airfix lanc

Depends which variant of the Manchester you want to do. If you want one without the mid-upper turret, the Dambuster or Grandslam issues of the Airfix kit will save some work. You may wish to consider investing in this:

Some interior pics and 1:144 plans, but more story than modelling reference. But let's face it, there wasn't too much in the way of markings variety, mainly variations on the night bomber scheme.

Is it the Contrail conversion?

Jon.

yes, the contrail. i want a three rudder with the skinny upper turret model. what group flew those? i will need to find interlibrary loan books. shouldn't be too hard. thank you for the help.

Avro Manchester - The Legend behind the Lancaster, Robert Kirby, Midland Publishing Ltd, ISBN 1 85780 028 1 (This is the one currently on eBay) Aircraft Profile No.260 - Avro Manchester, Chaz Bowyer, Profile Publications Ltd, Modellers Datafile No. 4: Avro Lancaster, Manchester & Lincoln; Richard A Franks, SAM Publications, ISBN 0 9533465 3 6

According to the Datafile, three fins and the FN.7 mid upper turret means a late Mk.1. I think the conversion has a vac-form turret, but it always struck me that the relevant turret from the Airfix Stirling kit would work quite well, although the turret fairing would need modifying.

Jon.

i have a stirling canopy and one from a flying boat. one of them should build up. that is a cool combo to me. i'll see if i can scrounge up those books. thank you. byw, anyone seen tom lately?

If you mean MAIESM Tom, he's on AOL and that wonderful entity dumped the news groups.

i hope i still have his email. i'll try to get him hooked up free. maybe bubba/terra news.

no it doesn't. what does it mean, bill? i thoughr airfix was the kit to use? or is it a later 'fix kit? is it worth sanding and rescribing? i thought the other brands had problems of width and shape? so which IS the one? i'm so confused.

Kit #3-129 dates back to the '60s and is no doubt heavily covered in rivets. I'd wait for the better kit.

I'll bet it says "Craftmaster" on the box.

Bill Banaszak, MFE

i remember craftmaster paint by numbers. that ugly horse gallops through bad dreams... i'll check for the later release. does the early have any collector value? the matchbox lanc doesn't look right cross section. might be the eyeball though. selling matchbox kits is BAD! unless it's to me. thanks billy b.

Dear Confused, 3-129 should be the earliest Airfix kit. The Craftmaster reference was on some of the boxes because around '65-'66 Craftmaster took over distribution of Airfix kits in the US. Prior to that they were handled by the Airfix Corporation of America out of Philly. Craftmaster was an outfit that produced paint-by-number sets and other craft-y things. They were shortly gobbled up by MPC, the plastic car model folks. I think I still have my '66 Airfix catalogue. Interestingly, the B-17G suddenly jumped to $1.63(?) from $1.29 after Craftmaster took over. The Airfix kit to get is the later version that came out in the '80s and is still available according to Squadron. I never tried sanding off the rivets on my first Lanc. Back then I was clueless and assumed they were supposed to be there. Of course my picks for the green and brown colours were nowhere near reality either. As I understand it the 'new' Airfix kit is the best available at this time with the Matchbox second. I had one of those but never built it. It got E-bayed along with all the other 4-motor Matchbox kits. It looked nice in the box, (sigh).

Bill Banaszak, MFE

O.K. Much discussion on this so I went down into the cellar and dug into "the stash". The later Airfix Lancaster I/III kit is number 08002, and the dambuster variant is #08004. These are the 1980's releases and are good. FWIW If you want a "Lanc" with the bulged bomb bays, look for the last Frog kit issued, it was very nice. I am talking about Frog's

1/72 scale Lancaster, not their old 1/96 scale kit. This was issued just before Frog went under and the molds disappeared into Russia.

Bill Shuey

i just want the correct fuselage for the manchester conversion. once i get that done, i'll start doing the variants. i am looking for the froggy kit.

Bill

Did they use the "series #" system with the Lancaster kits? If they did which one would be the latest version in terms of series number? I always used this a a way of determining which kit I get which is usually the highest version (series)number.

The Modellers datafile is good for ref and info, not sure where u are in the world, its reduced to £10 now

For the Manchester conversion you want the Mk.I/III kit.

Bill Shuey

FWIW If you want a good reference on modeling the Lancaster and it's variants there is: "Lancaster, Classic Aircraft No.6". Neville Franklin and Gerald Scarborough. Patrick Stevens, Cambridge, 1979 ISBN 0 85059 344 1

This is part of the "Classic Aircraft and How to Model Them" series published in concert with Airfix. It covers variations and one chapter is on the Manchester conversion.

Bill Shuey

right, but i meant which airfiz model...

great, thanks, bill.

Airfix of America had their own system. I believe it worked as such: All the kits that sold for $1.29 were numbered and the Lancaster was #3, the Halifax was #2 and the B-24 was #4. Scale had nothing to do with the numbers as the 1/144th 707 is #5-129 I suspect that the B-17 was #1 but in the catalogue I have it's #2-163. It's listed as retailing at $1.50 but I do remember being charged $1.63 when I bought one. The real oddman here is the F-4B which was #1413. (?!)

Bill Banaszak, MFE