John R

Thanks - glad that was cleared up. I had a sneaking suspicion that it was because 206 was a Mk II John

Thank you all - most helpful John

According to the plans, allegedly from Avro, the nose is conical. In plan the nose goes straight from straight-sided to conical whereas in elevation the fuselage has a slight curve before becoming conical giving the impression of an ogive John

I need to build an earlyish Airfix for our next model club meeting and as I specialise in prototypes I thought the Viggen might be suitable. It will also be a trip down memory lane as I 'helped' my son build one of these over 30 years ago. All this leads to a question. The kit calls for the thrust reverser to be deployed, which I do not want. Should the slot in the rear fuselage be faired over in this configuration? John

Having had a look at the later issue the only difference between it and the earlier boxing is the repositioning of the actuators and a different decal sheet. The latter is of better quality but appears to use the wrong font for the RL201 marking! Paul - your picture of the front fuselage doesn't help as it makes the nose cone look ogival rather than conical! Is that replica still accessible? I have not been able to find any pictures via Google John

The title says it all really. The Airfix kit instructions say 'Dark Sea Gray' but this may apply to XK491 whereas the first one was definitely blue. John

Just to clear things up, the Arrow that I am starting from is the original HC 1392 with 'whitish' box and the actuators on the topside of the wings. When I saw Finn's post I googled the details he gave and ended up at the website he gave in the next post and failed to notice the '2008'. Maybe this refers to the version with actuators on the underside in the 'brownish' box. A friend of mine has one of these in his stash (which is why he gave me his original to rip apart) so I will try to get a look at it and report further. As to 'new tooling' my cynical attitude to these has been formed by several recent releases from Eastern European and Chinese manufacturers which never should have been allowed to see the light of day if they had any pride in their work. John I

Aaaah! but the proof of the pudding is in the eating... John

A while ago, having almost completed an Arrow, I put up a post about the availability of decent decals and this turned into a discussion about the kit's shortcomings. I then set about working out if it was possible to produce a reasonably accurate version and what follows is a summary of my findings. If anybody can supply any additional information or comments I would be grateful. Wing Ailerons need to reversed L to R to get the actuator fairings on the underside OK to use original fuselage attachment points after fuselage has been widened. Inboard leading edge to be lengthened to give correct sweep Trailing edge needs widening at root Reshaping of the leading edge needed to give drooped LE Aerofoil section is too thin at mid-chord Gear door cutouts need some relocation Fuselage Nose section About correct width but needs to be mounted much further forward. Nose shape should be conical but otherwise about right in profile. Intake ramps need mounting further forward. Work needed on boundary layer bleeds Intakes not wide enough – insert spacers Intake shape is wrong. It should be much more rounded at the bottom corner Main fuselage needs widening. Bulge after intakes needs to be removed (how did they get that wrong?) Cockpit to fin fairing can be used but bulges alongside cockpit need removal. Air exhaust outlet on fairing needs correction Bottom of the fuselage is too rectangular - corners need rounding Rear section needs lengthening and reshaping Engine exhaust and nozzle ???? Any ideas? New canopy needed. The canopy is completely wrong! The glazes panels should be flat and form a 'V' shape which blends into the rounded section above the observers cockpit. Fin too small (also warped) Landing gear Wheels too small New main gear doors needed I haven't even thought about the u/c legs John

I have added this to show how small the actual a/c is. Everything is 1/72 Note the Gloster E28/39 on the shelf above John

John Thompson - I've added Musa's details to the original post in case people don't scroll down this far plus payment method via Moneygram. Paint. The kit says 'blue-grey'. Musa says use FS36463. Vallejo 154 Sky Grey acrylic is listed as FS36463. Somewhere on the internet (forget where) it said to use 3 parts Humbrol H34 (matt white) to 2 parts H126 (Satin Mid Grey). I didn't have any H34 so I used H22 (gloss white) instead. I used roughly 1:1 as I didn't want it to get too light. Thank you all for the compliments John

A while ago I found myself corresponding with Musa Zekoreev who runs Prop+Jet, in Nalchik, Russia, and wished to make models of British prototypes. I think that he gave up on the idea because nearly all of them were already issued in one form or another. This is most unfortunate because if he could produce kits of such a/c of the same quality as this one I am sure he could corner the market. In the course of the above correspondence I discovered that he specialises in Russian prototypes and so I got this one, and a Yak 50, from him. The first reaction on opening the box is 'exquisite'. The components are beautifully moulded and well finished. Assembly revealed that the kit is not quite perfect but it is certainly much superior to any other resin kit I have built. Other manufacturers of overpriced and inferior resin kits please note - this is what can be done! Musa's web site is here http://propjet.ucoz.ru/ email: propjet@yandex.ru His english is pretty good (far better than my Russian!) and he replies quickly You can pay him via Moneygram at the Post Office. It will cost you £5/transaction on top of what you owe Musa. He's a Britmodeller member, so you can also contact him by searching the members list for his posting handle ("Walker") and sending him a PM. This a model of Lavochkin's first jet powered by a 1000lb thrust Jumo 004. It was bedevilled by the problems associated with the early jets and did not reach production. Added 11 May The picture doesn't really convey how tiny the actual a/c was so here's how it compares with a couple of my latest - all to 1/72 scale John

Oops! This has now gone into 'Ready for Inspection' whereit should have been in the first place. John

They look really good but could you please tell us about them. i.e subject/kit/scale and any opinions. Other peoples expriences are always appreciated. They can save us from our own mistakes! John

I had the F6 version which compared to the Revell Hunter is a bit undersize (3 to 4 %). I converted mine to the prototype - you can look in here http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.p...c=43527&hl= I had no trouble with the canopy. It went together quite well and would make a good 'first resin' kit John

Actually the closer you look the more there is to find wrong. The nose is tilted 10deg nose down and I just noticed that in the model the fuselage widens towards the intakes whereas the drawing shows that it does not. For definitive Dimensions have a look at this. It's for the J75 version John

Wow! I think my query would generate such a response and so much information. I knew that the kit wasn't that accurate but decided to press on anyway. My last three projects involved lots of corrections and I just wanted to get this one out of the stash and finished. I now have the feeling that this one is going to give me guilt feelings every time I look at it. I didn't check the scale but in the process of trying to find the shape of the canopy transparencies I enlarged the drawing in the 'Arrow' book to match the wingspan of the my model and it indicated that whilst the wingspan seemed near enough (about 4mm short - about 1/75 scale) the fuselage was not undersize in the same proportion, which matches Aardvarks findings. Thanks for the explanation about its origins. I was originally told that it was a 'rip-off' of the Astra kit and that the wing actuators had deliberately put on the upper surface to avoid accusations of copyright infringement. This all makes me long for those early days when I just bought a kit and made it, never dreaming that manufacturers didn'y care about getting it right. John

Any potential builders look here - wish I had seen before building http://scalemodels.ru/modules/forum/viewtopic_t_7970.html John

More info: http://scalemodels.ru/modules/forum/viewtopic_t_7970.html I have a model from Hobbicraft in a black box, in principle not such and bad there decal. But it isn't rescued at all from that that by model approximately on the 77 scale. Correction set http://www.mastercasters.co.uk/4.html Wish I had seen this before starting However the correction set is £17.95 + £5 packing - Ouch

This has been sitting in the loft for years because the aileron actuators are on the topside of the wing instead of the underside so it is necessary to cut out the ailerons and transfer each to the opposite wing, I didn't feel confident of producing a gloss white finish and rumour was that it was not a nice kit. What got me started was finishing the Tu 128 and thinking that this would make a nice comparison as they were both designed to carry out the same task. What I had forgotten was that the Arrow was dead and buried long before the Tu 128 flew. Anyway here it is warts and all. The main snag was the poor fit of the fuselage halves - lots of milliput needed. The wing leading edges look too blunt and were sharpened up. The air outlet behind the cockpit is totally wrong and needs correcting. The canopy has a 'pointed' top. I didn't realise how wrong it was until I had glued it in place so took out the sanding block and skimmed off as much as I dared. It still is not right. It might have been better to have chamfered off some on the underside of the front to lower it to produce a smoother line. Against my better judgement I fitted the rather flimsy nose probe at an early stage and sure enough I managed to drop the model on its nose and break it so a new one was made from brass tube. The final straw was the discovery that the decals were rubbish and also prone to curling up after application. John

Paul J CanMilair do 3 sets for the Arrow. At $20 a set! No thanks - my modelling skills don't justify that sort of expenditure. Oh and by the way I bought my model in the Hobby Center in Ottawa back in 2006 and was the black box with better (much) decals and corrected plastic. Chris(CTModeller) has this boxing and didn't think too highly of the decals See you Tonight!? ???? where were you? John

I would reinforce that warning about surface finish - get it as fine as possible. Also beware of using 'basic black' primer. It takes time to set properly. I had trouble with the finish darkening and not setting properly and this, I was informed, was because I had not allowed enough time after priming. Apparently days are needed. If you look in here http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.p...c=43527&hl= There is a P1a where it went right - polished aluminium over Humrol gloss black and a Fairey FD1, polished aluminium over alclad basic black primer, where it didn't - you can see the marks caused by handling John

Yes it is the early model. I wondered if the later release might have better decals. I also wondered if they corrected any of the other faults beside the actuators. I thought about getting a later one but decided against it. Anyway it's now 'finished' - probably to appear in 'Ready for Inspection' soon Thanks to all who replied John

Whilst waitng for something to set on this, my latest exercise in masochism, does anybody know if anybody ever produced a decent decal sheet for this kit? The one in the kit is dire. Failing that does anybody know of decent pictures of the markings and stencils. I've got the Boston Mills book 'Arrow' but it's not much help. John

That looks very nice indeed. I have one which, when I took it out a short while ago, had badly warped rear section of the wings so it went back in the stash. Regarding the decals I am very wary of 'aged' Hasegawa decals. I have had them fail to release from the backing or break up when they do. John