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GWH Vulcan B1a - I've Finally Lost It --- FINISHED


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2 minutes ago, Max Headroom said:

Thanks for posting that image, now I have something to do with another Airfix Valliant if I get one... 
I have a feeling I'm not the only one who will want to do that

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So this is what I've been doing this afternoon, plenty of filler in the panel lines and I've done the upper side of the right wing.

Oh and plenty of coffee with that.

I hope to be painting this by the end of next week. Definitely going with antiflash now, any pointers for a good source of suitable decals would be much appreciated.

Edited by Adam Poultney
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Taking a break from the wings, the next job is to reshape the tip of the tailcone to the slightly more rounded one of the B1a.

https://abpic.co.uk/pictures/model/Avro 698 Vulcan B1A

That link has a number of pictures showing this. I think the best one is of XH504.

I would use my own photo of a B2 to compare to but as you can see the only Vulcan I've had the opportunity to photograph well enough to close tried to take off with no airspeed with wings covered in snow and the tip of the tailcone is gone...

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Have I mentioned how much I love XL319? So much character in that rusty old Vulcan, and looking fantastic with the be paintjob it received this year.

https://flypast.keypublishing.com/2018/06/29/southend-vulcan-receives-new-coat-of-paint/

One of XL426 shows the later, similar but different shape.

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Here's my attempt to recreate the shape with milliput. Not quite right, but I think it's ok for my first attempt. I don't think I would have picked up on this obscure detail if it wasn't for Rob's attention to detail in his conversions, so credit to him for this.

 

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So here's a better lighted picture of the model with the canopy and nose probe. 

So close......

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Filling panel lines, coffee and WW2 documentaries.

Surely there's a better way of doing this....

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More control surfaces redone

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Good enough for my first attempt at this

All the control surfaces are now done, and with that I believe I have completed all the required modifications to make a Vulcan B1a.

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I have made a summary of all the modifications I made to the model for anyone to use as a guide if they wish to do this conversion. I will make a much more detailed one at some point (without all the ticking off what I've done). 

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And these guys need painting. I love that GWH include them in the kit even in this scale. 

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Link to an image of Vulcan crew that I will use as a reference for colours. 

https://images.app.goo.gl/XfLRMZaSSrKjfC7JA

 

Edited by Adam Poultney
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12 hours ago, Timmas said:

Ha, love the crew members 😀

 

Incidentally, what colour will you paint their bone domes? I’m never sure whether pilots wore silver or white ones in that era. 

Don't think the difference between white and silver is the most important thing in that scale. I think I'll go silver. 

 

While getting very annoyed at the fact that Cosford had both XA900 and XM598 for three years at the same time before XA900, the last surviving Vulcan B1 (and I believe by a good few years, most were scrapped around 1970), I moticed one thing absent on the Vulcan B2 that that I hadn't previously noticed. On the left side of the nose (right of the picture) there is some sort of small intake (just forward of the gear doors).  I probably won't bother adding it in 1/144, does anyone know what it is?

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These pilots are tiny!!

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This just shows how huge the Vulcan, even the B1/1a, actually was.

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Not bad for this scale me thinks. 

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So tiny in this model

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Canopy on and masked with PVA glue. Think it works quite nice for the awkward shaped windows. Oh and I need to deal with that scratch on the side of the fuselage.

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Look what I forgot to glue on.......

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Canopy interior colour painted on. 

 

Next up, painting the model white and probably preshading.

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On 10/29/2019 at 7:27 PM, stever219 said:

I don’t think any Vulcans were used for Pegasus trials; XA894 was the Olympus 320 flying test bed and XA903 flew the Olympus 593 after its Blue Steel activities.  There is at least one photo of Valiant WP199 with a Harrier centre fuselage and Pegasus FTB, but if anyone knows different please correct me!

XA896 was assigned to 230OCU at RAF Waddington, where Mrs Bullnut's Grandfather was her Crew chief. In 1964, she was passed to Bristols for use as a flying testbed for the  Bristol Siddeley BS.100/9 vectored-thrust turbofan engine, fitted with Plenum Chamber Burning, for the Hawker-Siddeley P.1154 VSTOL fighter project for the RAF and FAA, She was scrapped at Filton in 1966, just about 2km from where we now live. A strange coincidence given that Mrs Bullnut grew up on Humberside.

 

Image below from vickersvaliant.com shows XA896 in overall HIghspeed Silver, though by the time she was at Filton, I think she was wearing Antiflash White

 

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Ready for priming. This will reveal any problems that I need to address. Sorry the pictures are so dark

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Now this really is a Vulcan B1a! Primed in Citadel Corax White, a number of flaws are revealed.

You can also see a salvaged 1/72 Vulcan cockpit from another model in the background..... That will be on WIP soon(ish)

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Basically a number of panel lines weren't filled properly

 

Edited by Adam Poultney
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1 hour ago, bull-nut said:

XA896 was assigned to 230OCU at RAF Waddington, where Mrs Bullnut's Grandfather was her Crew chief. In 1964, she was passed to Bristols for use as a flying testbed for the  Bristol Siddeley BS.100/9 vectored-thrust turbofan engine, fitted with Plenum Chamber Burning, for the Hawker-Siddeley P.1154 VSTOL fighter project for the RAF and FAA, She was scrapped at Filton in 1966, just about 2km from where we now live. A strange coincidence given that Mrs Bullnut grew up on Humberside.

 

Image below from vickersvaliant.com shows XA896 in overall HIghspeed Silver, though by the time she was at Filton, I think she was wearing Antiflash White

 

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Love that picture! Maybe I will do a B1 in silver one day... It's just getting the tailcone and fin right that is stopping me. Oh and the availability of GWH kits. Slowly getting expensive..... 
Anyone know if the Pit Road Blue Steel version will be issued outside of Japan?

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10 hours ago, Adam Poultney said:

 

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Hope you don’t mind me mentioning, but that recessed circle is a window. Airfix did the same with their kit too. 
 

Cracking build so far. Especially the pilots👍🏻


Trevor
 

 

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1 hour ago, Max Headroom said:

Hope you don’t mind me mentioning, but that recessed circle is a window. Airfix did the same with their kit too. 

Yeah, I decided not to drill it out and will paint it in gloss black along with the bomb aimer's window. The airfix one is in the wrong place I believe, so on my build of that I moved it back a little. Hopefully it's in the right place on this one...

1 hour ago, Max Headroom said:

Cracking build so far. Especially the pilots👍🏻

Thanks, I don't normally add them as I build gear down most of the time

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I've ordered a set of decals in 1/144 from Fündekals. They are for the Vulcan B2, but I believe I can do an XH serialed B1a with them. There are enough sets of roundels for three aircraft, so I guess I'll be buying more GWH kits (if anyone has any who don't want them I'll happily take them off your hands)

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And this is where I'm up to now. Anti flash white and ready for decals which may or may not take a few weeks to arrive....

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Another round of filler before the gloss white can be applied. The primer revealed a number of places I needed to correct.

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Pre shading time! Just used a dark grey for this since that's what I had to hand. The airbrush kinda went wrong so I gave up doing individual lines after the first few (Half the lines aren't even there anyway because I removed them all on the wings!). I weent with a bit of a random pattern just to make the white a little less consistent. Saw someone do the same on an Airfix Victor in reverse (white/grey over black, although that is a camouflaged model)

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And Halford's Appliance White, great stuff, couldn't recommend it enough. Just don't mess with it before it's fully properly for real actually very very much dried (leave it a good few hours if not a day if you need to do any corrections with filler or anything that you missed before).

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Looks like some of the panel lines weren't fully eradicated.... 

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And this is where I'm up to now. Anti flash white and ready for decals which may or may not take a few weeks to arrive....

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Minor update:

The canopy has been demasked and other windows painted

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This looks so clean and perfect without the black parts painted on, I now want to do VX770 with the straight wings after this but that airframe is a lot of work due to all of the differences so I think VX777 would be easier.

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This anti flash white is dangerous! I used a lamp to see how well I could see info the cockpit and my eyes hurt from how bright the reflection was! I went and got a much dimmer reading light instead.

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Decals are finally here all the way from the US! 

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Can't wait to get them on the model. 

Now I just need to decide exactly which Vulcan to do... XH serialed of course as the Vulcan B2 set that I'm using doesn't have XA serials, so that cuts my options in about half.

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16 minutes ago, OutcastJoel said:

That is really nice work so far. Also your handwriting looks disturbingly like mine!

Hmmmm.... Although that isn't my true handwriting, I wrote this to be legible. Took far too long.... My normal handwriting is a lot less legible. 

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A Level Physics handwriting ^^

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