Chris Bucholtz Posted Friday at 08:49 PM Report Posted Friday at 08:49 PM The Silicon Valley Scale Modelers had a contest called "Build Your Name." Unlike Frank Babbitt (who did a Ki-84) or Eugenie Ray (whose pre-marriage initials were E.T., hence her little spaceship), I had no obvious options. I built the plane flown by Robert C. Buchholz of the Fourth Fighter Group (you can read his full story here: https://obscureco.wordpress.com/2026/04/12/metronymic-mustang-building-lt-robert-buchholz-p-51d-10-from-the-eduard-172-kit/ ) who was not a close relation (although his name is spelled like my family's was before they immigrated from Hamburg in the 1880s). The Eduard kit is a step up in detail and accuracy from the Tamiya kit, but a step down in ease of construction. The surface is detail is... well, a bit overdone. Some areas of construction, like the instrument panel/rudder/windscreen, don't fit very well. The 108-gallon tanks in the kit don't fit particularly well; with Eduard's Brassin line, one could be cynical and say there was a reason for that. Different variants need you to scribe or fill lines; pay particular attention if you do a D-5 with a fillet. All that said, the cockpit looks great, they give you tank options we've never had before, and a bit of modeling is rewarded. I used True North paint for the red and white trim and Alclad II for the fuselage. The wings were puttied, sanded and painted with Floquil old silver. 2
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