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RAF Sabre questions........


Artie

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Hi all.....I'm thinking about building a RAF Sabre Mk.4, but some questions keep me undecided.

AFAIK, these planes were Canadian built CL13 Mk.4, wich to my limited knowledge of the subject, were Orenda engined F86-F30, with 6-3, wings, with wing fence fillets...

Any Hasegawa, Academy, or even the old Monogram kit would be OK, with some minor modifications....

And now, the questions:

a) Cockpit colour. Light grey or black...???

B) Underside colour: Azure blue...???

My second option would be a RCAF Mk.5. Would it be a slatted 6-3 wing, minus the 12" wingtip extensions..????

TIA and best regards....!!!!

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Hi all.....I'm thinking about building a RAF Sabre Mk.4, but some questions keep me undecided.

AFAIK, these planes were Canadian built CL13 Mk.4, wich to my limited knowledge of the subject, were Orenda engined F86-F30, with 6-3, wings, with wing fence fillets...

Any Hasegawa, Academy, or even the old Monogram kit would be OK, with some minor modifications....

And now, the questions:

a) Cockpit colour. Light grey or black...???

B) Underside colour: Azure blue...???

My second option would be a RCAF Mk.5. Would it be a slatted 6-3 wing, minus the 12" wingtip extensions..????

TIA and best regards....!!!!

Not a simple answer coming your way...but basically and briefly (!) MOST, but not all Sabres were delivered to the RAF with slatted wings. Some of these were converted to the 6-3 wing, and the last batch or so delivered were done so with 6-3 wings. I haven't got the figures here, but I'd recommend Duncan Curtis's book on the subject........

Delivered in NMF, some having red panels on wings and tail for delivery, they were subsequently painted in RAF standard Dark Green and Dark Sea Grey upper surfaces. Those destined to fly in the UK had high speed silver painted lower surfaces, those destined for RAF Germany had PRU blue lower surfaces. There were of course anomalies as aircraft were swapped around. Cockpits were black.

Academy And Hasegawa kits can be built OOB for a 6-3 winged jet, nothing OOB for a slat winged plane. Airwaves(Hannants) issued a conversion set some time ago.

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More than a few, the initial deliveries were slatted, then these were swapped for fixed wing 6-3 aircraft (some, but by no means all, were converted at depot level)

The RAF Sabres didn't have Orendas, but regular J47s .

Colour scheme: Germany Based, Dark Green/Dark Sea Grey over PRU Blue; UK Based: Dark Green/Dark Sea Grey over Aluminium

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Not all had the hard wing, a lot had slatted ones on delivery. To complicate things some had the hard wing fitted in service. Best to check your references.

For cockpits any colour as long as its Black!

UK Based aircraft had silver undersides with a low front demarcation line, Germany based Sabres had PRU Blue undersides with a high demarcation line.

Julien

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Hi all.....I

My second option would be a RCAF Mk.5. Would it be a slatted 6-3 wing, minus the 12" wingtip extensions..????

TIA and best regards....!!!!

Negative, the Mk5 has the 6-3 hard wing. Mk6 has the slatted 6-3 wing. Just have to make some vent and panel adjustments to the fuselage for the Orenda power.

Tony

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Not a simple answer coming your way...but basically and briefly (!) MOST, but not all Sabres were delivered to the RAF with slatted wings. Some of these were converted to the 6-3 wing, and the last batch or so delivered were done so with 6-3 wings. I haven't got the figures here, but I'd recommend Duncan Curtis's book on the subject........

...

I'll second that recommendation, quite apart from anything else it includes lists of aircraft by serial number used by each unit, and specifies for each one whether it was slatted on delivery and remained so; slatted on delivery and subsequently converted; or delivered with the 6-3 wing.

Edited by MikeC
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To add to the conundrum some of the aircraft in the XB*** range were reserialled into a block for XD*** and if I remember correctly compromised aircraft already wearing those serials. It's many years since I checked but BARG had a British serials book that set out the whole sorry mess.

Trevor

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WOW......Things are not as simple as I thought........I've got few books covering the subject, but still a mess for me..!!!

Thank you very much for all your input, Sirs..

As far, I've came to know that most of them were delivered with slatted wings, so they were Mk.4 (F86E), and retrofitted with 6-3 wings at some point....Some were Mk.5 (F86F) with 6-3 wings, and a few of them were Mk.6, with F86F40 wings, minus 12" wingtip extensions.....Well....I must check my decal stash and decide wich one I'm going to build.....

Who said Spitfire variants were hard to understand...??????

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Bill Scobie of Scobie-Do productions did a range of slatted wings in 1/72 and 1/48 including standard slatted and 6-3 slatted (the latter not applicable to RAF Mk 4s but is applicable to Canadair Mk 6s). They fit nicely onto Hase or Academy F86E/F kits. The other option for a narrow slatted wing is to rob any F86D kit. You don't say whether you are considering 1/48 or 1/72 but all the above applies equally. Not sure on the current availability of Scobie-Do wings but worth searching out. If you are near Toronto or Halifax NS, the aviation and model shops there had them on the shelves last time I was about a few years back, not much help to you I know!

The RAF a/c were Canadair 2s and 4s which are basically (I believe) F86E equivalents. The 6-3 wing was fitted either from new or by retrofitting from slatted wings later on, but not all got the 6-3 wing, they tended to be allocated to units either all one or the other in order not to catch unaware pilots out with the rather feisty low speed handling of the 6-3 wing. As Bill says, ref. to Duncan Curtiss' book will help enormously with sorting out which had and which hadn't the 'Hard Edge (6-3) wings although as ever, small slip ups are there to catch one out! All RAF a/c had the GE J47 engine as Dave F correctly points out. The Canadair 5 and 6 had the Orenda.

Just to confirm Artie, the RAF never flew the Sabre 5 or 6.

Nige B

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I also recall that a mere handful were Mk.2's and the vast majority were 4's.

Trevor

I believe there were only 3 Mk.2's delivered. Edited by Wez
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Well.....as said before, lots of useful (and believe me, somehow confusing) information.......By now, looking for Duncan Curtiss' book is not going to be an option.......I'm not able to spend lots of money in further bibliography or aftermarket stuff....must stay with what it's already in my stash.....

I've got an old Monogram kit wich comes with a nice set of decals wich depict XD753, a plane flown by Sqn. Ldr. A.F. Osbourne, No. 66 Sqdn, RAF Linton-on-Ouse, 1956.

it was supposed to be a Sabre Mk.5 (F86F30), with 6-3 hard wings......Let's get started next friday afternoon.....Hope to have it finished on sunday evening...!!!

Cheers....!!!!

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According to Larry Milberry's book on the Canadiar Sabre, aircraft up to construction number 700 had the original slatted wing while construction number 701 onward were built with the 6-3 hard wing.
This change occurs part way through the Sabre 4 production. For RAF aircraft the situation is made more complex by the reserialling of the Sabres with the result that the serials and construction numbers do not run in parallel.

RAF Sabres built with the 6-3 hard Wing are, according to the Milberry book,
XD780/1 c/n 701/2
XB916 - XB961 c/n 703 to 748
XB973 - XB977 c/n 749 to 753
XB646 - XB650 c/n 754 to 757
XB770 - XB775 c/n 758 to 763
XB851 - XB855 c/n 764 to 768
XB978 - XB999 c/n 769 to 790

The others would have been built with the slatted wing and many later converted to 6-3 Wing

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The others would have been built with the slatted wing and many later converted to 6-3 Wing

and therein lies the 'rub'. Some did, and some did not get converted until after RAF use. Best to go from a photo if possible.

Model On !!

Tony

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Hi Rod...thank you very much for your help....

Now, can I assume that XD 753 was indeed a 6-3 wing equipped Sabre....?

If so, any F86F30 could be built almost OOB, with just some minor work.

In fact, I've got an old Monogram kit wich, at some point that my brain can't remember, I rescribed and added some leftover resin and PE stuff (actually old resin detail set, not very useful indeed).

Never thought that building a RAF Sabre could turn into such a nightmare.....!!!!!

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Bill Scobie of Scobie-Do productions did a range of slatted wings in 1/72 and 1/48 including standard slatted and 6-3 slatted (the latter not applicable to RAF Mk 4s but is applicable to Canadair Mk 6s). They fit nicely onto Hase or Academy F86E/F kits. The other option for a narrow slatted wing is to rob any F86D kit. You don't say whether you are considering 1/48 or 1/72 but all the above applies equally.

Nige B

Hi Nige, never knew about the Scobie-Do set, sounds interesting....regarding using F86D wings, I did try that one, using the wings from the Revell/monogram kit on the Academy kit. It didn't work out too well as the wing sweep angles were different, and form memory there were problems with the wing root join to fuselage, and wheel well bays. I daresay it is do-able, but not straight-forward.
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From Duncan Curtis book, XD753 was delivered with slatted wings, and was NOT fitted with the 6-3 wing in Service with 66 Sqn.

Cheers, Tony

Tony,

I based my model of XD753 on that very same information after reading the Curtis book, so imagine my chagrin when an inflight image of XD753 contained in the Modeldecal 97 instructions very clearly shows the 6-3 wing!

Mark.

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Tony,

I based my model of XD753 on that very same information after reading the Curtis book, so imagine my chagrin when an inflight image of XD753 contained in the Modeldecal 97 instructions very clearly shows the 6-3 wing!

Mark.

I'll check my stash of Modeldecal instructions, then

Cheers, Tony

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You are correct, XD753 did get the 6-3 leading edge refit in RAF service. Photo evidence trumps everything.

Thanks for the correction, then the HaseCademy Sabre CAN be used to model XD753.

Cheers, Tony

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You are correct, XD753 did get the 6-3 leading edge refit in RAF service. Photo evidence trumps everything.

Thanks for the correction, then the HaseCademy Sabre CAN be used to model XD753.

Cheers, Tony

If it's the 1/48 version you need to move the wing fence and underwing pylon outwards from their indicated positions.

91DEA466-F9E6-4921-981C-B4CFFE6165A5_zps

9B41A4AB-ABA0-41D1-89B0-521F9D57ADCB_zps

Trevor

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If it's the 1/48 version you need to move the wing fence and underwing pylon outwards from their indicated positions.

Trevor

For 1/48 scale the wing pylons should be at Sta 99.5 which works out to be 53mm from centreline

The wing fence is at 78mm from centreline(1/48 scale)

Cheers, Tony

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Hi Nige, never knew about the Scobie-Do set, sounds interesting....regarding using F86D wings, I did try that one, using the wings from the Revell/monogram kit on the Academy kit. It didn't work out too well as the wing sweep angles were different, and form memory there were problems with the wing root join to fuselage, and wheel well bays. I daresay it is do-able, but not straight-forward.

Next time, just try chopping off the respective leading edges and doing a 'reverse 6-3' mod. It's in my future as I picked up a cheap Revellogram 'D' for that purpose.

Cheers, Tony

PS the actual 6-3 mod was just a new leading edge swap, it was performed in the field in Korea.

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