My congratulations on your new arrival.
The Keil Kraft kits you mention are rather rare 1960's era kits. I'll
bet they are molded in a heavy yellow plastic, right ?? This is the only
1/72 scale Camel kit to have a rotary enging molded separate from the
cowling, as opposed to the Revell example. I haven't looked at my example
of this kit next to a drawing, such as from the Datafile. It struck me as
looking a lot like the Revell (another I have not set next to a set of
drawings).
Windsock Datafile #6 is the Sopwith 2F.1 Camel, also called the
"Ships' Camel". It will probably be printed next year. Another good book
is "The Camel File" available from:
Air Britain (Historians) Ltd
19 Kent Road
Grays
Essex RM17 6DE
UNITED KINGDOM
I think the price is in the 20 pound range (= about $35.00). This is
an excellent book, it records the use and ultimate fate of EVERY Sopwith
Camel made. It also has drawings of the various models produced.
Naturally there are lots of pictures. This book can be ordered directly
from this address, they take Master Card and VISA. I've not seen this book
in any U.S. bookstore, probably because most bookstores here don't like
dealing with such small publishers. I got one by ordering direct. If you
belong to the Cross & Cockade Society you get an additional discount
>I just picked up two (one for me, one for my son) Keil Kraft 1/72nd Sopwith
>Camels (at a pretty good price). My question is, how does this kit
>compare to the Revell model (which I have built several times). My
>suspicion is that it will need some extensive fixes, but I haven't taken
>it out of the plastic wrap yet.
>
Who wrapped this kit up in plastic?? Can this be original ?
>Also, I am about 1/4 finished with my son's "rocking horse" airplane (all
>of the wood is cut. I said, the last time I mentioned this, that I
>wanted to use the HB W.19 for inspiration on this project (of course I
>meant the HB W.12). So far the wings and fuselage look okay, but the
>floats are too far forward to be used as effective rockers (although I
>have a fix in mind for that).
>
>I was curious what the "large" scale & RC modelers used to paint Naval
>Lozenge? Is there a pattern somewhere? Does someone make a large scale
>lozenge decal?
The only Naval Hex Camouflage decals have been produced in pretty
small (1/72, 1/48) scales. See the recent post by Steve Hustad on sources
of images of this camouflage. The pattern is simply that of regular
hexagons, like a honeycomb. The original printed fabric featured hexes
that were 15 cm wide when measured across opposing flat sides. The
Americal sheet gives pretty good values for he colors used.
A seaplane rocking horse sounds like a pretty good toy. Years ago I
met a fellow in New Zealand, originally from England. His father had
worked in a factory bulding Sopwith Camels. The father and a co-worker
made for the son a kids toy Camel at work and he would "fly" it around the
garden of his house. I asked him if he even had a picture of such a
marvelous thing. Sadly, he did not.
Back to work for me. Hope you get some sleep.
Charles
hartc@spot.colorado.edu