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Showing results for tags 'Puma HC.2'.
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While we were at Duxford last Thursday, this Puma dropped in for an hour or so. It is XW224 and presumably one of the oldest Pumas left in service. It was marked up with all the unit badges that have operated Pumas over the years, and had the current fad for silly Union Jack shapes on the tail. This was not fairing well with a muck from the exhaust. Not the greatest photo, but it was parked a distance away and as always at Duxford, the sun was in the wrong place. It was taken on our Canon PowerShot SX720. Long since ditched my SLR after my stroke.
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I've fancied a 1/72 Puma HC.1/2 for ages - my brother had the Airfix one as a kid - but that was about the last time anyone produced a Puma kit in 1/72! Picked this Heller one up off eBay a little while back, but only then started researching in earnest. Sounds like lots of accuracy and fit issues lie ahead of me. I don't mind a bit of tweaking; I'm not a competition-standard builder, and I know my scratch-building limits, so as long as I can tweak it enough to look quite a lot like an HC.2, that'll do for me. Initial look in the box doesn't seem too off-putting...cockpit detail a bit simplistic, but the fuselage halves look ok with loads of raised rivets, which as it turns out, seems quite realistic! Initial build stages and everything fits together pretty well so far - nice to have locator pins/slots, unlike the last build (Sword Harrier T.10)! I read somewhere that the Airfix/Heller moulding has the undercarriage leg oleos at full extension... this is correct for a flying helicopter, but will look wrong on the ground when they should be compressed. Sure enough they're extended on the model. A quick calculation and I reckon about 15cm oleo extension on the real one isn't too far off, which equates to about 2mm in 1/72. So 2mm was duly removed from the front leg and a bit of Eduard etch (linkage) added. Turns out the plastic is pretty brittle after all this time - just about managed to do the nosewheel here but am a bit nervous about the main gear legs in the future. Before and after:
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I'm looking to build RAF Puma HC.2 ZJ955 'Black Peter' using the Airfix kit. I have the appropriate Whirlybirds update and conversion sets to turn the kit into an HC.2. Some questions regarding that particular airframe; 1. I know it is a former-SAAF airframe. Did it receive all the appropriate mods to bring it to HC.2 status? Does it have the glass cockpit? Anything unusual or non-standard about the SAAF airframes in RAF services? 2. There appears to be a different aerial fit on the port tailboom - is that now a standard RAF fit? It isn't included in the Whirlybirds set - what is it? 3. Does anyone have any interior photos of Black Peter? If not, what was its interior fit? What colours? I cannot find any interior shots of this airframe on the web. TIA!