Airfix 1/48 scale
Avro Anson Mk.I

by Keith Sherwood

This is the latest addition to my Irish Air Corps collection. When Airfix first announced the model a couple of years ago I knew then this would be a great addition to it. It really is a superb model. In my opinion probably one of Airfix's finest despite some reservations about the wing fabric representation. Personally, I agree that the surface texture looks somewhat overdone, but, when it's lightly rubbed over and paint is applied it looks fine to me.

Anyway, detail throughout is amazing and because the glazing is crystal clear you're going to see everything. The only additions I made were some generic Eduard seatbelts and if you use the sloped canopy, you'll need some piping and cables to power the instruments as it's quite obvious through the glazing. With the later canopy the fuselage shroud hides them. And, also, some for the small set of 4 instruments on the radio operator's panel.

As I particularly wanted to do a very early Irish Air Corps aircraft, I needed to modify the ailerons by lengthening them inboard by 3ft (about 20mm) by cutting away the wing and part of the flap. I had initially thought of using a spare set from a Classic Airframes kit which comes with the longer ones as additional parts. I even managed to obtain a set from a very nice chap on here as for some obscure reason I could only find one of mine.... Anyway, it wasn't to be because despite the length being okay and looking good from above, the underneath was a different angle and just looked odd. The only option therefore was to modify the length of the kit ones. Not a difficult job and I think the end result looks OK. 

The markings (well actually only the 21) came from Max Decals. They do supply the green/white/orange as decals, but I think it looks better if they can be sprayed on and it was simple enough to do. Also, the green is my own mix but it seems to be showing darker than it really is in the photos. I used a combination of Humbrol 78 and 120. The aluminum is Tamiya LP38 and the cowlings are LP48 Sparkling silver.

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So, that's it. I'm certainly looking forward to building another one ASAP but using the other canopy and different engine cowlings. A godsend too will be when Eduard release a set of glazing and turret masks...\   

My thanks to Joe Maxwell at Max Decals, Michael Whelan, Curator of the IAC Museum in Baldonnel and Luke Slaney at Airfix for providing extra 'information etc' and some photos that I hadn't got. Much appreciated.

Model and Text Copyright © 2022 by Keith Sherwood
Page Created 29 November, 2022
Last Updated 30 November, 2022

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