Boeing 720 United Airlines ,Revell USA, modified

[Alex1978]

Back in the year 2000,Revell USA released their ancient Boeing 707 kit as Boeing 720.

The first issue dates back to 1964,as they released it as KC-135 Tanker/Transport.

Since then the kit appeared in many different airline markings,none of which of course resembled the real thing.

Revell's 707 comes, if anything, closest to a 707-120.

For this project,I decided to try to modify the kit as good as possible to produce a 720.

 

The fuselage was shortened in front and behind the wings,counting the recessed cabin windows,compared to the real thing.

Some slight adjustments were unavoidable to get the fuselage segments seamlessly back together.

So there is a 2mm discrepancy in length to its 1/139 scale.

But its as close as possible you can get with that kit.

The main gear wheels I replaced with wheels from a Revell 747-100.

They have the same size to the kit parts but are far more better detailed + the original wheels suffered from poor moulding.

The cockpit was replaced with a DACO canopy to correct the front section.

The kit features just window holes and looks completely off.Some later releases had a clear window part and there the shape was quite right.

The rest of the kit was built OOB.

 

The most challenging part was the painting,esp. the wings.

Research on the net showed many different color patterns on the 720,even on United aircrafts,so I picked what I thought looked the most interesting.

The silver/white  on the fuselage was done with masks.I copied the decals and used the paper copies as layout pattern.

The cheatline decal is printed with the blue,white and gold as one unit.

I remembered from an earlier attempt to build this kit,that the white is not opaque.

So here I decided to trim away the white parts.

 As I had shortened the fuselage,the decals had to be trimmed as well.

I used first the copies to find out where to cut and create the correct layout.

That worked out well and only slight touch ups were needed

Paints are my usual brands,Gunze,Tamyia,Testors.

Its not 100% accurate but I am quite pleased with the outcome.

For a more accurate Boeing 720,there is the Roden kit.

It was an interesting and fun build,despite its issues I like those Revell 707 wanabees

 

Something new for the photoshoot...the runway is from the Hawk/Round 2 Comet kit

 

 

Alex

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 10, 2022 by Alex1978

[Bertie McBoatface]

Excellent work.

 

The wide body with the narrow intakes looks very odd, doesn't it?

[Michael51]

Another fine build - a lot of work in that,

 

Michael

[Wulfman]

Looks good to me, great work !

 

Wulfman

Edited May 9, 2022 by Wulfman

[Alex1978]

2 hours ago, Bertie Psmith said:

Excellent work.

 

The wide body with the narrow intakes looks very odd, doesn't it?

 

Thank you very much.

The early engines were quite small in diameter

 

1 hour ago, Michael51 said:

Another fine build - a lot of work in that,

 

Michael

 

Thank you very much.

It was quite some work,also because of the less than stellar fit

 

1 hour ago, Wulfman said:

Looks good to me, great work !

 

Wulfman

 

Thank you very much

[Viking]

What a lot of work, but it certainly paid off, It looks pretty good and I think it is always interesting to carry out these sort of modifications, 'real' modelling instead of kit assembly.

 

Cheers

 

John

[Skodadriver]

Excellent as always Alex but I can't help thinking it might have been easier to start with the Roden kit 

 

The early United livery is lovely and you have captured it to perfection. I remember doing lots of research into 720 wings when I built my Invicta 720B a couple of years ago. I don't know why the 720 had such an unusual pattern but it was completely different from the 707 and pretty much unique. Of course as airlines did repairs and modifications things tended to change and by the end I doubt if there were two 720s with identically painted wings. All part of the fun of modelling!

 

Dave G 🇺🇦

[Alex1978]

7 hours ago, Viking said:

What a lot of work, but it certainly paid off, It looks pretty good and I think it is always interesting to carry out these sort of modifications, 'real' modelling instead of kit assembly.

 

Cheers

 

John

 

Thank you very much John.

Thats true.Sometimes I like to test my skills a bit more and also see what can be done with such old kits.

 

2 hours ago, Skodadriver said:

Excellent as always Alex but I can't help thinking it might have been easier to start with the Roden kit 

 

The early United livery is lovely and you have captured it to perfection. I remember doing lots of research into 720 wings when I built my Invicta 720B a couple of years ago. I don't know why the 720 had such an unusual pattern but it was completely different from the 707 and pretty much unique. Of course as airlines did repairs and modifications things tended to change and by the end I doubt if there were two 720s with identically painted wings. All part of the fun of modelling!

 

Dave G 🇺🇦

Thank you very much Dave.

Yes,thats probably right.

But I had this kit in my stash and as Revell stated it as Boeing 720,I thought I should give it a try and turn into something that resembles the Revell " claim" 😉.

 

Its always a timeconsuming task if a 707 or a derivate thereof is on the bench.

A lot of research on the subject and one ends up with so many different layouts,this can drive one crazy at times.

But as you said...its part of the fun

Edited May 10, 2022 by Alex1978

[David H]

I think you did a brilliant job, given what you had to start with.

 

-d-

[Alex1978]

On 13/05/2022 at 07:42, David H said:

I think you did a brilliant job, given what you had to start with.

 

-d-

Thank you very much.