The latest edition of Random Thoughts arrived on my doorstep after a bit of a delay because the first copy disappeared in the mails. This is the second of the quarterly editions and it still has considerable color. The Sweating Beaver was gone from the cover and as part of the revamp, it was explained that the beaver will only be shown if there is no Canadian content within. Hmmm. I sort of like the guy and would wish to see it stay a permanent part of the cover.

Anyway, there are five very nicely done build articles and a reference article along with some other bits and pieces. I notice that now there is a photo of the article author (just like in FSM) and some information about him/her. The editor stated that he intends to keep fiddling with the format so it is quite possible that each edition will be somewhat unique from the others.

For articles, there is Andrily Bass' 1/35 LAV III conversion based on the AFV Club Stryker ICV.

There is Bernie Hengst's Airmodel 1/72 Do-26v2. A really superb build of what is not an easy kit to begin with. This is done in Lufthansa livery during its brief use as a mail plane.

Billy Bishop's Nieuport 17, based on the 1/72 Eduard kit is next. Andy Bannister put a great deal of effort into additional detailing to make this superb  and what has to be somewhat small model.

Randy Lutz then tackles the Czech Model 1/48 Me-309v1. Typical of a short run kit, it needs some additional attention to get the details right and the end result is a very fine looking model of this interesting, but unsuccessful aircraft.

The final build article gets my 'hero of the issue' award and it goes to Gary Barling for having the courage to build and fix all the glitches in the Frog 1/72 Whitley. Gary's end result is truly excellent and his work can only inspire the rest of us.

That is it for kit builds. There is a most interesting article on British Camo painting by Steve Sauve'. He comes to many of the same conclusions as most of us in that one never says never when it comes to aircraft camo. Included are several demonstrations on how to get various results when doing Brit camo.

All of the articles are accompanied by several pages of large, well done photographs, making this a very nice edition.

If you aren't a member; join. You don't have to be Canadian, eh! You can get details via the IPMS Canada website.

June 2009

If you would like your product reviewed fairly and quickly, please contact me or see other details in the Note to Contributors.