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1:72 Lynx kit questions


stevehnz

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Before anyone points me at the pinned Lynx threads, I have been there & not found the answers to these questions among the wealth of knowledge therein.

So, after reading the recent thread on the Army Lynx retirement & enjoying Julien's photos of the AH.9 undercart I started to look for suitable kits to convert to an AH.9, thinking AH.7 with scratch built engine deck & undercarriage. No Airfix AH.7 I could see, :( maybe  a Plastyk Battlefield Lynx AH.7 kit, it has the BIRP (?) blades too. or would the Airfix Mk 8  Navy Lynx would be a better start point, it appears to have a round nose among its bits & all the right blades & probably a better kit all up? I know Air Graphics have threatened an AH.9 but I'd kind of like a Lynx in the hand rather than one in the bush.

Steve.

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Since you mention the Plastyk kit I assume you're interested in 1/72 and in this scale there's very little when it comes to Army variants of the Lynx

The Plastyk kits are IMHO very crude, but can be used as source of parts if you can find one cheap, something that often happens. The Airfix AH.1 is, always IMHO, still the best starting point for an accurate Lynx. It's not perfect, requires some work to make certain areas closer to a production machine and to eliminate some toylike features. The tail boom also need to be modified to represent the non-folding type. And then there are the famous mesh protections on the intakes that are missing

Then there are the modifications required to build the AH.9 of course but guess you're ready for these anyway. The HMA.8 kit has the right BEPR blades but I'm not sure if this includes the pointier AH nose or only the HAS.2 one, IIRC it's only the latter. The HMA.8 however could be a source of blades and tail rotor and the parts remaining in the box still allow you to build a HAS.2, so buying this box makes good sense if you already have an AH.1

BERP blades can also be found in resin by Pavla but are for the Hobbyboss kits, using them on the Airfix hub may or not be easy.

Since you have to scratchbuild the landing gear anyway, starting from a Hobbyboss kit may be an option, as some of these come with BERP blades and the reverse pitch rotor. You would still need the pointier nose and IIRC the tail boom would also need changing. I can't remember if the HB kits have the correct engine casing, my 3 kits are stashed away.

 

Regarding the Airfix kit, I posted some comments in this thread. These are general and don't include any of the modifications needed for a later variant

 

 

 

And a bit off topic... my very first post here was on how to build an AH.7... :D

 

 

I can't believe it was 10 years ago...

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Thanks Giorgio, I'll digest those links, & try to make sense of the whole Lynx thing some more, I guess I could do with a couple of RN Lynx anyway, an early & late, so a couple of Mk 8 kits seem destined to head my way & as you suggest an AH.1 & some inspiration for an AH.9. Maybe I should look at modelling an AH.1 & 7 while I'm at it, its starting to sound a bit like Hawks. :unsure: I have read that the HB Lynx have accuracy issues & wondered how they compare with others?

Steve.

Edited by stevehnz
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A modeller posted a comparison of the HB and Airfix kits a while ago, with the Fujimi kit also thrown in the mix, unfortunately pictures are not visible anymore due to Photobucket

There may be other threads with pictures of both Airfix and HB kits, searching the forum may bring something useful.

I've never compared the HB kits with the Airfix ones personally but I've seen the comparison done by others and these convinced me that the Airfix shape is better.

Said that, the HB kit is more detailed than the Airfix offering and I can see how modellers can prefer one or the other depending on their taste. Even if I prefer the Airfix kit for its accuracy, this didn't prevent me from buying 3 HB kits, although the fact that they were for sale at AU$ 8 each had a part in this decision.. :lol:

 

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  • Mike changed the title to 1:72 Lynx kit questions
46 minutes ago, Giorgio N said:

A modeller posted a comparison of the HB and Airfix kits a while ago, with the Fujimi kit also thrown in the mix, unfortunately pictures are not visible anymore due to Photobucket

That was me! I will try and debucket the photo and repost it. I have the AH1GT set for Air Graphics but not yet done anything with it  bar fondle the resin. Buy from their website rather than eBay as it is considerably cheaper. As Giorgio says the Plastyk Lynx is gash, but the blades, exhaust filters and possibly TOW launchers can be salvaged as a far cheaper alternative to resin bits (but obviously way less detailed.

 

pat

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  • 4 weeks later...

Sorry to Pat & Giorgio for missing these last responses,  thanks a lot for them, I took delivery of an Airfix Mk 8 during the week I'll need another one, one will be built OOB & one as an HAS.2, also OOB I guess but without the later stuff which it'll donate (rotors anyway) to to an AH.9 conversion, unless of course Air Graphics comes in with theirs in time to forestall that pain. :)

Steve.

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There was a story that the AH9 main undercarriage legs were based on those of the Whirlwind. One source even said they were old Whirlwind units from stores (Apart from the fact they are quite different, why would spare u/c legs be stored 20 years after the type left service)

Edited by Dave Fleming
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I had read that somewhere Dave, I think my stock of spare Whirlwind undercarts is even somewhat less that Westland might have had so I'll be scratching them up as best I can from available drawings & photos.

Steve.

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Steve - Rotorcraft did a white metal set that was part of their conversion sets of the Italeri kit to Westland FAA versions. Colin (Heloman1 on here) might have some spare and would be worth a PM to or perhaps Freightdog who sell the Rotorcraft range might also have some?

 

PAt

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On 10/03/2018 at 10:21 PM, Dave Fleming said:

There was a story that the AH9 main undercarriage legs were based on those of the Whirlwind. One source even said they were old Whirlwind units from stores (Apart from the fact they are quite different, why would spare u/c legs be stored 20 years after the type left service)

Dave,you would be suprised what is or at least was knocking about prior to SDSR....the thing that springs to mind is a 'Phantom only' telebrief test set used on SK mk4 even had an 892nas local serial number etched out on it....30+ years after the navy lost them....GPMG gate mount...was doing a survey of them using drawings marked for Whilwind and Belvedere....all this new fangled stuff aint what it used to be ;)

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That would have been before back in the 90s the government adopted Resource Accounting and Budgeting, under which a cost is attributed to just owning something.  It is intended to stop the government having assets it doesn't use (in fact the early stages involved a lot of work for government departments to find out what they did actually have) but, particularly in the area of defence (when one sincerely hopes most of the kit will never get used), it gives rise to seriously damaging perverse incentives.

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7 hours ago, Seahawk said:

That would have been before back in the 90s the government adopted Resource Accounting and Budgeting, under which a cost is attributed to just owning something.  It is intended to stop the government having assets it doesn't use (in fact the early stages involved a lot of work for government departments to find out what they did actually have) but, particularly in the area of defence (when one sincerely hopes most of the kit will never get used), it gives rise to seriously damaging perverse incentives.

What do you mean by the last statement Seahawk ? 

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We had a similar problem in nursing homes.  If someone's dressings changed or wounds healed (yay!) any surplus went into a cupboard where the correct dressing was used in emergencies or as a first resort until that resident's own prescription could be obtained.  I used to stock my first aid bag (with our director's knowledge and encouragement) from it, which got me many party invites even sans bottle. (A friend studying Pharmacology once told a fellow student "that's not a first aid kit - it's a mobile wound clinic")  This was very good, then we received instructions from CSCI to shed our surplus.  Now in the event of urgent need we have to send for paramedics to do stuff we should be doing, for lack of equipment and trust.  No money was saved; in fact it adds to NHS waste, since that's who foots the bill.

Edited by Chillidragon
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8 hours ago, Dave Fleming said:

 

Not Seahawk, but the incentive is not to hold stocks, as you get penalised for it in terms of your budget

I can say from experience ....that there is no incentive to hold stock....coz there isnt an awful lot example if you have so many helicopters x then you have x plus the bear minimum extra. Canibization is a logistics solution these days....and dont get me on split pins....j dont know if you are ex service but its hand to mouth these days.....gen dit

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1 hour ago, junglierating said:

I can say from experience ....that there is no incentive to hold stock....coz there isnt an awful lot example if you have so many helicopters x then you have x plus the bear minimum extra. Canibization is a logistics solution these days....and dont get me on split pins....j dont know if you are ex service but its hand to mouth these days.....gen dit

Exactly: Accountants 1, Operational Capability 0.  During the Falklands crisis the RN was able to stand up extra Wessex squadrons very quickly by pulling aircraft out of storage and reactivate the reserve fleet of Tribals lying in Fareham Creek.  I have seen no evidence that RAB is flexible enough to cater for that sort of wartime (or even increased tension) situation where, by the time you realise you need you need something, it is already way too late to obtain it, indeed you may have lost the industrial expertise and capacity to produce it.  In peacetime the accountant is God; when a crisis blows up (vide Falklands), s/he gets told to shut up and get back in his/her box - if you're lucky!

 

Thanks to the others who, spotting the danger, cleverly stepped in to stop me boring the readership with a comic strip explanation of RAB.

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  • 1 month later...
On ‎17‎/‎03‎/‎2018 at 11:18, Seahawk said:

it gives rise to seriously damaging perverse incentives.

Best example I know of was HMS DRYAD in about 2000/2001.  We had a cracking working model (probably about 1/12 scale) of the Vickers Mk8 4.5in turret.  it had been given to the Navy completely free of charge by Vickers in the 70s as an instructional tool when the turret first appeared and was an invaluable resource to explain how the automated feed ring worked etc.  It came out for every PWO course, every Gun Controller's course and was superb.  It cost us nothing other than about 3 sq foot in the corner of a classroom.  Then in that particular year, all the section heads were asked to identify savings to find another £500K across the establishment.  Someone found out that under RAB, we had to pay just under £1K for the privilege of owning that bit of kit.  The last I saw of it was broken in a skip about 6 weeks later.

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