Revell 1/144 Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo WhiteKnightTwo

[Darren Rhodes]

Greetings folks,

First completed build of the year. When I saw this it jumped right to the top of the to do pile! Please forgive me for deviating from the one true scale. Whilst it might happen again, it shouldn't happen too often

Very nice kit, went together easily, with excellent fit. I say that, however the instructions call for some glazing to be installed before the fuselage halves are joined, one window of which straddles the fuselage seam. I considered this a recipe for disaster, so I ignored the glazing, filled the seams and then filled each window with white glue to protect the interior grey from the white paint to follow. After the sealing gloss coat, I removed the white glue with a new No. 11 blade and then filled each window with Airfix Clear Fix, albeit with only partial success, some are crystal clear, others have fogged over as it dried. At least I got a sharp edge on each window.

The instructions call for 5g of nose weight in each fuselage including SpaceShipTwo. It seems overkill initially, but once built there's not a huge load on the nose gear. It also gives a nice weight to the finished product. There's not a lot of space in there, however, so I tried Deluxe Materials Liquid Gravity. Nice stuff, though I found it time-consuming mixing it with white glue and packing the required amount in. Paint was Zero White Filler Primer, which gave such a smooth finish once cut back with Micromesh that I just gloss coated with Alclad Acqua-gloss. The rocket nozzle was done in Alclad Copper, the engine inlets in Xtracolour Boeing Grey, and the tires were done using the new Tamiya XF-85 Rubber Black acrylic. Finally a quick drying replacement for Xtracolour Tire Black!

Decals went on pretty well, treated with copious amounts of Set and Sol, with no adverse effects, and by large settled down nicely, save for a few wrinkles that refused to budge on the large underside decal. On with the photos!

Normal service will resume (1/72 scale)...

Darren

Edited March 1 by Darren Rhodes
Photo links edited

[Norman]

Well done

Nicely finished model

[cuprar]

Darren that looks the nuts fella! Well done matey

[Flankerman]

Great model(s) Darren.

Superb finish and decals.

It's a pity they aren't in 1/72 scale - to go alongside the Amodel White Knight & Spaceship One......

(which I must get around to decalling............)

Ken

[Darren Rhodes]

Thanks guys, very kind.

Ken, indeed, it is, in fact I almost past on it because it was 1/144. However, it does come out a reasonable size, almost a foot across, so it would be one large model in 72nd, just short of 2 feet across! From your photo, it's interesting to see that the design has evolved quite a bit as it's been scaled up to SS2/WK2.

Darren