Sea Vixen FAW.1x2

[71chally]

You know that moment when golden throngs of light enter your world from behind you, and you use words like thee, upon, giveth, and resurrection and Pachelbel's Canon in D is playing in your head - well this is your moment Tony!!👌👌

[71chally]

PS, I've noticed the wings, only because of your brilliant incorporation of the outer wing leading edge cambers, and the boom starting points!

Utter brilliance though.

Seriously, I think there's a market for your work.

[Terry1954]

31 minutes ago, 71chally said:

You know that moment when golden throngs of light enter your world from behind you, and you use words like thee, upon, giveth, and resurrection and Pachelbel's Canon in D is playing in your head - well this is your moment Tony!!👌👌

Took the words right out of my mouth!

 

Terry

[TheBaron]

7 hours ago, limeypilot said:

Still looks bloody good even with the wings bottom-about-face!

Cheers Ian!

7 hours ago, limeypilot said:

Got to love auto correct. I did NOT type "bottom"!

Out of character if you had old boy!

7 hours ago, woody37 said:

It looks like a vixen...a very good vixen

From you Neil, praise indeed. Thanks.

7 hours ago, AdrianMF said:

don't paint the tops white and the bottoms EDSG....

 

4 hours ago, perdu said:

Go on go on go on, do it that way

I could always pass it off as a rare Australian export version I suppose?

6 hours ago, keefr22 said:

Wow! Just Wow. WOW.....!!!

 

Do you realise you are going to be the most envied (or hated!) man in the 1/72 aircraft modelling community for being the only person in the world with an accurate Sea Vixen....!!

Thought that was Kate Bush posting for a minute there Keith! 😁

 

As to envy or hatred, I refuse to believe that such things exist in the pure and virtuous 1/72 community. 😉

5 hours ago, CedB said:

Absolutely bloomin' gorgeous Tony - well done that man!

(Even with the wings on the wrong sides, she looks amazing)

Kind of you Ced.

I have form of course in the 'feck sake look at that absolute divot' dept.- remember how I stuck the rear interior of the Iron Chicken in backwards and didn't realize for several days?

5 hours ago, AdrianMF said:

Well Tony, now you've finished it, what's the next project going to be??

An elaborate series of hoax phone calls to Scotland Yard if you're not careful matey....

4 hours ago, perdu said:

Tony this is utterly brilliant, just W O W !

Wouldn't be half the fun without this amazing audience Bill!

4 hours ago, hendie said:

I'm really pleased for you in that all those months of hard work have now resulted in a truly exceptional Sea Vixen.

Gracious of you Alan.

This was the first major test of CAD to resin for me as you know, so feeling a bit 'Victorian heroine recovering from a fit of the vapours' tonight now that then tension has broken. That only leaves the minor matter of detailing to do of course, though perversely I'm rather looking forward to getting stuck into some of those smaller complicated regions. Decisons to be made over what might require brass instead of resin also along the way....

4 hours ago, hendie said:

I'm gonna guess... maybe about 50p to print, all said and  done?

I reckon that whole bundle took about 1/3 of a tray's depth to print so your costing must be pretty close. Mad eh?

4 hours ago, hendie said:

there's nothing to stop you saving each part as an individual project and analyzing them separately, then combining them for the actual print

Can you do that? I hadn't considered that might be possible from Chitubox to Validator....Worth looking into - thanks!

4 hours ago, Terry1954 said:

Really excellent results Tony, and the bottom up wing is a mere glitch in the whole scheme of the universe I would say. 

Most kind Terry - you've all been most patient through the arcana of drawings and lofts over the last few months.

3 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

At least this is a test build and you know now so you wont do it again. 

I can give no such undertaking at this time!

2 hours ago, Space Ranger said:

Unless he decides to sell copies to all of us drooling with envy!

2 hours ago, Spookytooth said:

Splendid job Tony, absolutely fantastic to say the least.

Cheers Simon - that's much appreciated sir.

1 hour ago, giemme said:

OH

MY

GOD

You think it's good enough for Jehovah? 😄

1 hour ago, 71chally said:

You know that moment when golden throngs of light enter your world from behind you, and you use words like thee, upon, giveth, and resurrection and Pachelbel's Canon in D is playing in your head - well this is your moment Tony!!👌👌

Means a lot from someone with your wealth of knowledge James. Appreciate those kind sentiments immensely.

59 minutes ago, 71chally said:

I've noticed the wings, only because of your brilliant incorporation of the outer wing leading edge cambers,

As soon as I noticed the same thing in the photos after posting earlier I genuinely thought: 'James'll clock those straight away and realize it's wrong!'

59 minutes ago, 71chally said:

Seriously, I think there's a market for your work.

It is something I've begun to seriously consider of late James. There are a growing number of subjects that appeal to me personally that are either not represented at all or not done so with sufficient rigour at this scale (such as the Vixen) that I feel would warrant the time being put in.This is all so new to me that I've only just begun to consider even obvious things like how to break an airframe down into parts for ease of both printing and assembly, to what extent to mix media like resin and brass and so forth to best effect

 

I want to take a day or two to reflect now on today's output now in order to make some notes about changes required to the design in terms of future printing, and to think more closely about the best way to break the whole thing down into components that will require minimum clean-up after printing and prior to assembly. With those decisions in place it'll then be time to make a new set of lists about what order and in what way to start introducing exterior and interior detail, again, with an eye on the practicalities of printing and assembly.

 

Did discover earlier a reference I'd been seeking in the manuals for the opening in the top of the fuselage roof for the pilot's cockpit:

The coal-hole is self-explanatory but am I wise to assume that given here for the pilot is a  broadly accurate representation?

 

Thanks for looking in chaps  - your comments have seriously made my day and they mean a lot coming from such a knowledgable and experienced bunch of minds.

Tony

 

 

 

 

 

[71chally]

5 minutes ago, TheBaron said:

 

The coal-hole is self-explanatory but am I wise to assume that given here for the pilot is a  broadly accurate representation?

...xactly👍

[71chally]

Just looking again at your amaZing work, doubtless you have slaved and tortured yourself over this, but is there a way of making the tailplane in one piece? Maybe with the fin tops still incorporated?

Edited May 30, 2020 by 71chally

[hendie]

2 hours ago, TheBaron said:

I reckon that whole bundle took about 1/3 of a tray's depth to print so your costing must be pretty close. Mad eh?

 

if you plug the price of your resin into the properties in Chitubox, it tells you the print cost after you've done the slicing

 

 

 

 

 

[CedB]

11 hours ago, TheBaron said:

…feeling a bit 'Victorian heroine recovering from a fit of the vapours' tonight now that then tension has broken.

Quite right - the relief must be as amazing as the test print…

Strong tea required.

With spirits…  

[TheBaron]

11 hours ago, 71chally said:

Just looking again at your amaZing work, doubtless you have slaved and tortured yourself over this, but is there a way of making the tailplane in one piece?

There is at the designing stage of course James but the fun starts however when having to take decisions about breaking a large structure down into components for printing purposes. By this I mean that with all the supports required to hold the various structures in place whilst they're printing, you're always endeavouring to have a) as few as possible, and b)not have them in any prominent or hard to get at places so that you leave a lot of blemishes all over the structure from the contact points (think runners where they meet an injection kit multiplied..)

 

I reckon though that now I've managed to get the actual contact points down to a very small size and tested them out on the last print for robustness, that I can indeed do the boom and fin as a single printed entity next time around, as shown on the right below:

As you can see the revised version would need a modest slew of supports out there along the leading edge of the fin where it strongly deviates from the vertical, but with smaller contact points and yesterday having learned that resin makes for a strong and seamless filler afterwards as well, this should not be too onerous to deal with.

10 hours ago, hendie said:

if you plug the price of your resin into the properties in Chitubox, it tells you the print cost after you've done the slicing

Way to depress the market price dude.

1 hour ago, CedB said:

Quite right - the relief must be as amazing as the test print…

Strong tea required.

With spirits…  

If only I hadn't given up alcohol back in November Ced!

 

Today's modelling job:

Need to cast a top and base for the sundial inherited from Mrs B's family. The pillar was cast from an old drain pipe last summer and so only 12 months later that 'I'll finish it next week' promise is finally made good on....

 

Enjoy your weekends all.

Tony

[Ex-FAAWAFU]

Even your sundials look de Havilland-esque; if you go to Salisbury Hall (& if you haven’t you definitely should, though their Vixen is a mere FAW2) there are moulds / formers for Hornet & Venom fuselages lying around that look very like your cast pipe.  Different shape, obvs. - the Hornet was far too elegant to be a drainpipe

[Brandy]

I haven't been to Salisbury Hall in....donkey's years! It was well worth a visit back in the 80's, I'm sure it is even more worthy now!

 

Ian

[Ex-FAAWAFU]

They have recently spent a lot of money on it; there is a completely new hangar since I was last there, enabling (amongst other things) their Vixen finally to go back indoors.  Plus some incomparable Mossies, obviously.

[bigbadbadge]

Wow Tony a lovely physical model to run around the garden making jet engine noises, you do have form for that it I recall a previous thread.  Great, nay outstanding result from your research and design. 

Keep up the good work

Chris

 

[Pete in Lincs]

I just got back on line after being away and headed here to catch up. Crikey! Whoosh, Zoom and watch the VNE! 

I'll take a (Bakers) dozen in assorted colours and flavours. Lovely stuff and 50p??? Amazing.

[perdu]

Looks like the cardboard box will cost more than the Vixen

 

I hope we don't get the banana shaped fuselage version apparent from the plan!

 

 

😰😧😨

[Pete in Lincs]

Banana flavour? I'll take two.

[TheBaron]

On 5/30/2020 at 12:41 PM, Ex-FAAWAFU said:

if you go to Salisbury Hall (& if you haven’t you definitely should, though their Vixen is a mere FAW2) there are moulds / formers for Hornet & Venom fuselages lying around that look very like your cast pipe.  

Sound right up my street. Currently working on Mrs. B as to how a cockpit section in the garden might offset the clematis in a strikingly iconoclastic piece of garden design.

On 5/30/2020 at 4:28 PM, limeypilot said:

I haven't been to Salisbury Hall in....donkey's years!

Wasn't that a Wurzels single in 1975?

On 5/31/2020 at 9:39 AM, bigbadbadge said:

Wow Tony a lovely physical model to run around the garden making jet engine noises, you do have form for that it I recall a previous thread.  Great, nay outstanding result from your research and design. 

Keep up the good work

Most kind of you Chris - hope all is well with you and yours.

On 5/31/2020 at 12:23 PM, Pete in Lincs said:

I just got back on line after being away

That was you in the Dragon capsule? 🚀🤯

On 5/31/2020 at 3:45 PM, perdu said:

I hope we don't get the banana shaped fuselage version apparent from the plan!

Yes we have no bananas! (you cheeky moneky). 😁

 

Gah! If not an outright egad or zounds.

 

Between the unseasonable heat pulse and various online shenanigans eating up time at work it has been a spectacularly unproductive week in the 1/72 hangar, so a quick Friday lunchtime update. Some fruitful consultation with James (including a delightful Vixen Zoom conference last evening - thank-you again!) however led to some necessary revision of the aircraft profile, viz. taking some of the 'bow' out of the belly beneath the cockpit area. Simple enough in principle but needed some fiddly redrafting of the control lattice for that area with the revised cross-sections involved. Whilst in a stern corrective mood, some minor adjustments to the radome 'shoulder' and boundary layer fairing were added also in order to finesse some of the sleekness back in  where things in retrospect looked a littly hefty.

 

This really sets things up for the next exterior detailing phase, in conjunction with which I've taken a few decisions about the differences there will be between the Martel trials XJ481 and XN708 lost on operations:

It's prudent to take stock at this stage as the coming phase has to inccorporate the differences between the two aircraft, from minor but easily-overlooked matters such as XJ481 being an early production model minus the Microcell bulges and deciding (because of the attactive paint scheme), to have this as a clean airframe in flight, poss. w/ flaps down, not to mention the truncated Martel test nose. By comparison, XN708 will have radar, RAT, engine bay, airbrake, Microcell reveals, along with a wing folded and U/C down/canopies open. Within a few weeks at the most then the designs are going to bifurcate into two separate sets of plans in oder to accomodate these distinctions:

 

This stage also necessitates cutting away and defining the various features such as control surfaces and U/C doors as an increasingly long list of sub-components for printing - something that it might be wise to generate a third design project for in order to host such sub-assys. and thus avoid having to much clutteraround  in the main airframe ones.

 

Ditto for when it comes to interiors like engines and bays, cockpit & etc.

 

The plan for both pilot and observer cockpits is to build them up on an integrated floor that can be slid into place from the rear of the nose section, which (in theory) should allow for maximum ease of installation. The engine bay(s) on XN708 will be a major challenge however and I expect this to eat up considerable time on the build, not just in terms of building a reasonable replica of the engines themsevles but also regarding their installation within the airframe. This may involve mimicking installation of the real thing where there are removable trunions between the access panels affording the required longitudinal access:

I found a section in the manintenance manuals also that has drawings of all the non-standard tools provided to ground crew for maintaining the Vixen but be assurred that particular rabbit hole will remain unsullied by Baronial ferretting.

 

I hope this finds you all well.

Tony

 

[giemme]

Can't wait to see the next steps....  

 

Ciao

[perdu]

You know what?

 

I think this might just be a bit complicated.

 

Maybe...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(WOW and other assorted exclamations should be taken as read, WOW)

[CedB]

Nice update Tony  

 

[Pete in Lincs]

4 hours ago, TheBaron said:

That was you in the Dragon capsule?

I discovered that Tamiya Extra Thin doesn't set in a vacuum.

[AdrianMF]

...but nobody could hear you scream...

[bigbadbadge]

Excellent stuff Tony, interesting video too.  I can't wait to see the engine and Cockpit work.  

All the best

Chris

[TheBaron]

On 6/5/2020 at 1:41 PM, giemme said:

Can't wait to see the next steps....

Steps? Steps? he wants steps as well? Jeeaz this is a tough audience!

Actually G there are some quite enticing illustrations in the manual of the various ground machinery and fittings used in servicing these birds and a set of steps mightn't be a bad idea after all....

On 6/5/2020 at 2:38 PM, perdu said:

I think this might just be a bit complicated.

I should have paid heed to that old Somerset folk saying Bill:

 

'With tail booms and with wing-ed fences,

'tis clear you soon shall lose your senses...'

 

S'gonna be a busy few months/years..... 😄

On 6/5/2020 at 4:30 PM, CedB said:

Nice update Tony

Most kind Ced - now I only have to make good on it of course! 🤦‍♂️

On 6/5/2020 at 5:04 PM, Pete in Lincs said:

discovered that Tamiya Extra Thin doesn't set in a vacuum.

It was just asking for trouble launching the ISS in kit form if you ask me Pete....

On 6/5/2020 at 5:31 PM, AdrianMF said:

..but nobody could hear you scream...

An ill-advised and unnecessarily pedantic recruiting slogan from the early days of NASA:

 

'In space no-one will hear you scream, due to:

1. Explosive decompression
2. Loss of signal
3. Massive fireball
4. Any or all of the above events occurring simultaneously.

Flight pay and travel allowances may be affected.'

 

10 hours ago, bigbadbadge said:

interesting video too.

That Navy Wings crowd do a great job documenting their work on the various aircraft under their benison Chris.

 

A grim stormy day here today, strong Westerlies throwing  the Atlantic Ocean over the house in gaseous and liquid form all day. I had intended an early start in the studio but ended up reading til about 2am last night (George Prochnik's beautiful book on the writer Stefan Zweig and all the forms that exile takes), so with that and the low light levels, it's been a sleepy half-awake day. Bacon sarnies and an afternoon kip reinvigorated the neurons sufficiently however that I was able to get in and start playing with some ideas for hollowing out the Vixen's interior where required.

Also siginificant is this step:

The design now splitting into two different airframes in the design tree.

 

As regards hollowing-out the aircraft in places, th Fusion software has a magnificently simply tool called 'Shell' designed to do just this in a manner that is entirely useless on an airframe with compound curves as varied as that of the Vixen. Great on regular geometries (think box, cylinder and variants thereof) in fairness but completely u/s on anything of a more organic nature. My first abortive attempt involved simply reducing the airframe back to proto-surfaces like this, with a view to thickening the resulting cross-sections of each:

In this I was stymied again (and probably for identical reasons to those experienced by the 'Shell' function) in that curves collide and intesect with each other in non-regular ways.

Ho.

Hum.

Undaunted, or rather just plain stubborn, I resorted to Occam's Razor/brute force and ignorance* and used a scaled-down version of the orignal shapes to core them out:

 - the nose above for example was scaled down to about 0.92 of it's original X/Y dimensions in order to give a thickeness of approx. 0.8mm for the walls of the cockpit section, which should print as it has in the past quite happily.

 

Unsuprisingly the rear fuselage/engine bay/exhausts proved a far more intractable beast to wrestle (due to the richer landscape of changing contours) but eventually this too succumbed to logic/swearing/prayer:

There are a range of wall thicknesses here from about 0.9mm down to 0.4mm in one or two corners - enough of a variation that I'm going to run off a test print to make sure this doesn't produce any nasty surprises later, due to either support or shrinkage issues.

 

X-ray views of the hollow stbd interior now:

 

It was impossible to hollow the whole of that run from exhaust to just behind the cockpit as a single structure so it made sense to divide it into two about 5/6 of the way back - this made it surprisingly easily to add the partition for the spectacle beam as a natural result of this process:

The access panels need cutting-out of the roof of course, followed by addiition of the intake tunnel, firewall partitions &etc. but I'll hold off on these structural details until I've had a chance to run a test print for structural integrity.

 

Eating a firm family Mexican favourite of Picadillo and tortillas for tea in a bit. Move over Mr. Creosote....

 

A cordial evening to you all mes braves.

Tony

 

*delete as required

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Brandy]

If Mr Creosote is involved, you'd better make sure the masking is in place!

As for the rest, it's looking pretty good! (master of understatement strikes again!)

 

Ian