Another 1/24 Airfix Typhoon; Really? I'm Back!

[georgeusa]

First off, does anyone want another WIP of an Airfix 1/24 Typhoon? If not, then I will just post pictures of major developments and leave it at that. If so, then I will be a bit more detailed in pictures, build process, irritations, excitations, exhortations, exclamations and exasperations. This will be a slow and steady build I must warn you.

Why am I starting this now, with more than a few other projects on the bench? I was tricked; I was bamboozled; I was seduced. I had promised myself that I had to complete at least 3 projects before I started this one. And, I was doing so well this weekend. I received this monster of a kit from Airfix on Thursday the 24th. All I did was open the box up, be amazed at the pretty sprues staring at me, mad a cursory examination of the decal sheet and the instruction book and put it in a corner in my office to be drooled over at length and at my leisure.

Then the trickery began. I started reading posts from everyone who was getting their kits in and a trend started to develop, my friends, and not a good one. Most people were indicating their main canopy arrived with a small hairline crack next to the sprue attachment. Not good. I had put off looking at this detail all weekend long as I was trying to get some other projects completed. (Great progress on the IdolM@ster F-22, okay on the Neptune, painfully slow on the Cam-23). So, at 11:30 p.m. Sunday night, I opened up the Typhoon box to check my canopy. Lo and behold, I am one of the unlucky, but very common recipients of a cracked canopy. Now, it is just a small crack, but it is there. I guess I will join the many in sending a replacement request to Airfix and get on the list. Now to Airfix's defense, I thought the packaging of the canopy was quite good. There are two clear sprues. They are packaged separately. Each is first wrapped in a paper towel type material, and then placed in a sealed foam package, which is then sealed in a plastic bag. Seems like this would be adequate to protect it, but I guess not.

Now the seducement. Since I had the box open, I started looking at the different sprues and thinking they just looked great. Next thing I now, the sprue cutters are out, the glue is being applied and pieces are being put together. So it is now 1:00 a.m. and I am on step four and stopping to post this. So kind gentlemen and gentlewomen, does there need to be another Typhoon WIP?

[viper-30]

For one I would like to see it ,people build differently and I think why not .....go on show us .and it will be a while before I get anywhere near mine .

Terry

[Caution Wake Turbulence]

Go for it!

Andrew

[Plastic Bonsai]

But of course! Bring it on.

[dadgaddad]

Did you not see all of the Eduard spitfire builds? You couldn't move for them for a while. Let's see your Typhoon, the more the merrier.

[The Crusty one]

George get your bottom into gear and post some pics pronto...i get the feeling (as has been said) its going to be wall to wall tiffies and spit mkVbs in here for a while! Get yours going early my friend i will look forward to seeing how you go....size of this thing you will get lots of airbrush practice!:-)

[Biggles87]

Yes, if you convert it to a car door type (only joking) it's good to see different approaches to achieving the same end result.

I'll be watching

John

[spitfire]

Definately a big yes, anything to improve my chances of building mine to a decent standard, the more build threads the better, and I am also unlucky as both of my kits have the distorted circle in the canopy and cracks where the canopy attaches to the sprue.

Cheers

Dennis

[Biggles87]

At least you've got one, sorry two.

[stevej60]

Do it George,everyone will build to their taste and skill level,and for those like me that follow will take a bit of "I can do that" or "no way can I do that"

from each and every build.If every post on here were a museum quality offering I for one would loose my mojo as I did reading the trade mags a few

years ago so the more skill levels on show the better!Bring it on.

[AdrianMF]

Speaking as someone who has just built the Nth Airfix Hurricane this month, I say post away! Every build is different, otherwise we'd only have one build per kit!

Regards,

Adrian

[Stew Dapple]

I'll pull up a chair George, start when you are ready

Cheers,

Stew

[dadgaddad]

I'll pull up a chair George, start when you are ready

Cheers,

Stew

Join the rest of us. Got any beer?

[The Crusty one]

Join the rest of us. Got any beer?

i will fetch the beer...any requests?:-)

[dadgaddad]

http://www.spitfireale.co.uk/

https://www.facebook.com/TyphoonBrewery

Edited July 28, 2014 by dadgaddad

[georgeusa]

Well, remember you asked for this drivel. Now a bit of a disclaimer; I like the Typhoon, but I am by no means an expert on it. I will be relying on the kit instructions for color callouts and perhaps a teeny tiny amount of artistic license. If there are some glaring mistakes in the kit color callouts, please let me know. The next disclaimer, this will be a slow build. I am taking my time on it to do it justice. However, given my limited skills, maybe mercy should be the goal.

I was very excited about this kit when it was announced. How excited you ask? Fiscally bad excited. It seems that I placed an order for one with Hannants way back when this kit was first announced on their site. And, I got caught up in the Amazon rage when the kit was announced at a fairly low price; placed an order there for one. My birthday rolled around at the end of May and I got a discount coupon from Airfix and, yep you guessed it, placed an order with them using the birthday discount. Well this kit is from Airfix direct. I have received emails from Hannants and the Amazon vendor that those two kits are on their way. I believe I will have 3 of these beasts to build at some point in time. So a conversion of one to a car door model will probably happen. So, let me post some pictures.

The kit I received from Airfix had the very common crack in the main canopy.

I have sent an email to Airfix; I would imagine they are swamped with requests for replacements.

The first steps in the kit deal with the main wing spars and cockpit. I have attached the side pieces to one of the main wing spars. Already I see problems with posting this build as the parts are so big!

One side of the wing spar is very generously supplied with injection marks. (Ahhh, the memories of the 1/24 Mosquito comes flashing back to me, what fun those were). Now how these are different than the Mosquito parts is that it seems the designers took some time to think about where they would be located. The Typhoon designers, unlike the Mosquito designers who delighted in putting injection marks in the most visible but hard to fill and sand locations, have tried to minimize their appearing in the build. These injection marks seem to be on the side of the spar that is least likely to be visible. But, there is an awful lot of detail on this side so I wonder how much of it will be seen. So, for right now, the plan is to fill all of these little jewels.

While I am filling the injection marks, there are some rather visible mold seams on the spar parts. Normally in scales of 1/72 or 1/48, these are so small that they really aren’t visible. In 1/24 scale, they stick out like a sore thumb. So, these were sanded off of all of the parts for the spar and cockpit. (Can’t wait for an expert to tell me that these were present on the real aircraft like the weld seams on 109 exhausts.)

On both of the cockpit sidewall frames there are many injection marks on what appears to be the side that faces the fuselage. Again, I do not know how visible these will be once the cockpit is in the plane and it is buttoned up. But, I will fill them just in case.

The beginning of the cockpit framing with the main sidewall frames and one bulkhead.

And next the wing spars are added

This is where I stop to let the glue dry and begin some painting. The detail on these parts are just fantastic. Also, the design of the parts and how they go together is quite good and positive. It may even be hard for me to screw up their alignment. (I have faith that I will, it’s a talent, you know!) I will paint this base section first, and then add on parts and paint them as I go. I just think that will be the easiest way rather than put it all together and try to get my fingers to contort around all of the tubing to insure each part is painted correctly. It seems as if the tubing was a mixture of black and metal colors. So, this may be my first test where the kit color callouts and artistic license conflict with the actual aircraft. Any help pointing out my very fallible painting will be most welcome. For now, as always, all comments welcome.

Mini-update: The kit from Hannants arrived today. Its canopy has the same crack as the one sent direct from Airfix. This is not a good time to be employed at the Airfix problem resolution desk.

[Stew Dapple]

Hi George,

It's a shame about all these cracked canopies, as you say not a good time to be starting your first day working on the Airfix Returns desk

Is the clear plastic very thin? Perhaps they have aimed for a more 'to-scale' effect than the plastic can handle?

Anyway, you're off to a flyer

Cheers,

Stew

[georgeusa]

Stew,

The canopy plastic is thin, but not overly so or more thin than some other canopies I have seen in recent kits. I am wondering if it is something that happened in the molding process as the molds are removed causing the cracks. I have two kits and so far two cracked canopies. The third kit will arrive later this week. I would bet that is cracked also. But it is going to be quite a while before I get ready for construction regarding the canopy. By then, there may be a distortion free after market one available.

[Biggles87]

Three! You're just gonna have to convert one into a 'car door' now.

John

PS

I thought everyone knew about the weld seams on the framing

[spitfire]

Airfix seem to be on the case, a day after I e mailed them I got a reply that the replacement parts were in the post, which is nice to hear

Cheers

Dennis

[andyrowe]

George, I think you'll find the colour of the cockpit tubular framing was aluminium throughout, with no black parts. My canopy has the crack also. It's only attached to the sprue by this one attachment point so I think it needs at least one more to support it. Good luck with the build.

[georgeusa]

George, I think you'll find the colour of the cockpit tubular framing was aluminium throughout, with no black parts. My canopy has the crack also. It's only attached to the sprue by this one attachment point so I think it needs at least one more to support it. Good luck with the build.

Hmmm. That really conflicts with the kit painting instructions. It specifically has some callouts for the the frame pieces located in the upper half of the cockpit area to be painted black. There are also some old posts in what I like to call "Cockpit Wars", that indicate some of the upper tubing was painted black. Rats, research to be done that will probably not be definitive. I love it.

[georgeusa]

Cockpit update. This kit is massive and work is demanding. Two very not compatible situations. I do have a small update consisting of the beginning paint stages of the cockpit. As an aside before I start, the third kit arrived and it too has a cracked canopy. I have contacted Airfix through their customer support website, and have received an automatic email response. After going through the Airfix color callouts for the cockpit area, reviewing comments made on this thread and others regarding the color(s)? of the interior, I decided to go with the kit color callouts on this model (tubing a combination of silver and black). I have two others to build and one shall have all of the tubing silver. The other, who knows, I may do it as an IdolM@ster kit and tart it up. So, the construction gets a base coat of silver and Nato black.

On the next kit, I will paint all of the parts separate, put them together, followed by any touch-up as needed. It would have made my life a lot easier to do it this way. I have seen individuals complete an entire cockpit and then somehow paint it without all the various colored parts looking shabby. I just am not that good. Maybe because I have trouble staying between the lines when I color! What I can tell you is the detail on this kit is just breathtaking.

Now the observant among you will notice there are injection marks on some various pieces. And, I said I was going to fill them in, but I haven’t. Let me explain. I have I will be building this kit with the shark mouth scheme. I also think this scheme will look best all buttoned up with no doors, panels, etc. open. So, with that proviso, not a lot of detail will be visible with everything buttoned up. Therefore, only those injection marks that will definitely show will be treated with filler and sanding. This kit is a bit of an experiment. With two others to go (SWMBO will not be happy if she sees there are not one but three very large red Airfix boxes) and the assuredness of aftermarket sets coming out, I will be opening one if not both for as much detail as I can muster. That said, the cockpit is too clean sterile right now and needs some life to it. The simple solution is to add a wash to the silver parts to bring out their detail and some drybrushing to the black parts to do the same thing. The silver parts are treated first to bring out the detail and to give a more dull metal finish to the tubing.

The first picture is the wing spar after a bit of weathering; the second is the other half of the wing spar before weathering for comparison. The rest of the silver tubing and wing spars are treated.

With the tubing and spars completed, the black portions get their own treatment. Here is the bulkhead before weathering.

Some judicious, (I hope) drybrushing and the detail pops out and the cockpit begins to take on the look someone has actually been in it before.

There are still more pieces of tubing to be added to the frame before the foot boards, seat and IP panel can be installed. I have already ordered the Airscale IP and placard enhancements for this kit, but I think they will be used on the other two since this one is destined to be sealed. I am not fretting too much as the kit detail seems way more than adequate. It may be like the 1/24 Mosquito situation. I got the Airscale upgrade for that too, but ended up being quite happy installing the kit decals and IP panel. As always, all comments welcome. I do realize this thread may be picture heavy. If there are too many pictures, let me know and I will post less. And for the few that are fuzzy, sorry, getting older and what my eyes see in focus through magnifiers may not be what the camera sees. Also, there is a phenomenal two plane build elsewhere on this site. The kits look great and both were built in a span of about 10 days by people with way more spare time and talent than I have. Go take a look.

[Biggles87]

Good progress so far George, I like the weathering on the framing. Perhaps some of the tubing was black on some aircraft, I would have thought that with Chris (Typhoon) Thomas advising Airfix, they would have got it right. We shall see.

John

PS. Can't wait for the IdolM@ster version, perhaps if you make it look different enough SWMBO might not notice that it's the same type.

[Stew Dapple]

Looking very sharp indeed George, I am astounded at the amount of internal structure this kit includes. I can't say I'm tempted by one, because if I ever built one I would not have anywhere to put it, but I am certainly impressed by it

Cheers,

Stew