I’m Finally Building a Sea Balliol........slowly ticking over

[Max Headroom]

This is a model of a type that I’ve always to do, but have up to now been frustrated.

 

All available models as far as I’m aware have been to 1/72 scale. The first two I recall date back to the 80’s and were a vac form by Gerald J Elliot and a short run injection kit by Pegasus. I have the uncompleted mortal remains of both. If I can find them, I will use them for comparison purposes.
 

The vac form build stalled, because I’m hopeless with that medium. The Pegasus kit fell by the wayside, because it suffered from irredeemable defects from the cockpit canopy forward. I’ll explain below. At one time I was considering a Fanken-Balliol using the best bits from both, but that idea fell by the wayside a long time ago.

 

The two recent kits are the Ali Cat resin offering. I don’t have this one, but from what I see from photos and the reputation of the mould maker, I have no doubt that that it builds into a very nice replica. I’ve never built a resin kit, so steered clear. The other offering is from Special Hobby and is the subject of this build.

 

 

Why is it flying at zero feet, over rather choppy seas and with menacing clouds in the background? This is the option that I’ll build. It doesn’t get more hi viz does t?

 

Such is the scarcity of scale drawings for the Balliol, that I’ve only ever seen two sets. The first was published in a now defunct magazine called Control Column. This was the in-house magazine of the British Aircraft Preservation Society. To my eye, everything seemed to be in proportion. The other drawing is probably the better known one and was published in Aviation News and appears to be the source of inspiration for the Pegasus kit. Unfortunately, the drawings show a squashed canopy and an engine cowling slope that ends in a notch at the junction with the spinner. A look at any front 3/4 view, will show that the canopy transparencies are rectangular and that there is an unbroken, smooth line from the base of the windscreen to the top of the propeller. The Aviation News plans are wrong in this area. I should also mention the side views drawn by the late Mike Keep for an accompanying article on the type in the original iteration of Scale Aircraft Models. As I recall, they looked right too.

 

I’ll discuss the various differences in the development of the Balliol as I start cutting plastic, but for now let’s have a look at the contents.

 

 

 

Etched metal and resin bits are a bit of an unknown, so let’s see how I get on. Transfers look ok. 

Given the amount of glass panelling in the cockpit, I don’t fancy masking from scratch so treated myself to this

 

 

I’ve never used a commercial masking set, so another first.

 

I’ll start building shortly, just as soon as I recover my notes and papers from what I euphemistically call our Den, which at the moment is a repository of half the world’s production of jigsaws and which belong to Herself. I need to burrow through that lot first. 
 

That’s it for now.

 

Trevor

 

[stringbag]

Hi Trevor.

PM sent.  👍

 

Chris.

[72modeler]

3 hours ago, Max Headroom said:

Why is it flying at zero feet, over rather choppy seas and with menacing clouds in the background?

That student pilot is very, very lost!

Mike

[TheyJammedKenny!]

No recognizable landmarks at that altitude!  Looking forward to this one!

[VG 33]

Hello

 

Here is a nice choice.

I have already built the factory demonstrator Boulton Paul Balliol but yours will be more Hi-Vis.

 

https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235026255-172-special-hobby-boulton-paul-balliol-g-ansf/

 

Patrick

[825]

I built this a few years ago and it builds into a neat little thing. I used the mask set and it worked well. The only issues I recall, apart from the time taken to paint the red and yellow stripes was the cockpit was a bit fiddly and the etch seat belts were far too big, more like 1:48 rather than 1:72. I can't recall what I did with them and I never did a WIP. Here's the finished article

 

 

 

Enjoy the build. All the best. 

 

 

 

[StephenCJ]

Nice model 825, very nice

[Max Headroom]

@stringbag reply sent! And thanks for reminding me of the Manga Models 1/48 version - that passed me by!

 

@VG 33 thank you for the link - that canopy fit I’ll have to look out for that

 

@825 that’s a beauty. You’ve set me a benchmark there!

 

@72modeler and @TheyJammedKenny! I’m sure the student pilot would have received a good old navy rollicking when he landed. Wherever that was 

 

Now then, excuse me, I need to fight my way through the mountain of jigsaws......

 

Trevor

 

 

[Max Headroom]

OK, so I’ve spent this afternoon looking for all those references I’d stored up over the years for this very purpose. Can I find them?

 

Can I thump 😡

 

Trevor

[jackroadkill]

That's a type I'd never knowingly heard of, but what a little beauty!  It's like the love-child of a Defiant and a Chipmunk.

Edited May 12, 2020 by jackroadkill
Spelling

[Max Headroom]

Hello again chaps!

 

I’d like to say that I’ve started construction. In reality what I’ve done is cut off the fuselage halves, measured them, compared them to photos and then indulged in some filling, sanding and scribing.
 

First off, lengthwise it’s within tolerance. 35’1” or thereabouts according to my Murphy’s Rule, which accords to my Putnams.

OK, a couple of side views, arranged next to photos I’ve had for decades. Not my snaps, I’m clueless as to who may be the copyright owner. I use them here purely for comparison with the plastic.

 

Port side

(sorry but no clear Sea Balliol port side available - however the T.2 is virtually identical)
 

Looking at the photo from the nose, the lump above the exhausts is the fairing for the front of the Merlin 35’s engine block. It’s in the right place, but is more of a teardrop shape, with the point at the rear. A few minutes with a sharp knife, a well-worn piece of wet and dry, one pass with Tamiya extra thin cement on the port side, brought me to this - unaltered starboard side shown for comparison.

 

 

Despite what you see, both halves are the same colour plastic.

 

Looking underneath the cockpit fairing at the base of the wing, that panel is the wrong shape and the vertical ‘zig-zag’ panelling is wrong. The hatch behind the cockpit is too high and is shown as being proud of the surface. All that is being changed. The panel line in front of the oddly shaped hatch extends to the base of the wing. That isn’t depicted so will be added. I know 99.99% won’t notice, but I will 🤓. The black dot behind the panel is the plug for the 24v trolley acc, so a hole needs putting in there. Incidentally, this is where the plug was for all production T.2’s and 22’s. For the pre production examples, the plug was near the port front wing root. I’m guessing that the change of location was to allay the nerves of the ground handler! At the base of the tail is another hatch which is moulded as being proud of the surrounding area. This was rubbed off gently and polished off.

and now the starboard Side of the machine.

 

Less to do here except to finish the teardrop cam cover fairing, re jig the zig-zag panelling and extend a panel line onto the wing root as per the other side. Again there’s an extraneously proud hatch that needs knocking back. Check out the hatch behind the starboard wing root. Serving no purpose as far as I can see on the T.2, it was where the exhaust for the Mamba was placed on the T.1 (see below). Staring at it and the photo, I’ve just noticed the hatch as moulded is too high. Hmm.....that needs attention.

 

Incidentally, looking at the nose as moulded, it looks the right shape for a Mamba powered T.1. What do you think?

 

 

Finally, here is the result of my butchery so far!

 

 

And that’s it for today modelling wise.

 

I have been looking at the T.2 sprues. It appears that there is a different sprue for unfolded wings and additional resin bits for the drop tanks and wheels. It appears there are alternate parts for the wing break ribs too. With regard to the wing fold, this was present on the T.1 and T.2, so as long as the naval tail wheel and hook are present on that release, you are good for both types.

Finally, I’d like to say thanks to @stringbag for sending me some rather nice photos of the Cosford example. I’ll be scrutinising them for those little details that need adding to the build. Cheers 😉👍🏻
 

Anyway, I’ve rambled on long enough for now. Hopefully more to report tomorrow.

 

Regards

 

Trevor  

[Max Headroom]

Good afternoon

 

Picking up from the last post, the more I looked at the starboard panel cover, the more it annoyed me. Yes I know I’m probably the only one who will notice, but it needed correcting. I contemplated a number of ways in which I could do this including mocking up a template of the shape so I could scribe it in the appropriate place. In the end rummaging around my tool boxes I came across a thin metal template I had for years - I think it was by Verlinden

 

 

Next problem was how to keep it steady whilst I ran a pin head around it to scribe the shape. In the end, I stuck some kabuki tape over it and sliced out the shape.

 

I then placed it in the proper position and added more tape to secure it properly

 

 

I then ran the pin several times around the template. 

 

A quick rub down of the area with that well worn wet and dry paper, I then cleaned off the swarf, polished the plastic to restore the surface and finally ran Tamiya extra thin cement to seal it off.

 

Next on the agenda was chopping off the rudder, as I had decided that it needed to be offset to one side slightly, to give it a sense of animation.

 

 

The inside surfaces of the tail were then reamed to obtain a sharp tailing edge, whilst the front of the rudder had a 10 thou strip glued to it. Once dry, I’ll round off the strip so giving a snug fit when it comes to gluing.

 

Thanks for looking!

 

Trevor

[stringbag]

Cheers Trevor.

I've been having a look at the Magna 1/48 scale kit in the stash, prompted by your build.  I don't think I'll be starting that one any time soon. 

Good luck with your build.

 

Chris.

[Max Headroom]

13 hours ago, stringbag said:

Cheers Trevor.

I've been having a look at the Magna 1/48 scale kit in the stash, prompted by your build.  I don't think I'll be starting that one any time soon. 

Good luck with your build.

 

Chris.

That’s a pity. We need all the Balliols we can get to even out all the Spitfires, Messerschmitts, F-16’s, boring grey jets...........😆

 

Trevor

[corsaircorp]

Congrats Trevor !!

A Sea Balliol... I cry for a good 1/48 one !!

Great choice, Flying so low ??? It's a sailor after all !!

May be searching for a sub ?? 

I'll follow if you don't mind it !!

Sincerely.

CC

[Max Headroom]

@corsaircorp thanks for joining! No idea if the 1/48 Magna one is any good. Maybe @stringbag can post a few pictures of the kit?

 

Trevor

[Max Headroom]

Some actual assembly!

 

I trimmed the plastic shim on the rudder to give a gentle curve and an anchor when the time comes to gluing it back onto the tail. Study of photos of the rudder revealed three things.
 

Firstly the indents in the pressed (?) panel are in slightly the wrong place as is evidenced by the relative position of the rudder trim tab actuator. 
 

No, even I’m not that nerdy!

 

Secondly, as moulded, the actuator is only a lump. So off it came. The trim tab end of the actuator is a square on a bit of a wonk to the centre line and the fairing for the actuator rod is longer than depicted. Three pieces of plastic rod saw to that. 5 amp fuse wire will be added later in the assembly. 
 

 

The third thing is that the trim tab actuator is to be found on both sides and not one as moulded.

 

I then turned my attention to the cockpit. Now I’m pretty sure that my ‘missing’ Pilot Notes facsimile will have details of the cockpit sides, so with only limited information available I mocked up something which sort of looked like what I could see - I think a switch board on the port side and a map pocket on the starboard. The square on the port side behind the cockpit is a blanking piece for the 24v plug port that I drilled previously.

 

 

The cockpit is a mixed media affair. The floor and one sort of central triangular piece are plastic, whilst all the other bits are resin. This is topped off with etched parts for belts etc. The etch also includes microslivers (!) for throttle levers.

 

No thanks.

 

Obviously Tamiya extra thin cement is no good for the resin parts. Instead of CA glue which would give only a limited time to affix and get right, I used Revell’s Contacta Clear. I know from past experience that once set, this stuff’s rock hard. However, until then, it’s a sticky as water! I carefully glued everything into place and then set it aside to cure, making sure not to knock anything out of position in the meantime!

 

I’m undecided at the moment about how much of the etched brass I’ll use for the cockpit - instrument panel obviously, wheel covers probably, but the belts dunno, as an etched metal noob, I’m wary. If I can obtain a similar result with kabuki tape, plastic rod and foil bottle tops, then I might go with that instead. 
 

That’s all for today. Comments, corrections etc are welcome.

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Trevor

 

[corsaircorp]

Revell contacta clear for resin parts ! I'll give it a try.

I use Loctite CA gel but time to set the part right is limited.

It's better than th liquid one but still limited !

Thanks for the tip !

CC

[Max Headroom]

1 hour ago, corsaircorp said:

Revell contacta clear for resin parts ! I'll give it a try.

I use Loctite CA gel but time to set the part right is limited.

It's better than th liquid one but still limited !

Thanks for the tip !

CC

I could also have used PVA glue I suppose but I was too lazy to go and get it🤣 My main concern was that CA wouldn’t give me ‘wriggle room’ to manoeuvre.

 

Trevor

[stringbag]

On 5/17/2020 at 1:29 PM, Max Headroom said:

@corsaircorp thanks for joining! No idea if the 1/48 Magna one is any good. Maybe @stringbag can post a few pictures of the kit?

 

Trevor

I'll try and get some pictures done as soon as possible.

 

Chris.

[Max Headroom]

A bit more on the cockpit today.

 

I was looking at the etched fret and to be honest, although the detail looks nice, I’ve no idea about using the stuff, so I decided wine bottle foil and plastic card would do instead. Using the etch as a template I came up with this.

 

 

After another belt was made, I added both to the seats

 

 

 

Not too bad. You will see that I also added the control columns (very brittle) and the footrests. There is no way this side of hell freezing over that the etched metal leather hoops were going to be added!

 

The roll bar was also added, the crossbar of which fits into the cradle thingy (part A5) behind the seats.

 

 

Amazing how the camera magnifies all the flaws I barely see!

 

More soonish!

 

Trevor

 

 

 

[Max Headroom]

Sorry for the hiatus folks. Not been modelling for a few days as I have been outside ‘doing things’ and have otherwise been distracted on a totally non aviation thing, namely digging into the life of a local priest and martyred saint - very interesting, digging out little details and trying to make sense of things as to the what, who, where and why!

 

Anyhow, on with the kit bashing!

 

I left you with the cockpit. Today I painted the foil seatbelts and then folded them onto the seats

 

 

 

All that’s left now cockpit-wise is the instrument panel. You get an etched metal part for this, together with a clear plastic film for the instruments. Looking logically at the assembly, I used Contacta Clear to stick the film onto 10 thou sheet. The instrument panel had been pre painted by me and was cut off the sheet - very thin gates of metal could easily be cut through with a modelling knife. This in turn was glued on top of the instrument panel film, making sure the instruments were lined up. I am now leaving this to dry before trimming, fitting to the fuselage half Along with the cockpit and then sealing up the fuselage.

 

So whilst I wait for stuff to dry, I’m now off to find why one of the witnesses giving evidence against the priest was shortly afterwards found dead in a pig sty.......

 

Trevor

[Max Headroom]

Hello everyone!

 

A little bit of progress. As I had finished the insides it was time to button up the fuselage. Not being a long run mould there were of course no locating pins and as a result, even with my adjusting, I didn’t get it lined up exactly. Whether it’s me, the model, or a bit of both, I ended up using filler and trying to get as smooth a join as possible. As this will be a silver finish, any flaw will be unforgiven. Let’s see how this ends up!

 

 

In my last session I assembled the prop and spinner. The blades are separate and I was dreading the assembly. If I had a spare four blade Spitfire prop, I’d have used that. Never mind, I figured that blue tack and a rigid surface would do the trick for alignment. In order for the backplate to lie flat, it was necessary to snip off the locating lug at the rear.

 

, 

Yes I know now that the blade at 1 o’clock is the wrong way round, but a bit of twisting sorted that out.

 

 

Finally, I couldn’t resist. Blue Tack for a temporary fix.....

 

 

I know, I’m such a kid 🙄

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Trevor

 

[Max Headroom]

Work carries on apace!

 

wing work next. Having dry fitted the inner wing pieces it became apparent that the wing root would get a gap somewhere along the line. Working on the assumption that it would be better to have a neat fit in the upper wing roots, I glued those pieces on first

 

 

A little bit of fiddling would still be necessary at the rear though. As you can see, I’m also working on the lower wing. On each part there is a recess where the resin spars would go if the wings were in the folded position. However as this was never on the cards, I glued a 10 thou strip to anchor the two halves together. As reinforcement, a rectangular piece of plastic card was glued.
 

 

The lower wings were then glued in place.

 

 

 

As you can see below, filler will be needed

 

 

What I did afterwards was fill in the gap at the wing root and then fill the gap in the wheel well with Contacta Clear.
 

This just left the upper outer uppers.

 

 

Although not shown, the tailplanes were a bit of a rotten fit and lots of filler was necessary.

 

The radiator comes in four parts, two for the housing, one for the flap and a resin radiator that fits positively into the hole under the nose.

 

The radiator is a nice moulding.

 

 

Then a loose fitting of the radiator housing to make sure all was well.

 

 

It is!

 

After all that it was more filling and sanding  🙄

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Trevor

 

 

 

[Max Headroom]

Today I spent a little bit of time adding some of the smaller details missed out of the kit. This consisted of two areas, namely the nose and the coaming at the rear of the cockpit.

 

First, the nose:

 

 

From left to right:

 

1. two rectangular fairings a the base of the windscreen. Made from scrap plastic, these will be sanded down to shape in due course. I’m not entirely sure what these are for, but I’m speculating that they are something to do with keeping the windscreen clear of crud and work in a similar way to car windscreen washers? Looking through my available photos, it’s clear that not all Balliols/Sea Balliols were so fitted, so if you have a particular machine in mind, check your references. Below are links to a couple of photos of my subject. Luckily one is in colour too, so probably acted as the muse for the box art. 
 

https://abpic.co.uk/pictures/view/121130

 

Incidentally here is WP328 when it was just a vanilla airframe.

 

https://abpic.co.uk/pictures/view/1446270

 

Whatever those bumps are at the base of the windscreen, they could be retrofitted.

 

2. At the wing root is a missing hole. This was drilled out. Camera gun? In any event, it’s only on the starboard side. Incidentally. The hole for the port side machine gun needs filling in, because Sea Balliols didn’t have this feature.

 

3. At the rear of the aperture for the exhaust stack is another hole, again on one side only. More than likely connected with something in the engine, photos show a dark stain emerging from it on more well-used machines.

 

4. Underneath the exhaust stack is some sort of intake. This like the additions at (1) above will need shaping once the glue has gone off.

 

5. Finally at the nose, there is a bulge in the underside of the nose, halfway between the lip of the radiator and the prop. This will also require shaping. Guess what? Yup, another starboard only appearance.

 

Now then, the rear of the cockpit. Looking at photos, I remembered that there was a tube running from the top of the A frame to the lip at the rear of the cockpit opening. The kit part is too short and should really be at almost canopy height.

 

Curses and naughty words 🤬

 

Bodge entered the room. I cut a short length of plastic rod and rested the angled bar from the top of that. Given that it’s all black and the canopy will mask too close a scrutiny, it’ll have to do.

 

Note also what appear to be a pair of seat belt cable anchors. Not quite the right shape and there should a a hole in the middle, but it’s close enough for government work. 5amp wire will complete this. Finally in the photo above are the beginnings of canopy guide rails - more needs to be done here. 
 

Here are a couple of shots of the canopy temporarily taped on place.

 

 

 

I had read that the fit was a bit iffy. After a dry fit, I scraped the mating surface of the front part and the curved bit at the rear. The front doesn’t look too bad, but the rear needs more fettling.

 

You can see some glue run marks under the rear canopy and elsewhere - don’t worry I’ll be attacking those in due course.
 

More soon and thanks for looking!

 

Trevor