It’s
August 14, 1964
at Penhold
airbase, Canada, where a 19 year old
Norwegian has just done his solocheck in number 334
and has been cleared to take it up on his own for his very first solo. The
instructor, F/O Schlossberger, watches
apprehensively as the babyfaced Norwegian cranks it
up in a sputter of smoke..
At
least that is how I’ve been told it happened by my dad, to whom I’ve made
this as a Christmas gift. It was meant to be for his birthday but unfortunately
construction was delayed.
My
father retired last year after 41 years of flying, 17 of which was in the
Norwegian AF. He did his flying training in
Canada
on Harvards
and T-33’s.
For
his retirement day I got a Harvard to taxi up and park next to his 737 when he
landed after his last flight for the airline Braathens,
and we then put him in the Harvard for his final flight. The look on his face
when it cranked up was worth every penny!
The
occidental kit is built as a Canadian built Harvard, and all the parts for this is
in the kit. I used Eduard etched brass details and Canopy masks. The masks didn’t have a very good fit and the glue
on them didn’t want to stick around sharp curves, so I made some of them
myself. The plastic on the surface is slightly roughened, but this is easily
sanded down. Otherwise the fit is good although I am left with the impression
that the vertical stab is slightly on the thick side.
Click on
images below to see larger images
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I
primed the model with humbrol 64, and it’s the
last time I’ll do that. It just doesn’t work for me. I managed to rescue it
though and painted the whole thing trainer yellow after some subtle preshading,
before painting the red and antiglare black. In retrospect looking at some of my
reference material, I realize that the red should have been slightly more
fluorescent or dayglo-ish, but it’ll work.
I
had a sneaky peak at my old mans logbook, and found the tailnumbers
on Harvard in question as well as the date and the instructor involved. I had a
good look through the Hannants library and found
that the decalsheet for the Goldilocks aerobatics
team by Leading Edge would provide both the numbers and the old-style Canadian
flag. So once the Humbrol clear was on thick, the
decals went on like a breeze.
I
had some spillage through the masks on the canopy that I tried to fix with Klear.
I don’t know if it was because they were coated with future before I painted
or just poor quality Klear but it didn’t work. So
I’m sticking with future from now on..
I
stole a few hair of my lovely blonde girlfriend, painted them, and made the antennawire.
The white stuff behind the rear cockpit is the instrument hood which is made out
of tin foil. It was while under this hood my father was asked by his Canadian
instructor: “Eriksen! What’s minimums in Norwegian!!?” making it clear
that he had missed a rather important call. “eh…
it’s minimums sir!!” “Well..
then at least it’s not a language problem!!”
I
left the wingflaps off because I have to put the
model in a box and airlift it to
Norway
in a week. I have plans to
build a plexiglass monter
for it as well but we’ll see.. The base was built
as per Florian K’s
description in this sites tools’n tips.
It’s
just a shame that I can’t be home this Christmas to see his face..
Espen
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