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Saunders - Roe SRA/1 AKA 'Squirt'


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Hi Stuart,

 

I have 2 books by Brown, published by Hikoki. One is "Wings of the Luftwaffe" and covers a wide range of German wartime aircraft. The other is "Wings of the Weird and Wonderful" and mainly covers British and US wartime and post war aircraft including a few experimental ones. It also includes the Zero. They have some useful pics and also IP displays. He may have done some others - Amazon lists one on the Miles M.52 and another called "Wings of the Navy". There seem to have been a few different covers over the years and they are getting a bit pricy now. I might ask my family to buy me "Wings of the Navy" as a Christmas present - given his Naval background it could be quite good. Knowing my luck it will probably be out of stock by then!

 

Cheers

 

Pete

Edited by PeterB
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On 9/19/2019 at 8:16 PM, AdrianMF said:

Looking forward to this build. Beautiful aeroplane!

Thanks Adrain, I'll do my best

 

Like most builds, the cockpit tends to take priority in most builds as most want the fuselage closed up and this was no exception. I started off with the simple stuff...

 

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...my test pilot in his white overalls. The first two protoypes were fitted with Martin Baker Mk1 Ejection seats and as far as I can tell were predominantly black in colour. I'm assuming that the third prototype was fitted with a standard seat and would have most probably be painted interior green.

 

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The kit i/p was just a flat surface. With no photographs of the cockpit available to me at the time, I went with artistic license and knocked up an i/p by using 1/72 Mike Grant cockpit decals.

While other bits are drying and such like, I took a look at the wing(s). As a previous pic showed, the wings were a little warped and needed some attention. I tried the hot water technique but it didn't seem to work for me, not sure why, so plan B...metal rod. The rod needed to be thin enough to fit between wings and stiff enough to overcome the 'warpage'. This was done on one wing, worked well and offered up to the fuselage for musing.

 

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Out with the vernier and the wing chord was longer that the fuselage wing chord. Also of not was that the wing cross-section wasn't quite right, there was a difference in thickness of 1.5mm. Not quite sure how to overcome this but I have two ideas; spaces between the wings or run a lip around the fuselage wing join that will fit inside the the 'correct' wing profile. The second option has the most appeal as it would give better bonding.

 

More anon.

 

Stuart

 

 

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On 9/15/2019 at 11:17 PM, Courageous said:

I haven't found an image yet showing these housings and was wondering if I'll need to box them in, much like wheel wells. 

Hi Stuart,

following with interest your build, I have the same kit and plan to build it sooner or later.

Don't know if you already browsed through the walkarounds in the Seawings site, there are these image collections that can be of great help:

http://seawings.co.uk/saunderspage.htm

http://seawings.co.uk/saroA1WRgal.htm

Cheers

Fabio

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16 hours ago, Murdo said:

A very interesting beastie.  Looks like quite a challenge though.

Cheers Murdo, we do like to inflict pain on ourselves.

1 hour ago, Whirly said:

Don't know if you already browsed through the walkarounds in the Seawings site,

Cheers Fabio. I hadn't come across these images , absolutely fantastic stuff. Unfortunately, I've already cemented one of the wings together, so dropping the flaps is out. The float wells and stuff will definitely be used. Looks like I'll be repainting the cockpit as without any data, i wen't with black see thing the Meteors were black, not too much hassle. Thanks again.

 

Stuart

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Wrestling with this stinking cold which is not good for modelling mojo but after looking through the links that @Whirly posted, I've got the 'bit between my teeth' with this build.

 

Target: Cockpit.

Now armed with the excellent pics and some blurb I found about the subject, I decided that the cockpit tub was a bit under scale in girth and was a bit boxy leaving no room to add any of this stuff. As can be seen, the cockpit was rather spacious and some references state that the fitting of a second seat was possible!

 

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The top tub is the kit part that I'd added a bit of plastic for a lever or two...bin that. The white tub is my version, with a little more girth and more round in cross-section as it's meant to follow the curvature of the fuselage. Framing has been added as are the floor supports at either end. Look at all that space!

 

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The floor is made from plasticard and is the same size as the kit floor. Chair mounts were fitted to give the seat a jaunty angle. Control column position marked and drilled. I/P centre section was lengthened to set the height of the i/p and little spigots came off each side, ready to receive additional panels.

 

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And here it's all loosely together, now for the detail but mot today. I'm pretty chuffed with that.

 

Stuart

 

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With good reason to be chuffed!

Have you thought of putting some Airscale bezels over the dials with clear?

Or if you don't have Airscale, I saw another modeler make bezels from thinly sliced styrene tube.

Edited by Thom216
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Well after some gentle nudging from @Thom216 after the I/P, I took a look at the situation...you can see the i/p. So, using this image, I scratched my own.

 

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The front fascia is thin plasticard that had numerous holes carefully drilled into it to match the two different size gauges I have available. Decal gauges were then applied to a very thin bit of acetate and delicately moved into place to match the holes in the fascia. The fascia was painted black, the rear of the acetate was painted white and when dry, stuck together with Humbrol Clearfix. Once that's dry, I'l drop of Formula 560 into the holes for lens effect.

 

Stuart

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No update today as I've been to the last regional model show at St Ives today and buying a few opportunistic items.:gift:

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A trio of floatplanes, all in 1/72. The first was the Devastator as I didn't know of until noticed the build in this forum, had to have it. The 'Glen' was next to be added to the floatplane collection and the ace in the pack was the Supermarine S.4 :inlove: by Airframe. If I finish the Saunders-Roe build, one of these might make an appearance.

 

Stuart

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The S.4, Stuart.  Didn’t do well in the races but it sure looks the business with that mid-wing and streamlined struts.  You are amassing a collection of unusual floatplanes.

 

Dennis

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3 hours ago, DMC said:

Didn’t do well in the races

I agree Dennis but as you say, she 'looked the business'. As for a my growing floatplane collection, the emphasis is 'growing'...need to build more. The saving consolation is that with a hopeful retirement in a couple of years, it will shrink...

 

Stuart  

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Hi Stuart,

 

I believe I had a couple of Airframe vacforms many years ago - both WWi biplanes. One was an FE 8 pusher and the other was a Halberstadt DII. The first was bought by mistake, and the other was later replaced by a more up to date injection moulded version so I never built them. However I do remember they were rather crude with not much more than fuselage and wings/tail surfaces. They would have needed an awful lot of work to turn into anything decent. At least the S4 has only one wing and won't need as many struts!

Edited by PeterB
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1 hour ago, Courageous said:

Still feeling lethargic with this stinking cold but the 'Show must go on'.

 

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Windscreen on.

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Wheels with axles. Wheel suspension centres were painted aluminium, the outer bits of 't' are effectively elastic bands that stretch under load, much like WW1 landing gear and these were a Stone grey. The assembly was given a wash of Nuln Oil and dry brushed afterwards.

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Wheels mounted on their suspension gear.

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Gear on and now it's an amphibian.

 

Next:

  • Drill a small on slope in front of windsreen to mount the wind pump, it will be fitted near the end.
  • Fit the top wing.
  • Fit the front centre struts.
  • Measure the span for main wing supports, make, paint and fit.
  • Fit engine, cowling and prop.
  • Investigate possible pitot and location.
  • Fit control lines to tail surfaces.
  • Make a base.
  • Misc items that I've forgotten.

 

Stuart

 

Ps. FIT CANOPY, see I did forget something.

 

Erm, Stuart, your Saunders Roe has turned into a Shavrov SH-2.... cough cough!  :shrug:

 

Davey

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Just seen your post and what a surprisingly pretty aircraft this is, but that's a tough looking kit.

 

Look forward to seeing this finished.

Bob

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Just seen your post and what a surprisingly pretty aircraft this is, but that's a tough looking kit.

 

Look forward to seeing this finished.

Bob

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Thanks for popping by Bob. This is my second resin kit and I was hoping for a relatively easy build but I was expecting to scratch a cockpit, I shouldn't have looked at those links. :tmi:

 

The build is moving along albeit slowly, I had to prioritise my Shavrov build as I want her to be finished for club night on Wednesday, fortunately I have tomorrow off work so both the Shavrov & the S-R will be getting my attention.🛠️

 

Stuart

 

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