1/32 Brit Phantom FG.1 XV571 conversion from Tamiya and Wild Hare set

[Antti_K]

I have the Hasegawa boxing on the table and decals for both No. 6 Squadron and No. 74 Squadron just arrived from the "Big H". After seeing this:

 

 

one has to really concentrate to find excuses for not to build a "Tiger"😉

 

Cheers,

Antti

[colin ritchie]

Beautiful video .. thanks.. Now where did I put my hankies

[Anthony in NZ]

OK, so I have had my moments this week with this kit, I cant hide that fact.  Been on the SOD 2x this past week!  But I just cant stop here with all the help and interest you guys have invested in me

 

This week an enormous amount of data has come to light, some PM's with scans of the kit against cross sections etc.  Thanks guys, you rock and have kept me going, even though you were the reason for it nearly going in the bin!!

 

So the intakes turn out to be a bug bear and painful to get my head around.  Anyway, I easily can over complicate things in my head but I think, bottom line is that it's not that bad.  Tamiya's kit is almost a hybrid FG.1 in some respects, which is great.

 

The 'shoulder sits too high making it ideal to represent a Brit Toom, the intakes are too tall (only a couple of mm) which throws off the thrust line for the Spey intake.  A slice taken out of the intake corner taking at least 1mm out goes an enormous way toward fixing this height and correctingsetting up the thrust line.  Thus setting up well for the enlarged shoulders and slightly wider engine intakes. But we will deal with that after the inners and dimensions have been sorted.

 

The bleed air louvers on the top and bottom of the intakes are at different angles and wider at the base (this is where the intakes were widened on the actual airframe as I can tell.

Also the corresponding lower one is a different shape and depth, see Derek Bradshaws measurements and edited photo below

And I changed the angle and widened it here also

Also note the shimmed out Real Model intake trunk....my fault and caused me to stay tp to 2am one morning!  Oh I took it out of the bin when I woke up LOL

 

These shims are still very slightly oversized as I study exactly where they need to me on the airframe.

 

I also shortened the intake length by 1.2 mm at the rear edge, this sits the intake length the correct dist down the fuse.  It had to come from here as the leading edge of the wing to intake lip is still the same on Brit ones.

 

You can see below I am now sorting the intake trunk inner surfaces to box them and get them all smooth.

 

The vari ramp section inside the intake was lengthened, but I will explain that later on

 

Anyway, inner sections are getting there...

 

Thanks for looking in chaps, love having you here!

 

Cheers Anthony

[Dr. Quack]

Admirable attention to detail, and superb craftsmanship.

A joy to follow, sir.

Q

[Anthony in NZ]

11 hours ago, Dr. Quack said:

Admirable attention to detail, and superb craftsmanship.

A joy to follow, sir.

Q

Thanks Doc!

 

Ok, quick update before bed...

 

I am really pleased at how the intakes have shaped up internally.  I have the intake lip sorted, but still prob 1mm too deep, but I can live with that.  I have the opening width correct from the lip to the closed vari ramp at 14mm.  I shortened the intake and tweaked the length of the rearmost part of the ramp to get the proportions more accurate.

 

Anyway, I hope you guys are happy with the look of the new intake opening and geometry, please give me your feedback on areas I might have overlooked?  The outside contours will be a whole new story

The middle section of vari ramp needs modifying as the intake length is slightly shorter, but this area needed addressing anyway.  Notice also the contour leading edge shape change on the top, this matches photo's  

 

See below the new intake opening, I think it looks like a Spey one now....well to my eye it does, only about 1.25mm wider but noticeably different. 

And here is the back of the ramp piece modified a little

 

I photographed it on the grey plastic wings as you couldnt see it on the white background

 

So tomorrow I shall spray Mr Surfacer on the internal trunking areas and fix any blemishes etc.  Then on to doing the right side intake.

 

Are my mods doing the trick?  I dont know, I guess time and photography will tell, if I got the 'look' correct, but it's the best I can do.

 

Thanks for looking in as always

 

Cheers and thanks for your interest

Anthony

[heloman1]

Just found your build Anthony, magnificent! I never got to work on the Phantoms, I was a Gannet and Wessex grubber. Excellent work going on here and serious attention to detail. I'll ignore the fact that it won't end up in grey and white!

 

Popcorn and beer at the ready...

 

Colin

[Anthony in NZ]

4 hours ago, heloman1 said:

Just found your build Anthony, magnificent! I never got to work on the Phantoms, I was a Gannet and Wessex grubber. Excellent work going on here and serious attention to detail. I'll ignore the fact that it won't end up in grey and white!

 

Popcorn and beer at the ready...

 

Colin

Hey Colin, great to have you along buddy!

 

I know, I have struggled not to put her in the grey and white scheme!

Edited December 12, 2020 by Anthony in NZ

[Anthony in NZ]

5 hours ago, heloman1 said:

Just found your build Anthony, magnificent! I never got to work on the Phantoms, I was a Gannet and Wessex grubber. Excellent work going on here and serious attention to detail. I'll ignore the fact that it won't end up in grey and white!

 

Popcorn and beer at the ready...

 

Colin

Hey Colin, great to have you along buddy!

 

I know, I have struggled not to put her in the grey and white scheme!

[Anthony in NZ]

Right-O 

For those of you wanting to see the nuts and bolts of the intake mods.  Here are the Real Model intake trunks with the outer surfaces all ground off on my trusty belt sander.

Then I have to widen them a little, so a little boiling water applied and the lower edge opened up after making a cut partially down the length.  This gets filled with plastic card and CA once this is glued into the widened plastic kit parts.

 

All looks a bit messy right now, but at least you can see this warts n  all on how I am doing this.  Because the intakes arent that much wider, this mod really isn't that difficult to do.  It is just understanding how the designers did it and doing the same

 

Oh the left intake looks awesome all primered up, so happy with it.  I will post a pic when I have the 2 finished together.

 

One more thing....just got these the other day, all I can say is WOW! Miloslav has done an amazing job, the detail is unreal and highly recommended.  Pretty sure I can use these on this build after studying photo's

 

Thanks as always for tuning in

 

Cheers Anthony

[Anthony in NZ]

You BM guys are prolific builders...I couldnt find my thread...it was 7 pages back LOL!

 

So the next stage in building Spey intakes (well my way anyway, there is probably an easier way to go like engine blanks!) is to glue the resin trunking into the kit plastic parts. Notice the width increased at the inner section up against the fuselage, not midway.  Extending at the bleed vents was how the original mod was done, so I replicated that. Also the gaps were blanked off with plastic card.

From the top you can see where I brought the trunking up to and filled with card. Also note the slot on the kit corner part to lower the opening and more accurately portray the corner curve, I think I am within a mm or 2 now of the correct depth.  The top of the intake leading edge is being modified to 'square off' a little as per photo's.  With the kit intake shortened and the last section of vari ramp inside moved back to suit, the slightly shorter middle section becomes evident.  I will fix this when I figure out how to make it and represent the holes to look realistic.  

At this stage there was a LOT of filling and sanding with CA to blend everything in!!

Armed with Derek Bradshaw's measurements of the rearmost part of the vari ramp, I just made one to the actual size in 1/32.  Bit of a risk, but I figured it would show up any issues when I tried to fit it.

Front surface got a line scribed in it for the new plastic piece to sit into on the front edge, then chiseled back to accept the thickness of the card stock.

Back surface with a small shim to transition nicely back into the trunking with bending out the straight panel.

Will it fit when cut to actual dimensions??

 

Almost perfectly with only minor sanding to fit..what a fluke and thanks Derek for those measurements.  The last section of ramp is quite long compared to the kit one as you can see. I must be close to having the sizing right overall...

I also used my belt sander and corrected the angle of where the fan face goes to match drawings and have both match.

 

Started priming with Mr surfacer now to find all the little blemishes

Both intakes are now looking really good, their openings are 14mm from the closed splitter to the front edge lip and I believe I have the opening/lip shape correct too.

 

Well that's the internals of the intakes taking shape, no doubt I will spend a fair bit more hours getting it all internally perfect and painted before gluing to the fuse.

 

Thats where the hard part starts!  There are some tricky and deceptive curves on the outside.

 

Was it all worth it for 1 mm or 2?  Hopefully the finished result will answer that, but you can see they are slightly wider and when placed up against the kit fuselage looks 'spot on' and definitely wider and 'Spey-like' to my eye.

 

Still a long way to go, but it has literally taken many hours to get to this point.  I think this is worth it though as these are the things that make the Brit Toom unique, so it is important to me to get this spot on.  Everyone looks at the intakes and drooping back end and its associated shapes.

 

Thanks for hanging in there chaps...I am still making progress, albeit slow as this is trickier than it looks.

 

Cheers Anthony

[(ex)Sgtrafman]

Hey Anthony

 

Lookin' real good there mate, the changes you are making / made are really paying off! Have a great Christmas buddy.

 

Iain

[Antti_K]

Anthony, those are the best intakes for a British Phantom I've seen in any scale. Keep up the good work there mate🙂

 

Cheers,

Antti

[Anthony in NZ]

6 hours ago, (ex)Sgtrafman said:

Hey Anthony

 

Lookin' real good there mate, the changes you are making / made are really paying off! Have a great Christmas buddy.

 

Iain

Thanks Iain, hope you're having a great day today buddy!

 

5 hours ago, Antti_K said:

Anthony, those are the best intakes for a British Phantom I've seen in any scale. Keep up the good work there mate🙂

 

Cheers,

Antti

Thanks Antti, that is very much a compliment from you mate as I know you know your Brit Phantoms!  I am slowly getting there...

 

Appreciate the likes and comments chaps, helps me hang in there

 

Cheers Anthony

[mark.au]

Absolutely fantastic attention to detail, looking forward to seeing how this shapes up.

[Anthony in NZ]

On 12/26/2020 at 2:45 PM, mark.au said:

Absolutely fantastic attention to detail, looking forward to seeing how this shapes up.

Thanks Mark, much appreciated!  

 

More blending and sanding

Have also removed the patches off the intakes and have one to rescribe.

 

Hopefully after this session I can paint the interior....I just still keep finding imperfections and shape 'tweaks'  also getting the intake lip a consistent profile/cross section all the way around isnt as easy as it sounds after all the chopping and filling with CA

 

Oh well....no one ever said it would be easy!  But it's a hang of a lot of fun

 

Cheers

Anthony

[CJP]

Neat work Anthony - the list of fans of your work grows each day

CJP

[bigbadbadge]

Good grief this is some fantastic and very neat work,  the intakes look fantastic now. Great work.   Are you using just CA as a filler or are you adding  Talcum powder to it to make ot easier to sand back and scribe?

Chris

[Anthony in NZ]

12 hours ago, CJP said:

Neat work Anthony - the list of fans of your work grows each day

CJP

Thanks buddy, but I am not sure about that!  Probably watching on to see where my breaking point is LOL!

 

10 hours ago, bigbadbadge said:

Good grief this is some fantastic and very neat work,  the intakes look fantastic now. Great work.   Are you using just CA as a filler or are you adding  Talcum powder to it to make ot easier to sand back and scribe?

Chris

Thanks Chris, means a lot coming from you, I was having a great read of some of your builds...very impressive indeed!

No I havent used Talcum powder.  I have heard of it but not tried it.  I just use straight gap filling Zap CA of varying viscosities.  Might do some tests, if we have any talcum powder here.  Havent used any since my son was a baby and he is nearly 18 now!

Thanks for the tip reminder

 

I hope you arent all sick of seeing this topic keeping on popping up on page one...sorry about that.

On another note, here is the best pic I could get of the new opening

Plus I started sorting out alignment and shapes of the side of the fuse so I dont end up with too much of that 'hour glass' waist shape at the wing/fuse intersection.  I heated up the resin so its pretty close and trialled the modified intakes. I think I need to take even more out of the shoulder at the join due to how much the conversion was widened.  I have taken a splice out already, but it may need more.  This is where just using the Tamiya fuselage would have made life easier.  Anyway I might be able to get away with the step between the 2 with the new intake shoulder profile

The overall view...I feel like I am getting somewhere now.  However things are just taped together and not properly aligned, but I needed to see how it looked together for my own mental state! The splitter/vari-ramp is sitting still a little forward, but I will be cutting these front 2 sections off shortly anyway.

 

 

 

Ugh...I just realised looking at these photo's that I really need to do those blasted widened bleed air louvers on the top and bottom of the intakes before I glue them on.  

 

Oh well, best figure it out now before I struggle later on!

 

Thanks for looking in chaps

Anthony

[bigbadbadge]

12 minutes ago, Anthony in NZ said:

Thanks Chris, means a lot coming from you, I was having a great read of some of your builds...very impressive indeed!

No I havent used Talcum powder.  I have heard of it but not tried it.  I just use straight gap filling Zap CA of varying viscosities.  Might do some tests, if we have any talcum powder here.  Havent used any since my son was a baby and he is nearly 18 now!

Thanks for the tip reminder

 

Wow, a very big thank you for your kind comments there Anthony,  very kind indeed.  

If you can get some talc and experiment you will love it .  If you add a bit more talc it sands even easier and takes a scriber well.   Your rescribing looks great anyway , I struggle over neat CA that's why the Talc  and CA was such a blessing.   My scribing is not as neat as yours.  .

Great work 

Chris

[Anthony in NZ]

3 minutes ago, bigbadbadge said:

Wow, a very big thank you for your kind comments there Anthony,  very kind indeed.  

If you can get some talc and experiment you will love it .  If you add a bit more talc it sands even easier and takes a scriber well.   Your rescribing looks great anyway , I struggle over neat CA that's why the Talc  and CA was such a blessing.   My scribing is not as neat as yours.  .

Great work 

Chris

My pleasure

 

I will definitely give this a go.  Especially if it makes scribing through CA easier.

 

Cheers Anthony

[Anthony in NZ]

When I place the widened intake up against the fuselage all the angles seemed out (to keep the opening at 14mm) as well as have the front splitter sit on the vanes that hold it out from the fuselage.  I ended up with a gap half way down.  No matter how I tried I could not figure out why.

 

The answer was so simple I just couldnt see it. I needed to glue in a piece of plastic card wedge to fill the gap.  It was only a small gap, but otherwise would have ment the front splitter would have touched, the rear intake would have touched and the lower intake touched, but it appeared kind of cranked in the centre at the top. Then I remembered from earlier on, that the upper bleed air width wasnt quite wide enough (almost a mm) and I know that sounds a silly insignificant number but the wedge instantly corrected the straight line that it should all be in and unexpectedly corrected the bleed air vent width at the rear!

 

The fit up against the fuselage is almost perfect now and no brute force and epoxy will be needed. The intake sits at 14mm perfectly too.  The corner of the intake shoulder still needs addressing, but that's for another day.

 

I am probably making no sense at all, but this is for the benefit of those embarking on this conversion themselves and saves you a few hours figuring out how to make it all work.

 

For those building, here are the measurements

A=1.6mm

B=2.3mm

Now I am back to boxing in the louvered vent box

Feeling like I am posting too much again, but it is for the benefit of those wanting to do this themselves.  Rather than finish it and show a pretty picture I think it best I explain how I am doing it.

 

I am sure there are other ways, but this is just my way around it for what it's worth.

 

Cheers...again

Anthony

[bigbadbadge]

That's good work on figuring it out, there's nothing more frustrating, especially after the amount of corrective work you've done.   I will never likely build one of these (I have my 72nd Fujimi kit) but its a very interesting thread journey anyway.  Don't ever think you're posting too much,  I am enjoying watching this develope.

Cracking job

Chris 

[Dr. Quack]

6 hours ago, Anthony in NZ said:

Feeling like I am posting too much again, but it is for the benefit of those wanting to do this themselves.  Rather than finish it and show a pretty picture I think it best I explain how I am doing it.

......and we're mighty grateful to you for sharing your efforts and keeping us right.

Inspirational is an overused word, but it's the one that comes to mind!

Q

[Antti_K]

Anthony,

 

I really admire your work. Your attention to detail and right shape is inspirational and creates an excellent on-line resource.

 

The "splinter plates" or "vari ramps" are rather poor in this kit (giving its size). A detail that is wrong in every Phantom kit I've seen so far. Luckily they are very easy to fix. Here's mine for the F-4J, but the basic idea is similar for a Spey engined planes.

 

 

 

 

Cheers,

Antti

[Anthony in NZ]

4 hours ago, Dr. Quack said:

......and we're mighty grateful to you for sharing your efforts and keeping us right.

Inspirational is an overused word, but it's the one that comes to mind!

Q

Thank you sir...nice to know!

 

9 hours ago, bigbadbadge said:

That's good work on figuring it out, there's nothing more frustrating, especially after the amount of corrective work you've done.   I will never likely build one of these (I have my 72nd Fujimi kit) but its a very interesting thread journey anyway.  Don't ever think you're posting too much,  I am enjoying watching this develope.

Cracking job

Chris 

Thanks Chris, much appreciated mate.

 

4 hours ago, Antti_K said:

Anthony,

 

I really admire your work. Your attention to detail and right shape is inspirational and creates an excellent on-line resource.

 

The "splinter plates" or "vari ramps" are rather poor in this kit (giving its size). A detail that is wrong in every Phantom kit I've seen so far. Luckily they are very easy to fix. Here's mine for the F-4J, but the basic idea is similar for a Spey engined planes.

 

 

 

 

Cheers,

Antti

Thanks Antti!

You are one of the people who has been a great help along the way, and I appreciate it! My hope was to collect info from all over the 'net' and those who are experts on the Brit Phantom together to chime in and make suggestions etc.

 

I hope this brings everything together for those wanting to build a brit Phantom in any scale.

 

I love your Vari Ramp mods, they look great and something I will need to do when I make that second section (different shape and hole pattern) on my build.  For some reason the lower section on the Spey birds has 4 compartments, but will need to check my photo's on that.

 

I have sprayed a Mr Base White 1000 (just Mr Surfacer but whate)in the intakes and all is looking pretty good.  Still a few more imperfections to tidy up, but at least it is white and each successive layer I spray and sand will only mean a very thin top coat, which should avoid any of that horrible dusty surface that comes from spraying small areas where the air/paint mix just circulates before it dries.

 

I have some Mr Color Barley grey as well, so I can mask off the white and paint the inner section the interior colour.  As a side note, it seems there are variations on how far back that exterior colour comes into the intake.

 

I might however get some MRP paint as a few here and on LSP rave about it.

 

Cheers for now and thanks

Anthony