Pappy Posted September 8, 2017 Share Posted September 8, 2017 (edited) G'day people, I have cracked the bags on this one. The Dassault Mirage III certainly needs no introduction and this aircraft in RAAF service was affectionately known as the 'Miracle' as in it is a miracle it could fly with such tiny wings! Based upon the Mirage III/E, the 'O' (for "Ostralie") differed mainly in the avionics equipment installed and externally this is manifest by the antenna arrangements, although other differences existed as well. I am undecided as to which scheme I will do but as I have 'several' of these stashed away, I will be a little spoilt for choice. The long career of the Mirage in RAAF service meant that the schemes worn by the "French Lady" (the other moniker) varied from the delivery scheme of natural metal, to doped silver, then a wraparound disruptive camo, which in turn evolved into the 'standard' camouflage scheme. Towards the end of the service life,a number of low visibility schemes were trialed, plus there were several display and test schemes, so no shortage of choice! I will not bother with box and content shots as there are plenty of these about. Well, onto the plastic then, First up, the cockpit. The tub is a simple affair and the detail on the console is adequate, but I decided that a little PE would be better. I sanded off the console details as this would be replaced by pre-painted PE. I am not a big fan but I cannot argue with the crispness. RAAF Mirage cockpits were basically black, so it will be a challenge to make this interesting and get the details to pop as there is the tendency for the details to disappear into the blackness. I shaved off the aft bulkhead details as these are not correct for an RAAF Mirage.The PE additions go some way to making the cockpit more accurate. Some lead wire and scrap styrene details completed the detailing. Four different instrument panels are provided. I ignored the instruction's suggested instrument panel option and instead opted to use part C16, however this part needs modification. The RAAF mirage featured a large central RADAR display. I scraped the details off the centre panel then removed the panel in toto. A small section of styrene was then inlaid at a slight angle. Finally the engine exhaust received some attention. The turbine face detail is nicely executed, but this is moulded integrally to the burner can. In order to simplify the painting, I separated the turbine face. And lastly, the exhaust was dressed up with a very nice piece of PE which required some care to install. The interior nozzle segments were separate items but the central ring and inner vanes and actuators were a single part. removing this item from its fret was a little nerve wracking as it would be very easy to damage this item. cheers, Pappy Edited September 8, 2017 by Pappy 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exdraken Posted September 9, 2017 Share Posted September 9, 2017 Nice start!! PE work looks good ! Especially the nozzle! A bit fiddly I guess! By the way, there is a Mirage GB going on at the moment ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Graeme H Posted September 9, 2017 Share Posted September 9, 2017 Nice to see you join in at last, and some nice PE work as well Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pappy Posted September 9, 2017 Author Share Posted September 9, 2017 (edited) 1 hour ago, exdraken said: Nice start!! PE work looks good ! Especially the nozzle! A bit fiddly I guess! By the way, there is a Mirage GB going on at the moment ... G'day ED, Thanks very much! I know about the GB, it looks to be very well supported already but I have not have a good track record with GBs this year so I prefer to proceed at my own pace this time around. 58 minutes ago, Graeme H said: Nice to see you join in at last, and some nice PE work as well G'day Graeme, I did not realise people were waiting for me? Still, I can never resist a delta! G'day people, The compressor face looks nice but is almost impossible to see one it is 'entombed' within the inlet duct, and I thought it would be the last time it would be visible, The intake parts were then assembled and set aside to dry And that is when I realised my mistake. The instructions would have you assemble the left and right inlet duct halves and then attach each respective half to its parent fuselage half. Of course I thought I knew better and joined both ducts together. When the time came to fit these into the fuselage it did not work. it was like trying to nail wet paint to a wall made of jelly, I had made the rookie mistake of not test fitting first! Remember kids, when all else fails - read the flamin' instructions!! My solution was to cut off the rear portion of the duct just aft of the bifurcation. The rear portion would be retained and sandwiched between the fuselage halves as directed by the instructions and the inlet ducts were attached to the fuselage halves as originally intended! While these were drying, I turned to the right inlet (part A2 for those playing along at home). This has a clear part inserted which was not a feature of RAAF Mirage III/Os. I added a clear panel (part J9) from the part provided on the clear parts sprue (which is not mentioned in the instructions BTW) then used CA to fill and eliminate the surrounding panel details The inlet parts were then offered up to the fuselage and a very good fit was obtained with no steps and no filler required. Turning now to the cockpit, rudimentary details were added to the cockpit sidewalls And then the fun bits started, detailing the ejection seat. RAAF Mirages were initially equipped with the OM.4 seat ( basically a MB. 4 variant), and from about 1983 onward, these were upgraded to OM.6 standard. The seats were now zero/zero capable due to the installation of an underseat rocket motor. Externally, these were recogniseable by the fibreglass parachute container that replaced the canvas parachute pack and the upper firing handles were now two loops instead of a single pull handle. Kinetic also supplies a complete MB. 10 seat which was a nice addition for the spares box. Kinetic supplies two different headbox items to depict either the OM.4 or OM.6, however, the seat more closely resembles the later OM.6 variant. Since mine will be a post 1983 machine, I used the twin loop item. I was pretty happy with the details provided and concentrated my efforts around the upper seat harnesses, which did not really capture the complexity of this area. Lead foil and lead wire were used to add various details, Phew, painting tomozz! cheers, Pappy Edited September 9, 2017 by Pappy 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pappy Posted September 10, 2017 Author Share Posted September 10, 2017 (edited) G'day people, The tub has been painted up and it looks very busy now The PE set provides a Radar control stick but I thought it looked a little '2-dimensional' so I substituted a stick from the gash spares. The provided PE throttle and its quadrant was also discarded and replaced with a scratchbuilt item. I decided to leave most of the instrument panel details intact and only modified the RADAR screen. After adding the angled section of plastic, a small glare hood was added. The area beneath the HUD was also tweaked and some instrument face decals were punched out of an old decal sheet after rummaging through the spares box for suitable candidates. They were suck to a puddle of Future and then brushed with more Future to sandwich them in place. I think that for the price Kinetic are charging for their kits, they should also include instrument panel decals on the decal sheet! The nose gear bay was also tweaked with the addition of PE and some plumbing made from solder That lot was now put aside and I turned my attention to the stores. I want to use the RPK-10s provided in the kit. The RPK-10 is a based on the small, supersonic underwing tank but modified to enable it to carry stores. The RPK-10s had four 500lb stations, two on each side. The Kinetic RPK-10s look great except that in RAAF service, the inner stations were staggered forward in comparison to its counterpart on the outside of the tank. This left me with a decision to make: 1. Do nothing 2. Wait for aftermarket to catch up 3. Fix it myself I went with option 3! I have started on the fix. I basically extended the slot for the inboard bomb racks forward. Once this was done, a section of plastic stock was added to the rear of the slot allowing enough for the bomb racks to fit in their new, forward positions. The old panel lines and outline for the bomb rack access door was then filled with CA and sanded. In the pic above, you can see the modified position vice the unmodified ones. I will need to scribe in new doors and add the swaybraces and bomb supports, but the hard bit is over. There is some conjecture if foreign operators who used RPK-10s had staggered stations as well. I can't shed any light on that, but I know that RAAF RPKs has the staggered stations. This also means that the tanks will now be 'handed', so if you decide to mod your tanks, make sure you have a left and right, not two lefts as I nearly did! I ended up placing the two outboard sides inside the kit box and making sure that I only had the inboard sections in front of me when I started, cheers, Pappy Edited September 10, 2017 by Pappy 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pappy Posted September 24, 2017 Author Share Posted September 24, 2017 G'day people, Well the beastie is coming along slowly. The intake seams still need some work but they will get there The top side was not too bad but the lower side will need some more work The fin fillet will also need a smear of filler. The left side was very good, but the right, not so much, In between applying filler and sanding, I was able to do some more seat work, And I could not resist a cheeky dry fit! cheers, Pappy 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
baldwin8 Posted September 24, 2017 Share Posted September 24, 2017 I love the attention to detail, it all looks good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pappy Posted September 25, 2017 Author Share Posted September 25, 2017 16 hours ago, baldwin8 said: I love the attention to detail, it all looks good. Thanks very much! Pappy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hewy Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 Cockpit looks great pappy Glynn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pappy Posted October 2, 2017 Author Share Posted October 2, 2017 On 9/25/2017 at 4:56 PM, Hewy said: Cockpit looks great pappy Glynn Thanks very much Glynn. G'day people, I had hoped to be a little further along however I have had a setback. Earlier, I modified my RPK-10 combination bomb rack/fuel tanks. It turns out that although RAAF RPK-10s had staggered forward inboard positions, the aft inboard stations were not. I thought about attempting to salvage these tanks but eventually set these aside and instead pilfered a set from another Mirage IIIE/O kit. This time only the forward inner station was modified, I will need to re-scribe the access doors but the work went a little faster as only one station per tank required modification. I was also able to spend a little more time cleaning up the various airframe seams starting with the lower intake seams. The fin fillet and finally the wing root It may look like a lot of filler was used but it is really just a brush coat of liquid putty that has been feathered in with light sanding. I am pretty happy with the fit in general. You will need to take your time and test fit before committing to glue if you want to get a good fit, cheers, Pappy 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exdraken Posted October 2, 2017 Share Posted October 2, 2017 Great updates! Strange thing about these RPKs.... Would have assumed there way one design only.. Might it have to do with LGB use on the Aussi ones? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now