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Heller 1/72 scale Javelin


James K

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Has anyone made one of these?  I've seen a place advertising them at around £20 which is £12 less than they're asking for the Airfix.  I made the 1/72 Airfix Javelin for my son back when it was first produced (when did they stop it?) and was fairly pleased with the results, will the Heller be similar quality?  

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The Heller Javelin T. 3 is a good basic kit with generally accurate shapes and sections.  Surface detail is in the form of fine raised lines and the wings have vortex generators,but these are a bit chunky, and inset control surface hinge lines.  Undercarriage bays are boxed in and the intakes and exhausts have short lengths of ducting.  The cockpits feature side consoles, control columns and rather rudimentary seats.  Decals wee provided for 60 and 72 Squadrons.

The kit builds up well and needs a little filler; the joint between outer wing panels and centre section is a bit of a nuisance but careful assembly pays dividends

 

Airfix reissued this kit as a T. 3 and as an F(AW)9, however they didn't widen the rear fuselage to accommodate the larger diameter jet pipes of the Mk. 9's reheated Sapphires and the result looks a little under-nourished.  Firestreak AAMs, their pylons, and drop tanks are provided, as are markings for 64 Squadron and one other whose identity escapes me just now.

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18 minutes ago, stever219 said:

The Heller Javelin T. 3 is a good basic kit with generally accurate shapes and sections.  Surface detail is in the form of fine raised lines and the wings have vortex generators,but these are a bit chunky, and inset control surface hinge lines.  Undercarriage bays are boxed in and the intakes and exhausts have short lengths of ducting.  The cockpits feature side consoles, control columns and rather rudimentary seats.  Decals wee provided for 60 and 72 Squadrons.

The kit builds up well and needs a little filler; the joint between outer wing panels and centre section is a bit of a nuisance but careful assembly pays dividends

 

Airfix reissued this kit as a T. 3 and as an F(AW)9, however they didn't widen the rear fuselage to accommodate the larger diameter jet pipes of the Mk. 9's reheated Sapphires and the result looks a little under-nourished.  Firestreak AAMs, their pylons, and drop tanks are provided, as are markings for 64 Squadron and one other whose identity escapes me just now.

Thanks, that's really very helpful.  I was thinking a Javelin would be a nice companion to the Sea Vixen 

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22 minutes ago, James K said:

Thanks, that's really very helpful.  I was thinking a Javelin would be a nice companion to the Sea Vixen 

The real aeroplanes were originally designed to the same specification for a day/night/all weather fighter for the RAF; they went for the Glister GA. 5 which became the Javelin whilst the Navy opted for the dH 110 which became the Sea Vixen so parking one (or more) of each together makes quite a lot of sense.

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If you've already made the Airfix kit then you know what to expect as the Airfix kit was the Heller tooling modified to attempt to produce an FAW9 version. The Heller/Airfix T3 kit is becoming something of a rarity now as once the moulds were modified there was no way back to produce more T3 kits. Both kits build up into a reasonable representation of the Javelin and in my opinion are the best of what is on offer in 1/72 scale but they are products of their time and we really do need a new 1/72 scale Javelin kit. If Airfix were to down size their 1/48 Javelin and Sea Vixen kits to 1/72 scale they would make quite a few modellers of British jets very happy.

 

Duncan B

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Built the heller T3 an enjoyable build of an old kit I also have the airfix q in the stash along with the horrible swirly gray frog copy and an other t3 that's missing the canopy 4 javlins to end up with 2 that are worth building 

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23 hours ago, stever219 said:

The real aeroplanes were originally designed to the same specification for a day/night/all weather fighter for the RAF.

 

Once attended an aviation group meeting with talk from a very senior retired RAF officer who had trained as a Javelin Navigator towards the end of its service and then did an exchange tour as a Royal Navy Sea Vixen Observer and he reckoned that there was not much if anything to pick between them especially as far as his job was concerned.

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At least he could see out of the Javelin. 

Second all the comments on the 

Heller Javelin. It is a nice uncomplicated kit with few surprises. Shame Airfix didn't put a bit more effort when they modified the mould. 

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I picked up both an Airfix T3 and  Heller T3 at a show 5 years back, and the main difference was better plastic on the earlier Heller boxing, in that the Airfix boxing used a much softer plastic.

 

This was a problem with the nosewheel, which is very thin and fragile.  When I built the Airfix boxing, I resorted to coating the nosewheel in superglue in order to reinforce it.

 

I recall having the same problem on a build of the Airfix FAW9, not surprisingly.

 

The Airfix kits both had one piece 'wraparound' tail flashes, whilst the Heller boxing has the more common two piece.

 

Decals were semi-translucent, so I used spares to double decal roundels because of poor colour density.

 

 

Edited by Hepster
typo
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On 02/07/2022 at 17:57, ed-209 said:

Built the heller T3 an enjoyable build of an old kit I also have the airfix q in the stash along with the horrible swirly gray frog copy and an other t3 that's missing the canopy 4 javlins to end up with 2 that are worth building 

The Frog kit preceded and has nothing to do with the Heller/Airfix ones. FWIW.

 

Paul.

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23 minutes ago, ed-209 said:

Sorry thats not what I meant the grey swirly 1i think is a east Europe copy of the frog kit I don't know what the manufacturer is called I bind the box 

Ah.  Goes by the unlovely term 'Frogspawn'. That could be almost anyone then, depending on when it was made. Initially NOVO, as Frog went belly up, and then later a whole host of people, such as Chematic and Eastern Express. NOVO started out okay, and even made useable decals, but soon started using unsuitable plastic and making extremely bad decals (all from the original Frog artwork).  Some of the companies who to this day re-release some of the kits would mould competently, except the moulds themselves have been mistreated over the decades using the wrong plastic at too high a pressure.  I don't recall the specific history of the Javelin kit though (although I may have known once).

 

Paul.

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Which only shows to go you - we NEED a new 1:72 Javelin! Mr Airfix, I'm looking at you - you at least have the information, even if it needs transforming from 1:48 (I already have enough of them, thank you ...)

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On 7/4/2022 at 8:15 PM, Mr T said:

At least he could see out of the Javelin. 

Second all the comments on the 

Heller Javelin. It is a nice uncomplicated kit with few surprises. Shame Airfix didn't put a bit more effort when they modified the mould. 

And he would keep his knees ouch

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  • 1 month later...

Check out my 3D printing of revised parts for the Airfix FAW9 with parts that will also suit the T3.

 

https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235113746-airfix-javelin-faw9-3d-printed-parts/

 

I have already created replacement nozzles for the High Planes conversion.

 

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