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Biggin Hill - July 1940 - 1/48 Airfix Ready For Battle Hurricane #Finished#


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Not sure how much time I'm going to have for this project with everything that’s going on, but it is THE Battle of Britain 80th Anniversary GB!!
This was a birthday present from a colleague at work a few years ago:

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I'm going to at least try and get the Hurricane finished (hopefully with the prop motorised) and then see how many of the other bits and pieces I can complete before the finish.

Really looking forward to the GB!

Kind regards,

Stix

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The Hurricane is a fantastic kit Stix, looking forward to seeing one of your dioramas come together.

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Right, I'm grabbing a front row seat whilst there are still a few left!

As Steve and the others have said this is a really good kit and has all the extras you would need for another of your fantastic dioramas. I built the kit last time we did the Battle of Britain and really enjoyed it, just be careful not to get any paint on the mating surfaces!

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 04/07/2020 at 11:56, Ozzy said:

The Hurricane is a fantastic kit Stix, looking forward to seeing one of your dioramas come together.

 

On 04/07/2020 at 12:12, giemme said:

This is going to turn out in another of your magnificent dioramas :tasty:   :popcorn:

Ciao 

 

On 04/07/2020 at 12:34, JOCKNEY said:

Fantastic choice Stix

Lots of us have this kit in the stash really great to see this one getting built.

Best of luck

Cheers Pat

 

On 04/07/2020 at 12:39, stevej60 said:

This should be right up your street Stix all the elements you do so well,will be popping in.

 

On 04/07/2020 at 13:35, modelling minion said:

Right, I'm grabbing a front row seat whilst there are still a few left!

As Steve and the others have said this is a really good kit and has all the extras you would need for another of your fantastic dioramas. I built the kit last time we did the Battle of Britain and really enjoyed it, just be careful not to get any paint on the mating surfaces!

 

On 04/07/2020 at 14:27, alt-92 said:

Motorised?
I'm in!

 

On 04/07/2020 at 15:56, GREG DESTEC said:

Nice one 👍

 

Hurricanes are proving to be popular already! 😀

 

Cheers Greg

 

On 04/07/2020 at 19:00, Hockeyboy76 said:

Good luck Stix. Will enjoy this build. 

 

Hi all. I hope you are all well and I apologise for taking so long to reply. It's been over two weeks since my original post and I had to hunt for my thread - which had ended up down towards the bottom of page 4 - the last page of build threads for this GB!! I'm normally posting a lot more regularly than this!! Thank you all for your interest in my project.

 

I have found time to work on this project over the past few weeks but not had chance to post any progress updates.

 

For pictures of the sprues please check out my previous build of a version of this kit - which are identical apart from the decals and the extras I used and can be found here:

https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235033375-hawker-hurricane-mki-new-tool-airfix-148-up-w-finished-and-in-the-gallery/&do=findComment&comment=3001655

 

My first job was to cut the parts required for the cockpit area of the Hurricane from the sprues and clean them up. There were a few seam lines and ejector pin marks that needed sorting. You will be able to see that I leave some parts with sprue sections attached - this is so I have something to hold on to when brush painting:

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Everything was then given a couple of thinned coats of Revell's Anthracite - applied with a medium flat brush:

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You can see I decided to do the cockpit side walls as well.

 

Then the areas that are to be aluminium were dry-brushed with Revell's Metallic Aluminium:

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Green areas painted with thinned Humbrol 78 - Cockpit Green - applied with a combination of small flat and pointed brushes:

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You will also see I had done some detail painting and light weathering and got the decal applied to the IP:

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The decal settled quite well and the IP should look okay in the closed up cockpit with a pilot in place.

 

Then I started getting some assembly of the cockpit parts started:

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It is quite a nicely detailed cockpit even without any extras:

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Sorry for the amount of photos of the cockpit but I always like to have a record of what I have done in cockpits as they mostly disappear once the fuselage sides are joined.

 

Then I made up a pilot. I had used the one from this actual kit for another project - so this one is from the old Airfix Seafire kit - so not as nicely detailed but should look okay:

50134949806_8dcdbbf86e_b.jpg

His legs and feet took some work (breaking!!) to get them to fit even vaguely on the pedals. They won't be seem once sealed up.

 

Then he was given a base coat of thinned Revell's Anthracite:

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Next painted and weathered:

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Finally sat in place:

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I also decided to get the motor fitted. I drilled out the centre of the spinner pin to enable the drive shaft to fit snuggly inside. I used sheets of thin plastic to build up the area from the inside of the exhaust support and then glued the motor in place using two part epoxy:

50146662523_fea91752f6_b.jpg

 

More soon I hope!

 

Comments and suggestions welcome.

 

Kind regards,

 

Stix

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 25/07/2020 at 14:32, JOCKNEY said:

Great progress Stix and lovely job on painting the Pilot.

Cheers Pat

Hi Pat. Thank you. He's not as nicely moulded as the one from the kit but....needs must!

 

On 25/07/2020 at 14:34, Ozzy said:

Top job Stix, well worth the wait.

Thank you Ozzy although it's been another wait for this update too! 

 

On 25/07/2020 at 15:22, giemme said:

Fantastic interiors, Stix! :clap: 

Ciao

Thank you Giorgio!

 

On 25/07/2020 at 15:39, GREG DESTEC said:

Looking good 👀

Cheers Greg 👍

Thank you Greg. :thumbsup:

 

On 25/07/2020 at 16:27, patmaquette said:

Coming on well, Stix 👍. I chose the same kit for my BoB GB, so will be watching over your shoulder for great ideas, if that is okay ☺.

Good luck with it,

Pat

Thank you very much Pat - although I was planning on looking over your shoulder (and others!!) for ideas! 

 

On 25/07/2020 at 16:49, Johnson said:

Marvellous! Great work already Stix.

You are very kind Johnson! Thank you.

 

On 25/07/2020 at 17:50, Valkyrie said:

That pilot and cockpit assembly is good enough to leave like that on display no need for the aircraft, good work 

You are way too kind! But thank you. :thanks:

 

On 25/07/2020 at 19:25, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Oh Wow... You're going to motorize this ! I give up now 😲

Hi Dennis. Never give up, never surr............err.... I'm sure that's a quote.... :winkgrin:

Thank you.

 

On 26/07/2020 at 05:09, Stew Dapple said:

Nice Stix, very nice indeed B)

Cheers,

Stew

Thank you very much Stew! 👍

 

On 26/07/2020 at 05:35, Hewy said:

Your pilot  looks ace stix,great work 

Thank you Glynn. Most kind!

 

On 29/07/2020 at 15:22, SimonT said:

Top quality as always Stix, looking forward to the next update.

Thank you very much Simon for your kind comments.

 

Well I must apologise again. Been a longer time than anticiapted between updates. I have been doing some work on a build which I have now completed for the T-34 STGB so, hopefully, I can devote more time to this Hurricane for a while........well at least until the next GB starts that I want to take part in!!

 

So my next move was to glue the instrument panel in place and then I did a test fit of the cockpit seat frame:

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It seemed to look okay in place although I could see it was going to require a bit of effort to get the upper part of the head armour section to fit well into the upper section of the fuselage behind the cockpit. 

 

It was at this point I remembered I had gone a bit away from the instructions on my previous build of this kit. A quick check back through my previous build thread, in the Hawker Siddeley GB section, showed that I had glued the fuselage first and then fitted the cockpit seat/frame unit into the fuselage rather than on to the lower wing. I have to say, like others have found, the fit of most of the bigger parts isn't great. The fuselage halves didn't line up brilliantly. I don't know if they were warped slightly, but I ended up gluing just the top of the cowling first - to try and get the best join I could in that area and then, once dry, I glued the tail fin halves together, taped up the rear fuslage and the glued the top of the rear fuselage together - applying the glue from the inside. Once set it looked like this:

50207199891_fdf851bbcf_b.jpg

 

The cowling still required a bit of filler but the join now looks okay. There was also a bit of filler required in front of the tail fin. There was a wierd line in the join here. Don't remember it from the first of these kits I built, but it may have been present.

 

Once this was all fully set I got the seat/frame assembly fitted in place but glued just the seat armour to the fuselage sides behind the cockpit:

50207477812_d4d73b3eb3_b.jpg

 

While I have been letting everything properly set for long periods, I have been doing other jobs on the kit. I thinned the insides of the trailing edges of the wings. I should have taken before and after photos but, hopefully you can see the result from the after photo:

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I did remember to show the before (right) and after with the ailerons:

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I do not know why Airfix made the trailing edges of the wings so thick. 

 

Next I decided to glue the rear lower fuselage section and front underside cowling in place:

50207477672_ba04954abd_b.jpg

I felt doing it this way would help me locate the lower wing section more effectively. To make sure the rear section was in the correct place I also assembled (and glued in place) the stabilisers and elevators.

 

While waiting for the glue on these to set I did some work on the exhausts. This is how Airfix supply them - with blank/flat ends:

50207199611_fbe04424ae_b.jpg

 

So I marked the centres with a pointed blade (right) and then used a micro-drill to drill out the ends (left). 

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I hold the drill in my fingers for this and use the drill at different angles to widen the holes.

 

Both sets done:

50207199531_007b8d30d9_b.jpg

Not perfect but better than the blank ends.

 

When I came to fit the lower wing section I realised there seemed to be a large gap at the front when it was seated against the rear under fuselage piece. So I created a fillet from plasticard:

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Lower wing piece glued in place:

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Fit from underneath looks okay:

50207199401_789d4a3dc7_b.jpg

 

Next I need to properly sort out the route through for the motor wires and then glue the upper wings in place. The fit of the latter looked okay in the trial run.....we will see!!

 

Comments and suggestions welcome.

 

Kind regards,

 

Stix

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Wow! Thats almost a complete build in one update!

Brilliant work again mate, and yet more deserved advertising for Revell's anthracite. :) This is pretty much a "how to" guide for those of us going to build the Airfix Hurricane, a real masterclass as you have got really good looking joints on all the major parts.

The painting of the cockpit and pilot are definitely up to your usual very high standard and the IP looks great. Good job on the exhausts and thinning the wings and ailerons too.

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