Global Scale Modeller

My grandfather flew with the USAAF and USAF from the mid-1940s through the 1960s and retired as a Lieutenant Colonel after working in the Pentagon and the Strategic Air Command. He passed away a few years ago and I'd like to build one each of the airplanes he flew as tribute, and would love some tips on which kits to buy (or avoid) for each of these planes based on everyone's experiences. Ideally they're all the same scale so they look correct as a display, and I'm thinking 1/72 scale since he did fly the B-52; a 1/48 scale B-52 would have a 47-inch wingspan!

Here's the list:

• Fairchild PT-19

• Vultee BT-13

• Cessna AT-17 Bobcat

• Consolidated B-24 Liberator

• North American Aviation T-6 Texan - [I've bought the T-6G Revell kit already]

• Douglas C-47 Skytrain

• Boeing B-50 Superfortress

• Boeing B-47 Stratojet

• Boeing B-52 Stratofortress

Thanks in advance!

What a great idea to honour your grandfather
I would suggest having a look at a data base like scalemates....https://www.scalemates.com
When you type in the aircraft’s info after clicking “kits”, it gives you a history of kits available, scales, production date, versions, manufacturers etc. At least a starting point for you

As far as the PT-19 goes the MPM model is not very good. I just picked up a Planet Models resin kit that looks much better and at a better scale for a small trainer. However, that would violate the "same scale" rule.

Cool! Those are all neat aircraft.

I've crawled through Scalemates and have a spreadsheet of who makes which kit. Ultimately I'd like to focus on one great kit per aircraft - for example there are 8 manufacturers of 1/72 B-24 Liberator kits: Academy, Airfix, Eduard, Hasegawa, Italieri, MPC, Minicraft and Revell.

Maybe I should have asked - who has built kits of these planes, and would they buy again?

Hasegawa for the B-24, by far. Airfix for the C-47. Pavla's BT-13 is not too bad, I've built but I suspect the AZ models kit may be better though I haven't seen it. Academy is the only B-50 kit available and it looks very nice in the box. I am pretty certain the Minicraft kit is the same kit. For the B-52D I would stick with the Monogram/Revell kit myself although I think there are rumors that ModelCollect may have one in the works. For the G and H you have the AMT/Italeri kits, or ModelCollect. I like the AMT kit better but both have their issues. I have the AMT kits, I've only read reviews on the Modelcollect and they haven't impressed me enough to spend the money. Hasegawa is the only choice for the B-47 and it is some work but the shapes are very good. Pavla has the UC-78, so does RugRat resins, I have both and would shade toward the Pavla.

You can see build logs of the Pavla BT-13 and Airfix C-47 on my website:

http://goldeneramodel.com/mymodels/bt13/bt13.html

http://www.yolo.net/%7Ejeaton/mymodels/ ... /2c47.html