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Airfix 1/72 Hawker Typhoon Mk.Ib Sprue Shots


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Exhaust plinths and shrouds were fitted only to late aircraft, certainly from early 1944 onwards.. Check your photographs.

Really? I'm sure they were fitted on car door Typhoons, which certainly weren't late production aircraft.They were an attempt to cure the CO leakage into the cockpit, but weren't very successful, so ended up being discarded in most cases. I would also counter that most images in my 3 Typhoon reference books do not show these as being fitted. Indeed, the image of one of the kit options (MP126) on p.78 of Typhoon Wings of 2nd TAF 1943 show very clearly that it did not have them fitted. I would argue that they are the exception, not the rule.

I would also advise using the Hendon Typhoon as completely representative of the type due a combination of factors. It has a Hastings spinner fitted, the radiator is a cut down replacement from a lorry and it was used as a test airframe for it's flying life.

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OK - let's now move on to Rocket Rails.

The references I have (many by our expert Chris Thomas) show a difference in Rocket Rails from Mk. 1 (as supplied by Airfix) to Mk. 3 as the war progressed. Are there any dates / time period when this occurred? Did certain squadrons convert at a staggered period? Would it be accurate to depict a 1945 Typhoon with Upper C1 roundels with Mk. 1 rocket rails? Am I being too pedantic?? .

Hopefully someone may be a position to shed some light on this. Thanks in advance.

Cheers.. Dave

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I'm surprised by the negative tone of the postings attracted by my exhaust comments. Isn't building model aeroplanes supposed to be a hobby, supposed to be fun?

I suppose your comments that the Airfix kit is "wrong" and "check your photographs" can be taken by some as being a little direct. None of us were there (although in a strange way most of us probably wish we were), so no one will actually know for sure the exact details about any WW2 subject. If anything may I suggest that if you ask questions or make statements always come across that there is always some element of doubt in your understanding. You will be surprised how quickly others will correct you.

Please do not take my comments as condescending, continue to enjoy the hobby and welcome to Britmodeller.

Cheers.. Dave.

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Have there been any rumors of them doing a car door version too?

Regards,

Murph

No, but I would like to start one...

Richard

Edited by RZP
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I'm happy to forget about the exhausts for the time being. I need to see more photographs. However,just in case this post attracts more flak, I'm now wearing my Kevlar bodice.

A keen eye will spot many interesting details in the photograph of SW537 in Profile No. 81. Panel lines around the nose, where you would expect to see indications of removable panels and their fasteners, are invisible. There are leading edge landing lights. The mainwheel tyres really are black, maybe even a little glossy. The tailwheel rubber is nothing like the same. Most of the wheel hub is covered by the wheel door. (I wonder how much of the hub would be visible when the aircraft is loaded with a pair of 1000 ib bombs?) The yellow leading edge stripe seems to squarely butt up to the cannon fairing rather than curling around the circumference. Upper surface camouflage extends around and under the lip of the radiator intake fairing. The whip aerial is there on the top rear fuselage but is almost invisible. There's more, but that's enough for now.

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Exhausts in the kit are correct. Shape of exhausts looks really accurate too. Don't clean up the flash- it makes perfect weld seams.

Mk. 3 rails began arriving with squadrons in Dec 1944, so the kit scheme depicted in that month is almost certainly correct In having Mk.1 (the aircraft was shot down on 5th December).

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I would also advise using the Hendon Typhoon as completely representative of the type due a combination of factors. It has a Hastings spinner fitted, the radiator is a cut down replacement from a lorry and it was used as a test airframe for it's flying life.

I am reasonably sure that it also doesn't have an engine fitted, so given the angle from which it is on display, and given the rest of the bodgery and make-do that is known to have been carried out to make it a superficially complete airframe for display, there must be a strong possibility that it doesn't have any actual Sabre exhausts at all and that the shrouds are post-war ad-hoc tinwork from the back room. Random pic:

raf-typhoon.jpg

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I am reasonably sure that it also doesn't have an engine fitted, so given the angle from which it is on display, and given the rest of the bodgery and make-do that is known to have been carried out to make it a superficially complete airframe for display, there must be a strong possibility that it doesn't have any actual Sabre exhausts at all and that the shrouds are post-war ad-hoc tinwork from the back room. Random pic:

raf-typhoon.jpg

Other things wrong (that I've just noticed from that photo), is Hendon have painted the underside of the cannon barrels Medium Sea Grey, when they should be the same as the top camo in the area of the cannon, i.e. all Ocean Grey except the starboard outer which is Dark Green. Also the invasion stripes on the doors shouldn't be parallel with the ground, but sloping downwards quite a bit.

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OK, lets sort out these exhausts. First let me say that the kit is correct for a late production Typhoon (serial numbers from about MN600) which were entering service from just before D-day.

The RP rails are Mk.I and are correct for Stapleton's ZY-Y, confirmed by German photos taken on 5 Dec 44 when it was shot down. At around this time the first Mk.III (aluminium) rails were being introduced and although most Typhoons were so equipped by the end of the war a few still had the original steel rails (mostly in 84 Group).

The tropical filter in the kit was not fitted to Stapleton's aircraft but it was to Fraser's (5V-X). They were fitted to around the last 800 production Typhoons and a number of rebuilt aircraft delivered in the last months of the war.

I'm afraid Oddjob has been misled by an erroneous caption in F.K.Mason's 'Profile 81' and or his Putnam 'Hawker Aircraft'. In the former (as stated above) the aircraft is captioned as 'SW537'. First warning sign is that it is carrying Typhoon identity stripes that were ordered removed from Typhoons by "first light on 7 February 1944; SW537 was not even built until more than a year after this date.

Many years ago I was able to go right through Hawker's glass negative collection. The photo in question was one of a sequence taken at Langley c.Dec 1943; one of the photos shows the correct serial of this aircraft was JR333 (reproduced in Typhoon and Tempest Story, p.22 and Warpaint 5, p.6). It was the first new production Typhoon to leave the Gloster line with a bubble canopy (some retro-modded aircraft were already in service). It has a (then) non-standard 4-blade prop as it was used for trials of the DH 4-blader. It has the original exhaust fairing which was standard on the production line at that time. And a small tailplane!

As Harry says, the exhaust fairings were added to production Typhoons in mid-1943 as part of a program to 'clean-up' the Typhoon. They appeared on the production line c.JP590 but were replaced by a version without the surround in early 1944, on some of the last MMxxx serialled aircraft. These were identical to those seen on MN235 at Hendon (those rather battered fairings are original). They did not last too long as they were found to impede cooling (and were probably more trouble than they were worth); the last known example was MN375.

The problem for the modeller is that, if he/she departs from the kit decal options they will have to model an aircraft with a serial later than MN600. During that last year of the war (D-Day to VE-Day) many early Typhoons, with 3-bladers and small tailplanes, served alongside (particularly in the RP squadrons) the late production version.

I did my best to explain the above and many other details in 2 articles which appeared in MAM a few years ago; if you are interested they were 3/11 Nov 2004 and 8/7 July 2009.

A word of warning, if you are using Valiant Wings Typhoon book, although it contains a lot of useful detail photos and ex-manual drawings, the versions depicted in the 'Build a collection' pages contain a number of errors in detail, notably in exhaust fairings! And, for example, the 'Mid-production (last with car-door)' did not have 4-bladers or large tailplanes (photos of the former on a cardoor Typhoon are of a trials aircraft). The 4-blader did not appear on production aircraft until after the bubble canopy was introduced.

Edited by Chris Thomas
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As usual everything is more complicated than I ever wanted :)

Just build the kit! Its correct!! Much of the above is defragging red herrings. How about that for mixed metaphor?

Chris

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Just build the kit! Its correct!! Much of the above is defragging red herrings. How about that for mixed metaphor?

Chris

Lol.

Will certainly build two or three ...

One will be the Recce version, I have the conversion somewhere.

Dunno if that needs the three blade prop tho.

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Lol.

Will certainly build two or three ...

One will be the Recce version, I have the conversion somewhere.

Dunno if that needs the three blade prop tho.

I'm afraid all FR.IBs had 3-bladers and small tailplanes. And before anyone points at Wg Cdr Button's black and white decorated 'JCB', it was not an FR.IB but a field-modified late production aircraft.

Chris

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I'm afraid all FR.IBs had 3-bladers and small tailplanes. And before anyone points at Wg Cdr Button's black and white decorated 'JCB', it was not an FR.IB but a field-modified late production aircraft.

Chris

Thanks for the heads up Chris, so I'll have to wait til Airfix releases the three blader.

Cheers,

Martin

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Thanks for the heads up Chris, so I'll have to wait til Airfix releases the three blader.

Cheers,

Martin

The Brengun kit is fine for a FR.

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As a matter of interest is the Brengun kit a limited run type?

Also, in the photo of the Airfix vs Academy models posted in comment # 64 the replacement Aeroclub canopy looks longer and slightly more "blown" than the Airfix canopy. Is that just an illusion because the canopy is open or is there an actual difference in size?

Thanks.

Nick

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Thanks for the A1 top notch info Chris, it is much appreciated and I`ve already dug out your MAM articles!

As much as I`m looking forward to buying an Airfix Tiffie when they eventually reach my local model shop, I`m currently building a Bren Gun kit and it is very nice indeed! True it doesn`t have the fish plates around the tailplane but it does have the small and large tailplanes, 3 and 4 bladed props and a bubble and car door canopy,......so there is enough there to please most people!

I was going to do it as Button`s JCB with black and white props, cannons and wheel door interior but I`m now in two minds whether to do my Airfix kit (when I get one!) in this scheme instead and build the Bren Gun kit as a car door version operated in the desert by the Aussies?

All the best

Tony O

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Thanks for the A1 top notch info Chris, it is much appreciated and I`ve already dug out your MAM articles!

As much as I`m looking forward to buying an Airfix Tiffie when they eventually reach my local model shop, I`m currently building a Bren Gun kit and it is very nice indeed! True it doesn`t have the fish plates around the tailplane but it does have the small and large tailplanes, 3 and 4 bladed props and a bubble and car door canopy,......so there is enough there to please most people!

I was going to do it as Button`s JCB with black and white props, cannons and wheel door interior but I`m now in two minds whether to do my Airfix kit (when I get one!) in this scheme instead and build the Bren Gun kit as a car door version operated in the desert by the Aussies?

All the best

Tony O

Hi Tony

Aaah. So many Typhoons, so little time.

I don't have the Brengun kit but I think the JCB decals are missing his initials for the u/c doors.

No photos of the trop filter as used in N Africa have come to light, although Arthur B's latest version of his plans has updated drawings of what I take to be the original version. The filters were modified in N Africa but again, no details. The trop filter in the Airfix kit is a developed version for production Typhoons but not fitted on the production line until c.Oct 44. Someone (with a red face?) had decreed the filters were not priority on Typhoons, despite Spits and Mustangs being so-equipped prior to Normandy. Hence the Typhoons ran into their well-known dust problems there.

Best of luck with your choice.

Chris

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The Brengun also doesn't have C1 roundels for JCB, but not a big deal to find them aftermarket. I intend to make one of my Airifix ones as this aircraft (it needs the tropical filter), and I don't want to have to fix up the tail wound of chopping the Brengun.

Although the Brengun boxings available now have the car-door canopy, the fuselage is not correct for it, the cockpit opening is the wrong shape. They are about to release a new box with different fuselage.

My Brengun review is on Aeroscale.

Brengun, as expected, have a PE set for their kit, which includes the fish plates. I don't know why they don't supply them, as they have a small PE fret in the kit with seatbelts (non-Sutton type, probably wrong for most/all Typhoons?).

Nick: the Brengun is a modern shorter-run kit: the parts don't need major thinning, for example, and the detail is crisp, but there aren't locating pins. The Airfix goes together quickly, while the Brengun needs clean-up and test fitting. With regards to my Academy build with the Aeroclub canopy, certainly the height tapers off more quickly in the Airfix, which may give the impression it is shorter. As you can see from the white catch-light reflection, the Airfix is quite blown around the front part near the pilot's head, probably overhanging more than the Aeroclub. The actual shape is very hard to get right, but both are acceptable (if you look at an Academy/Hobbyboss, even without anything for comparison, you can see something is very wrong.

noses.jpg

Chris: I've wondered whether the tropical filter fitted to the Tempest VI exactly the same as the production Typhoon version?

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Chris: I've wondered whether the tropical filter fitted to the Tempest VI exactly the same as the production Typhoon version?

Good question Ben. I don't think so. Still no good photos but from what I can see, although rather similar, the Tempest VI filter housing was more rounded on the edges and rear end. The Typhoon one had square sides and end.

Chris

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Thanks for the info Chris.

My review and test build has been published over on Aeroscale.

The part where I mention something about the rocket rail support lengths was an error, I think. I have seen a photo where they look different lengths (seeming to counter the dehedral, so all rockets are in line), but I have now seen other photos where they are not.

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if you are able to edit the article to correct that, you might also want to note that you have misspelled S/L Stapleton's nickname as 'Stampe' - it should be 'Stapme', based on a well-known expletive of the era.

Edited by Work In Progress
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