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Airfix Harrier GR1 conversion


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How did you make them Bill? I made a soft set for as SHAR a few years back, just a couple of blobs of Milliput pushed into the intakes before assembly to get the shape and then a little texturing while still wet, then popped them out when dry, piece of cake.

On a visit to Yeovilton back in the late 90s I saw SHARs with both the soft and hard FOD guards, though for your Harrier GR.1 the latter are the more appropriate.

I've approached this in different way's..the inflatable ones were indeed plastic card and milliput. Basically the intake shape with a thin "sausage" of milliput ariund the extremity. I then used Krystal Kleer to make them appear like plastic/fabric. These were generally dark grey with dayglo central panels. there was a valve on the fuselage side of the thing....

These Dayglo versions were again plactic card with crinkled seloptape on paper applied to give the plastic-ky texture. Sprayed Halfords white then plasticoat(?) Dayglo Red. The silver reflective strips were from silver foil and the black grab handles from black plastic card.

For the hard cover on the SHAR 1 - its the Flightpath PE cover. If I manage to bugger up the GR1 intake mod., then I'll use a piece op plastic card with handles and plates from additional card. they do add a blotch of colour!!

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Whats your load going to be Bill?

The stores in the kit are pretty reasonable...I think that I will probably go for the following.....

Inner pylons - the 100gal tanks. These are quite colourful(!) The pylon themselves were Dark Green (Its true I tell'ya!!), and the Tanks Dark Sea Grey over Light Aircraft Grey. The "Warning" triangles were red on a white background. For the outer pylons (Dark green again!) I'm gonna go for the SNEB pods. Matt Aluminium bodies - High gloss (Chrome - if I get it to work) rear sections with black nose cones. The rocket tube apertures will be given a thin application of wet milliput - to represent the frangible covers.

I will most likely add the Aden gun pods, and maybe add a 1000 lb "inert" Blue/Dark Bronze Green bomb on a sctachbuilt centre pylon...

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Bill could you just describe the intake problem in a little more detail. I've spent sometime studying Nicks SHARSIG 1/24 build but cant see what the problem is. Now the turbine 'shaft housing' I can see the problem with but is the whole turbine to far backward? Where should it be on the real aircraft i.e. what should it be lined up with?

According to Nick - check out the HARSIG Faq/page on his SHAR1 & 2 build's (you are a member aren't you?) where he exp;ains all. On the kit itself there are parallel raised lines where the intake former section is supposed to fit. This unit should be fitted immediately in front of the 1st line.

In all honesty - even after looking into the intakes, the difference is probably not that noticeable. Certainly though the turbine "shaft housing" does indeed need some work.

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Nice work so far Bill, very educational mate.

Glad to see those pesky customers didn't keep you on the phone too long today :winkgrin:

Customers are never a problem Col (even if they are at the other end of the country!!!) :winkgrin:

And I quite fancy a TF.X myself now!!! See what you and Zeke have gone and done!!!

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Customers are never a problem Col (even if they are at the other end of the country!!!) :winkgrin:

And I quite fancy a TF.X myself now!!! See what you and Zeke have gone and done!!!

A Harrier TF.X - now *that* would be interesting!

:)

Jens

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The stores in the kit are pretty reasonable...I think that I will probably go for the following.....

I'm gonna go for the SNEB pods. Matt Aluminium bodies - High gloss (Chrome - if I get it to work) rear sections with black nose cones. The rocket tube apertures will be given a thin application of wet milliput - to represent the frangible covers.

Doesn't the kit have fatter RN 2in rocket pods (3x rows of rockets) as opposed to SNEB/Matra 68mm ones (2 rows) Not being a 1/48th person, I only have a vauge memory of this. I do recall seeing early GR1s with 2in pods, but with the rounded frangible nose cap and not the conical one.

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Doesn't the kit have fatter RN 2in rocket pods (3x rows of rockets) as opposed to SNEB/Matra 68mm ones (2 rows) Not being a 1/48th person, I only have a vauge memory of this. I do recall seeing early GR1s with 2in pods, but with the rounded frangible nose cap and not the conical one.

Good call Dave! Luckily I have a pair of these.....from the Hunter FGA9 set

FLIGHTPATH to the rescue!

I have though seen a picture of a GR3 at Port Stanley -I think- with what looks like the larger (RN) white or maybe silver pods you mention, with the pointy nose... was there not electrical combatability/interference problems with the RAF SNEB/Matras on board HMS Hermes?

Heres a (transposed!!!) pic of a fully tooled up GR3..letting RIP!!!!! And yes you can see that they have two rows of tubes....

hargr3_1.jpg

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I have though seen a picture of a GR3 at Port Stanley -I think- with what looks like the larger (RN) white or maybe silver pods you mention, with the pointy nose... was there not electrical combatability/interference problems with the RAF SNEB/Matras on board HMS Hermes?

Heres a (transposed!!!) pic of a fully tooled up GR3..letting RIP!!!!! And yes you can see that they have two rows of tubes....

Yep, they used the RN pods during the war (Hence why they are included in the kit) but all the point noses were gone by then.

I just wish there was a way to get the 2in pods in 1/72 without buying a CMK Bucanneer!!

I used to have that photo on a poster on my wall when I was about 10!

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  • 2 weeks later...

A mini-update.......port intake has had some attention- auxilliary doors opened...I've started to add some plastic card/rod cockpit detailling

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Rather than use aftermarket nozzles, I thought I'd try to adapt the kits parts...here I've drilled and reamed the solid "vanes" out. Plastic card replacements will be added..

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The nozzles been temporarily fitted!

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Still a long way to go......I'm not that happy with the panel lines, so they will need to be filled and re-scribed...

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Blimey Bill, that's turning into an ambitious project! Like it though... Ian (Heritage Aviation) makes a nice set of dropped doors that would have saved you some time. He also does nozzles & landing gear in white metal. The landing gear parts are quite nice too, from the cursory inspection I've given them. :thumbsup:

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Blimey Bill, that's turning into an ambitious project! Like it though... Ian (Heritage Aviation) makes a nice set of dropped doors that would have saved you some time. He also does nozzles & landing gear in white metal. The landing gear parts are quite nice too, from the cursory inspection I've given them. :thumbsup:

I have a set of heritages nozzles - (others available from Pavla and Airwaves!!) as a part of the T4 conversion set, and as nice as they are - they are still solid. I wanted to open mine up so you can see inside them! As for the intakes - I've built dozens of Harriers over the years in all scales and its summink I do as a matter of course...I can then regulate the droop of the doors etc.,

Nothing wrong with these sets - in fact I'm all for them they do greatly improve the kit items - I just prefer to do the necessary myself - reaming out the nozzle only took me half an hour sitting in the shop with my feet up - very therapeutic as it happened!! :gobsmacked:

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For the load I would got with SNEB on all pylons, you see a lot like this in old pics.

Julien :speak_cool:

I'm thinking along these lines as it happens.....I may see if I can get my hands on another couple of SNEB pods from Flightpath......

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  • 2 weeks later...

Update time, been messing about with plastic card and odds and sods..but one fuselage half seems to be taking shape......

First off the opened up forward nozzles. The vanes on the left hand nozzle have been added from thin plastic card.....

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Cockpit details being added - with the seat in you won't see too much anyway......

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Nozzle added for effect....

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I'll probably need to back the grill to avoid see-through..

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A bit of progress - mainly internally.........

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..and externally on th epanels. One fuselage half has been primed thanks to Halfords, to highlight problem areas. I'll do the same with the other half too...

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Edited by Bill Clark
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  • 2 weeks later...

Weeellll..some progress since the last pic's... The fuselage halves have been added along with a few more coats of Halfords' grey primer.

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For the GR1 "pointy nose" I'm using a section of resin from...erm...summink or other, with a pitot tube fashioned from the needle applicator from an old humbrol adhesive dispenser plastered with milliput. I'll have some fun sanding this to shape.............

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  • 3 weeks later...
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