Auster J4 Archer 1/48 Scratchbuild (VH-AET - the pilotless one)

[ianwau]

A recent release from Airfix in 1/48 is the Hawker Sea Fury - one release of which features on the box art the little known (now better known) incident of a civilian Auster (VH-AET) being shot down in Australia in 1955. The story is told on the Sea Fury instructions and plenty of coverage of it online with a bit of Googling.   So no doubt plenty of Airfix Sea Furies being built in that scheme - but what of the hapless Auster? Perhaps prophetically, my model club (Australian Plastic Modellers Association - APMA  had published an article in 2014 covering some of the history and details of kits/conversion prospects in 1/72 and 1/48. 

Clearly an accompanying model of the Auster is called for. But there's slim pickings in 1/48 - the Sword kit of the Auster Mk.III is more suited to military use - and the civilian Austers J4 Archer (ie VH AET) has a very different glasshouse and canopy arrangements. So much so that you'd end up scratchbuilding most of the fuselage anyway.  No doubt other differences - but rather than do things that way - I thought I'd just scratchbuild the whole thing.  I see @Heather Kay did a J1 Auster conversion in 1/72 in 2020 which was a good read!

 

As is always the case, I ended up finding quite a few variants of plans - and finally settled on something workable. And also managed to do my own walkaround of a Auster J/5B Autocar on display at the Queensland Aviation Museum (QAM) - that's a 4 seater vs the J4 a 2 seater so plenty of differences.   Starting point was the wings - and I've jumped ahead a bit - but below is a shot of the laminated wings - which had just come out of traction (bulldog clips in the background) and had a bit of sand and clean up...

 

 

Then onto the fuselage - the rear section of which I elected to make of a box section construction. The fuse sides have distinct lines from the stringers - which I imitated by firstly scoring styrene sheet from the inside - then embossing with a blunt kitchen knife. Pretty happy with the result as you can see in the picture. 

 

 

and on we go with now the fabric 'skin' applied and the basic shape of the front fuselage taking shape. The bulkhead at the front of the rear fuse section will be removed later - it's lightly tacked into to help get the shape right...

 

And here's the wing rib strips being applied using thin tape (and a template modified from the drawings to assist with getting things tight and parallel). I wasn't inspired to use the embossing technique on the wing to better emphasise the ribs - which would have been more accurate but didn't suit my construction technique. 

 

 

So with a little more work we find ourselves with most of a fuselage and the wings - starting to look a bit Auster-ish

 

More to come imminently...

[ianwau]

Second instalment....   Firstly - here's a picture (source National Library of Australia - Wiki Commons)  of the actual aircraft taken a couple of years before in 1953 on a Reliability Trial. Not the pilot(s) involved with the pilotless runaway Auster - but gives some good detail for the model!

 

 

Below is a picture of the model with preliminary set up (including 2 x fine brass spars for the wings). The tail feathers have been added. And a master made for vacforming the canopy.

 

 

And here's the vacformed canopy just out of the vacforming machine (ie the oven in the kitchen). I've used 15 thou Butyrate for the canopy - and as you can tell it's a home grown vacforming solution using the vacuum cleaner, the oven etc. 

 

 

And here's the canopy in situ after a basic cutting to size and cleaning up. And slotted in between the wings (still not glued) to make sure the canopy width is good. 

 

 

Then onwards to the framing. Certainly needs something to hold the wings up in the air! Framing is from ~0.5mm brass rod (which is pretty much right on 1:48 scale for the real thing). Have also added the front cowls (thin styrene encourage into a light curvature). 

 

 

Then another test fit to make sure it's all still fitting together. It is!!  I see in the pix that the brass diagonals between the wings are a bit skew-if - but not too phased as this is going to be obscued by the roof (which just has 2 x skylights in it). 

 

 

More to come....

 

[T-21]

Superb scratch building thanks for many build tips.

[bigbadbadge]

My word this is gorgeous,  what a cracking build and great subject matter. I am goingvto give @Anthony in NZ a mention here as he is a real fan of the type and will love this I'm sure.

I like how you have made this look very achievable for us average modellers too!!!

Great work 

Chris

[ianwau]

Motoring along. Interior mostly done. Next step was cutting and fitting the side glass. Basically flat sections with a bit of an angle at the rear door post - and halfway up the door. Used thin strips of tape to mark out the edges on 10 thou clear styrene - then cut out with a sharp scalpel  (and clean up edges etc. 

 

 

So here are the two sides cut out, and with some rough masking - so the inside isn't shiny clear...  More precise masking on the outside will more clearly define the windows (not that excited about having precise interior masking - not going to see any reward for the effort).

 

 

And with a little bit of fettling, and a bit of tape to hold in position - here's the glass now glued in place...

 

and some undercart - bit of brass, bit of styrene... (clever engineering on the real thing)

 

 

 

and here's where we're at currently.  Top wing is not sitting quite right - I have some fillets installed at rear of wings which need a bit more filleting. It'll be a snug fit - but that's the intent

 

That brings me up to date. But have a head of steam on this one.....

 

[woody37]

This is brilliant, really do enjoy following scratch builds

[bigbadbadge]

8 hours ago, ianwau said:

That brings me up to date. But have a head of steam on this one...

I'd say this much progress would take me ages if I could do it, you are making this look very simple.  Inspiring stuff.

Great work 

Chris 

[Anthony in NZ]

11 hours ago, bigbadbadge said:

My word this is gorgeous,  what a cracking build and great subject matter. I am goingvto give @Anthony in NZ a mention here as he is a real fan of the type and will love this I'm sure.

I like how you have made this look very achievable for us average modellers too!!!

Great work 

Chris

Thanks Chris, not sure how I missed this...

 

Absolutely stunning work!  You really are capturing the look very well.  Like Chris, you make me feel like I could build my own Auster (T.7 WE552 I am rebuilding to fly), in 1/32 scale. Bravo, that's awesome!

[ianwau]

A little more progress to report.   With a little bit of fettling - the wings have now been glued to the fuselage and the front glass attached. 

 

Still to add the roof top glass and blend this all in. Quite pleased with the fit though. Sort of looks odd without the wing struts don't you think?  Will sort them out shortly...

 

Needs a bit of a general sand and clean-up before moving onto paint (and masking before that). I've laser printed the decals for it. Fuse is blue with white lettering - and since my laser printer seems to struggle a bit with printing white, I have reverse printed. The idea is I paint a white background - mask the general area of the lettering, spray blue, then apply the decals. Not sure if this'll work or not but nothing to lose!  The main challenge is spraying a blue that colour matches the blue(s) I printed. Gave myself a couple of options of blue!  

 

 

 

 

 

[heloman1]

Excellent work, I like the way you have tackled the rear decking and the wing tape, also the cabin framework. An AOP 9 would make another great build.

 

Colin

[TEXANTOMCAT]

That’s absolutely brilliant 👍

[Jackson Duvalier]

Really inspirational modelling.  Thanks for sharing your techniques!  😎

[bigbadbadge]

Great progress,  to see the wings on is wonderful,  good idea rectge decals, fingers crossed you can get the colour match okay.

Chris

[k5054nz]

I'm really enjoying this Ian, it's great to see someone tackle an Auster.

[abat]

This is superb work. Looking forward to the next installment.

Andrew

[ianwau]

Some more progress. The clear roof transparency was cut to size and fitted - then all carefully blended with a some fine white Milliput, and some Mr.Surfacer 500, and judicious sanding with 1200 wet and dry.  Seemed to work OK. 

 

Then pushed ahead with the canopy masking, some rattlecan undercoat (Tamiya Fine Grey) and some touchups (Mr.Surfacer 500 to the rescue again) which is where we see her now. 

 

 

Oh, also made the rear tail springy thing. Laminated 3 x thin strips of 0.2mm styrene formed over a marking pen (to get the bend) - with a bit of Tamiya Thin to weld it together. 

 

 

 

Next steps will be paint.  Fuselage is blue with a polished metal front portion of the nose. Wings, empennage are silver. Am going to black base for the silver - then will spray with SMS (The Scale Modellers Supply) aluminium lacquer - an Aussie supplier. This'll need a flat clear over the top (to mimic the aluminium dope finish) - I like its very fine metallic grain. After the silver, and a bit of masking, the fuselage will be done in a hand-mixed blue - probably going to use Tamiya Acrylics for that.  Hopefully painting this weekend - middle of winter in Sydney, but looks like a 20+ celsius weekend.

 

Will glue the wing struts on after painting - they're just going to get in the way.  

 

 

[k5054nz]

I want one. Well, an Autocrat, but still!

 

Beautiful work Ian. I'm really enjoying this build.

[Ptmvarsityfan]

Superb!

[bigbadbadge]

Looks awesome,  can't wait to see the paint going on .

Great work 

Chris 

[ianwau]

A good painting weekend in Sydney. Although a change of heart in approach to paint. Decided to do the blue fuselage first - then the silver, using Tamiya Flat Aluminium acryic. Reason was an intervening project had me use the SMS Aluminium Lacquer and it really is too bright - even with the flat clear over the top. 

 

I initially left a white patch on the fuse for the decals (with the view of doing reverse print decals in the same colour blue as the paint). Whilst my colour match was good - the tranlucence of the lasered decals meant i wasn't getting anywhere near the effect.  So painted whole fuse blue - and now on the quest for white decal lettering(!). 

 

Here she is having come out of the blue paint shop....  And starting to mask for silver.

 

And jumping ahead - silver has been shot - and starting to remove the masking....

 

And masking all off - including the canopy mask  (this is one of my favourite bits of the painting process - the reveal. Provided it's all worked of course)

 

The front of the nose has been done in SMS Aluminium lacquer. It's polished aluminium on the real thing (well it was before it was shot down) so pleased with the effect.

 

Next steps - a few touch ups here and there, then decals, struts, wheels, dangly bits, prop.  On the home stretch now... 

 

 

 

 

[bigbadbadge]

Oh wow this looks absolutely lovely with paint on.  Great job. 

Chris

[TheyJammedKenny!]

This is gorgeous!  Did you solder together all the metal framework?  Amazing job on this, and you make it look so easy, which of course it isn't.  

[ianwau]

7 hours ago, TheyJammedKenny! said:

Did you solder together all the metal framework? 

Thank you!  Metal framework is all ~0.5mm brass rod with superglue. And a dab of canopy glue (PVA) to be sure to be sure.

[ianwau]

Steaming ahead. Have been applying the decals, and added the wing struts/stays and empennage rigging. The original aircraft was owned by the Kingsford-Smith Flying School - which explains the underwing markings (nothing to do with famous aviator Charles Kingsford-Smith - just happened to pick up his Company name in a fire sale [or something like that]). Airfix, in their PC diplomatic wisdom, have omitted the Kingsford-Smith markings from their Sea Fury box art - but have otherwise faithfully told the story with due acknowledgement to a number of Aussie contributors.  

 

The white VH-AET markings on the side are rub-down lettering and are quite oversize.  I'll replace in due course once I find something suitable - but would rather have 'something' on vs nothing...  Not entirely happy with the fleck in the Tamiya flat aluminium, but I ain't redoing it!

 

 

She's starting to look almost complete - the end is in sight!

 

 

Still to do is the prop, exhaust, pitot. A coat of clear to address the silvering in the decals (hopefully!) - and a bit of light weathering to tone down some of the highlights (eg demarcation between polished nose and cowl) 

 

I think next posting might be in 'Ready for Inspection'? I am rather tempted to pose it in a diorama - the Auster bounding pilotless down the runway -  with the hapless pilot frantically bounding after it. To no avail. 

 

Thanks for following. This project was originally started ~January 2021 but has really pushed ahead just in July 2021.   Really happy with the result - a very pretty plane and building it makes you appreciate the 1:1 engineering...

 

[Anthony in NZ]

Absolutely sensational!  Just love everything about this scratchbuild and inspires me to do one in 1/32 scale one day still!

 

Wonderful, we need more Auster kits!

 

Cheers Anthony