2020

xmas 2020

Special guidelines and recommendations have also been announced by the BAG for Christmas 2020. We usually celebrate Christmas in close family circles. In that sense, we didn't have to adapt extremely. For Nadine and Ivan, who went to Vienna to see Ivan's sister, some calculation was necessary. But everything worked out and we celebrated together on December 25th. It's nice when everyone is together.
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Lighthouse Louie (1:72)

The story of Jackpine Joe is also the story of the MTO (Mediterranean Theater of Operations). So far for me it has been more of a sideline in WW2; this is deceptive. In addition to the BG, FGs of the 15th Airforce were also involved. The history of the 325th Fighter Group (FG) is particularly exciting. They have 'decorated' the tail units of their aircraft with a black and yellow checkerboard pattern. That soon gave them the name "Checkertail Clan".
I have now built a model of an early type, a Curtis P-40F Warhawk. And as always, the photos are on a flicker album.
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teaching courses (GBW)

teaching an old dog new tricks, that's how you could describe it. The Corona pandemic challenges everyone to a greater or lesser extent. The schools, and that includes the GBW in Weinfelden too, have to come up with a lot of ideas when it comes to protection concepts. In the fall I taught a few courses and that's how I got around to teaching a few "distance learning" lessons. I've never done that before. For this I got - and received - the support of Alain and Nadine.
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B-24 Jackpine Joe 1:72

now I've (finally) built a model of a bomber; a Consolidated B-24H Liberator in 1:72 scale. Not quite OOB, but that's no surprise if you know me. This model is also related to the history of my surroundings. The bomber "Jackpine Joe" SN 42-52466 crashed on July 19, 1944 on the Wyden Castle near Ossingen. The crew bailed out short after passing the lake of Constance near Siegershausen.
Not only was the building of the model an exciting matter, the research of the story itself was fascinating too; I am now in contact with the son of the bombardier and the pilot (among others). Josh Golden wants to create a website about Jackpine Joe's last flight and asked me to take photographs of the assembly. Some of these photos are already on a Flickr album.
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orienteering in 2020, MOM

everything is different this year; the corona pandemic also has a direct impact on orienteering. From March all competitions have been canceled. After the lock-down, a few runs with drastically limited numbers of participants took place. Nadine and I only contested four competitions in the fall season. My last run was the MOM in Seelisberg. A great, but also difficult terrain.
And now the Garmin software can display the recorded route in color with an additional parameter (e.g. pace or pulse). This is my course with the pace drawn (blue=slow, orange= fast).
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the irchel planes are complete

the Airacobras that crashed into the Irchel also include a Spitfire, also from the Armee de l'Air. Less than two years later, on 12. March 1947, Charles Leroy was killed in a Spitfire Mk .IX in the opposite direction. He also followed the Rhine on the way from Friedrichshafen to Lahr (near Strassbourg) and did not see the Rhinsberg, which was surrounded by ground fog.
Now I have finished a model (1:72) of this Spitfire too. The Eduard kit is something of the finest that currently can be built. You can find photos of it here.
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75 years ago

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just in time for the 75th anniversary, I finished building my two models of the Airacobras. The two fighter planes, flown by French pilots, probably collided in the air that Monday due to bad weather and the sharp turn of the Rhein. They crashed in the Irchel and both pilots were killed.
From time to time reports about this accident appear in the newspaper. Inspired by such a report, I have now built these two Bell P-39 Airacobras as models in scale 1:72. After I had gathered all the necessary information, I was able to have the decals drawn and let them print myself. You can find detailed information and photos on my Flickr album.
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the year of the Shermans

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actually I don't building tanks, but I couldn't resist last autumn's Black Friday offer: a set to age a US military vehicle as it was used in Europe during World War II (ETO). During the past six months I have built three models of a M4 Sherman tank each in a different scale. There is an album of every model, i.e. in 1:35, 1:48 and 1:72. This was quite an unexpected long time and I wonder whether it was worth it.
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excursion to the Makers

inspired by Alain, who works at the PH in media design with a Calliope mini, I also got myself such a microcontroller. Interesting to see how it all developed, who used to assemble electronic kits in 1980 is now called a maker or the microcontroller itself. The first such kits and boards appeared in the 70s and 80s (PET, AIM65 or µProfessor). Today, much more powerful computers are implemented in a smaller space. I also own some of the best known: Raspberry Pi, Calliope mini, BBC micro:bit or Arduino. With the microbit I have built a (simple) weather station that sends its data to the cloud.
image MCU-galerie-blog
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Happy New Year 2020

a few quiet days over the Christmas with family and friends and doing a little sport too. Strava, one of my training apps, summarized my year briefly and presented it in a few key figures (check it on the picture below). I am excited to see how it will continue in the new year.
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