BritJet

I would build a plastic card box around the canopy area with the top open, spray the inside with release agent and then carefully add the car filler. Once it's cured you can pull the box apart and release the fuselage. You will get a much better result with the female mould. You may be able to get blue tinted PETg but I've never looked so don't know, it would probably be more expensive and have a minimum order quantity as well so might not be worth it unless you are going into production! I think you'd be better off experimenting with clear blue paint airbrushed on the canopy inside, Tamiya do a few clear colours and I'm sure there is a blue one. An oven in the modelling area, that could lead to a fridge, kettle, microwave, bed...... Steve

That drawback is also an advantage! Female moulds will give you all the detail on the outside of the mouldings, where you need it, instead of a 'soft' version that you'd get with a male mould. Also the mouldings are the right size rather than oversized by the plastic thickness, the moulded thickness will vary with the shape, so it's difficult to allow for it with a male mould. As good as your CNC milled female moulds are, I don't think they will give a good enough surface for moulding the canopy. I would glue two of your fuselage mouldings together, make the seam invisible and get a perfect surface. If you then follow how I did the Prentice canopy and make a female mould from car body filler, it can be polished before vacforming. If there any imperfections they can be carefully rubbed down with wet & dry, before polishing again. That, Sir, will start a very vicious rumour! I just make this stuff up as I go along, some of it actually works now and again...... I try different things and if they don't work, try something else. Eventually a solution appears and then it's just a case of tweaking it. Thanks for the praise. PETg is probably the best for canopies as it takes a lot of punishment when vacforming, smells a bit when heated but it's not too bad. I always vacform when the other half is out, to avoid any complaints. It's what Coke bottles, Easter egg packaging etc is made from and these can be used to practise vacforming. I would buy some PETg sheet for the proper mouldings as it will be scratch free and a constant thickness. Steve

Glad you found it useful, I thought it would make more sense to link to that with the photos rather than me just try to explain it. The masking tape does help but the water get to it after a while. Small parts are always difficult to hold while sanding I've been there a few times! As you can vacform another one easily I wouldn't bother trying to repair it unless you want to do it for practice. The trick is to count how many rotations you do and keep looking at the part, reverse direction of the rotations and look again. Reversing the rotations helps to keep the sanding even. If there are only a couple of areas still needing plastic to be removed then you can always use a sanding stick or files, but be careful to keep the mating surfaces correct. Vacforms always need filler so a bit more due to 'operator error' won't hurt! It helps to identify where you need to remove more plastic and to check how the parts will fit together but it's also very satisfying to see it start to come together. Are you using PET for moulding the canopy? Steve

The silver one (large bore intakes)...... .....is easy - Decal sheet. It would need the front canopy as it's non-standard. I love faded dayglo! I don't think the black one (small bore intakes) is too difficult, the Martin Baker titles/logo could be printed onto white decal paper with a black outline and some gold stripe decal. The other markings are pretty standard. You've got me thinking now about doing the black one and I'm trying to give up Meteors! I've done 28 so far and have the kits for another 10 or so, there's just so many I'd like to do. Steve

That looks just right to me, I didn't want to publish the photos here as it would be obvious where they came from given the rarity of them and I certainly didn't want to upset Air Britain as I have a lot of respect for what they do. Glad you managed to get hold of a copy of the magazine as it's better to have than just my description of the photos. What are you doing planning to do with the T7½? Steve

Looking good so far. You might find this useful for how to deal with the vacform parts. Steve

Steve

It was PR5 as it was unarmed like the PR10, the FR9 had canons. Steve

I've only got a scan of it but the magazine is available here Steve

I've uploaded the photos here. Hope they're useful. Steve

Have you seen the photos in the Walkaround section I think I've got some of a dismantled Brit as well, I'll have a look for you. Steve

There are two photos of it in the Air Britain Aeromilitaria Summer 2008 and it may be unpainted rather than high speed silver as there are different tones to some of the panels. It has long span wings (F3) style, the gun ports plated over and is just in the standard F4 scheme of the time. The nose looks the same as the FR9/PR10. There is also a photo of the PR3 EE338 that only had the oblique camera ports on a standard nose. The Swift PR6 is mentioned as being photographed dismantled at Halton in a couple of books, but I've never seen it anywhere. Steve

Found a couple of photos and some history https://abpic.co.uk/pictures/registration/VW427 https://forum.keypublishing.com/forum/historic-aviation/84600-meteor-vw427 http://www.ukserials.com/results.php?serial=VW Hope this helps. Steve

Off to a good start, don't worry about any 'critical gaze' I'm sure you'll only get positive, helpful comments. Don't spend too much time on the cockpit as you won't see much of it.... I would advise drilling into both resin wing roots and the fuselage to take some metal rods as there will be the tendency for the resin to pull away from the fuselage if there is any force on it, such as the model being picked up by a wing. It will also help to make sure the wings don't droop once the angles are right. Also for some of the large gaps, I would add some plastic card shims to bridge the gaps before filling. You might find it useful to have a look through some of the builds in the Non-injected Group Build from a couple of years ago. I've got two of these conversions and plan to do one as a B1 and the other as the prototype so will be following your build all the way. Just ask if you're unsure of anything as there are plenty of people willing and able to help. Hope this helps. Steve

The only ones I remember were by Fineline, but I think they are long gone now. https://modelingmadness.com/scott/decals/fineline/sbd001.htm https://modelingmadness.com/scott/decals/fineline/sbd002.htm edit: Hannants have some - https://www.hannants.co.uk/search/index.php?product_category_id=&product_division_id=&manufacturer_id=8011&code=&product_type_id=&scale_id=&keyword_search=&setPerPage=25&currency_id= Steve