Sword 1:72 T-33 Shooting Star

[TeeELL]

Firstly, I have used the 'Search' function to see if this has been done before but, despite seeing various references to 'T-birds' in various scales the search reveals nothing!! Administrators, if this is just a duplicate of something that has gone before, please feel free to delete.

OK, got that off my chest!

I have a penchant for modelling aircraft used by the Cuban Revolutionary Air Force (FAR), no special reason other than it focusses my area for builds. I have a Sea Fury used during the 'Bay of pigs' era, a Vought Kingfisher same period (stalled at the moment), a diecast B-26 and I am working on a T-33. It is this last build that I am planning to share with you.

The kit is the 1:72 Sword T-33 kit:

The kit comprises a hard plastic model, resin detail parts and pre-coloured etch components.

In addition I bought the LF models decal sheet for the Cuban T-33 of the 'Playa de Giron' era and resin wheels from RES-IM

The intakes have been fitted and then prep work was undertaken with painting and fitting the main undercarriage and airbrake bay to the lower wing section.

As tends to be the 'normal' order of things the model construction proper was commenced by putting the cockpit tub together

Some moulded parts need to be removed in order to add the PE parts, the ejection seats are fitted right at the end of the construction, just before the cockpit is added!

On the left in the above photo, is the nose undercarriage bay, in the fore-front the gun ports have been opened and barrels fitted.

That will do for now.

[Giorgio N]

Very good to see a build of this kit, the T-33 is such an important type that it's hard to believe how little it's been reproduced in scale model form. Looking forward to your next posts !

[TeeELL]

With the cockpit completed I started to work on getting the fuselage halves to mate up. With nothing to assist positioning them I added a few tabs. I did think I was going to have to cement things together in stages.

Whilst this helped the fitting of the cockpit tub and nose wheel bay caused headaches and much head scratching. With the Nose wheel bay in place the cockpit tub can be fettled into position, a tight fit but it works. trouble is, it is impossible to achieve closure on the cockpit halves. Whatever I did, I couldn't get things to sit right.

The gaps immediately in front and behind the cockpit were going to prove a challenge to remove. The biggest difficulty was determining what exactly was causing the mismatch. The instructions say remove some material from the outer sides of the cockpit tub. To be honest, it might be a good idea to try and achieve a good fit before applying the PE side panels. I removed quite a significant amount of material before the fuselage 'closed', even then, a gap remained just ahead of the cockpit. Note the wings in place, I had hoped this would help in getting things aligned, boy was I wrong!!

The kit has some fitting issues!

However, things can be fettled reasonably well, but not wonderfully well.

In fact, my positioning the upper skins of the wings contributed to the distortion because one wing (the starboard) has a slightly greater span. The error is at the wing root and requires the removal of 1-1.5 mm of material. Once done, the wings line up and the U/C mounting point 'appears' in the wheel bay.

[TeeELL]

The completion of the cockpit is not entirely clear, the front coming is a resin part which will not attach to the fuselage - I cyno'd it to the rear of the instrument panel. With this being a gun armed version, an K-14 gun sight was needed so I ordered a set from Hannants. Having filed a flat on the coming I realised that the original plastic coming would have been a better option due to the channel running along it. In addition, a completely arbitrary piece of resin from the kit appears to be a K-14 gun sight - nothing in the instructions!

The photos show the fixing of the front coming and the K-14 gun sight. The 'dust' in the second photo is from filing down the cockpit sides to achieve a fit in the fuselage.

I will fit the sight glass once the canopy is about to be fitted!

[TeeELL]

Whilst modelling this aircraft I have come to rue my photographic shortcomings. I have flown/flown in so many military aircraft, aircraft I have qualified in and aircraft I have had the opportunity to fly in. One such aircraft was a Turkish airforce T-33 in late Sep or early Oct 1990 at Cigli airbase; I had no camera so like so many other opportunities have no photographic record. A few photos might have helped with this build.

My penchant for Cuban aircraft is a challenge because, apart from my geographic disadvantage, there is not much information available, enough in some respects but detail, especially of early days, is so very limited.

Heck, even my avatar was taken by a 'third person', albeit a photographer standing next to my partner.

[Kevin Callahan]

I have to say that your experience matches mine on the Sword kits that I have built. They have wonderful kit choices, but the engineering execution is less than perfect. They can be built, but everything you remember from the early days of short-run kits applies.

[TeeELL]

Hi Kevin,

this is only the 3rd aircraft model I have built having returned to the fold after 30 years. This Sword model is the first I have ever built that is not 'mainstream' so my learning curve is steep, very, very steep. That I havn't had it stall on me is down to the fact that I have to have it finished within the week. Off to practice with some Alclad II metallic now, nothing clever, no differing panel colours - just want a shiny aluminium finish (even if that is not realistic for a poorly serviced 'captured/liberated' combat aircraft!!)

[patjb]

Slight digression, loved #3 in the the first set of pictures. The reason, intake blanks marked port and starboard! My first aircraft as a mechanic in the RAF was the Vulcan and we still referred to the sides that way. I went on to C130's where when i mentioned the starboard side of the Hercules it was days before the laughter stopped!

[TeeELL]

Pat,

I had to go back to see what you meant. The markings are because the fitting of the intakes is anything but positive and it is really easy to fit them incorrectly, so I marked them. I am much further ahead on the build than reported here, so much so that the model came close to being 'binned' these last couple of days - I will attempt to carch up with myself next week (model is due to be completed by Thursday.