not much bigger than a couple of tubes of toothpaste, it’s really coming into it’s own now! So that’s it for now, in the next instalment the walls go higher and the first door and window formers go on to allow those openings to be produced in the brickwork. Very soon, the Battle of Britain film is going to overtake Star Wars as my most watched movie, AND the Aces High theme is fast becoming an integral part of my daily waking life - it’s a good job it was already my most favourite tune of all, (with 633 Squadron a close runner up!) Until next time, happy modelling to you all! Robin Plymouth57 attached the following image(s): First wooden ship: The Grimsby 12 Gun 'Frigate' by Constructo Second: Bounty DelPrado Part Works Third: HMS Victory DelPrado Part Works 1/100 scale Diorama of the Battle of the Brandywine from the American Revolutionary War Diorama of the Battle of New Falkland (unfinished sci-fi), Great War Centenary Diorama of the Messines Ridge Assault Index for the Victory diary is on page 1
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