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Airfix 1/72 De Havilland Vampire T.11


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As a bit of light relief after four consecutive group builds, a never-ending Tempest and a love-hate relationship with a Defiant, and alongside my first attempt at an AFV, I've decided to build myself a nice little 1/72 aircraft to steady the ship.  I had two Airfix Vampires in the stash (which turned out to be lucky because the kit I started had a piece missing and I had to scrounge one from the second kit) and as I rarely build jets I thought I'd go a bit wild and get building.

 

Anyway, it's early stages yet, but something tells me this won't be a very long build.  I've got this far:

 

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It'll be finished in the scheme of WZ584 / K, of the Central Air Traffic Control School at Shawbury in 1970.

 

Cheers,

 

JRK

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12 minutes ago, bigbadbadge said:

Got one of these in the stash , will tag along if I may.   

 

Chris

 

You don't need to ask, Chris - you've given me no end of help in the 18 months I've been here!

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2 minutes ago, jackroadkill said:

 

You don't need to ask, Chris - you've given me no end of help in the 18 months I've been here!

Thanks fella, kind of you to say.  I think you will enjoy this kit from the threads and magazine articles, I should do mine at some point, doing an FAA T22.  

Chris

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That's a sweet little kit. With a bit of modification of the main gear mounts on the boom sudes (or possibly the tops of the legs...), you can avoid having to insert the legs early in the build, although I can't now recall exactly what I did - but if I figured it out, anyone can. 

 

The booms align flawlessly, but do take a bit of time to make sure that mould lines and flash are removed, or there will be pain later on. That goes for the whole kit, actually - clean up where needed, and it's just about Lego. 

 

Enjoy! 

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It's a nice kit but there's no real option of not inserting the main undercarriage legs early in the build. I found a canopy mask made a difference at the painting stage. Also needs some weight in the nose so it's not a tail sitter. Good luck with it. 

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1 hour ago, 825 said:

Good luck with it. 

 

Uh, yes, luck....

 

Well, I've screwed it up.  First of all I knocked over my bottle of TET, which went all over my cutting mat, Swiss army knife, laptop, brushes etc.  Never mind, I can get new scales for the knife and the laptop still works, even if the casing now looks like it has leprosy.  That was bad enough, but then, having cleared up the mess and ordered new knife scales and another bottle of TET, I continued the build.  And somehow I managed to cement the under-surfaces of the wings in before attempting to fit the tail booms....  It turns out that you need to fit the booms first.

 

 

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I'd filled the nose cavity with lead shot; Airfix reckon 7g is needed, so I put it a bit more just to be on the safe side.  I refrained from pouring CA in after the shot and used PVA instead.

 

 

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A less-than perfect fit around the air intakes, but not something which can't be sorted with some filler and a bit of fettling.

 

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And here's where it goes runny; you can see the undersides of the wings are on but the booms aren't.  Surgery will be required...

 

Cheers,

 

JRK

 

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Good start, excepting for the glue spill! It's a neat kit, I built it when it was first released and finished in Admirals Barge 'Green Parrot' FONAC's aircraft.

 

Colin

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39 minutes ago, heloman1 said:

Good start, excepting for the glue spill! It's a neat kit, I built it when it was first released and finished in Admirals Barge 'Green Parrot' FONAC's aircraft.

Hi Colin,

The "Green Parrot" sounds interesting, where did you get the decals?

Thank you.

Mark 

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1 hour ago, Kingswear1 said:

Hi Colin,

The "Green Parrot" sounds interesting, where did you get the decals?

Thank you.

Mark 

I think they are on a Model Art sheet somewhere. I'm building one as well and am using leftover transfers from a CMK resin kit. Model Art sheets can be difficult to get a hold of nowadays but someone might have some CMK transfers. 

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On 10/3/2021 at 3:26 PM, Kingswear1 said:

Hi Colin,

The "Green Parrot" sounds interesting, where did you get the decals?

Thank you.

Mark 

Hi Mark. Xtra-decals sheets for the titles and an old sheet from the stash for his pennant.

 

Colin

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This was the first kit that I built after coming back to the hobby about this time last year. It turned out ok, I got a bit overzealous with sanding the seams in some places. I also chickened out of doing the RAF version and went with the Swedish option - the decals were far more simple! I've got another in my stash to try and learn from my mistakes. 

 

It'll be nice to follow someone who knows what they're doing!

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23 minutes ago, Bobby No Mac said:

It'll be nice to follow someone who knows what they're doing!

 

Yes, that's what I think when I follow other folks' builds!  I only built my first kit last April so I'm in no way anything other than a beginner myself.  However, feel free to watch the mangling as I go!

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Just a small update - I have done some pre-shading (rather heavily in a place or two so that'll be toned down a bit before we do too much more) and have got the Light Aircraft Grey onto the fuselage.  Once this is fully dry I'll mask it off and spray the wings, tail and booms silver.  I must say that so far I'm really quite enamoured with this little kit, and might even treat myself to one of the new 1/48 Airfix F3s when they arrive.

 

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Cheers,

 

JRK

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She’s a lovely kit! You seem to be un phased by the troubles in the road. Bravo.

I’ll tag along if I may. Btw what’s that big spinning thing in the background? Looks like a fan or a sander? but sheesh if it is you wanna be careful. 😵💫

 

nice Pre shade by the way.

 

Johnyy.

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54 minutes ago, The Spadgent said:

Btw what’s that big spinning thing in the background? Looks like a fan or a sander? but sheesh if it is you wanna be careful. 😵

 

It's the extractor fan for my home-made Heath Robinson spray booth.  When I made the step from brushes to an airbrush I didn't know if I was going to like it, and in addition to that I haven't got the facility to install a  permanent spray booth so I made one using some flexible trunking (which actually exhausts through my letterbox!) a five gallon plastic drum and a USB-powered fan.  Whilst it might not be pretty it works pretty well.

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On 09/10/2021 at 13:23, bigbadbadge said:

Looking good JRK,can't wait to see the top coats go on.  Got a F.3 on pre order too.  Looking forward to that arriving. 

 

Thanks Chris.  I got the first coat of silver on the rest of the airframe last night and will hopefully get the second coat on this evening.  If so, I'll have an update for you then.

 

I'd be interested to see what the F3 looks like when it arrives.  Jets aren't my thing really but I seem to be quite taken with the Vampire.

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This photo spectacularly fails to show the nice satin Light Aircraft Grey fuselage and silver wings, booms and tail, so you'll just have to have take my word for it that I've done those areas in the appropriate colours.  Next job is to paint the canopy and surrounding fairing white and then it'll be time for the scarily big decals.

 

Not much of an update, but hey ho.

 

Cheers,

 

JRK

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