Westland Wallace

Trade Notes
     From Frog this month comes the "Westland Wallace", a truly unusual and historic subject. Famous for the successful Houston-Mount Everest expedition. FROG's replica of this little known aircraft goes together beautifully from 31 parts. Registration letters G-ACBR are provided in the kit together with R.A.F. roundels and rudder flashes, so that a model of the R.A.F. version can be produced, though the "greenhouse" of a canopy is not provided. Price is 3|-.
     While with Frog it would be well in compliment this firm on their sensible kit box design. This instead of comprising lid and a base as two separate units, is all in one, with a fold along the back edge for the lid. When opened, the box fods out to provide a simple working tray from which even the tiniest plastic part is unlikely to be lost having said that where is our port aileron..? ...suffers only from an oversize ...ailerons (...a minor fault in the Wallace).
AeroModeller 1965-02


CONQUERORS OF EVEREST
     Houston-Westland (Converted P.V.3) For the Houston Mount Everest Expedition of 1932/33 two aircraft, with an operating ceiling of at least 33,000ft, were required. In the book First Over Everest, the authoritative account of the expedition, it is stated: —
     "The selection of the aeroplanes was by no means easy, having regard to the prominent part played by the engine. At first sight it would seem that an engine like the Pegasus would pull almost any well-designed modem aeroplane of suitable characteristics to the immense height called for by the task. Investigation proved that there were not many aeroplanes suitable for the flight. Naturally, the machine had to be a two-seater. . . . Then again otherwise suitable aeroplanes were inadmissible owing to low undercarriages. Our machine must have a propeller of unusual diameter in order to grip the thin air, and we had to foresee the possibility of taking off from aerodromes covered with sand, gravel or small stones. Should the propeller tips come too near the ground, there was danger of their being damaged from flying fragments. . . . Even with all these points suitably adjusted, it was as well to have a machine with a deep and broad fuselage in which the observer could handle his numerous cameras without becoming hope-lessly congested. Our final choice rested on the Wesdand P.V.3, which we never regretted."
     The engine installed was the highly supercharged Bristol Pegasus IS3. The aircraft was lightened as much as possible, a process involving deletion of the wheel brakes and wheel fairings, and substitution of a tail skid for the existing tailwheel. The observer's cockpit was faired in to give protection, and springs were incorporated in the controls to compensate for unequal contraction of metals at great altitudes.
     Early in 1933 final tests were made by Mr. Penrose, who ascended to a height of 37,500ft, and on April 3rd, piloted by Lord Clydesdale and with Lt-Col. L. V. S. Blacker as observer, the Houston-Westland, in company with the special Wallace mentioned below, accomplished the historic flight over the great mountain.
     Eventually the P.V.3 came home to Yeovil, and thereafter served out its days as a flying test bed for Bristol engines.

     Wallace (Everest Conversion) As a second string for the Houston Everest Expedition, the original Wallace was fitted with a Pegasus IS3 engine, was lightened in the manner described for the Houston-Westland, and the rear cockpit was faired in. For the actual assault, the pilot was F/L. D. F. Mclntyre, now managing director of Scottish Aviation, Ltd., who carried as passenger Mr. S. R. Bonnett, a Gaumont-British photographer. Flight 1955-04-15 №2412

Air Lines
Lines Bros., Inc., 1107 Broadway, New York, NY, USA.
Period: 1964-1966

The first U.S. distributor of Frog kits was H. Hudson Dobson in New York, who sold the pre-war Penguin kits. When plastic kits were re-introduced in the 1950s, distribution was handled by Lines Bros., Inc., and also by Continental Models, Inc., in Brooklyn, New York. Incidentally, Continental also handled most of the Airfix imports. However, all imports of plastic kits were subjected to high customs tariffs and sales were therefore relatively low. It was to cure this situation that Air Lines were born.

Air Lines was the brain-child of Alan Ginsburg, the local Lines Bros, manager. His suggestion was to have all the kits moulded in the U.S.A., thus avoiding the tariffs. He eventually persuaded the management in London that this was a sound proposition and an initial range of 24 kits was selected. After visiting a number of potential candidates -bringing a sample Frog mould in the car boot - an agreement was reached with Pyro in New Jersey to mould the kits.

Most Frog kits at the time had a line drawing rather than dramatic artwork on the box and this was felt to be unsuitable for the U.S. market. The artist Jo Kotula was therefore commissioned to paint new art for Air Lines, many of his paintings later being used on Frog kits as well.

All decals were printed in England and, apart from the new ones for the USAAF B-25 and B-26, the same as in the contemporary Frog issues.

Instead of the normal U.S. practice of adding the price after the kit number. Air Lines incorporated it in the number itself. Kit 3901 thus cost 39 cents, and so on.

It should be noted that the Vimy was never sold with radial engines, although shown thus in the Air Lines leaflet.

The first kits appeared in 1964 and a further five kits (7908, 9803, 9804, 12903 and 12904) were added in 1965. The last kits to be released were the 59 cent range in spring, 1966. However, by now it was apparent that the whole scheme was in fact uneconomic and Air Lines was terminated later in that year, an additional five kits planned for August never being produced.

Production quantities are not known but must have been substantial for most kits, judging by the numbers still around.

FROG model aircraft 1932-1976, R. Lines, L. Hellstrom

Tri-ang/Frog (France)
Lines Freres S.A., Route de Dunkerque, Calais, France (to mid-1964);
Meccano - Tri-ang Lines Freres S.A., 70-88 Avenue Henri Barbusse. 93 Bobigny. France (from mid-1964)
Period: 1962?-1972?

Early in 1964 Lines Bros, bought the Meccano group and - almost as a bonus - also got control of their French branch. Meccano was already a well-established name in France - much more so than Tri-ang - and the two companies were therefore quickly integrated, the Meccano name being worked into the Tri-ang brand name on most products. The existing Meccano manager became the new managing director for France. He had no objection to the name Frog - indeed, he thought it a good joke! - and their kit range was thus renamed Frog/Tri-ang.

A new box style and new artwork was adapted for new releases. For reasons unknown, these also reverted to the old suffix-P. Kits already in production were not changed, apart from getting a sticker indicating the colour series when appropriate (red for the Attacker etc.). There is no known example of an old kit being given a new box. The fact that the Britannia was released in this style is admittedly confusing, but probably only indicates that it was never issued in the early style for some reason.

It should be pointed out that Tri-ang did by no means handle all sales to the continent. Managers of the continental Lines Bros, selling branches did, of course, buy where the price was lowest and Tri-ang prices were often higher than those of IMA. Lines Bros. (Holland) NV did, for example, mainly buy British-made kits.

By 1966, kit production was becoming uneconomical and was consequently terminated before long. This was partly caused by poor sales and partly due to problems in planning the mould swapping programmes. In early 1967 some 50000 standard Frog boxes were sent over from Britain and most remaining Tri-ang stocks reboxed - in some cases this was done by simply putting a new box over the existing one. But for certain kits, such as the ships, airliners and small-scale WWII bombers, no new boxes were available and old stocks of these were still sold as Tri-ang in the early 1970s.
"New" Style

FROG model aircraft 1932-1976, R. Lines, L. Hellstrom