Falklands Phantom FGR.2 questions

[Mark V]

I just finished my Revell FGR.2 23 Sqd Phantom in the ‘70s Green/Gray camo so next up is a Falklands Phantom in the grays. 

I did a search for photos, and previous posts, but couldn’t find definitive answers to a couple of questions. 

1. There are two versions of the SUU-23 gun pod, the tail with a long tapered fairing or a short “bob tailed” fairing. Did the Falklands jets use one or the other, or both?

2. I thought that I read that the red painted hazard areas; e.g. speed brakes interior, flaps and aileron edges, were pink rather than red due to thin overspray of the underside light grey. True?  (I can’t find the posts that discussed this. Sorry.)

3. Did all of the Phantoms deployed to the Falklands have the rear cockpit periscope installed?

4. Did the jets have external rear view mirrors installed?  Most photos show one mirror at the 12 o’clock position (canopy apex). 

5. Photos show external wing fuel tanks were either medium sea grey upper/light aircraft grey lower, or what looks like overall Camouflage, or Barley, Grey.  Thoughts?

I am planning on doing VX466 “E” using the XtraDecal sheet of the 23 Sqd history. I could only find one photo of this jet in the Falklands, a front quarter view of the jet taking off. It gives me an excellent view of the forward nose gear door and the weapons load. 

I will start a WiP thread soon.  I just wanted to get ahead in the planning of this one. 

Thank you in advance for assistance in answering my questions. I did spend a couple of hours searching Britmodeller and google in general. 

[RAGATIGER]

Hi Mark

 

Well following  the flow there are more than one conversations regarding the RAF Phantoms in Falklands War like this ones

 

And of course you also can look here for the decals

 

https://aztecmodels.com/

 

https://aztecmodels.com/collections/decals/products/d-063-war-for-the-falklands-malvinas-2

 

(by the way there is more than one option for RAF Phantoms in Ascencion  Island)

 

Regards

 

Armando

[FortyEighter]

11 hours ago, Mark V said:

11 hours ago, Mark V said:

I am planning on doing VX466 “E” using the XtraDecal sheet of the 23 Sqd history. I could only find one photo of this jet in the Falklands, a front quarter view of the jet taking off. It gives me an excellent view of the forward nose gear door and the weapons load. 

 

Nice choice of airframe Mark; I finished the same one in KUTA 2021 (Gallery Page2) and like you based my choice on the Xtradecal 23 Sqn sheet.

 

Photos of this as a 23 Sqn bird are rare (though there is a nice full starboard view in Patrick Martin's "British Phantoms" book (Double Ugly Vol 5)).  In its later 1435 Flt guise there are a lot of photos - it must be that white tailfin.

 

As for the fuel tanks, your suggested colours are very common though as you can see from my photos I finished one in triple grey tones, not necessarily correct for XV466 "E" but there are some photos of Falklands FGR2s with this scheme - presumably an older tank had the nose section replaced and nobody was bothered about repainting the whole tank.

 

Mike

[Phone Phixer]

As I mentioned on your build thread, I'm doing the same as you. Currently slowly making a start. Mine is XV497 D from when I was down there in 1988.

It still survives and has been re-painted in these colours. Currently located at the old RAF Bentwaters cold war museum.

 

To answer your questions.

1, The SUU 23a gun pods could have either long or short rear fairings. They just came from the gun bay with what ever was in use.

2, It varied across the fleet with the red painted areas. Some were low viz pink, same as the pink in the roundels. Others still had full red paint in the areas. Time is making the memories dim, but I think all aux air doors and speed brake areas were full red.

3, Yes, all aircraft had the TESS periscope.

4, Only the rear canopy had the external mirror at the 12 o'clock position. Both canopies had 3 internal mirrors around the canopy frame.

5, The sargeant fletcher wing tanks were usually light aircraft grey on the pylon and undersides, barley grey on the uppers. As mentioned above, you could see lots of variations if sections had been replaced by the tank bay.

 

 

If you fancy doing some scratch building, all the aircraft down the Falklands had AN/ALE 40 chaff & flare dispensers on the inboard pylons.

Talking of the inboards, remove the MWA's (multi weapons adapters) from the lower surface. They were used for ground attack weapon fits, not air defence.

 

Any other questions, give me a shout.

 

Rob.

[Mark V]

Armando, Thanks for the links. I did see those threads when I searched before. Some good information there.

Mike, Thanks for your comments and info also. Mismatched external tanks was not unheard of, as you noted. At Spangdahlem we usually had a few on the jets that were made up of 2 or 3 different tanks recombined. Your models look great. 

[Mark V]

16 hours ago, Phone Phixer said:

As I mentioned on your build thread, I'm doing the same as you. Currently slowly making a start. Mine is XV497 D from when I was down there in 1988.

It still survives and has been re-painted in these colours. Currently located at the old RAF Bentwaters cold war museum.

 

To answer your questions.

1, The SUU 23a gun pods could have either long or short rear fairings. They just came from the gun bay with what ever was in use.

2, It varied across the fleet with the red painted areas. Some were low viz pink, same as the pink in the roundels. Others still had full red paint in the areas. Time is making the memories dim, but I think all aux air doors and speed brake areas were full red.

3, Yes, all aircraft had the TESS periscope.

4, Only the rear canopy had the external mirror at the 12 o'clock position. Both canopies had 3 internal mirrors around the canopy frame.

5, The sargeant fletcher wing tanks were usually light aircraft grey on the pylon and undersides, barley grey on the uppers. As mentioned above, you could see lots of variations if sections had been replaced by the tank bay.

 

 

If you fancy doing some scratch building, all the aircraft down the Falklands had AN/ALE 40 chaff & flare dispensers on the inboard pylons.

Talking of the inboards, remove the MWA's (multi weapons adapters) from the lower surface. They were used for ground attack weapon fits, not air defence.

 

Any other questions, give me a shout.

 

Rob.

Rob, thanks for the info. I thought about messaging you directly but figured other people would also like to know the answers to my questions. I’m going to save the above and print it out. I’ll save it with my other RAF Phantom notes. 

On the ALE-40s, were they the same boxes as we had on the USAF jets?  Triangular front fairings with the chaff boxes attached. Our flare boxes had a “wedge” adapter to angle the flares downward a bit. I have some included in the True Details inboard pylon sets so no scratch building required if so. 

Thanks for the hint to trim off the bomb rack adapter from the pylon. 

Now off to work on the model...

[Phone Phixer]

Hi Mark.

Yes, they sound exactly like the set up on the inboards. Even the wedge is the same to direct the flares downwards.

Do you have a link for the true details set. I'm interested.

 

Rob.

[Mark V]

2 hours ago, Phone Phixer said:

Hi Mark.

Yes, they sound exactly like the set up on the inboards. Even the wedge is the same to direct the flares downwards.

Do you have a link for the true details set. I'm interested.

 

Rob.

Hi Rob,

The True Details resin pylons sets were part of the old Squadron Shop line in the USA.  I bought several sets for my Hasegawa 1/48 USAF F-4E and G kits.  Depending on when the sets were cast, the packaging changed.  Also the resin is either gray or cream colored.  The set number and parts are the same for both. 

 

 

I used the inboard pylons on an F-4D kit that I built several years ago, but did not use the ALE-40 bits.  I put a quick, very poor, wash on one set to try to highlight the details.  It's not too bad.  

The clean set shows a chip out of one of the parts.  It's a flare adapter piece, so the flare box will mostly cover up the chip.

 

 

 

I will use these parts on the FGR.2.  

 I don't know if the US Navy and RAF pylon sets, the pointy ones, have the ALE-40 parts included.  I couldn't find a decent photo or diagram of the parts included.

[Phone Phixer]

Thanks for that. They look just like the ones used. The backing plates just need the angled bit cutting off. The plates we used were just flat metal sheets.