Il-28 Egyptian Beagle flock, some wip Mistels and a black base.

And then I got my campaigns mixed up :) I could have sworn that these were in the first campaign of the Star and Pyramid book, but I was wrong so I have been painting items that didn't need to be painted yet. Tough, but fun none the less.

I went with gloss metal cause I think they would still be wearing that, and the only pictures of camouflaged Il-28's I could find were from the '73 war. Sadly, no more Beagles have to be painted for the rest of the campaigns so to get more done in the future I will have to look at other conflicts where they are used....maybe Africa?

Also, some progress on my Mistels that I want to use for the Bombing the river Bug - scenario, I copied my old conversion to the letter so I know have 2 Mistels. As I like making stuff in pairs I might leave it at that, and maybe build more in the future (with Fw-190's then), but I think having 2 is enough for now. I will paint matching seperate fighters to go with them. As I only had Me-109 G's and not the Me-109 F's that they actually had, I just trimmed off the cannon bulges from the nose and called it a day. Looks good enough at this scale.

Also, since I can't make my mind up about the bleeding bases I got from Warbases.co.uk, I painted one all black to see how I feel about it. Now it fits in on any table that I have, and the dial number (speed) stands out more, so a bit of a win/win. I wil strip down the others and repaint those black as well. Then I have 20 stands, more then enough for most games.

I will be making new photographs of old work as well as I found so many items I never really documented properly, and only need toutch ups or are good to go. Also, my magnet order from China arrived. 1000 3mm x1mm M35 magnets (so with less pullforce then the M53 and up, which is overkill for most aircraft by a big margin) shipped to my adress in less then 3 weeks for a fraction of the cost of local sellers, namely 10 euros. 1 magnet of the 1000 had shattered and the rest is working fine.

Star and Pyramid: 6 Day War: Operation Moked progress

Tonight, I've removed all of the old 1mm width magnets from the aircraft (with no magnet surviving the process and a gash in my thumb from a slipped knife <sigh>) and added 3mm width magnets to all of the aircraft and nails to the helicopters.

Sofar I have painted:

2 Mirage IIICJ with droptanks
1 Piper Cub
1 IL-14

And I'm still enjoying myself. Currently in either a primed or half painted and new magnets/nails installed state are:

2 Mirage IIICJ
4 Super Mystere
4 Ouragan
2 S-58 Helicopters
And oddly enough 2 Cobra Attack helicopters....I think these came from my Iranian batch and somehow got mixed up with this lot as they are not in the campaign lists (or I have misread that and I'm going blind....also an option!)

That bed of nails was the best thing I ever did for my 3mm aircraft....so much easier to store them all in a drawer this way, other then small bead boxes. If one aircraft is a big bigger you just slap a few extra magnets underneath and raise it a bit. Brilliant. Must make more.

Now, the opposition....

4 MiG-19
6 MiG-17
2 MiG-21 PFM and 4 MiG-21 F-13 - only 1 model is sold but I think I can make some small modifications
3 IL-28
4 Su-7b

....a bit of a problem. I know I ordered all of these back then,. and they are in the big box of aircraft. Problem is, I can't find the little fokkers (and you have seen the sheer amount of boxes in my attic) !

So, I have 2 options. Re order what I need and spend another 14 pounds on aircraft for the first part of the book. Or wait untill I find the several kilograms of aircraft in a box. I've chosen the sensible option......yes, I don't know when I will find them, but it saves money and I have plenty to keep me busy, as during my search I did find a box with part of my Vietnam stuff, a ton of WIP's and some assorted finished aircraft that may or may not need some retooling.

Since I have no opponent anyway that I have to play against (I will try play by email for this with some friends and see how that works) there is no rush, and all of the conversions that I need to finish will keep me occupied for a while anyway.

That will be all, stay tuned for more 3mm beauties soon :)

L5 Stinson Sentinel painted as Israeli Piper Super Cub

The "Head to Head"sceanrio calls for a Piper Super Cub. Nobody makes that, but the L-5 Sentinel does come close and with some additional painted windows (all the way underneath the wing) it looks quite ok. This is the last test, this time to see how I handled something really small, and I passed that too. Not too many left now on the block, and I want to get as many done as I can before Doms shipment comes in for the Falcon and the Duce scenarios.

2 Israeli Mirage IIIs in Six Day War scheme

Also in my scrapbox, as were 2 others, but they had the wrong magnets inserted....the ones I painted have 1x3mm round, the ones I did not paint have 3x1mm round bar, and they just keep falling off the flightstand whereas the 3mm round stick on like glue. I have a box of flat head nails that I will use for the smaller WW2 aircraft as a big 3mm magnet might be a bit much on those....I will experiment with that on a Israeli spotter plane next.

1/600th - finishing a job started a long time ago!

A job started in December 2011 to be precise! (never throw anything out)

Remember this one? Il-14

 Well, I didn't want to drown myself in thinner again tonight so grabbed the Il-14 from the scrapbox and had a go at it. And I'm quite happy with the result to be honest. A tad rough, windows could be a shade whiter but other then that, pretty happy. But, you be the judge (and jury).

I even did the presentation in my old way from back in 2009 when I was painting lots of aircraft. I think it suits them. The base coin is a 1 euro cent, the squares are 1 cm.

Original C-47 by Tumbling Dice, Roundels by Doms Decals, flag by I-94 and numerals by QRF