I built the main body of the mole from 3 3/4 inch EMA plastic tube. I cut out the slots on either side where the Mole's side tracks go and built boxes to house these tracks. I made a rubber mould for these tracks as on the original they were also like this. I made the 8 wheels on which these tracks run, again, out of EMA tube, also on 1/8th inch axles. I made these complete assemblies up first with the tracks in place and then stuck these into the slots from behind. The rear end bulkhead was turned in perspex on a lathe, (the original was from a toy of some kind (I think) but I could not find it. Any ideas anyone?

The exterior detail on the Mole consists of the 2 halves of the nose of the B58 stuck front and back of the side track housings (you need 2 B58's for this as there are 4 altogether). Either side of these slots are the leading edge panels from the wings of the B58. Above these are ships railings, including the lifebelts!, from a 1/100th scale ship model (as yet unidentified). Other detail consists of more of the strange cog-like wheels from the B58, small grills cut from the steps of the Footbridge kit. more girder supports and portholes made by Rip-Max "Supermarine". These were ship fittings available individually from many model shops. it is worth noting that other parts from this series, including chrome ship's hooters and railings, are seen in all the Thunderbirds launch silo's and also on Thunderbird 5. Indeed the hatchways from this series can be seen in the film version of Thunderbirds 1's launch silo and on the side wall of Stingray's pen. But I digress. On the Mole all these parts were applied with liquid cement. Unfortunately, for reasons I can only guess at, with the exception of the slots for the side tracks, nothing on one side of the mole is the same as the other. In other words the model is very lop-sided. since I wanted my model to look the same as the original on both sides I had to stick the parts on out of alignment. The one final puzzle with the mole is the strange cowl that sits astride the top rear of the model. I scratchbuilt mine and I have no idea what was originally used.

The final piece to make is the auger. This is by far the most awkward part of the model to make. I 'turned' this in high density polyurethane foam and painted this over with glass-fibre resin. making the thread is the worst part as this has to be done by hand turning the lathe and carefully cutting in the threads with a file. The original nose cone was made from a model aircraft spinner and propeller so I did the same.

Final painting was done with cellulose spray paint. I used a nice matt dark grey for the tractor and lemon yellow for the mole, the auger was basically silver. One of the things I like most about the Mole is its heavy weathering. I used soot, pencil lead and liberal amounts of airbrushing to achieve this. I used Humbrol matt black and brown for this and gave it a really worn look. Well, the thing is supposed to travel through the earth!

This photo of my Mole model was taken at an exhibition in Sunderland (UK).

These are some of the many shots I took of the Mole that appeared in many issues of both the comics, poster magazines and video covers.

Indeed this model was featured in more photos than any other model I did for Thunderbirds