The Modelling section is dedicated to members who wish to show their WW2 related aircraft & squadron field kits.
Tips & Advice is available, along with photos of models under construction and completed projects.
WOW.......incredible! What a truly fine Stirling I trust this is a practice run before you attempt the full size version? If you elect not to add the dorsal turret,...she would be OK in the markings of an early Mk 1. John (K4Kitty) has posted some great pics of early Mk 1,s on the forum. viewtopic.php?f=4&t=44&start=90
I wish you well with this stunning model,.....i can,t wait to see her airborne! Keep us posted.
Rgds Tom
"Rule Britannia two tanners make a bob,three make eighten pence and four two bob"!
Firstly what a fantastic model and welcome to the forum.
Sorry come in late on this thread, I am all for honouring our VC airman but what about honouring the unknowns, the thousands of young crews who served and died without being decorated.
I could name a number of crews who completed a full tour experiencing the full horrors of war and did not receive a DFM or DFC, their bravery is equal to the VC holders IMO!
I am also thinking of a 218 Squadron crew who were lost on their 29th operation after a particular torrid time during the summer of 1943, the bravery of this young crew to me epitomizes the bravery of Bomber Command.
Don’t want to put a damper of the tread but why the pre-occupation with VC holders !
Thank you Tom and Smudger, I will indeed keep you informed. Hopefully there will, one fine day, be a video of the beast taking off and, if all goes well, returning home after a sortie.
But that all feels a bit distant still....
This build has taken me so long that I had forgotten that I had got as far as building the under-cowl air intakes characteristic of Mk.IV or Mk.V.
I am not going to alter those - so okay, it will be a Mk.IV.!
The top scoops were too high so altering them was going to be necessary anyway.
I don't think I am particularly preoccupied with decorated airmen... more with actually getting the model completed and flying! As you say, those who survived are equally brave - and with VC awards there is the thought that the aircraft did not survive - which perhaps bodes badly for the model !? (Not that I am superstitious!)
There is another kind of bravery for the survivors who had to live with the scars thereafter.
In joining this forum and posting my request I had in mind that there might be some reunion being planned that might make a particular colour scheme particularly appropriate - although I do realise that there may not be many still with us to remember those times first hand!
There was also the thought that when I eventually retire the airframe from active duty (assuming it survives!) it will be looking for a home. (My 1:4 Leopard Moth now hangs in the DH Heritage Museum - much to the annoyance of one ex-DeHav employee who was apparently hoping to acquire it (and has placed a reservation on my DH90)!)
So now the choice may come down to some nose art...?
Not looking to hijack this post but I just wanted to acknowledge Steve's comments regarding ............ crews of summer .......... and winter of 43 and early 1944, The Berlin Raids.
I am just reading 'Men of Air' ( The Doomed Youth of Bomber Command ) by Kevin Wilson. ( it has so many interviews with former aircrew )
WHAT A FANTASTIC READ !
So far, I'm about a 1/3 of the way thru. What these crews were up against at the very worse time of Bomber Commands' history. The reason for this post is to reflect what Steve has said. Every day crews experienced the very worse of war and many ................ most, were not recognised for it.
So although Stirling aircraft played little activity during these months ( main force ), the fact that many a crew had flown in a Stirling, whether it be in HCU's or on operations and then converted to other types of aircraft, aircrew as a whole, deserve equal recognition.
After having read many books over the past seven years, no book has ever stirred my interest, as this book. This book is all about the crews and what they experience.
John
K for Kitty Crew - Winthorpe, 1661 HCU's - stirlingaircraftsoc.raf38group.org/
630 Squadron - East Kirkby
" There is nothing glorious about war with the exception of those who served us so valiantly"
Smudger/Steve, if you are happy to post whatever you have I may be able to come up with colours that are not too far adrift.
A career spent in architecture and latterly as a perspective artist working with water colours is probably as good qualification as any for the task.
And so long as whatever I come up with is labelled as not being definitive in respect of colours I would rely on what I said before - if I can't come up with anything dead on even with the help of the experts, then what have any others got on which to base criticism?
LK292 W-Witch of 570 Squadron (below from 'Stirling Wings' by Jonathan Falconer)
There are other nose-arts but the quality of the photo isn't very good.
That's all for the moment.
Kind regards.
Bruno,
Thank you! Not quite like the nose art of your typical 8th Airforce B-17 or B-24 ... typically British though - much more refined!
"Glorious Beer" I thought might be a front runner - but no invasion stripes, whereas "Shooting Stars" has the full set.
I spent some time puzzling over some of the tally, which doesn't appear all that often it seems. Some aircraft would not have survived long enough to get a long list of course.
I think I am safe in assuming that a swastika means an aircraft kill, a dagger a supply drop to resistance forces, a windmill a drop to forces in Holland and a bomb plainly an actual bombing mission. I would also assume that a mountain denotes a trip over the Alps to bomb Italy (as in Arthur Aaron's last mission), but what is that last sign at bottom right of Glorious Beer's tally? Bombing beach defences prior to D-Day perhaps?
Another question that arises is ' was the art repeated on the starboard side of the nose?' The only photo I have seen that suggests that it might is of 'MacRobert's Reply'.
John,
I was given a copy of 'Bomber Boys' for Christmas. I'm not even half way yet - but I do have a bomber to build!
And as an addendum in response to any expectation of another, larger, model Stirling that Tom may have I did some years ago dream of a quarter scale Stirling for a prone pilot. Four lawn mower engines to lift her sedately into the air... carbon fibre technology might just make such a thing possible - but it will remain a dream - or the memory of a dream in my case.
They abolished national service just months before I expected to be called up (membership of school Air Training Corps having (I hoped) settled my course in that event) and I never did have the money to devote to obtaining and maintaining a PPL thereafter.
And from the design side I was rejected on health grounds by DeHavillands when I applied to join their design team so never gained the maths (not my strongest subject in any case) for calculated design that the CAA make vital for any man-carrying vehicle above 20kg weight - so I am restricted to keeping my feet on the ground and remote controlling my electric powered models designed empiricly by whatever understanding I have gained in the intervening years... So I am neither fitted for, nor probably have the years left for any such dreams to become reality... ah well! We can't do everything!
But if someone else nearby had the same dream and needed extra hands... who knows... just maybe...?
Robin
I trust this is a practice run before you attempt the full size version? 
If you elect not to add the dorsal turret,...she would be OK in the markings of an early Mk 1. John (K4Kitty) has posted some great pics of early Mk 1,s on the forum. viewtopic.php?f=4&t=44&start=90
