Just got back from a windy, cold, damp, expensive holiday in Cornwall.
However, last sunday was OK and while lining up to buy body boards for the kids at Widemouth Bay I spotted some gliders for sale.
Remember those polystyrene efforts with lurid colour schemes at 20p, every model looking the same, whether it was a 109 or a spitfire, well they seem to have progressed rather dramatically.
This company is called Fly Leader, made in Taiwan, the scale is about 1:25, the detail is fantastic, they’ve put printed card on top of the polystyrene and shown every rivet. At £1:99 I bought a desert camo spitfire, Mk Vb, clipped wing , spurious number PG065, squadron marking FL, along with a Stuka, PG 03, there were many different marks of spitfire, 109 and P-51, in various colour schemes, looked great, anyone else seen any of these about, worth every penny.
Not much interesting in the way of a/c down in Cornwall, a lot of stuff noted at Popham on the way down, best sighting was a Tornado ambling along the coast at Polzeath then turning on the brown smoke and going supersonic over the sea, nice to get home yesterday and have the cricket interrupted by P-47 and spitfire hammering over the rooftops during the morning, thank you Duxford.
By: Pete Truman - 29th August 2005 at 14:09
We used to get the little gliders at the local supermarket – had “dogfights” where we tried to knock the other plane out of the sky (or at least hit it). Had some rollicking big scraps in the back garden sometimes! I ended up with over 300 “kills”! 😀
I think I’ve seen these new ones before. Never picked one up, though.
Always a good bet at kids parties, hire the village hall and hand out the gliders when the dear ones arrived, saved a lot of bloodshed.
Only found these gliders at the beach shop at Widemouth Bay, unfortunately the poor weather put paid to another visit, am sure there was a silver P-51 in Duxford chequer board markings, still got the pathetic red plastic props though, would look better in black, definately worth going through the box, will try and track some more down, can’t find any reference to the company on the net, might have to wait till next years holiday. When I’ve cut the grass may enter into combat mode.
Didn’t do a Lightning, everything was WW2, mainly variations on Spitfires, griffon and merlin, P-51’s, stukas, BF109’s, FW190, P-40 and possibly a tempest, difficult to concentrate with 2 kids dying to get in the sea, stuka actually has cranked wings, undercarriage supplied on all a/c.
By: DazDaMan - 29th August 2005 at 12:42
We used to get the little gliders at the local supermarket – had “dogfights” where we tried to knock the other plane out of the sky (or at least hit it). Had some rollicking big scraps in the back garden sometimes! I ended up with over 300 “kills”! 😀
I think I’ve seen these new ones before. Never picked one up, though.
By: DGH - 29th August 2005 at 11:16
They sound interesting Pete. Don’t suppose they did a EE Lightning did they?
Last time I had one of those I ended up ‘flying’ it into Lake Windermere when I was about 4 or 5 back in the middle seventies. It all ended in tears 😀
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August 29, 2005 at 9:23 am