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TSR2 WIF Completed 29/04/20


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Canopy and inner pylons are now on, I'm thinking about a centre line pylon with a fuel tank if I can find one that looks right.

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There are large gaps that will need filling, no real surprise there.

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You can see I pushed the inner pylons outward slightly so the undercarriage doors will clear the MER/mk82's

And finally a comparison against my other filler queen, the B58. Not so much difference really considering the B58 is a four engined aircraft!

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On 3/23/2020 at 12:21 PM, billn53 said:

Shouldn’t that be light gray (FS36622), not white?

After checking for the correct underside colour, I found that that the aircraft deployed on Op Combat Lancer had the SOIP paint schemes changed, so the light grey undersides were repainted black. Looking at the pictures a matt or satin black rather than gloss, not sure if this is due to fading or availability of paint.

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1 minute ago, neil5208 said:

After checking for the correct underside colour, I found that that the aircraft deployed on Op Combat Lancer had the SOIP paint schemes changed, so the light grey undersides were repainted black. Looking at the pictures a matt or satin black rather than gloss, not sure if this is due to fading or availability of paint.

Side note: When I was a young Ensign in the US Navy’s submarine force, I was in charge of the team whose job was to keep the sub rust-free and painted. Deployed to the Mediterranean, paint was in short supply, and we ended up with half the hull done in matt black, the other in semi-gloss. 
 

The Captain was not amused. 
 

🚣‍♂️

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34 minutes ago, billn53 said:

Side note: When I was a young Ensign in the US Navy’s submarine force, I was in charge of the team whose job was to keep the sub rust-free and painted. Deployed to the Mediterranean, paint was in short supply, and we ended up with half the hull done in matt black, the other in semi-gloss. 
 

The Captain was not amused. 
 

🚣‍♂️

Better than painting a bare patch of soil green in preparation for a royal visit.

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While I'm filling the gaps around the canopies I test fit the undercarriage in preparation for spraying.

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Also prepared the MER's ready for paint but need to decide on black or white. White is normal  Vietnam era launchers and racks for all US forces but the pictures for the F111A's deployed on Op Combat Lancer and Line Backer show that the Aardvark's had black MER's, I know the Aardvarks had it own design specific low drag MER but as this is a WIF replacing the F111 I going with the standard issue MER's

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So today work on the TSR2 today involved spraying the interior colours on the canopy sections and preparing the stores, sanding 24 Hasegawa mk82's was not fun.

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As you can see I went with black on the MER's I think it will suit the WIF premise better

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TheTSR2 is no longer white! managed to spray a primer coat of XF22 on today to see how much more sanding I need to do and it not too bad considering the amount of filler she's had so far. Looks quite good in grey, a low viz scheme would suit the shape of the TSR2 well. So a bit of sanding with 1000+ and spraying the undercarriage bays next.

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Does anyone know ir the US Airforce were red edging the undercarriage bay doors by the early 70's or was that just the Navy?

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Neil you are a glutton for punishment, doing both this and the Hustler at the same time. Neither of which are the most cooperative when it comes to fit. They're looking good, though, and I can't wait to see them fully painted.

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2 minutes ago, billn53 said:

Neil you are a glutton for punishment, doing both this and the Hustler at the same time. Neither of which are the most cooperative when it comes to fit. They're looking good, though, and I can't wait to see them fully painted.

Bill, do want to have a guess what I also have waiting to be built?

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Yes you have it , Italeri YB49. But I will  do some smaller NMF first, I got the Hobbyboss P61A which will be done as the Pacific Air Commanders personal aircraft which was unpainted.

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2 hours ago, neil5208 said:

P61A which will be done as the Pacific Air Commanders personal aircraft which was unpainted

Sounds like a great colour scheme! Love the TSR2, too (and the Hustler).

 

Regards,

Adrian

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First time I saw anything B-58 was when reading Phil Chinerys book ‘Desert Boneyard’. First I saw TSR-2 was when I visited Cosford, well before the museum was re-opened after the new building was even started. It captured something in me!  There was a model of it next to it, I also saw many of Britain’s test jets including the P-1 and even earlier prototypes to it. Fascinating stuff. I have never seen a real B-58 but it’s picture is so impressive. Jimmy Stewart got to fly one!

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Started painting the TSR2 last night, the decal instructions called for XF52 Flat Earth but after spraying I thought it was far to dark so I resprayed with XF59 Desert Sand which looked much better last night under electric lighting but today in natural light still looks to dark when compared against picture of the F111.

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Stock F111 pictures

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XF52, XF59 and XF57 Deck Tam which I think will be the final tan colour

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Personally I'd stick with the desert sand, the photos look a bit overexposed and maybe some fading over time that a 'nam TSR2 wouldn't have. Also a touch of scale effect?

 

Great build so far, as an owner of several what-if TSR-2s-to-be I know what a battle that 1/72 kit is.

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So I took the advice from TallBlondJohn in regards to the shade of tan and stuck with the XF59 Desert Yellow and I'm happy that I did as soon as I started to spray the dark green it made the tan appear a lot lighter. Before spraying I fitted the main undercarriage doors with blue tack so I can match up the colours and again the fact that Airfix never intended for these to be fitted in the closed position is obvious as can be seen from the pictures below. I've been sent into the garden to continue painting the fence so I'll let the green harden overnight and have a look at the second green tomorrow.

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I using the F111 camo scheme but it will vary due to differing shapes and being sprayed freehand.

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Edited by neil5208
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On 2/2/2020 at 9:52 PM, Markh-75 said:

Read a few good books about the whole debacle, i have a keen interest in this aircraft; only one ever flew and it was destroyed on the weapons ranges at Shoeburyness before being finally scrapped there. The next two aircraft were XR220 which was close to flying its maiden flight when it was all cancelled, and XR221. Unsure if any others exist other than at Cosford and Duxford but i doubt it because they were all pulled off the assembly line and set on fire. TSR2 was about 10 years ahead of its time technologically but was heavily over-budget however the cost of keeping it going would have been less. It goes into the £ billions. They wanted to keep two operational to do testing for Concorde but the new government said no, and wanted EVERYTHING destroyed so that nobody could ever restart producing them. Great shame.

XR221 also went to Shoeburyness, as did XR223.  The airframe at Duxford is a bitter: the wings are from ‘222, rear fuselage from ‘227 and front fuselage from an engineering mock-up.  How and why is anyone’s guess; ‘227’s fuselage was substantially complete, so why chop off the back end and attach it to a different front end is illogical at best.  

 

Ne of the front fuselage test specimens, T5 I think, now resides at Brooklands; this was the air conditioning and pressurisation 

trials specimen and was also used for canopy jettison tests in the wind tunnel.

 

All of the completed airframes and major assemblies were cut up with acetylene torches (there are several images of the dismembered components that show this clearly and at least two that show this work in progress).  In the weeks following cancellation BAC issued instructions on cutting up of TSR 2 structures which specified use of extreme care as certain trials components and fluids would give off toxic fumes when exposed to extreme heat.  

 

As as far as is known only the mock-ups at Warton were burned; even the great Roland Beaumont got it wrong that rear fuselages at Warton were dragged out and burned; there’s an image of XR225 waiting to be cut up there while a pair of fitters set to with torches on parts from other jets.  Various ares of the mock ups were painted in different colours to denote their use, for example a brick red for fuel, and this can’t be seen on the cut-up bits of rear fuselage in the image of XR225 referred to above.

 

The drawings were microfilmed before many of them wound up at Huron being used as paint masks on the BAC 1-11 line.  Unfortunately a significant proportion of the microfilms have also now been lost or destroyed.

 

 

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Does seem quite strange to make one from other parts! Especially when some were nearly complete in build. The way it was all done i think there were a few TSR 2 'haters'  high up, Jenkins for one.

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I thought 222 went to Cranfield as an incomplete airframe & while has no doubt had bits changed & added over time, she was still quite incomplete when she arrived at Duxford in the 70s. I remember seeing them making up missing panel sections when I went there as a kid

 

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two old pics I took with my little 110 camera back then as I couldn’t get her in one picture.  Probably about 1978?

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I wasn't happy with my free hand spraying or the second green so its resprayed XF59 Desert Sand again and this time I went to my usual masking method and selected a different darker green XF65 Field Grey for the second colour, the third will be XF61 Dark Green.

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Back to sand.

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I'll leave that overnight and hopefully get the third colour on tomorrow.

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On 4/8/2020 at 11:47 AM, Markh-75 said:

Does seem quite strange to make one from other parts! Especially when some were nearly complete in build. The way it was all done i think there were a few TSR 2 'haters'  high up, Jenkins for one.

That particular government knew little or nothing about the military, defence or aviation other than that they considered all of them wasteful.  That they then laid waste to the British aviation and defence industries and the armed forces rather than doing the fest possible with and for them simply rubs saint into the wounds.

 

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