Matchbox Armstrong Whitworth Siskin IIIA

I picked this up quite cheap on eBay, having made it first way back in the late '70's. There were no instructions in the box. Those in the photo are from my first build. I have the old Airfix Space Shuttle kit box full of instructions and spare decals. 

Painting the pilot & what little cockpit there is, is proceeding gradually. 

I'm drilling holes for the rigging. 

I'm using the Silver Wings instructions for the rigging plan. 

So far I've broken five 0.4mm drills. It's currently a race to see if I can drill all the holes before I run out of drills! 

The engine was done with a black base and Alclad steel. Then a silver pencil was used to highlight the cylinders. It will need a bit of tweaking after being handled for a while. 

More work on the pilot. Nearly there. 

The pilot is now seated and ready to be fitted into the fuselage. 

I've had a go at the propeller wood grain effect. 

The engine & prop, still under construction. At least this shot shows the woodgrain effect a bit better. 

The fuselage halves are together and the seams & sink marks (mostly on the underside) are being dealt with. The instructions show a windshield part, but it is not numbered and no part is in the kit. Drilling all the rigging holes cost me 5 broken 0.4mm drills. 

The windshield is clearly visible in this picture. 

The lower wing is stuck on. The tail & upper wing are dry fitted. Starting to look like a biplane now. 

You can see how much filling was needed on the underside. I think it was three applications of Mr Surfacer in total. 

There are a couple of points where the Mr Surfacer had formed bubbles rather than fill the gap. I've scraped a bit more filler out than needed and that should reduce the chances of forming a bubble, I hope! 

After several attempts to fill the joint on the lower wing using Mr Surfacer and Levelling Thinners, I abandoned the thinners and sanded instead. The thinners was taking too much thinner out of the joint.