stever219

Good progress Rob. When it comes to fitting the side transparencies I found the fit to be surprisingly good, requiring minimal filling and sanding. From experience I’d suggest leaving the flaps off until main masking and painting has been completed; in fact getting the masking on before installing the engine nacelles makes life easier too. Airfix have been a bit lazy with the main undercarriage and you may well want to install some bracing struts to help the legs cope with the nose weight (I didn’t with my first and paid the penalty with a collapsed undercarriage). If you can find @general melchett‘s build in WIP I think he did add bracing.

Deferred (1); between de second and de fourth, Deferred (2); shaved cat

With the exception of the T. Mk. 3 the cockpits and intakes of all Javelins were in the same palace relative to each other, in fact the overall fuselage shape remained more or less constant between the bottom of the windscreen frame and the trailing edge of the wing for all fighter variants of the type. I suspect that the front fuselage of the Mks. 2, 6 and 8 were cut back due to the American radar being heavier than its British counterpart and the consequent need to keep any centre of gravity changes to a minimum so as not to alter handling characteristics too much (no need for MCAS here!). Likewise Glosters probably wanted to keep as much of the original radome shape as possible which would hopefully ease production and minimise any changes in handling characteristics due to changed aerodynamics. The front fuselage of the Javelin has a slight taper, so the interface between fuselage and radome on the Mks. 2, 6 and 8 is of a greater diameter than that between nose and radome for Mks. 1, 4, 5, 7 and 9. Couple that with the shortened distance between radome rear edge and engine air intakes and the aeroplane can’t help but appear to be much more blunt than the variants with British radar.

You seem to be much further on with yours than I am with the one I started months ago.😥😊 If you’re building the model with wings fully forward you’ll need to modify the leading edge of the part of the wing that goes inside the fuselage. @general melchett covered this in his (hopefully pinned). WIP thread on the GR. 1(4). Essentially there is a rib on the fore part of the inboard wing part which needs removing, otherwise it will foul the internal cross brace and prevent the wings from reaching minimum sweep angle; consequently you may find reduced or no clearance between lowered flaps and fuselage sides.

I used lead sheet in the nose wheel bay under the right hand side of the cockpit floor and in the forward ends of the engine nacelles before installing the firewalls. If you’re not too worried about being able to see along the bomb-aimer’s access tunnel under the pilot’s seat you could get some in there too.

At that price it’s nearly the equivalent of VAT free, which has got to be worth a go. Failing that you might be lucky and find one or two “under the table” at a model show for under £50 if you’re willing to wait a while.

Sorry Jonners, I responded to Heather before you (brought up under the “ladies first” system🙄). If you’ve read my earlier post I apologise for reiterating some of it here using different wording. There are indeed some kits that do fall together and some that fight back every step of the way and, as you rightly point out, that needs to be brought to potential buyers’ attention. If a kit does fall together and you found a better/simpler/more fun way to do it then so too does that, for example the Airfix 1/48th Javelin main wheel bays and legs can be built up before building the wings around them, rather than trying to juggle a large, heavy model whilst fiddling the jacks and side stays into position. With regard to painting we all have our preferred methods and materials, but “little Johnny” may not have access to these so is stuck with what’s available in a starter set or the local Hobbycraft (other large retailers are available). By all means use Humbrol 116 or 163 instead of 30 for RAF Dark Green and tell us that you’ve done so and why, or use another manufacturer’s paints altogether to produce a model that can, if need be, sit happily on your display shelves or a display table at a model show, but maybe the “how I painted my review model” might be better suited to a “Tools & Techniques” type article of the sort that SAM (amongst others) used to do so well, and which I usually enjoyed, even if I was too ham-fisted to actually copy. Sadly 1/32nd American post-war jets don’t really fit into my modelling scheme unless they’re wearing RAF national markings, but I’ll certainly have a browse of the next SAM to see what you’ve been up to. There are a number of reasons why I’ve not bought a modelling magazine for years, often there’s not enough content that appeals to me to justify the cost and living in a late ‘80s built shoe box I’ve no real space in which to keep them being the two uppermost in the decrepit pit that is my mind at present. Thank you for your kind offer of a free mag though, it is appreciated.

Thank you Heather for that Meatloaf moment (“You took the words.....”)😉👍. A review of a new or revised product should tell and show a new modeller what they should end up with if they follow the instructions, assuming that the instructions are followable, those for the MPM Meteors, for example, are not particularly well thought out and could lead an inexperienced modeller attempting to get an assembled main wheel bay and leg into an already assembled wing. It’s also important that reviewers point out any necessary modifications to produce the most accurate rendition possible of the chosen subject, for instance on the Airfix Victor B. 2 and SR. 2 you need to represent a large circular intake in the port wing root leading edge that isn’t provided for in the kit and for the K. 2 you need to add some reinforcing plates to the starboard side of the nose opposite the door and some floodlights in way of the HDU fairing on the fuselage sides. (Please don’t get me wrong here: neither the MPM Meteor, nor the Airfix Victor is fatally flawed nor terminally unbuildable, but both probably suffer from “what are the accountants going to let us include” syndrome.) I appreciate that reviewers can be given a brief along the lines of “Write 500 words on the new Airfix Hunter F. Mk. 4 and give me 3 images by tomorrow teatime. Here’s the kit, there aren’t any instructions, just do it” and they have to get on with it. If you (and your audience) have got the F. Mk. 6 kit you’ve got a bit of a start but in this case concentration on the differences, and how easy or not they are to achieve, might be the way to go. Whatever any given reviewer does he or she will not be able to please all of the readers all of the time.

There’s one in an eBay shop now for £50.95, I had 2 from this seller very recently and they are reliable and very quick despatch.

My condolences also Peter. It’s coming up to the fourth anniversary of our Sooty’s passing, the day after my birthday. He’d been diagnosed with an intestinal growth only a few days previously and that last trip to the vet’s with him was truly miserable. We’d had him, his sister Sweep and their nephew Maxwell from kittens and Soots was the last of the three to leave us: I still miss all of them.

If you're building this as a K. 2 the ailerons need to be rigged trailing edge up. For early jets it's 2 degrees, for later jets 4 degrees when neutral. The reason for this was to reduce the bending moment on the outer panels thereby prolonging fatigue life. Obviously this had an adverse effect on performance but was considered easier/less expensive than reinforcing the wings.

Hell’s teeth Melvyn, who’s got it in for you? Good for you trying to carry on with this madness hobby whilst dealing with your illnesses. As far as invasion stripes go you’re dealing with a can of worms hiding in a bag of nails: the subject’s been dealt with a number of times on any number of forums and possibly the best advice you’ll get is “try to find a good photo or several of your chosen subject”. You probably know as well as the rest of us that the stripes were applied “at the rush” in the few hours of darkness before the invasion went onto the beaches and that the airmen and women tasked with the job used any and every type of brush to get paint on aircraft. There are plenty of images of aircraft with stripes of varying widths, degrees of straightness and taper: some Typhoon units’ stripes were particularly ragged. Some ground crew(s) might also have been averse to painting stripes on ailerons due to concern about affecting the balance of those surfaces although this should have been allayed after the introduction of the Night/White underside scheme in 1939 - ‘40, or have been instructed not to paint them. Likewise not painting the stripes across the radiator fairings might just have been forgotten in the heat of the moment. The only aircraft that I know of with perfectly applied stripes was Tempest V JN751, Wing Commander Roland Beamont’s mount, which was “done” by Hawker’s paint shop at Langley.

Thanks Heather. Although I’m a non-driver I do cycle when I can and, like you, I’m old school. Sadly there are too many idiots on the roads and pavements these days to take chances with. My dad also took the advanced test but one dark and dirty night in East Kent his Mitsubishi Colt wound up as some of the meat in a four-car sandwich because the dingbat at the back hadn’t noticed that he had three cars stopped ahead of him trying to turn right. Maybe the advanced driving test should be made mandatory?

Sod’s Law says that you’re about to need your ABS; it’s like Martin Baker seats, there for when you really need it. Like the rest of us you’ll never know when someone’s going to pull out in front of you, or something’s going to fall off the back of the lorry in front or some other 5h1t is going to happen one wet or icy day that needs you to pull up quickly and under full control. Please be careful, it’s a jungle out there (other hazardous environments are available, ask your stockist for details).

I suppose dropping short might be a worry to the crews as they’d be closer to the bang, even if running away bravely at full bore. As Tesco say “every little helps”.

Assuming that I’m right and that that is ‘215 the object she’s just dropped is a “shape”, which could be anything from a totally inert, correctly ballasted aerodynamic test body up to a fully instrumented and equipped, but obviously sans warhead, systems test vehicle for arming, fusing and detonator tests. There’s a similar photo somewhere of WP223 of 90 Squadron in anti-flash white but with full colour national and squadron markings also having just let go a Blue Danube “shape” and I believe that she never dropped a live weapon either. Years of development and testing, including dropping the weapons, went into these weapons before the live drops took place. The last thing anyone wanted (apart from having to drop them for real) was for the bomb to get trapped in the airflow around the bomb bay of the carrier aircraft (hence the deflector plates on the Victor) and either collide with it or fall away late and/or off track, or to fall short of or beyond the target due to worse or better aerodynamic performance or simply not to go off when required.

I’ve looked again at the first image in post 2 and I’m beyond reasonable doubt that that is WB215, the second prototype. She has the original shallow bomb-aimer’s blister only applicable to the first few aircraft, but has the later intake lip shape of all Valiants except WB210. What clinches it is that her fin flash is swept and follows the line of the rudder leading edge: production Valiants had a rectangular flash painted slightly further forward. It would help if her serial number was clearly visible but the reflections from the skin coupled with poor image quality (on my screen at least) have kyboshed that one. As for the footage in that video I can’t get a good enough look but it could indeed be silver, but is it the actual aeroplane used for the test or just a handy clip used by the film producer for illustrative purposes?

I damn' well hope not!!! The Victor kit is beautiful, even if it does take a bit of fettling to get the wings on (and you can't beat a good fettle!).

Only the fan cowls apparently. There have apparently only been two failures of this nature involving the CFM56-7B engine but both resulted in penetration of the cabin. In at least one of them the penetrator was part of the fan cowl rather than the detached blade itself. Airlines flying 737NGs with this type of engine had already started inspections of the fan stages where the first failure occurred but, oddly perhaps, no-one appears to have thought that blades in other fan stages might also be susceptible to cracking and should also be inspected. Checks were still being undertaken when the second fan failed with the sadly fatal consequences for one passenger.

Can’t disagree: I have a recently-purchased tin of Humbrol 67 that’s been opened twice. On the first occasion, after much stirring, it was just about useable for brush painting an area of a model that won’t be easily visible when finished. On the second occasion it was impossible to get a satisfactory paint-to-thinners ratio that would allow it to be applied by brush and it’s never going to produce an acceptable medium for airbrushing (not that I have one). On the other hand I recently re-opened a tin of Humbrol Authentic HX1 that hasn’t been opened since before I moved to my present home over 21 years ago: two easily thinned coats no problems. If I could get Sovereign Models Colourcoats, which I can’t get through the post, I’d swap to them as I’ve never had any joy with either Revell or Xtracolour enamels. If anyone from Hornsby/Humbrol is reading this PLEASE FOLKS, GET YOUR ACT TOGETHER, GIVE US DECENT QUALITY PAINTS AND STOP ALIENATING LOYAL CUSTOMERS. I’ve used Humbrol for over 50 years and I have never had as many instances of almost totally unusable paint as I have over the last few years. If Aeromaster acrylics were still available I’d use them, with some caveats (their interpretation of RAF Dark Green is far too light) but they aren’t so I can’t and please don’t start me off on brush painting Tamiya acrylics: horrid!

The lo-vis SHARs were, IIRC, Barley Grey overall with Light Aircraft Grey below wings and tailplane. If anyone has the relevant Modeldecal sheet the answer is there.

Further to my grumbling at post 26 above I also get irritated with reviews that simply describe the contents of the box and the suggested sequence of assembling them. What I want to know is are those parts a reasonable, in scale (as far as practicable) facsimile of the full-sized article, is it easy to assemble and, if not, where the problem areas are and how, if at all, they were remedied. It also helps to find out if the instructions are fit for purpose or if there are “gotchas” waiting for the unwary. Finally do the decals do what they’re supposed to and look the part once applied? For a review it doesn’t matter to me which paints were used, how they were applied or whether pre-, post-, in-between-, or up-the-garden-path-shading was applied and whether or not umpty-dozen filters were used, just give me the important bits and I’ll sort out the rest for myself.

There’s no compelling reason to believe that DZ302/G would not have had her serial applied in anything other than the standard form, copies of which are available on a number of commercially available decal sheets as Seahawk has illustrated above.

There are, I believe, plans afoot by at least one “cottage industry” manufacturer to produce the AEC Mandator transporter/loader in 1/72th scale but as resin kits it/they will probably cost around 50% of what we’re going to be shelling out for our shiny new Vulcans next November.

Pity they couldn’t have cut up a Piper Puddlejumper or Cessna Spamcan, but I suppose none of them have the internal volume of the Jetstream that would have enabled filming.