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Welcome to the Jungle – RA-5C Vigilante - completed


trickyrich

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Right one beastie out of the way and time for the next one……will it ever end!

 

Ok first off a very special treat, a super rare photo!!!!!! :D

 

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It only stayed like that for about ½ hour!!

 

Ok I’ve ordered a new set of gear from SAC, the supplied gear is pretty crap and would need a lot of work to look nice, plus the location pins of the gar will match the new wheel wells.

 

Right first things some conversion work. I spent sometime on the web and in books checking out the particular model I’m building, especially to see if it was in the first or second batch of RA-5C’s built. There were actually two earlier models of the Vigilante, the A3J-1/A5-A that had the flat top fuselage, which was the original attack version, then the A3J-2/A-5B, which had the raised fuselage top, which was to be an improved version of the earlier model. But both of these were sort of abandoned when the Navy changed it’s mind on airborne nuclear strike and strategic bombing aircraft. A lot of these models would eventually be converted to RA-5C aircraft.

 

My particular aircraft, bureau #150834 was one from the first batch of RA-5C’s, which didn’t have the Leading Edge Extension of the later model and slightly different air intake (curved edge instead of straight).

 

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The RH one is correct for mine, the LH one is for the A3J aircraft (I don’t know if Collect-Aire ever did produce that model, I’d like it if they did, but guess the price would be truly frightening!!). LEX’s are supplied with the model if you were building the later version, and the line on the intake is where you would have had to cut it to have the straight edge of the later aircraft.

 

Right mod work done time for the main wheel wells, these were undercoated dark grey when painted white, this gives you nice shading right from the start. I’m not getting too concerned here, as most of it won’t be seen.

 

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I had previously ground out lots of resin for the new wheel bays to fit, so all I needed to do was some final test fitting and I could glue them in place. The models opening is the wrong shape, I need to fix that.

 

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Extra bits were glued in to give it more strength, as she’ll be a heavy model! With that task done I can close up the main fuselage, simple…..no!

 

The sides of the lower half were slightly warped and due to their thickness and a hot bath wasn’t going to straighten them without causing other issues, so after some thought pinning was the answer. I would match drill holes in both fuselage sections and use plastic pins to straighten out the sides, then glue in place.

 

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It worked a treat! Using CA cement meant I could start sanding it all back almost straight away. This shot is so I don’t forget this bit of detail, I have to redo this as it’s been sanded off now!

 

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The intakes were a bit warped as well and needed a bath in boiling water to straighten. The water temperature required to straighten warped resin can vary depended on the resin used, in this case it needed to be boiling. Only a little bit of cleaning up was required for the intakes to fit. So I’ll finish tiding them up and fit the variable intake ramp, paint the insides and they can be fitted.

 

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The wings look like they’ll go on without any major issue, for the moving rudder, I’ll probably use a brass socket and sleeve for that (probably the same for the elevators as well).

 

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Ok that’s the good bits, now the trickery stuff, I knew it wasn’t going to be this easy!

 

The rear tail module is a wee bit undersized, or the rear fuselage profile is wrong! I really don’t want to have to cut up the tail unit to widen it slightly!!

 

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The front…….well there is a wee…ok huge gap on the top section. Luckily some careful sanding and a shim cut to shape will fix that.

 

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The “Recon Canoe” which is the aircrafts most noticeable feature appears to be too long??? I’ll have to study some drawings to see what went wrong here, it should be a simple fix. I’m going to cut out and fit camera windows where required.

 

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Finally I’ve started painting the cockpit, it’s got a clear coat on now, so I can start with the detailing work, some careful painting should really bring it to life.

 

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That’s it after 2 days on her. Quite a bit of work required but now I know what’s needs to be done, so I just need to get on it. I should get the main fuselage completed or close to it by tomorrow, I don’t know whether to fit the wings then or later. Funny I thought the cockpit would have been the easier to complete first!

 

Now if I can just keep away from the Demon….I’ve bought bits for that one as well.

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with all that resin, I assume metal undercarriage (despite the wheel bays) are in order to support the weight? Incredible skills on display there by the way, I struggle to re-scribe on plastic, but on resin is it easier?

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metal gear is supplied with the model, but it's a bit on the poor side. The SAC version should have much better detail, plus it will fit perfectly to the new wheel wells. Strangely I may not need to add any additional weight to her for balance. But if need be there is a hollow section infant of the main wheel wells that could probably take half a kilo if needed!

 

I really hate doing panels lines, it's bad enough on plastic and just hard work on resin! Lines already there it's not too bad (I'm cleaning those up at the moment), but new ones.... I find a micro saw is the only way to get lines which are relatively smooth in finish, normal re-scriding tools I find product a line with can be quite rough.

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Great progress Rich. What a difference in the quality of the casting between Aires and Collect Aire - generations apart.

 

How did you align the pin holes in both parts? This is something I always struggle with and yours look spot-on :thumbsup:

 

Cheers, Peter

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thanks.

 

It was actually quite easy. I drilled the holes completely through the top section, then carefully lined up one side and drilled down through the hole just enough to make the lower section, I them did the same on the other side. With these location holes marked I then just drilled down far enough to securely fit a pin. The top holes were then fractionally enlarged so the top piece would slide down easily. I did something similar when I fit wings.

 

The casting is like chalk-n-cheese!! I found I have big problems with the front of the Demon, it's missing about 3-4mm in width! The radome looks oval from the front and not round ad the cockpit tup will not fit at all. Don't know whats gone wrong there, but some seruious work will be required to sort that out!

 

Gosh I love resin models! :wall:

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Rich, great work so far, it is real modelling, (I tend to work on nailing it together and then throwing paint at it 'til it looks about right) and I'm thoroughly enjoying it.  

 

Is there a risk, even given the weight of the model, that it might become a tail sitter?  Will you have to incorporate weight into the front end of the model somewhere to counter this?.  Might be worth planning that in now rather than later..

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On 15/04/2018 at 5:01 PM, Grey Beema said:

Rich, great work so far, it is real modelling, (I tend to work on nailing it together and then throwing paint at it 'til it looks about right) and I'm thoroughly enjoying it.  

 

Is there a risk, even given the weight of the model, that it might become a tail sitter?  Will you have to incorporate weight into the front end of the model somewhere to counter this?.  Might be worth planning that in now rather than later..

thanks, I do like the challenge of real modelling every so often, though it will be nice to get back to a plastic model again....only two more builds to go before I can.

 

It's going to be really close balance wish, the tail unit is sort of heavy, but to counter this I've got the resin cockpit. I may just hollow out the tail unit to help save weight (I can add that dust to the barrow load from the Demon, started to play with that while paint was drying....am now quite afraid!!). To mount the front cockpit assembly I'm going to pin it in place, so for a while I'mm be able to slide it on or off, so that will be the final test. As mentioned earlier there is a large hollow space in front of the main wheel wells that can be used for weights. Worse case, I'll just drill a hole and add some in later, have done that before! :whistle: As you can guess by now doing crazy stuff and mods is the normal now for my builds! :D

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I really haven’t done as much on this one as I had hoped, got a bit side tracked with the Demon. Have found I’ve made a major booboo on her when I was block sanding the fuselage halves. :wall: I thought they were both straight, but it turns out the front sections were warped and I remove way too much material, so it’s going to take a lot or work to repair/fix!!! 

 

Plus I had a couple of moments panic with this one as I thought I’d found some big issue…more later.

 

Ok I’m getting close to finishing the cockpit, now down to the detailing part, may get the finished tomorrow.

 

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I’ve started painting the exhausts, their initial dark coat, will clear this and start building up from here.

 

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I started to figure out how they would sit in the tail unit as they well need to slide in after the tail unit is fitted. This was the first panic moment as looking at reference photos the tail cone was completely different!! They were oval in shape in the pictures and mine is round!

 

After a strong cup of coffee and a couple of hours on the net I found the answer (I hope), the final production run of Vigilantes had newer spec engine (J79-10) with different exhaust nozzles and it appears the tail cone was changed as well. To something more oval in shape a scalloped for the exhausts. While the earlier ones (with J79-8) the cones was completely round in shape.

 

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And to make life hard when comparing display aircraft photo’s and bureau # engines and tail cone don’t match. It seem like for display aircraft now as long as it looks ok it’ll do (there are photo’s of display Phantoms with two different engines fitted!) Plus I found a third variation of the tail cone as well!!! Plus they probably varied from aircraft to aircraft I bet on the carriers as well!

 

Anyway, I’ve fitted a collar inside each opening that will allow me to slide each exhaust unit into it’s correct place after the tail unit has been fitted!

 

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hmm  looking at that photo I can see a line that off and the shape as well!! :doh: ...more work....

 

Second milder panic, I spent ages trying to find a detail photo of the rear of the Recon pod and it’s position in relation to the arrestor doors, as I was trying to work of the correct shape for the rear of the Recon pod. I couldn’t find exactly what I was after but I got enough info to make it work. It’s was more of a straight wedge then the softer rounded curve. I needed filler and scrap resin as I ended up going through the side of the pod while shaping it.

 

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It fits inside the arrestor hook doors now as it should. Plus you can see I’ve fixed up/corrected the issue with the main wheel wells opening being too wide and uneven. Plus I have started to make up where the windows will go for the cameras.

 

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While I was down that way I decided to work on the all-moving rudder as well….third panic. I go to fit the brasses shelve and find out the rudders position is nearly 4mm off to the left! The whole centerline at the rear is off to one side….and I only found this after I drilled the big hole! Scrap bit of resin and lots of CA glue to the rescue again. (the black line is the centre and as you can see the scrap resin is way over to one side where they wanted me to fit the tail)

 

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There’s a piece of aluminum rod in the tail, it’s a nice fit and works a treat. I’ll do the same for the elevators.

 

The intakes now they’re straight will fit nicely, I’ll fit the intake ramps and paint them before I fit them to the fuselage.

 

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The cockpit now sort of fits ok, though with the canopies open you won’t be able to see too much.

 

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My only real worry here is the instrument panel cowling, it’s too short and too narrow. This is because on the Trumpeter model it’s used for the whole front cockpit section is too narrow, one of the many faults with that aircraft. I’m not too sure how I’ll tackle this one for now. Cutting Edge did make a correction kit for this (complete new front end) but it’s really rare. and super expensive if you can find one (last one went for $100USD +postage).

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The rear end of the Vigilante was indeed modified in the last production batch with the newer engines and this part went through quite some troublesome development in the history of the RA-5.

Originally this was the rear end of the bomb/tank assembly and in the A-5 the idea was eject the whole assembly from the rear end and drop it onto the target.

With the change in mission of the Vigilante, this assembly became for fuel tanks only but was never totally reliable and there were cases of the tanks falling from the rear of the aircraft onto the carrier deck

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11 minutes ago, Giorgio N said:

With the change in mission of the Vigilante, this assembly became for fuel tanks only but was never totally reliable and there were cases of the tanks falling from the rear of the aircraft onto the carrier deck

That would concentrate the mind!!

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1 hour ago, Giorgio N said:

The rear end of the Vigilante was indeed modified in the last production batch with the newer engines and this part went through quite some troublesome development in the history of the RA-5.

Originally this was the rear end of the bomb/tank assembly and in the A-5 the idea was eject the whole assembly from the rear end and drop it onto the target.

With the change in mission of the Vigilante, this assembly became for fuel tanks only but was never totally reliable and there were cases of the tanks falling from the rear of the aircraft onto the carrier deck

yes I've read that launches were always a bit of a gamble with whether the fuel pods would come out or not. The first the crew would know was a terse message once they were airborne.

 

Though it could have been worse, an aircraft from RVAH-6 lost the rear canopy during a launch. The story goes that the CAG boss though at first the RO had ejected, all the pilot heard was a loud bang and he saw the canopy sailing past the tail in his mirror. They made it back ok, I bet the RO didn't complain about not being able to see out again!! Interestingly I've just read that RVAH-11 had one camouflaged aircraft as well with the checkered tail band they were known for, seems they got a replacement aircraft from RVAH-13, another scheme option?

 

Sorry Giorgio, I missed an earlier post where you mentioned the exhaust. You were right there was a mismatch, among a few on this model. The new exhausts fix this and fit the aircraft into the first batch of ture RA-5C's and not modified ones. If I had remembered that post yesterday I probably wouldn't have had a wee panic.

 

Canopy missing

 

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I didn’t get to do too much today (had to go for a skin check for sun-spots and skin cancer, not fun!), but what work I did worked out great!

 

Day’s like today I just love working with resin models, everything happens so quick and easy! It was all about the main fuselage today…mostly.

 

First up I filled in the nose wheel well, on the ground only the small door for the gear is open, everything else is closed up. So I filled in the main “door” area, there are two small doors which I’ll clos” once I get the new U/C painted and fitted.

 

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Next up were the intakes, I decided that I’ll fit intake covers to these. The model supplies some intake detail but the “front” of the engine is way too far forward and would never be seen normally. So the easiest way to fix this is to add covers. So once I fitted the variable intake ramps  (the front of these can be seen), I fitted the intakes.

 

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They actually fitted really well with any gaps first been filled with sprue and CA cement before a fine layer of filler.

 

And finally the rear section. I did find part of the “cone” was out of shape so I needed to re-shape that first. Due to the way this tail section would fit and that I was using CA cement (I don’t like using the Gel, I find it even easier to make mistakes) and would got only one chance to get it right, I fitted some guides to the body to help with the alignment.

 

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…and it work perfectly! It was nice and even and just where I wanted it to be. There were gaps to be filled, rather than using filler that might/would shrink, I used plastic rod and CA cement.

 

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Once dry…after 30 seconds, I sanded the whole thing back. All the joins are just about perfect, I’ve got the profiles I needed, all that was left was to add a tiny amount of filler to smooth out any imperfections and it was done.

 

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I just need to check on the rear bottom part of the profile of the rudder, but it’s done.

 

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Tomorrow I’ll fit the mounts for the elevators and replace the detail I had to remove from the area.

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Well another productive day, mostly spent on the main fuselage section.

 

So first off the elevators. I’m doing the same as I did for the rudder, except this time I’m using a copper sleeve and a brass rod pin this time.

 

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Next up I needed to replace the detailing I removed from this section. So using some thin card I made up the support panels for the elevators. This was not quite as easy I had thought it would be.

 

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But it worked out quite well and the elevators fit nicely now.

 

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Tge tail section looks really and is nice and strong now.

 

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Before I fitted the Recon Pod I needed to re-do the arrestor hook and mounting area. I basically made a new door for this and added some detail the Arrestor Hook area, just some filling and tiding up required. 

 

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That done I could fit the Recon ”canoe”, once I had cut out the opening and added glass, just a tiny amount of filler was required here.

 

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Finally I filled in the gap in the forward fuselage section

 

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I’ll fit the wings tomorrow, ten the main fuselage section should be pretty well completed!

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Other really productive day, so much so I even had time to start playing with the Demon and that was quite scary as well!

 

I decided to leave the wings off for the moment just because she is so large and it’ll make it easier to handle what I was doing today. Namely fitting the front fuselage section!

 

First up to make things really easy for me I made up some rather large locating pins!

 

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These worked a treat and made life so much easier getting the cockpit to fit and gluing up the front fuselage section. I forgot to take photos at this stage as I was working rather quickly.

 

The front fuselage section was quite thin in places and a bit warped in places.

 

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Rather than filling this gap with filler I glued on some thin plastic sheet, which was then sanded back. This gave me a much better repair that won’t shrink. Plus I started to fit the locating guides.

 

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More guides were fitted to the main fuselage section as well.

 

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Time to glue the whole lot together!

 

I must say it went together without any issues at all, all the joins were near perfect. As can be seen below, I just add a wee bit of filler to help smooth out a couple of spots, but the rest on the join is perfect.

 

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With the wings just sitting there she looks great. I’m super happy with the progress, it’s been a lot easier than I originally expected.

 

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Size wise she is a monster, a fraction smaller than an F-111 which is big, she makes the FJ-4B Fury look small!

 

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I’ve put her aside to allow the filler to cue properly, I may fit the wings tomorrow or continue working on the fuselage….will see what happens.

 

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2 hours ago, Basilisk said:

Some serious work going on here Rich :clap2: Great idea placing temporary guides to assist in lining up joints :thumbsup: Have to remember this.

 

Cheers, Peter

It's actually the first time I've done it when building...normally I think I should have done it the third or forth time I've re-split the join! It's works a treat, I'll be using it all the time now, even with plastic, plus using CA cement means it's quick and doesn't damage the original part.

 

The wings are on now. I had a rest from her today and played around with this;

 

http://www.trumpeter-china.com/index.php?g=home&m=product&a=show&id=2932&l=en

 

I may do some more on her tomorrow or just have a wee break as everything is progressing very nicely.

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1 hour ago, Yeoman1942 said:

Great looking work Rich. I never knew Vigilante existed until I saw your build, its a corking build of a cracking looking plane

They were a very impressive aircraft and it's hard to believe something that large operated off a carrier.

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4 minutes ago, Grey Beema said:

1/48 A3 Sky Raider next?

hmmm, well along those lines but a wee bit larger....

 

http://fishermodels.indiemade.com/product/douglas-1e-skyraider-conversion-132-scale?tid=3

 

I've always found these to be really interesting and have never built one so I figure if I do I may as well go large!! Gosh knows where I'd build it let along put it!!!

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I’ve been enjoying a break for this build and resin, been playing with an 8 wheeled beast that launchers Anti-Shipping missiles!!!

 

Before the break I fitted the wings, this was actually a really simple job and required very little filler.

 

The only photos I have are of her and an RF-111C just for size comparison. The F-111 was longer but with the wings folded it took up less space, weight wise they were very similar.

 

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Tomorrow I’ll get back to her and star tiding up the cockpit area. I’d like to start priming her this week.

 

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