EE Lightning F6 Airfix 1/48

[Allatsea]

Another Ebay purchase. Not my favourite aircraft growing up, but like the new Lightning its grown on me, plus I think the box art for this one looks amazing. 

Normally i have a mooch around on scalemates and on here for reviews and builds for any pit falls to lookout for or aftermarket needed, but for this one I went in blind. Having just built 2 airfix buccs, and in the past the jaguar and tornado gr1 I wasn't really expecting much, but that was fine, planning on just a quick out the box built after stalling trying to build the revell gr4 farewell tornado. 

 

Box Art and Sprue shots,

 

 

 

 

Cockpit was just sprayed with Tamiya medium sea grey and kit decals used for the instrument panels, seat looks pretty good out the box, sprayed black and dry brushed with silver, and put the pilot in to save time messing around with harness straps. 

Engine and intake area fitted nicely and was pretty impressed with the detail and fit of the kit, but its been an enjoyable change just to sit down in one evening and be able to reach this stage with out any faffing about.  

 

 

 

Pilot doesn't fit into the seat, so removed the base of the cushion, and sanded down the base of the seat a little. 

 

 

Rest of it came together pretty quickly, no need for any filler, no flash and very little sanding needed to tidy up the parts once off the sprue. 

Still undecided on the final paint scheme, but leaning more to a wrap around camo with silver/grey undersides. 

 

 

[Filler]

It's funny you say that the Lightning wasn't your favourite aircraft growing up. For me it wasn't either when picking favourites from what was around in the 80's, but I feel there aren't many that would say that.

 

I'd definitely like to add one of these to my collection and I believe it's a really good kit (although they seem often pretty pricey these days). Looks like yours is going together very nicely. Are you going wheels up?

[Lord Riot]

Very nice! I've built two Airfix Lightnings, one as an F1 and one as an F3. From what I recall the only slightly dodgy fit was the nose ring but it wasn't that bad. It's a really nice kit I thought, still have two in the stash to make as F6s one day.

 

I like the Lightning but I'd agree it wasn't my absolute favourite, it's grown on me more over time as modern jets get more and more boring. Nothing can displace the Victor as my all-time favourite. Unless it's a Canberra perhaps. Or a Jaguar.

[SAT69]

Nice work on the Lightning. Good to hear it goes together well.

[Back in the Saddle]

1 hour ago, SAT69 said:

Good to hear it goes together well.

It certainly is; it's the next model going on my workbench!