GWH Avro Vulcan B.2 1/144, XM657 Red Flag ca 1980

[Christer A]

Well, in very recent times I finished 3 kits! Naturally I have bought three times that amount since the last finished kit, but that's normal I guess.

I should really get back to some of my sleeping kits (the Sea Vixen, FJ-4 Fury and Strike Draken comes to mind) but that's not how I work...

No, instead I was going right into a Tamiya Mossie, just to discover that I really need the decals first in order to decide with version to do but that Hannants order will not arrive instantly but hopefully by the end of next week, or a bit later.

What to do in the meantime?

Well, there is a competition in southern Sweden at the end of October and one thing that I've learned is that the small scale aircraft classes are not that well filled, so that means that there is a greater chance for me to win something, and since the prices at C4 Open are GREAT why not give 1/144 scale a shot?

I mean, how hard can that be?

 

We'll see...

 

My plastic victim is this, which is probably a quite familiar sight.

A fance boxart, and two marking options, both Falklands. I do have a soft spot for Wild weasels, and there are two ALARM missiles included, but I didn't fell for these markings, and duly ordered the full fündekals offering instead.

Two huge pieces, quite well packaged. It does have a slight leaning towards a snap-fit kit. I expect the basic assembly will be swift.

Very nice panel lines, but a quite matt very very slightly pebbly surface. It cannot really be felt properly but it does show in pictures and natural light.

I'd guess a polish or three could sort it out

Look here! Slide molded intakes! 

Very nice, but why did they include the frontface of the Avons? It'll be impossible to paint those!

Some other parts, includin 386 wheels 😨

I KNEW there was a catch

More Falklands equipment and some tiny tiny crew. 

Look! You get a stand as well!

Naturally I couldn't resist some AM parts, but just a turned refuelling probe will do. This time!

 

I intend to do one of those wraparound painted Vulcans that tore up Red Flag excercises back in the days.

Something that I need to know before I start proper?

 

//Serial Kitstarter Christer

Edited October 8, 2018 by Christer A

[amblypygid]

Splendid choice, Christer, looking forward to seeing this build up.

[FZ6]

Hi Christer,

Look forward to seeing how you get on with this one.

 

If you want to take it to the next level, check out the photo etch that Shelf Oddity do for this kit.

 

Regards,

Mark

[Christer A]

Thanks Mark & Chris!

Yes, I've spied those Shelf Oddity etch sets, but for now I'll refrain from ordering one. I need to finish this in 6 weeks or so...

But Pit road has a Blue Steel equipped one coming out later this year, and I guess I need one of those 😍 and then it would be a good thing to add some etch!

After all, the fündekals have enough markings to last me a while...

[Mikey-1980]

o0o0o0o0o0o0o *rubs hands in glee

 

I do like a Vulcan build! looking forward to seeing your work with this.

 

I'm impressed by this kit so far, despite its scale it looks quite well detailed too.

 

 

[Christer A]

Let's see what we can do then Mikey?

There has been some benchtime today (not just at the gym mind you!)
I filled the nose with some lead shot, to avoid a tail sitter

The fin got the ECM addons, and the fit was great. I couldn't find any ECM-ess fin tip though so if one wants to that some sanding is in order. Not for me though!

Fin installed. Some gaps here and there (which sort of confirms my suspicion that this is a snapfit kit)

Those gaps were swiftly filled with PPP and and smoothed with water later on.

Cockpit completed. Just one part, and it was the instrument panel with 2 joysticks molded in.
[/url]
If I get bored I could always add some tape belts. I wonder if that is possible to see though?
First conundrum:


The one piece inlet ducts are a fine piece of plastic, with no nasty seams to clean.
Good good.
But how to paint the fan front?

Before doing something drastic like cutting out the rear part to be able to better access the front piece I chatted with a modelling buddy of mine which promplty suggested to paint the in the state they're in now, add washes and son on, and then form a piece of blutac and shove it down the intake throat.

Nice I thought, but will replace the blue tac with masking putty, since that is less tacky and easier to get out.

I still think that Pit Road could've molded the fan fronts as separate parts though, since that would've made everything simpler.

 

The top and bottom fuselage were joined together and with no effort at all it looks like a Vulcan!

Bottom fuselage also has tree larger inserts and one smaller.

This is to enable better looking engines, Blue Steel and K2 version off course.
Well, no waiting about, s just attach them to and get on with it.

Alla gaps were filled and smoothed with more PPP.

That was quick!

Tomorrow, there will be sanding, more filling and a bunch of other small parts to affix.

[Christer A]

Madness ensues!

While sanding and filling and priming and sanding and filling and priming the intake lips a few times I decided that the wheels wells were a little too boring, plain sheets of plastic as they are.

So a little while later, after searching for suitable pictures I arrived at this.

No one will do any upskirt photo shoots with this one, but it feels just right to detail something.
AFAIK the main wells are assymetric even on the 1:1 example so there you go. 

 

The landing gear was assembled looking all strong and solid.

Maybe a little too solid, since the main damper of each leg is square and not the more usual cylinder. I guess Pit-road decided that no one will ever be able to see that, so I shall not try to fix that.
The hydraulic steering equipment on the nose gear has a rather nifty hose running the whole length, so I decided to replicate that, even though my 0,3 lead wire is a little thick:

At the same time, I tried my best to construct the boarding ladder from strips och plastic, not an easy task in this scale.

Or any scale for that matter.

 

While the primer hardens on the underside, I'll focus my efforts on the brake lines on the main landing gear.

[charlie_c67]

I have one of these that I hope to start soon, so this is a good reference guide!

 

One minor thing in case you use them on another build, they’re AGM-45 Shrike missiles. ALARMs weren’t issued till the 90’s and never on Vulcans. Sadly, the latter has never been issued in this scale to my knowledge...

Edited September 21, 2018 by charlie_c67

[Christer A]

Thanks for the info charlie_c67.

It makes sense that ALARM was a little too modern for Vulcans, now that you mention it.

No matter, I won't hang them anyway.

I've primed and sprayed Gunze Dark Sea Grey all over, and also managed a gloss coat, all in preparation for the next thing, masking the camo!

A long fun time was had during the weekend, but all I got to show for it is this.

Now I just need to do it again, but in mirror version and on the underside. That'll take a while...

The difference between my usual method of taping, marking with a pen, removing, cutting, reapplying was complimented with strips of tamiya curve tape.

It did make adjusting the demarcation lines slightly easier, but the tape is quite troublesome to get to curve properly. I probably need a narrower one...

 

Edited October 2, 2018 by Christer A

[Christer A]

Enough with all the taping  and masking. Time to shoot some dark green on it, don't you think?

This was a first coat of Gunze Dark green C330 I think it was.

After both upper and under sides were painted, and the paint had had some time to cure, I broke out the tape AGAIN. 🤪 I'm probably loosing the last remnants of my sanity.

Then I went over the outer wings and airbrakes with Tamiya Dark GReen XF-81, suitable lightened, mottled and generally abused before adding a thin coat of it again to blen it all in.

Why did I do this?

It will be clear, shortly 😇

In the right light it is possible to see all the variations, I promise!

I'll probably add some more variations, once the weathering process begins in proper.

Time to rip the paint off, but carefully!

Some bleed through here and there, but nothing major. I also managed to avoid any ridges due to too much paint, so all in all it was a good paint session!

I also learned that it's easier to cover everything when not using curve tape, sine all those tiny tape patches tends to let in stuff. Food for thought.

Enough of the underside, get to the top I hear nobody say except in my mind.

Yes! This was the looks I was going for!

 

Time to show my token subject! Even though fündecals has like 25 different Vulcans on their sheet, the didn't have XM657 the last manufactured one.

Here's a link to the initial apperance

XM657 initial livery[/img]

 

Nice and shiny!

Since she was scrapped in 1982 nowadays she looks a little worse for wear
Abandoned vulcan 1
Abandoned Vulcan 2[/img]

A sad sight...

Back at the end of the 70:s thoguh, things were different.

XM657 flew at Red Flag back then and recieved wrap around camouflage.

XM657 at Red Flag

This picture is my goal!

I have  similar one in the Wings of Fame book, taken from a slightly different angle.
My guess is that she was repainted Dark Sea Grey over the previous Grey, and then they painted the underside and main fuselage with a new coat of Dark green.

Or they used  some really interesting paint!

Some touchups was needed, and for that, the masking putty came out.

Good stuff! Low tackiness, easy to form, remove and reuse.

I should probably use that to paint white distemper on a Harrier GR.3 that stalled due to the tape lifting the decals...

[Christer A]

All stickers are on (finally)

 

The clear coat will need to harden a few more hours before I add some light weathering.

Tomorrow it will join a few other models on a road trip to southern Sweden for the C4 competition.

We'll see how this is received there. 

 

[exdraken]

Really nice!!

[stevehnz]

Nice looking effort on that Christer, I've enjoyed your build, it will be helpful for when I come to tackle the kit I have in stock.

Steve.

[Tornado 01]

Looking good Christer,

 

I grew up within an hour of the last 2 Vulcan bases, and managed to get on a private base trip with Dad in late 1981. As per my pic look see which Vulcan was available to sit in.... None other than 657. I was later one of the staff that produced Wings Of Fame. 

 

Happy days

 

 

[dnl42]

This is looking great! I've got all these bits in the stash, so it's nice to see what's coming... 

[Christer A]

Thanks for all the comments guys!

@Tornado 01, the Wings of Fame article was the sole reason for this build! It was an amazing set of books, and I do wish that they would continue...

 

Anyway, the RFI is up now, so it's time to tackle something else.

(and that Sea Vixen...)

[Zaggy]

That looks brilliant!

For those of you, like me, contemplating a GWH Vulcan, I picked up the GWH K.2 variant (for about half the price of the B.2), and was CHUFFED to see that box includes all parts you need for the B.2, as well as the decals from the B.2 too... So you can do XM597 and XM604 (597 was the 'Shrike' jet wasn't it? The K.2 kit also includes the Vulcan Shrike Pylon and missiles) from this kit too - or one of the two Tankers!

Just thought that maybe of help to some - some helpful chap has also scanned the K.2 instructions too, if you need to double check things --? https://www.scalemates.com/products/img/3/0/5/224305-49-instructions.pdf


Dan

Edited December 8, 2018 by Zaggy
I wrote in Engrish - thought I'd fix it up! :)