When Commando Gets Creepy: Haunted

 Welcome to the third installment in this series. I wasn't originally planning on it being a series, even a short one, but I find that what I plan to write and what actually happens don't always match. 

 What we're currently looking at is the long-running British comic series called "Commando", which is a digest sized title focusing on wartime heroics and tending towards titles such as "Desert of Death" and "March or Die" 

 But every now and then Commando gets a bit strange. 

 Today I'm going to bring up another three examples of  stories with a supernatural element. A bit like the last lot, an item has a history and some unexpected properties. However this time the object in question is a lot bigger. And can move. And has guns. 

 Better hope it's on your side. 

Commando 2050: The Haunted Tank (1986)

 I mean, the title says it all. 

The story: "New boy" Sid Raleigh has finally been accepted by the rest of his tanks crew which means they let him in on a big secret: Their particular  tank is haunted, most likely by the spirit of a notorious practical joker.  Sometimes the tank will stop for no reason. Sometimes it will start for no reason. Funny thing is, it always saves the crew from incoming danger.

  Sid is a bit dubious, as you'd expect, but we all know how this goes.  Eventually Sid and his mates get dragged into a nefarious Nazi scheme and the ghost has to take decisive action. 

An entertaining story that manages to work with the premise without making it too silly. 

  

I Bought A Fistful of Books

 One of my favourite things to do when I have money in my pocket is to poke about a bookshop, and especially a second-hand bookshop.

  I'm going to make a clear difference a 2/h bookshop rather than a charity shop that does books because while charity shops do have some great stuff, their selection tends to be limited to what they think will sell, so anything too obscure or too dog-eared  is going in the bin.  2/h bookshops are more likely to have the sort of mostly-forgotten fantasy/Sf that I'm after.

 So the other day I decided to swing by the bookshop in Fratton's Bridge Centre because I could guarantee coming out with some interesting stuff.  

Let me share my haul with you.  

 Larry Niven - The Flight Of The Horse (1974)

 Not an author I know very well but that's an intriguing cover.

Am I the only one that prefers the old-school

 Chris Foss-style covers to the "stylish" stuff you get nowadays? 

Andrew J.Offutt - My Lord Barbarian (1977)

If there isn't at least one head-cleaving in this book I will be very disappointed.

James C.Glass- Shanji (1999)

I'm a sucker for anything with a woman wielding a sword. 

Interesting mix of tech on display too. 

Rick Cook - The Wizardry Quested (1996)

Another one that plays right into my interests;

WW1 fighter dogfighting  dragons? Yes please. 

Rosemary Edgehill - The Warslayer (2002)

   I saw this one on Reddit and promised myself I'd pick up a copy one day.

You can probably guess why 

The next three are all part of a series. 

Hopefully it's not a five part series because getting the other two books could be awkward. 

Paul O. Williams - The Pelbar Cycle (1981)

1. The Breaking Of Northwall

2. The Ends Of The Circle

3. The Dome in The Forest

See what I mean about "obscure" I'd never heard of this one. 

God damn, that's a big-ass axe. 

Frank Oliver - Axe - A Tale of Carthelion (1985)

The cover looks like something from a mid-80s German metal band

 so right away I was interested. 

And just to prove I don't only read SF/Fantasy:

James Lucas & James Barker - The Killing Ground (1978)

Oh boy, I already know this isn't going to be an easy read. 

This entire bagful cost me £15, by the way.

If I can, I  will review as many of these as possible so watch this space.

That's All Folks 

Where are you all coming from?

   I don't update this blog much these days which also means I only pop in now and then.  So when I decided to check out my current stats I got one helluva shock. 

 Normally I am doing well if I get over a hundred views per day but for some reason I am getting several hundred pageviews. Not that I'm complaining but I do have to ask: What on Earth is going on? Are you all bots or something?

  Just so you have something to look at here's a picture of some of my model collection:

 

 

BigD Builds A Tomahawk (pt 3)

 The story so far:  The author decides to build a P40 Tomahawk in the colours of the WW2 Turkish Airforce and is lulled into a false sense of security. Now read on. 

 

I'd been doing pretty well up to this point. I hadn't broken anything, lost anything, put a part in upside down or come close to yeeting the kit across the room. 

Time to apply some paint. I usually put some on at this stage, before I have to add anything like airscrews, exhaust stubs or undercarriage.  I find it easier to get those painted separately and apply once the fuselage is dry. 

  I'm not entirely sure I got the shade of green right but getting the right shade was going to be awkward, what with the shops being locked down  so I went for my old favourite. "Close enough - and nobody but me is every gonna look at it anyway."

 

Then i tried puttting the undercarriage on and for the first time I hit problems.   

Problem #1. The pegs on the landing struts were too big for the holes on the wheels. I had to break out the Stanley knife and do some hacking and drilling. 

Problem#2. The landing struts are quite delicate. My fingers aren't. Naturally I ended up snapping one of the damn struts and getting that fixed took some time and swearing. 

Problem#3. While I was grappling with the lnding gear I managed to knock one of the wing guns off. Good luck finding that on my kitchen floor.  And every time I managed to get a replacement fitted, the next time I had at the undercarriage I knocked the damn gun off again. 

                      See if you can spot the gunbarrel I had to impovise out of a spare bit of plastic. 

 

Once I got all that sorted - and believe me, it was a fraught, aggravating experience - I added the canopy and exhausts.

 

  I think that canopy is supposed to be flush with the fairing but whatever. 

After painting the underside I applied the decals and called my P40 finished.

                                                 It is a very striking colour scheme, isn't it?

 

As always I have mixed feeligns about the end result. I can't help feeling that it could ahve gone better and it sure as hell doesn't look as pretty as everybody elses' kits seem to come out.  Oh well.

 

Then again, I'm glad I got it finished and I did get several hours enjoyment doing something that didn't involve a screen  so I'm going to call this one a productive use of my time. 

 

That's All Folks

 

Big D Builds A Tomahawk (pt 2)

 Disclaimer: I am rubbish at building models.

 If you are aftter tips or even anything resembling competence you will be disappointed. 

 

The story so far: Big D decides to build a P40 Tomahawk in Turkish markings but has to go get some more brushes first. Now read on. 

 

This is the first kit I've ever done  where step#1 is to glue the fuselage together. 

Step 2: Assemble the cockpit and glue it to the lower wing assembly.

 I always have trouble with cockpits thanks to all the fiddly pieces but at elat this way i don't have to try and get the damn thing to align properly with the fuselage sides. You just slot the fueslage and this assembly together/ Nice.

 

Step #3. Join fuselage and upper & lower wings, making sure the wings hae the right ihedral. For this I used a cunning, home-made jig. 

 It's not stupid if it works. 

 

Added the tailplanes and rudder and I reckon it's looking good so far. 

Up to this point the Airfix P40 has been nice and easy to assemble with minimal fiddling, filing or swearing.  That will change.

 

Big D Builds A Tomahawk

 Hello again

 

  I'm making another model and this time it's an Airfix kit so I should be comfortably within my limitations.

  The current project is a WW2 fighter I've always had a soft spot for. 

  These days the Curtis P40 is seen as a bit  of an also-ran, especially compared to the late war triad of Mustang, Thunderbolt and Mustang.    The truth is, the P40 gave useful service across multiple theatres for US, Commonwealth and Russian pilots because it was what the Allies had.  The RAF would have sent Spitfires to North Africa in 1941 if they had any to spare  but they didn't, the RAF had Tomahawks and Hurricanes so that was what the Desert Air Force used.  For the vicious fighting over the Pacific Islands the USAAF deployed P40s until something better came along. You get my drift, yes?  The Tomahawk/Kittyhawk/Warhawk is another one of those fighters that held the line and helped chip away at the Axis Airforces in the early rounds, ready for the heavy hits later on. 

 Having said all that, I'm doing a P40 Tomahawk that didn't see any action, because it was serving with an airforce that gets a bit overlooked. 

I've been meaning to build this ever since I found this decal set online

 So after getting them from Ebay, I then chose the aircraft I want on my shelf
 

 

 Not only is it a handsome paint scheme but the Turkish markings make it look a bit different from the roundels and stars I'm used to. 

Next step: I needed an early model P40 - a Tomahawk rather than the later Kittyhawk variant with the longer fuselage and bigger chin radiator.  After a quick visit to Pompey's Waterlooville Models I came away with this.

 I am really looking forward to building a kit with those useful little pegs and holes again.

  I have just discovered two more issues though.

 

Problem One.

 Why is it that no matter how many paints I have in my box, I never have the right ones?  I managed to find 5 tins of dark green and none of them are the right bloody shade. 

  I may just use what I've got and hope nobody sharp-eyed makes a fuss. 

Problem 2.

 Oh dear.  I think I need some new brushes. 

 

Join me next time as I actually start glueing shit together.

 

That's All Folks. 

 

 
 

 

BigD Builds A Fighter With A Big Nose Part V: The Final Chapter

 It took a long time, a lot of procrastinating and a number of minor tantrums but I finally, finally got this kit finished.   

  All things considered, to have done a good job on the La-200B would have involved ...well to be honest, it being built by somebody who isn't me.  This is not an easy kit to make by any means and I think I've already mentioned some issues with instructions and parts fitting together. My limited skills really struggled in several places.

But never mind all that bollocks. I finished it!

Yes, I know my kitchen table is a mess.

To demonstrate just how big this aircraft was, here it is next to an F16.

 

 

It really shows how much difference a couple of generations worth of  engine, electronics and airframe can make.

To finish, let me break it down by the numbers.

Original cost of kit : £15 (The same as a really good XL mixed kebab & chips)

Time taken to build kit:  Approx 49 days

Time it takes to eat a really good XL mixed kebab and chips: about 20 minutes

Parts I dropped on the floor and lost: 4

(Not counting the decals I accidentally lost into the washing up. Don't ask.)

Parts I decided not to bother with because they were inside and nobody was going to see them anyway: 12

Times I had to glue the sodding nosewheel back on after it fell off: 4

Times I used some very naughty words: Beyond counting.

How I feel after seeing the completed LA200B on top of my fridge:

PRICELESS

 That's All Folks

 

Big D Builds A Fighter With A Big Nose Part IV

   Previously on "Big D Builds..."

I bought a model kit from a charity shop becaue it looked like a cool design. 

Since i'm not actually that good at building model kits this led to a lot of swearing and blobs of glue  everyfrigginwhere.

Now read on.  

 

 When we left off I'd managed to get the main body of the Lavochkin put together. Next step was to jam filler into all the gaps and bits where the parts hadn't quite aligned. 

 Once that dried I sanded it all down until I got bored and painted the result.

 

 

As an aside, the Celebrations sweet tin is a perfect size for keeping spare bits and pieces.  

Plus you get to eat the chocolate first. 

  I left off the canopy until I painted the fuselage.

 

Canopy is now on and I painted that distinctive nose.

 

I am disappointed that nobody in Cold War Russia took the opportunity to paint the nose bright red and maybe add some eyes on the side.
 

Here's a better angle on the (unpainted) nose.

Between the big schnozz and those three intakes the Lavochkin looks downright goofy from the front. 

 

  Now we come to the aprt I was really not looking forward to and in fact, this is why the update was delayed for so long.  

The Undercarriage.  

" Intimidated" is really not the wrong word.  As soon as I saw those miniscule parts on the sprue I knew this stage was going to give me nightmares and at least one psychotic episode.  FFS, why are the main undergarriage legs in THREE sodding pieces?  The Nosewheel strut is in two and the only reason I can see is that tehy wanted to fil some extra slots on the sprue.   

 The nosewheel assembly. Not counting the wheel there's three pieces making up this bad boy and all of them are tiny. Not a good fit with my well-documented lack of co-ordination and chunky fingers. 

 

 The mainwheel was even worse and turned out to be a bity of a trap. 

 

Here's the relevant part of the instructions. 

 That looks an awful lot like the mainwheel assembly  is essentially one straight line.Right?

 

So that's how I put them together.

 

Then I looked at the painting guide on the back of the instructions. 

 

 Lemme just highlight the problem.

That's definite right-angle going on there. Why is this not in the fucking instructions? 

Aarrgghhh!

 

Now I have to take these bits apart and glue them back together again. 

Did the guy who wrote the isntructions and the guy who designed the kit work in different sheds  or something?

I'm going to go have a a nice cup of tea and wait for the vein in my temple to stop throbbing. 

That's All Folks.

 

Big D Builds A Fighter With A Big Nose Pt III

   As you can probably tell, this project gets fitted in around stuff like work, eating and sleeping which is why it's taking so long.

   Last time I had finally managed to get the cockpit together and was feeling mildly pleased with myself. That was not going to last long. 

   One oddity of this design was that it had two engines. And for reasons that seemed justified at the time, the designers opted for a tandem layout with one engine in the nose, exhausting just in front of the landing gear. and one engine in the more usual position in the tail. 

  The kit had rather generously given me a whole engine to put together for the nose position with a ...complicated ... framework to hold it together.

I could not get the bloody frame to go together!        

  A definite problem with this kit was that it had none of the handy pegs and holes you get in an Airfix kit so it wasn't always clear how some bits fit together. Is part A supposed to slot on Part B or be glued to the edge?      The instructions did not clarify this. Then I couldn't help noticing tht some bits didn't quite match up to how they looked on the instructions anyway.

 

   Frankly I was getting a headache and  an ever-increasing urge to do something violently destructive. 

Then a revalation came to me.  

"All this is inside the model and nobody is ever going to see it. Why are you doing this, exactly? 

Just like that the clouds opened and sunlight shone upon my face. 

My path was clear and it did not involve the sodding engine fiddly bits. 

 Again, this feeling of satisfaction did not last.  

Trying to fit the cockpit into the fuselage and glue the shells togther was a traumatic 

experience and I had to hack some bits off the cockpit to make it go in. 

That's why the co-pilot's seat is leaning drunkenly to one side and the fuselage has several very large gaps in it. 

 

  Oh Lord, why did you make me so crap at everything? 

It doesn't get better on the underside.

Much as I'd like to blame the kit, we know what the real problem is, don't we?

Ah well. 

 Now just for a change I remembered to put some weight in the nose so my LA200 won't fall back on its tail.

A bolt and three nuts jammed into some blu-tack and job's a good'un.

 Then I broke out the putty and set about some of the gaps. As usual I managed a complete lack of finesse. 

 Obviously it needs some sanding. Then some more sanding. 

Fuck it, slap enough paint on it and nobody will notice.

Join me again for more misadventures in modelmaking and more damage to my sanity.

That's All Folks. 

Big D Builds A Fighter With A Big Nose pt II

   A bit of a small update for this project. I've not exactly been hurrying with this kit; more like wandering over when I feel energetic and tinkering a wee bit. 

   I finally managed to get the cockpit section completed and i ahve to dmit that it loks like an utter dog's breakfast.

  Somehow other people manage to fit all these tiny bits together and make it look neat and realistic. I made it look like the whole thing was put together by drunken orangutans.

  I also managed to lose not one but three tiny parts. Two dropped on the floor and vanished, the third pinged off when I tried cutting it off the sprue and could be anywhere in Hampshire. 

  Oh, yes, I snapped both control columns in half.  That's why they're so short the pilots have to steer with their knees. 

  My hopes of this being soemthing I can post on /r/modelmakers are already fading...

  More updates to follow. Or I might just give up and jump on and down on the bloody thing. Could go either way. 

 

Big D Builds A Fighter With A Big Nose.

   That's right folks; it's time for one of my awkward forays into the world of scale-modelling. A hobby that requires patience, good eyesight, nimble fingers and painstaking attention to detail. 

   I have none of these things. I also lack the ability to not drop tiny parts on the bastard floor.

                                            I do wonder about my choices sometimes. 

  Anyway the latest kit to get my hamfisted attentions is something special. I was passing by the Crys charity shop on Southsea's Osborne Road when my attention was immediately snagged by a window display of plastic model kits. And right away this one caught my eye. 

 

A&A Models Lavochkin LA-200B. Cost me £15.

  You have to agree that it's an unusual design.  Correction, it's a normal-looking 1950s jet fighter from the tailpipe up to about 18 inches forward of the cockpit when things get a bit weird. 

   After I got it home I did a bit of research because I was wondering if this was a real machine or something that never got past the  drawing board. 

   The Blog "Soviet Hammer" has a nice little article on this oddity.

 https://soviethammer.blogspot.com/2015/03/lavochkin-aircraft-200b.html

 To paraphrase slightly the Soviet Air Force wanted an all-weather fighter so the Lavochkin  bureau took their existing LA-200 design and fitted a massive radar into the nose. This meant redesigning the intakes which is why the LA200 went from this:

 Source: https://forum.warthunder.com/index.php?/topic/323878-la-200/

 ... to this.

 

Source; https://www.reddit.com/r/WeirdWings/comments/7rbzrb/lavochkin_la200b/

    After some testing the Lavochkin design was abandoned in favour of something a little less peculiar-looking but clearly somebody liked the LA200B enough to do a model kit of it.

  So after doing my homework, it was time to open the box. It's fair to say I got a bit of a surprise. 

    Look at all those tiny, tiny parts. 

Then I read the instructions and discovered that just the pilots' seats have 5 pieces each.

 Have I mentioned that I'm neither dextrous, sharp-eyed or patient?

So at this point I carefully put everthing back in the box and went away to have a bit of a whimper.

 I may have bitten off more than I can chew here.  

Oh dear.