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Hawker Sea Fury FB11


224 Peter

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The new Airfix Sea Fury arrived today,

First impressions: very clean moulding with good engraved and raised detail no flash and a lot of clever use of separate ejector pin sprue bits to minimise ejector pin marks from small parts. 

 

The markings are limited, one from HMS Glory during the Korean War for which there are a lot of optional loads, including a RATO unit to go under the fuselage, plus rockets, bombs and auxiliary tanks of various sizes.

There is one that looks like a tank, but the front is cut flat, does anyone know what it is? The instructions are devoid of explanation! 

 

The second set of markings are of the RNAS Historical Aircraft Flight aircraft VR930 in the colours she wore during service with 802 NAS in Northern Ireland. For this kit Airfix offer NO underwing load suggestions. This may be correct for the display aircraft, but surely not for the period in service. Can anyone suggest what would have been a typical underwing load for training flights at that time?  A couple of fuel tanks, perhaps plus training RPs or bombs? 

 

Any advice most welcome...

   

 

 

 

 

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Here's some quick sprue shots.  All looks very nice to me... Yes the clear part is included. Part F02 

 

25133232437_eb9691da79_c.jpg20180131_132210 by Keith Sherwood, on Flickr

 

25133063307_7c550284a8_c.jpg20180131_132518 by Keith Sherwood, on Flickr

 

26131145158_e2e79b3870_c.jpg20180131_132529 by Keith Sherwood, on Flickr

 

39971793512_99471441d7_c.jpg20180131_132540 by Keith Sherwood, on Flickr

 

39293540754_203dcbd9bb_c.jpg20180131_132607 by Keith Sherwood, on Flickr

 

25132711117_09a9dd4c56_c.jpg20180131_132623 by Keith Sherwood, on Flickr

 

25133214447_448498478c_c.jpg20180131_132438 by Keith Sherwood, on Flickr

 

26131302668_de512b4174_c.jpg20180131_132824 by Keith Sherwood, on Flickr

 

Edited by keithjs
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37 minutes ago, Red Dragon said:

The flat fronted tank is a drop tank that has been converted to carry a camera, do they include the glazing for it?  Phil

F02 seems to be the relvant part.

I notice the RP fins are moulded integral, did they use slide moulding to obtain the x arrangement, or did they mould a + as in the good old days ?

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3 minutes ago, tempestfan said:

F02 seems to be the relvant part.

I notice the RP fins are moulded integral, did they use slide moulding to obtain the x arrangement, or did they mould a + as in the good old days ?

The rockets seem to have the correct 'X' arrangement, interestingly they seem to have included two complete sets of them, always useful!

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3 hours ago, Red Dragon said:

The rockets seem to have the correct 'X' arrangement, interestingly they seem to have included two complete sets of them, always useful!

Err...no, the rockets are supplied as L & R halves, only 6 rocket sets. 

I guess that is how they got the fins correctly orientated! 

And thanks for explaining what the "glass fronted drop tank" is! 

Edited by 224 Peter
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41 minutes ago, 224 Peter said:

Err...no, the rockets are supplied as L & R halves, only 6 rocket sets. 

I guess that is how they got the fins correctly orientated! 

And thanks for explaining what the "glass fronted drop tank" is! 

Blimey,  that's a lot of clean up on the rockets,  onwards and upwards! 

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I've been looking at YouTube videos to see if I can find out more about operational weapon loads on the Sea Fury. 

 

Conclusions: 

1. On carriers they carried only single rockets on each launch point, not the "piggyback" load in the kit.

2. Mostly there are 2 rockets per side, not 3

3. Under wing fuel tanks seemed universal on operations

4. For deck landing practice there is no under wing load at all.

5. For bombing practice they use a load of 4x25lb practice bombs, mounted to the normal bomb rack.

 

This video has a lot of useful information though the deck landings are "interesting! The Sea Fury is quite short and the engine massive so after catching the hook the aircraft tends to go tail high and can easily tip up. 

One interesting comment is that a sudden application of power on approach can torque stall the aircraft, with dire results! 

 

 

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20 hours ago, Red Dragon said:

The flat fronted tank is a drop tank that has been converted to carry a camera, do they include the glazing for it?  Phil

There's a photo of it on p.27 of Sea Fury From The Cockpit: it's being carried by a VW-serialled 801 Sq Sea Fury on HMS Glory, winter 1952/3.  It's on the starboard inner rack with a standard tank on the other side and British-style 500lb bombs on the outer racks.

 

Edit: and another on p.85 of WJ266 155/R again of 801 Sq, HMS Glory.  Caption says that what look like (US-style) 500lb bombs on the other racks are in fact canisters for leaflets.  They have a visible horizontal join line.  Caption also draws attention to underwing serial in white, for which it has no explanation.  NB block-treaded tyres.

 

NB I don't have the Airfix 1/48 (hiss!) kit so all this without reference to what may or may not come with the kit.

Edited by Seahawk
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59 minutes ago, 224 Peter said:

I've been looking at YouTube videos to see if I can find out more about operational weapon loads on the Sea Fury. 

 

Conclusions: 

1. On carriers they carried only single rockets on each launch point, not the "piggyback" load in the kit.

2. Mostly there are 2 rockets per side, not 3

3. Under wing fuel tanks seemed universal on operations

4. For deck landing practice there is no under wing load at all.

5. For bombing practice they use a load of 4x25lb practice bombs, mounted to the normal bomb rack.

Re 1: see photo on p.31 of Sea Fury From The Cockpit (SFFTC) - VR943 105/R taking off from HMS Glory, spring 1951.  4 x 2 RPs and droptanks.

Re 2: "mostly" is, I think, overegging it slightly: a subjective impression from a flick-through of SFTTC is that it's about 50:50 between 4 and 6 rails, with aircraft on training duties likely to have just 4.  Operational aircraft more likely to have 6 (or 4 with bombracks -see below).

6.  Interesting photo on p.31 of SFFTC: VR943 105/R again but with no tanks, 500lb bombs on racks flanked by vacant rocket rails.  Spring/summer 1951.  Also p.86-7, 802 Sq eg TF991/C at Arbroath, early 1953.

 

In addition to SFFTC, two books that I suspect are about to become more popular are:

 

Furies and Fireflies Over Korea by Graham Thomas (Grub Street, 2004); and

With The Carriers In Korea by John R P Lansdown (Crecy, 1997).

 

Both include scattered references to weapon loads eg that Sea Furies initially operated with RPs, leaving bombs to the Fireflies, but later the roles reversed, with Sea Furies operating with tanks and 500lb bombs.  ISTR (but may be wrong) that later still they used 1000lb bombs.

Edited by Seahawk
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Thanks for the sprue shots, looks like a wonderful kit. So it looks like the clear parts are interesting. I assume the circular clear part is for the under wing lights but I believe there should be two, one on each side. I wonder if it depends on which Sea Fury version? I know the RCAF Sea Fury has two lights, one under each wing. I have actually been under the wing of the one here at our naval museum. As an aside there are two lights in one and a single light in the other.

 

Cheers

Chris

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On 1/31/2018 at 21:09, keithjs said:

Nope, nor is the pilot to be able use it anyway.....

Bugger would only break it anyway...:whistle: (I'm ex groundcrew btw)

4 hours ago, Skyhawk174 said:

Thanks for the sprue shots, looks like a wonderful kit. So it looks like the clear parts are interesting. I assume the circular clear part is for the under wing lights but I believe there should be two, one on each side. I wonder if it depends on which Sea Fury version? I know the RCAF Sea Fury has two lights, one under each wing. I have actually been under the wing of the one here at our naval museum. As an aside there are two lights in one and a single light in the other.

 

Cheers

Chris

Posts 2 & 4 explain what the circular piece of glazing is for, it's for the modified drop tank used as a recce' pod.

 

If you look on the lower wing halves you can see where Airfix have scribed the lines for the underwing lamps, just forward of the ailerons at the inboard end.  IIRC the single lamp was a moveable landing lamp, the twin lamp was fixed and was used for ID lights (although I could be wrong, happy to be corrected on this point).

Edited by Wez
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On 31.1.2018 at 6:52 PM, 224 Peter said:

Err...no, the rockets are supplied as L & R halves, only 6 rocket sets. 

I guess that is how they got the fins correctly orientated! 

Hmmm... perhaps not the most obvious way of engineering things. I'll be interested in seeing how this works in practice. I especially wonder how they got round  (pun intended ) of obtaining a flat horizontal surface between the fins. The RPs in the Seafire 47 were not stellar, especially the tail parts, but looked the part.

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On ‎2‎/‎1‎/‎2018 at 10:27 PM, Wez said:

Bugger would only break it anyway...:whistle: (I'm ex groundcrew btw)

Posts 2 & 4 explain what the circular piece of glazing is for, it's for the modified drop tank used as a recce' pod.

 

If you look on the lower wing halves you can see where Airfix have scribed the lines for the underwing lamps, just forward of the ailerons at the inboard end.  IIRC the single lamp was a moveable landing lamp, the twin lamp was fixed and was used for ID lights (although I could be wrong, happy to be corrected on this point).

The Sea Fury did have changes through production .... look at antenna positions...

PM

 

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21 minutes ago, Patrick Martin said:

The Sea Fury did have changes through production .... look at antenna positions...

PM

 

Every aircraft does, especially for things like avionics, most changes occur in service though, nothing is set in stone!

Edited by Wez
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19 minutes ago, avro683 said:

It looks like the starboard fin is short shot. I have seen other examples too.

Apparently a few folk complaining that they have kits with short shots on the leading edge of the fin on these kits :( If you have one and haven't looked in the box yet best have a look pronto.

 

Duncan B

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On 03/02/2018 at 9:17 PM, Duncan B said:

Apparently a few folk complaining that they have kits with short shots on the leading edge of the fin on these kits :( If you have one and haven't looked in the box yet best have a look pronto.

 

Duncan B

I do Duncan. In fact as far as I am aware they all have to some degree.

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I feel incredibly lucky that an initial inspection shows mine to be complete as Airfix intended. Of course I'll fix that when I come to build it but that's hardly Airfix's fault :D 

 

Andy

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Mine has about 1~1.5 cm missing on the starboard fin leading edge - extends back as far as the panel line only so a quick bit of superglue/talc filler should sort it and allow me to rescribe the panel line at the join. I also have a fairly significant short shot on the last underwing tank half on the sprue but as it's one of the larger tanks which I do not like it is of little consequence to me. As with Nickthebrief above, neither is a deal breaker, just happy to have a good looking Sea Fury in this scale, at last.

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