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1/72 - de Havilland DH.110 Sea Vixen FAW.1/.2 by Special Hobby (plastic MPM/Xtrakit) - release in 2023 ?


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Looks like this is a very good news. I wonder if SH is going to replace resin bits of original box with plastic or is sticking to resin seats, engine faces etc?

And second question to Sea Vixen connoisseurs - is that the best in class or Frog still beats it out on terms of geometric accuracy?

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13 minutes ago, Dennis_C said:

Looks like this is a very good news. I wonder if SH is going to replace resin bits of original box with plastic or is sticking to resin seats, engine faces etc?

And second question to Sea Vixen connoisseurs - is that the best in class or Frog still beats it out on terms of geometric accuracy?

Depends on how much work you like. The High Planes kit was pretty good for accuracy except the thickness of the booms, but is the epitome of limited run. Still way ahead of the Dragon/Cyrberhobby kit, although last time I mentioned that here I was told to shut my mouth. Good take on it here:  https://www.thunder-and-lightnings.co.uk/seavixen/models.php  .

 

 

Paul.

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It's a bit of a mess .it has the same fat front to the overwing booms that high planes has the nose contours are too rounded and many many other faults .at least Dragon has correctly shaped booms (albeit with reversed naca inlets )  in  theory combining bits of all the vixens would produce an accurate one 

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42 minutes ago, Neil Lambess said:

in  theory combining bits of all the vixens would produce an accurate one

Looks as a startup idea - selling instructions on how to make a good Sea Vixen out of SH+Dragon(Revell)+Frog(ark models?)

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2 hours ago, Dennis_C said:

I wonder if SH is going to replace resin bits of original box with plastic or is sticking to resin seats, engine faces etc?

 

Special Hobby prints in 3D more and more parts, I wouldn't be surprised if this kit had old resins replaced with much better 3D ones.

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12 hours ago, Dennis_C said:

Looks as a startup idea - selling instructions on how to make a good Sea Vixen out of SH+Dragon(Revell)+Frog(ark models?)

It has been done!

 

The most accurate Vixen in 72nd is this one by @TheBaron of course, and that is born out or necessity.  It is a very interesting thread to read,

 

Would be brilliant if a modelling manufacturer offered to buy his CADs!

Edited by 71chally
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Using the Warpaint drawings and the excellent Barracuda book as well as others, I reckon most of the errors in the 72nd scale kits are overstated, correctable or disguisable. The one challenge is the width on the engine bulge deck to the rear of the canopy. On that basis, I would say the best kit in terms of production, is the CH/Dragon but the most accurate is the old Frog. The SH/XTRAKIT can turn out a reasonable FAW1  if you can live with the aforementioned deck shape which is too flat and wide between the bulges. The best kit is of course the 48th Airfix and it will get scaled down in time.

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The Warpaint, and indeed any of the published non DH drawings, of the Sea Vixens are inaccurate, so are not good starting points.

I really urge anyone that seriously wants to build an accurate Sea Vixen to read the early stages of the thread that I linked to above. You will see that Tony had realised how bad references (and indeed kits) are and it's worth reading how he established that.

 

People have mixed the various kits together, and you can find references to these in Googleland.

 

What is a shame is that these kits seems to get reissued enough that you would think that there's a market for an accurate new tool kit.

Of course any Sea Vixen kit is going to look like a Sea Vixen, so it depends what you want, but manufacturers seem to be happy with the 'near enough is good enough' approach with this type.

 

 

Edited by 71chally
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13 hours ago, 71chally said:

The Warpaint, and indeed any of the published non DH drawings, of the Sea Vixens are inaccurate, so are not good starting points.

I really urge anyone that seriously wants to build an accurate Sea Vixen to read the early stages of the thread that I linked to above. You will see that Tony had realised how bad references (and indeed kits) are and it's worth reading how he established that.

 

People have mixed the various kits together, and you can find references to these in Googleland.

 

What is a shame is that these kits seems to get reissued enough that you would think that there's a market for an accurate new tool kit.

Of course any Sea Vixen kit is going to look like a Sea Vixen, so it depends what you want, but manufacturers seem to be happy with the 'near enough is good enough' approach with this type.

 

 

In terms of what is available they are a starting point and you always need one of those. The Barracuda book is very good and it is clear that the belly needs sanding on all of the kits so do the auxiliary rocket bulges and the nose needs extending/reshaping. The interior is easily sorted.  I guess it depends on your tolerance. My view is that if you can't detect an error, your job is done and it's irrelevant. There is need for a new kit for sure.

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I wonder if a 1/72 one is due from Airfix as they have not re-released their 1/48 one after announcing they would do a couple of years ago. If you are desperate for a Sea Vixen buy any of the available ones now or wait to see what happens in the coming years.

 

Regards

Robert

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On 13/01/2022 at 11:28, Robert said:

I wonder if a 1/72 one is due from Airfix as they have not re-released their 1/48 one after announcing they would do a couple of years ago. If you are desperate for a Sea Vixen buy any of the available ones now or wait to see what happens in the coming years.

 

Regards

Robert

Orrrrrr buy one now and buy one later?

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On 13/01/2022 at 11:38, BushBrit66 said:

In terms of what is available they are a starting point and you always need one of those. The Barracuda book is very good and it is clear that the belly needs sanding on all of the kits so do the auxiliary rocket bulges and the nose needs extending/reshaping. The interior is easily sorted.  I guess it depends on your tolerance. My view is that if you can't detect an error, your job is done and it's irrelevant. There is need for a new kit for sure.

The problem is that they are based on official deHavilland issued 3 views which were deliberately wrong (presumably as it was the height of the cold war ...these drawings with the overly fat fronts of the leading edges of the overwing booms are very strange )  the barracuda book has a copy of the 3 views and a nice underside shot looking up at the sea Vixen  ...compare the pointy slim booms with the 3 view and you will see what  I mean ....

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I had posted about my "FrankenVixen" quite a while back, but it seems that PhotoBucket took a dump on the original unfinished pics I had, so re-upping them here.  I used the upper center section and lower nose of the Highplanes kit (light blue plastic) with it's vac canopy, fused with the majority of the airframe from Cyberhobby (mid gray plastic) and the pinion tanks from Xtrakit (dark gray plastic), correcting a lot of things with Evergreen styrene and various fillers of choice... and spending a lot of time using the photos in Roy's book to get the shapes as close as possible.  I also used the Highplanes nose gear and wheel, because all others are woefully anemic and just totally throw off the looks of their respective kits.  Some may wonder why I did not use more of the Highplanes kit in the conversion and truthfully, its center-section is about the only thing accurate about it.  The booms and the pinion tanks are way too thick.  On the Xtrakit pinions, you'll notice on the sides of their noses the white spots... these are the areas that I back-filled with resin and had to get medieval with the sanding to get the proper shape to them.  Sorry for the quality of the pics, but the best I've got from the time.  I know this may seem daunting, but this is actually one of the more fun and enjoyable kit-bashes I've accomplished.  I really liked a lot of the features of the Cyberhobby kit (especially their intakes/exhausts detail), but just couldn't stand how they cocked up the upper fuselage and nose.  Also, since the time of my conversion, they've re-released their kit with the pinions, so one would not need the Xtrakit at all now... just the Cyberhobby and Highplanes to bash together... but be warned, they copied the Xtrakit overly thick pinion tank noses unfortunately.  One other thing... I did some re-shaping on the vertical stabs from the Cyberhobby kit... seems if I recall correctly, I cut down several millimeters off the very top and also from the leading edge and then did some re-scribing of panel lines... as again, per pics in Roy's book, things did not look right in that area until after I did that surgery.

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Edited by J.C. Bahr
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Thanks Chally!  TheBaron's work has been both mind boggling and very interesting to watch and then there was also Navy Birds great work he did on the Cyberhobby kit!... have been hoping that between the three of us challenging the modeling Gods, would get Airfix to issue a proper Vix, but sadly alas, still no.  😥

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  • Homebee changed the title to 1/72 - de Havilland DH.110 Sea Vixen FAW.1/.2 by Special Hobby (plastic MPM/Xtrakit) - release in 2023 ?

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