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Feel the Noise: A Super One-Eleven Wishlist

13/11/2019

Few aircraft could make the ground shake quite like a BAC One-Eleven and being a Gatwick based kid I heard a lot of them. Dan Air, BIA, BCal and BA all flew One-Eleven 500s from LGW and the type kept going into the 90s with European. It is yet another of the overlooked types in 1:400 despite there existing a superb casting. Here's a snapshot of what could be made.

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New Moulds from NG Models & Panda

3/11/2019

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There are currently more players in the 1:400 space than ever before and although some of the older manufacturers appear under some stress (mainly Phoenix) several of the others are still expanding. To that end two of the newcomers, NG and Panda, have both announced that they will be producing new moulds soon.

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Classic Airline Magazines Pt2: World Airline Fleets News

24/10/2019

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So many aviation magazines have come and gone but few were as excellent and useful as WAFNews. Even more the magazine was a labour of love of one man for its entire run spanning nearly 25 years. Before the web, if you wanted to know what was going on in any detail you had to get WAFnews.

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Aviation400: Sept/October Releases

17/10/2019

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Aviation400 have been getting a bit of stick recently for the amount of time it is taking them to release models after announcement. I have had multiple people asking me if I know when various A350s will be released. They certainly haven’t been too quick, but at the same time they aren’t JC Wings slow either. Anyway, they have just cleared a big chunk of their backlog so here’s what’s now available.

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Whisper It: A Bristol Britannia Wishlist

16/10/2019

1 Comment

Considering there were only 85 aircraft made you could argue the Bristol Britannia has had a fair run out in terms of 1:400 scale models with 32 releases. Nonetheless the big prop has been rather ignored in recent years and no UK historic fleet is anywhere near complete without a larger representation of the type. It may be a long shot but let's see what could still be done.

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Far from the ORDinary Pt2: O'Hare T3, T1C & Departure

14/10/2019

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In part 1 I discussed how I got to spend some time in Chicago and found myself with time to kill at O'Hare on my birthday. The long walk around the domestic terminals was great and I finished the last post moving from terminal 2 over to AA territory in terminal 3, which is where I'll pickup here.

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Far from the ORDinary Pt1: A Short Visit to Chicago O'Hare

13/10/2019

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Last month I travelled, at short notice, to Chicago for work. That didn’t give me much time to plan but fortunately the trip actually inadvertently allowed for me to spend a decent amount of time at Chicago O’Hare. The city was nice but O’Hare has long, for me, been one of the most interesting airports in the world, so getting to spend a few hours in the domestic terminals was the trip’s undoubted highlight.

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Full House: Manufacturer Colours Fleet Update

9/10/2019

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It wasn’t too long ago that if you wanted to acquire manufacturer house colours models in 1:400 scale then your most likely avenue was the series of Dragon Wings examples, which usually utilized their poorer Airbus moulds. Things have certainly changed and in the past two years there has been an impressive array of new house colours releases. This has helpfully fed my appetite for collection expansion.

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Classic Airline Magazines Pt1: Airliners

25/9/2019

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Research is key when I’m writing content for my aviation history blog and although the web does provide a wealth of great information you still can’t beat the printed word for a lot of the details. A core part of my library is made up of aviation magazines, mostly ones that are now out of print. This post is the first part of a series where I'll look at the most important titles of yesteryear that are well worth getting hold of.

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Second-hand Additions in 2019

17/9/2019

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I admit to getting quite a few new models a month, partly as a result of new purchases but also from the second-hand market. Overwhelmingly these come via Waffle Collectibles Collection Sales. Say what you like about Waffle but he gets the stock and ships it out efficiently at great prices. Here's a selection of 11 additions from the past 9 months acquired from the seconds market, mostly from the Waffle man.

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Lost Potential: A TU-204 Wishlist

15/9/2019

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The Tupolev TU-204 was robbed off a TU-154 style production run by the collapse of the Soviet Union, which is a real shame as it appears to be a decent aircraft broadly in line with Western contemporaries at the dawn of the 90s. In the end although the aircraft has had a 30-year production run only 86 aircraft were produced! Even so the type has appeared in a surprising number of liveries.

2 Comments

Incoming JC Wings for September

3/9/2019

1 Comment

JC Wings are well known for taking a literal age between announcement of a model and its release. This isn't always the case, but in general you can usually be sure of at least a 6 month wait. That means you're probably reluctant to preorder, but frustratingly when the model is finally released they often slip out with little fanfare. So to help you out here are some JC Wings, which should be hitting the shelves outside China soon.

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Classic A320s: A Wishlist 1987-95

15/8/2019

1 Comment

The A320 family is hardly under-represented in 1:400 scale. Even so most manufacturers are fixated on the now and looking back to the service entry of the original A320 is way outside their interest. That’s a shame as there are plenty of cool models that have not been made for A320s from 1987-1995.

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A Quick Look at Phoenix August Releases

8/8/2019

4 Comments

I don't write about Phoenix very often and that is partly because their releases are well publicised so I don't need to do it for them. In addition however it is also because their releases are usually super boring and at the same time pretty mediocre. This month's bunch illustrates what I mean.

4 Comments

A Box From Bob

4/8/2019

1 Comment

Model collecting isn't always a friendly business, but at its heart 1:400 scale has a good community of collectors who are happy to go the extra mile for each other. I have made some great friends in my time collecting. Due to the tyranny of distance I don't get too many models from other collectors but just this week a box arrived from Oz so here I'll look at the contents and how you too can get hold of some rare models from the same source.

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<<Previous

Feel the Noise: A Super One-Eleven Wishlist

New Moulds from NG Models & Panda

Classic Airline Magazines Pt2: World Airline Fleets News

Aviation400: Sept/October Releases

Whisper It: A Bristol Britannia Wishlist

Far from the ORDinary Pt2: O'Hare T3, T1C & Departure

Far from the ORDinary Pt1: A Short Visit to Chicago O'Hare

Full House: Manufacturer Colours Fleet Update

Classic Airline Magazines Pt1: Airliners

Second-hand Additions in 2019

Lost Potential: A TU-204 Wishlist

Incoming JC Wings for September

Classic A320s: A Wishlist 1987-95

A Quick Look at Phoenix August Releases

A Box From Bob

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