'Er...'scuse me.' I said.......

'Wot iz it?' I  said.

To which he replied 'PJ models Partenavia P68 Victor. Bit waterlogged. packed in 1991 newspapers.'

I first decided I wanted one of these - the P68, not the newspapers - in 1990 when I saw PJ's advert in RCME. And here was one for the taking.

Daft enough or not, I took it.

That was late December 2003.

Maiden flight was November 2004 - don't get much building time these days.

The Box contained a 'plan-pack' consisting of fibreglass fuselage, nacelles and spats, and obeche foam wing panels and tail feathers, with a few sheets of A3 sketches to build from.

Tail feathers were a little damaged, and water had moved the obeche in places, but not badly - one or two obeche splits occurred after covering, but luckily mostly on the under-surfaces. All in all, a reasonable salvage.

Engines are ASP 36 MkIII. Run in and set up in a Jumper trainer and my trusty Jazz. Clubmates wondered why I kept fiddling with 'this' ASP 36. Fact was, I was swapping engines........neglected to tell anyone about the twin until the week before it was finished.

Throttle servos (micros) are mounted on sliding trays, with a wire crank 'gismo' connecting to a hex bolt accessed from the nacelle top. This allowed rapid balancing of the engines - kneeling behind the model using a balldriver.Working nav lights, flashing tail light and landing lights complete the package. Haven't used these in flight yet; flasher seems to reduce Rx range, so work to do there. Landing lights seem OK, microswitched to come on with flap down. Might use those next time.....

Scheme is from a full-size owned by a Milan Konstantinovic, who uses it for air-racing, last outing I can see on the web being one in Devon.