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Valiant B.1 (1:72 Airfix)


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Taa very muchly ^_^

I'm just pottering about making up some of the smaller parts while I wait for the noseweight putty/metal mix, and the Milliput in the intakes to cure. I've just put the drop tanks together, and they're a bit bowed nose to tail - Just glue one end nicely aligned, then glue the other end after a wee while... job done :)

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The front seats have been installed today. They're Aeroclub metal seats with some scratch built rears & mounting specific to the Valiant. At present I'm just gluing in the rear crew's only way of glimpsing daylight - those oval side windows :)

Looking good Mike great detail, I have ordered mine through my local model shop

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At present I'm just gluing in the rear crew's only way of glimpsing daylight - those oval side windows :)

Paint 'em white on the inside Mike. Most crews I flew with on the Victors had the curtains drawn in order to read the instruments and 'scope. I understand that it was the same on both the Valiant and the Vulcan. External light could be distracting which is why most of the B15 and 16 Canberras had the Nav's hatch windows deleted.

That's a nice "claustrophobic" cabin you have there, all you need now are a few white cardboard boxes full of curly sandwiches, soup heaters, empty cans of juice, bulging pee-tubes, six heavy nav bags, a small tool box, the constant wine of the inverters, the rumble of four Conways. The odd click, whistle and an unexpected burp from somewhere inaccessible. The glare of the anglepoise. Counters counting down the miles until you can get yer numb bum of off a rock hard dinghy pack and some feeling back into your legs. The blast of the Air Conditioning that goes to everyone except you, soaked in perspiration inside a rubber immersion suit. An itchy shoulder blade you cannot reach because of the chute straps, seat straps and rubber suit trussing you up like a Turkey ready for the oven and where turning the page of a book you have already read twice causes the chafing at your neck to sting even more and looking out of the bomb aimers windows at mile after mile after mile of infinite Pacific Ocean.

That photo has brought back memories from a long time ago Mike - thanks for that. But would I do it all again ?

Bloody right I would.

Dennis W Robinson

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fantastic cockpit there mike, may i ask what green did you use as it looks spot on.

Nick, it's Lifecolor UA522 from the RAAF Set 2, Interior Green (FS24110).

I've been fettling the intakes, and got them together with a first coat of white Milliput, which was tooled with a clay modelling tool and water before it set. I've pictured the two intakes as they stand now, and because it's a dull photo, I've also put in some of my custom tools that I made to deal with intake seams. Mostly bits of wet'n'dry CAd to brass rod or aerofoil section, but also some strips of sanding sticks that I picked up in the US, and various bits of abrasives tacked to MaccyD's coffee stirrers :)

intake3.jpg

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:lol: Nothing too significant Tony, but the fuselage is closed up and the bomb bay insert...ermm... inserted. I've been in the workshop about 4 hours now, but still not managed to do a tap of modelling! :doh:
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Bonsoirno,

After much ado (mostly about nothing), I've finally got some modelling time and taken a picture of the now closed up fuselage.

When I offered up the two halves of the fuselage with their formers in, I noticed that the area behind the Bomb Aimer's Window (BAW) was a bit gappy, possibly down to some of my scratch-building, or the bulkheads being a bit wide. A quick tape together showed that the bomb bay doors fitted better this way and the lower wing joint is tighter, so I put a sliver of styrene sheet behind the slot for the BAW and glued everything together. The insert in front of the bomb bay with the dielectric panels got a couple of shims each side so that it matched the contours of the fuselage, and that was glued in too.

The bomb bay was glued securely on one side after all this had cured, and left for a day or so to fully set up. The join was very good, but will need a little rescribing in places where the liquid plastic has squirted out, but because of its very snug fit, there was a miniscule gap along the other side. Another tiny shim gave another good fit, and that too will be rescribed where necessary. The key achievement is that the underside of the fuselage will be neat and smooth with everything level. Any tiny gaps were then filled with Vallejo putty from the long applicator tube, and the excess wiped away with my stumpy finger :)

fuselage1.jpg

Next job is the wings and intakes, which I'm in the process of painting now :)

incidentally, the main gear bays look like they'll need some work, as the rib work is a little erm... how do I say this? Fictitious? :hmmm: I'm working through my stash of pics though, and will formulate an approach once I'm certain of my facts.

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Smashin' thanks Melchie - they're a bit better than the ones I took a few years ago, and have the wheel area open too :)

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In case you all think I've given up on this one, I've been dickering about with the main landing gear bays, which have a whole bunch of ribwork in their roof that isn't representative of all the pics I've seen (mostly courtesy of Melchie and my forgotten pics :doh: ).

I've removed the roof of one bay, put hundreds of Archer rivets on a thick sheet of styrene, and made some more accurate depressions in them, and am just waiting for the glue to cure so I can cut the bay out of the sheet. Then I'll be installing the proper T-section beam across the middle, and making the little triangle extension at one end. Then some minor wiring, a bit more detail in the bays in the form of correct(ish) ribbing, and I'll have to build some new retraction jack parts, as the big one moulded into the roof isn't the right shape, and died when I removed the roof :wicked:

Pics once it's out of the sheet for comparison :)

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This is just epic :worthy: After nearly giving up modelling forever after attempting the Mach2 " interpretation" of the Valiant this thread is giving me new hope!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Slow progress, as I've been working on summit else for a bit, but here's the 2nd gear bay after having its roof removed, plus some more progress on the 1st one. Some more detail added, and the eroneously moulded in gear strut scratched to be fitted to the bay later on - it's just dropped in place at the moment. :)

wheelbay2.jpg

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