Well, here it is: my first vac-form, the Aeroclub Meteor F.3. I scored this kit from Hannants cheap when Tamiya announced their early Meteors back in 1997. I eventually plucked up the courage to build it during 2001. The vac-formed parts make up the fuselage, wings and canopy. The engine fronts are resin and other details are provided in white metal. The undercarriage doors, tailplanes, and some of the interior parts are in injection-moulded plastic. I am quite proud of some aspects of this model. I managed to get the vac-formed components together with no joints showing — it's better made than many of my injection-moulded kits. However, I managed to attach the tailplanes at some weird angle, which looked alright at the time, but terrible now. I dipped the canopy in Johnson's Klear, as is my routine, and stuck it to the fuselage with slow-drying super-glue. This was a mistake. It has been said that Klear will prevent super-glue fogging clear plastic, but it certainly didn't this time, and the rear canopy is now white and opaque. I have since glued canopies to my models using liquid plastic cement. The 'plane was painted with Humbrol enamels and coated in Klear. The decals were nice but silvered quite badly in places — I still wasn't using decal solvents at this time. I toned the gloss finish down with Matt Cote. The wing pitot was replaced with brass tube and wire. It's a great vac-form, and I recommend this form of modelling to anyone.
