A 1/72 Gloster Javelin FAW Mk7/Mk9 by MisterCraft.

[Brigbeale]

Thank you all for your encouraging comments so far.
On the whole, I’m quite enjoying building this Javelin even though it seems, on the face of it, quite a dog - quality wise. But then that’s half the fun of it, isn’t it?

I’ve seen other ones built from the same moulds, one in particular being a ZTS Plastyk kit. Overall it wasn’t too bad, but there were a couple of glaring mistakes, partly due to the kit and the rest (not to knock the modeller) imperfect filling of the seams. 
 

With the undersides painted with the Aluminium/Grey mix (which looks even better in natural light) it was time to mask up for the top/side surfaces ready for painting.

Looking at the expanded Airfix call-out sheets, I set the nose-side, engine intake side and rear fuselage side demarcation lines with thin tape (10mm tape cut into 4 strips) including a slight curve on the forward ones. 
The underside of the wings were masked up and I used a sharp blade to make the curved demarcation lines under the front and rear of the wings on the fuselage. The call-out suggested the front one to be straight down, but I preferred the curved effect. I can always add a straight piece of tape if it’s supposed to be that way.

It was then a case of filling in the unmasked areas to completely cover the underside with the 18mm tape.

The horizontal stabilisers were masked off as well.

I also wrapped tape around the nose cone to limit the amount of unwanted paint on it as it’s supposed to be black.

 

It was time the cockpit canopy went on, but first, the seats had masking tape seat belts added and they were fitted in the tubs with sprue-goo.

The canopy was reasonably clear so it was masked up using tape, a toothpick and a sharp blade.

A quick clean inside with a cotton bud and then the canopy was fitted using Humbrol Clearfix. 
The canopy fits pretty well. There’s a slight gap around the rear where it sits over the rear coaming, but it’s nothing to get too worried about.

 

With the canopy fitted, the additional detail on the fuselage around the front of the tail-fin were fitted. The holes in the fuselage are bigger than the tabs on the parts, I but a squish into the Mr Cement S where it melts the plastic filled the gap (mostly). Also, care had to be taken removing them from the sprue as they’re quite pliable and the sprue isn’t. I just cut the sprue around them first to relieve the tension when I cut the parts free.

 

I cut the refuelling probe from the sprue - although a quick glance and it would be mistaken for part of the sprue itself! 
A quick offer up and the forward locating hole is too small, so it was opened up to 1.5mm. 
The probe fits - kind of!

Its ok at the rear but as it curves to follow the shape of the nose there’s a big recess which will need filling. 
And there’s a big sink mark in the side of the probe itself. I filled that with sprue-goo and I’ll sand it back tomorrow.

The probe also looked like it’s had a gentle overall curve downwards. I just used a bit of brute force to put an upward curve in the probe just forward of the fuselage mounting fairing to straighten it. It’s quite a tough plastic, but fortunately it took the shape I wanted without snapping off.

The end of the probe itself has no detail so I’ll add some with a knife and file to make it look like there’s a tip on it.

Edited August 9, 2022 by Brigbeale

[AdrianMF]

You are getting the Javelin together very nicely, despite the challenges it keeps throwing your way. I’ve been looking at Buccaneers too much recently I think - every time I see the Javelin nose it looks to me like a short squat* Buccaneer.

 

The Contrail vac looks exciting and scary at the same time - there’s a WIP that I will be following!

 

Regards,

Adrian
 

* [edit - “hunched” was the word I was looking for…]

[stevehnz]

I like the look of what you're doing with this, I could well be persuaded to follow this route myself, even though I have an original Airfix FAW.9 in stock, this begins to look like a better way to go in truth. You've certainly made it look doable.

Steve.

[Brigbeale]

I knew I had a refuelling probe from another kit. 

 

This one came from a Revell Tornado. The kit had been used for the some parts so it was incomplete. I purchased it for the undercarriage, fuel tanks, weapons, pods and other ancillaries left on the sprues

[Brigbeale]

The dried sprue-goo on the refuelling probe was sanded flat to kick of tonight’s proceedings.

 

I then went looking through my grey paints for the Dark Sea Grey for the upper surfaces. 
When I looked at it, I thought it may be too dark. I compared it with a couple of Javelin photos to be sure and I was right - it was too dark especially in this scale.

I tried Medium Sea Grey - too light - so I settled on Tamiya XF-66 Light Grey. 
That was airbrushed into the upper surfaces and given a second coat to ensure a good coverage. 
 

While that was drying, I started looking to see how I would go about the green camouflage pattern. With the Junglie Sea King pattern still in my mind (I’m still over the moon with the way that turned out), I figured that could be a possibility. Or I could do the white tac worm filled in with masking tape method.

 

I copied the top view of the Airfix call-out and cut the grey pattern shapes out and sat them on top of the wings and fuselage. Something was off with the scale so I adjusted it and printed another top view. I put the Javelin on top to check the size. The wings were perfectly sized.

 

However, with Adrian’s suggestion about the ‘hunched’ effect when compared to the Sea Vixen, I checked the size of the nose against the Airfix plan view. 
The Mistercraft Javelin nose cone appears to be about 4mm shorter than the call-out - if the call-out is accurate.

A bit of measuring here and there suggested the wings and horizontal stabilisers are the correct size as is the fuselage from the flat back where the exhausts fit to the front of the intakes. 
From the intakes to the nose-cone panel line is about 1mm shorter on the kit and the nose-cone is another 3mm shorter making the overall shortfall 4mm.

I found a plan of the Javelin and sized it to the same dimensions and it too, showed the nose to be shorter than it probably should be. 
 

I did consider cutting the nose-off and replacing it with a 3D printed version, but the nose is packed with lead nose-weights. I can live with it though.

Oh well - it’s not the end of the world is it?

 

The refuelling probe needs shortening by the length of the replacement tip to make it about right.

Well spotted Adrian.

[Brigbeale]

Despite the discovered misgiving with the nose on this kit, I decided to carry on anyway.

A plan popped in there this morning to 3D print a new nose cone to fit over the original nose cone. That should be an interesting exercise!

 

it was out with the 18mm Tamiya Tape this evening to mask up for the camouflage. 
I opted to used the same method as the Junglie Sea King where the expanded images were placed between two pieces of glass over a light source, to trace the camouflage pattern leaving extra at the edges so they could be recut with a sharp blade to blend them in. 
The wings and rear fuselage went fairly well.

I had to use a bit of artistic licence for the nose cone as both side views do not match up with the top view. So I ignored the top view and free-handed the pattern over the nose just in front of the cockpit.

The wing pattern was joined up under where the roundels fit. I was going leave to a gap, but I figured it would be better to mask them off.

This probably wouldn’t make much difference as I’m going to paint the roundel area with a base-coat of flat white as, never having built a Mistercraft kit before, I don’t know how thick the decals are and the last thing I want is the camouflage pattern showing through them. 
The side roundels and tail fin flash will also have a white base coat just in case. 

I cut the two roundels from one of the printed call-outs and placed them in position to check the camouflage pattern looked ok around where they fit.

Edited August 11, 2022 by Brigbeale

[Brigbeale]

Tonight, I painted the green camouflage after making sure the tape had stayed stuck down, especially where it overlapped a previous piece of tape.

All was good, so out with the airbrush and paint.

I elected to paint it with the lightened Tamiya Dark Green.

Despite the heat, the paint went on smoothly (I must be getting good at this airbrushing lark🤣)

I gave it about 1/2 hour to dry and then removed the masking tape - it always feels like Christmas come early when I unmask the models!

I was very happy with the outcome.

 

Previous to the masking being applied, I had to remove the two odd shape protrusions on the starboard upper fuselage forward of the fin. I could not get the masking tape around them successfully. Also, while handling the Javelin, I broke the forward ‘tube’ off the inner port protrusion. I didn’t notice until I’d finished the masking but I couldn’t find it anywhere. 
Once the green paint had been applied, I searched again for it. I found it about 5 feet away from where I was working. It must have got stuck on my clothes and dropped off later.

The protrusions we’re all cemented back into position and touched in with the grey paint.

 

To finish the evening off, I applied Astonish Floor Polish to protect the matt paint and to prepare it for application of the decals.
I’ve decided that rather than paint the white backing circles on, I’ll just lacquer some blank white decal paper (to give it some strength for ease of use), cut the circles and apply them instead.

 

I’m still going to have a try to extend the nose-cone as it looks even shorter now the camouflage is applied. Maybe it’s just me! If it doesn’t work after a couple of tries, I’ll just ditch the idea and paint the nose cone black.

 

 

Another piece of good news is the Contrail Vickers Valiant kit arrived today. It’s a big beastie!

I pictured the fuselage halves with the Vickers Wellington placed on top for scale.

 

Tomorrow, battle recommences with the Focus - reassembling the engine after the parts arrived today. I hope I remember where everything goes, but his brother has another Focus with the same engine so he can send me some pictures if needed.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Brigbeale

[Lord Riot]

That paintwork looks amazing! The grey actually looks perfect. I’ve always used DSG for RAF post-war camo, perhaps I need to use a lighter shade for 50’s fighters.

 

Outstanding work so far, you’ve made a terrible old kit look like new-tool Airfix!

[Brigbeale]

20 minutes ago, Lord Riot said:

That paintwork looks amazing! The grey actually looks perfect. I’ve always used DSG for RAF post-war camo, perhaps I need to use a lighter shade for 50’s fighters.

 

Outstanding work so far, you’ve made a terrible old kit look like new-tool Airfix!

Thank you!

When I took the masking off, I initially thought that the grey was too blue in colour. Once the floor polish went on, it appeared more of a grey colour. 
It’s probably not prefect to some, though. Maybe Medium Sea Grey would be a good alternative…….

[bigbadbadge]

Phwoarrrrr Brian,  this is looking rather lovely,  great job on that paint.  

Good luck reassembling the Focus too.

Chris

[Brigbeale]

I was too tired to do any modelling last night after refitting the parts to the Focus.

I did, though, finish reassembling the engine today and, with a jump start, it started up and ran beautifully- gone was the vibrating from the inconsistency between cylinder pressures. 
So I’m very happy with that - even though I dread the first turn of the key (or push button in this case) when the engine has been apart for what ever reason.

 

After a bit of a rest, I got the modelling stuff out to help to finally decide whether to paint the roundel undercoat on or just use the white decal discs as suggested earlier.

I set some strips of 18mm tape to from a square, and using the compass cutter, cut a hole slightly smaller than the diameter of the roundels for the upper wings.

Not thinking properly, I offered the tape template over the decal sheet to see if it was the correct size and no white paint would be seen around d the edge of the decal.

It was the correct size, but as I lifted the tape again, parts of two other roundels came away from the backing sheet, with the tape🤬.

 

I thought I’d turn the situation around and I got the old beater of another fuselage out of the drawer to see how the decals would look instead of finding out on the Javelin. The same Grey and Green were painted on and allowed to dry.

I then got one of the damaged roundels and cut it out. It was then put in water to soak. Decalfix was painted on the test patch and the decal was taken out of the water.

Even though it was free to move, a part of the already damaged decal remained on the backing paper.

Despite that I had the rest of the decal half on and half off the backing paper to slide it into position on the beater fuselage.

I noticed that the blue outer circle was transparent. The white and red appeared to be ok though.

It was laid onto the fuselage anyway, and as I rolled a cotton bud over it to remove excess Decalfix, the decal split again in the blue outer ring. I jostled the part back into position and applied a bit more Decalfix. 
 

The result is lousy really. where the blue goes over the demarcation of the colours, they’re visible. The white and red appear to cover better, but the colours underneath are still just visible through the white.

If any of the colours would have been affected like that, I would have expected the white to be the worst.

With a closer look, the white which was used as the backing is also visible through the blue, but it doesn’t extend to the outer edge, maybe about a third to a half way through.

 

The conclusion.

As you can guess these decals are cr*p! and remind me of old Frog decals

I’m going to make my own versions of them. 
The serial numbers are on a different colour backing sheet, so hopefully they will m=be better. I’ll try the fictitious number on the beater fuselage first to see if they are any better. I need to use the white serials as I can’t make white decals (well I could by making a negative version colour-wise but matching the Grey would be difficult).

Edited August 14, 2022 by Brigbeale

[Brigbeale]

I produced the replacement roundels this morning after finding a thread in which there is a discussion on roundel sizing.

The consensus was the upper wing roundels should be 66”, the underwing roundels 54”  and the side nose roundels should be 36”. I scaled these to 23.2mm (rounded up to 24mm for simplicity), 19mm and 13mm respectively. 
I also made replacement tail fin flashes. The Squadron stripe was going to have to be the kit original decals.

They were all given a coat of matt varnish and left to dry for the day.

 

This evening I set about making the templates, from Tamiya tape, for the white background circles for the roundels to be placed on.

Using a compass cutter, I initially cut a circles from and old colour call-out and placed the discs over the fresh roundels to check there was a hint of the blue exposed all the way around. This was to make sure there would be no white peeking out from underneath the decal once fitted.

Squares of tape was placed onto the cutting mat and a cross was marked to aid alignment later. 
The compass cutter was used to cut the disc and then it was paced onto the wing. It’s job was to ensure the correct location of the roundel and also to give the outer half of the template something to line up on. Once the outer template was stuck down, the centre disc was then removed to reveal the area for airbrushing. 
The same was repeated for the underwing and side-nose templates.

I took some pictures to show the sequence.

 

I originally intended to mask up the tail fin as the replacement s would also need a white background. But instead I cut the replacements out and used them as a template to cut the same shape from white decal paper. The backing was placed into position either side and once dried off a bit, the fin flashes were fitted. The originals were still whole, but the blue especially, was a completely different shade. 
I then fitted the squadron stripes after giving them a long soak and applying them with just water. One broke as it was being manoeuvred into position but went back together fairly well. 
 

While they were drying, I set up the airbrush and prepared the white paint. With the pressure turned down and the trigger stop set, the roundel locations were airbrushed. 
I cleaned out the airbrush and then removed the masking tape to reveal six white circles ready for the decals to be applied.

Edited August 15, 2022 by Brigbeale

[Brigbeale]

I set about fitting my homemade roundel decals to the white circles.

They went on with no major issues, just a boulder of bits of white poking out on the wings where the vortex generators held the tape up and overspray crept underneath. I just touched them in with paint later.

I almost tried the kit supplied serial numbers. One was cut from the sheet and trimmed close to the lettering. When offered up to the wing, it was obvious they were too big.

So I resorted to my home-made serials which were smaller inscale.

As with the roundels, they went down perfectly although. 
The squadron stripe in the tail-fin chipped on the leading edge despite Decalfix being applied. It was touched in with Tamiya White paint. 

I did try to fit the two white serial numbers to the sides of the intakes, but as with the other decals, they broke up during application, so had to be removed again. I’ll have to make a set of black serial numbers for them instead. I’ve written to Mistercraft, but I doubt I’ll get a decent set of decals instead, even if I get anthing in response.

 

The ‘V’ decals on either side of the fin also broke up. I did manage to get them back into the shape of a V. They’re ok if not inspected too closely.

[AdrianMF]

The home made roundels look great.
 

FWIW, Xtradecal do post-war white serial letters and numbers in a variety of sizes.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[Selwyn]

I too have this kit in the stash and last night I was looking at it against the warpaint drawings. It looks like the inner wing pylons are positioned too close to the fuselage so the  "Bump" on the leading edge is in the wrong place, but what is more worrying is that if you fit the tanks, the tank  body will possibly interfere with the undercarriage legs

 

Selwyn

[bigbadbadge]

Great work on this Brian it is looking absolutely fantastic with your home made roundels and serials.   

Glad you got the Focys sorted too, always a great feeling when the engine bursts into life for the first time after work.

Chris

[Brigbeale]

I spent. most of last night’s modelling session masking the intake surrounds and the demarcation of the nose cone to the green from the fuselage camouflage. 
i needn’t have bothered really and just painted them by hand as, unusually, the paint bled under the tape and onto the green, grey and the aluminium underneath. The intakes were a little better but still required remedial work (touching up).

 

I put the Javelin aside and decided to concentrate on the wheels. 
The kit nose wheel is pretty well detailed (considering the state of the rest of the kit). The main gear wheels are completely devoid of any detail, just a plain wheel with the tyre and that’s it for the detail.

I decided the kit deserved better wheels so I went back to my designs in Onshape and slightly adjusted the tyres from the Gannet build. 
In Cura, I altered the sizing and printed a pair of wheels to match the dimensions of the kit ones, but once they were 3D printed, they turned out to be too thick at 5mm, so I readjusted the size and printed another pair at 4mm. Much better.

I fitted the main gear struts into position to allow them to be completely set before the addition of the wheels.

 

Tonight, I painted the gear struts and wheel centres Aluminium and the tyres Nato Black (as my usual paint - Revell Anthracite has had it. 3 coats of NATO Black and they look good. 
The wheel mounting holes were drilled to 1.5mm and then they were fitted to the main gear struts. They are a good fit and they feel quite solid. 
I fitted the gear doors next. There’s a recessed hole for the pin on the side of the strut to fit into. Of course, it’s nowhere near where it’s supposed to be, so a good dab of Mr Cement S was needed to fix them where they touched. The inner doors and nose gear doors fitted ok - even if they’re a little thicker than I would normally like.

The nose gear was given a flat spot to suggest a weighted wheel to match the 3D printed main wheels.

The Javelin appears to be sitting about right, so I’m happy with that.

 

For the remaining 10 minutes or so of tonight’s session, I decided to fit the outer missile pylons in order to have them fully set for when the missiles get fitted.They were cleaned up and fitted in position. The receiving slot is wider than it should be so may need filling with paint to camouflage the gap. 
The curve on the top of the pylons do not match the curvature of the underside of the wings either. In truth, they’re a shocking fit.
They need to be removed and reshaped to fit the wing properly and also have the angle of fitment adjusted at the back as the missiles would be pointed upwards if not remedied.

 

And @Selwyn, I found out that the placement of the inner pylons, be it the other missiles or the fuel tanks, would be very close if not interfering with the gear bay doors.

I only read your post just after I discovered this issue just before the photos were taken prior to tonight’s update.

Thank you for your insight on this issue.

I think, as a result, the fuel tanks and inner missiles can be left off, although I’ll try a dry fit of both to see if they can be fitted.

[ed-209]

Looking nice I have a zts boxing of this that I got for the decals and as a last resort javlin I also have a hellier that's missing the canopy is there an interesting combo that can be obtained from the 2 

I also have a built t3 a very enjoyable build and an airfix two in the pending pile I sapose I should get a book or 2 to educate my self

 

 

[Brigbeale]

This was just a test page to try out imgbb again, but I’ve forgotten how to get images to display instead of just showing the link.

Edited August 19, 2022 by Brigbeale

[Brigbeale]

Nothing really changed visually last during last night’s modelling session.

The outer wing pylons were removed to re-shape them to fit the wings better and alter the angle the missiles would sit at so they would be more level than pointing upwards.

 

I did try to see if there was a way to fit the underwing fuel tanks by filing a section out of the inner rear side to allow for the undercarriage gear door. It almost fitted but, again the shape of the moulded in pylon does not match the wing. I’ll have a bit more of play with it tonight to see if I can get them to fit - I may have to resort to superglue to fit them though. If they don’t fit properly, I’ll just leave them off, or see if I can fit the other two missiles.

 

The undercarriage hydraulic struts were fitted once they were trimmed to length as they were too long. One side fitted in straight away while the other side put up a fight, but I won in the end.

 

One of those odd shaped parts on top of the fuselage had disappeared again. I found it eventually in the carpet. It was reattached again - hopefully as I’m nearing the end of the build, it’ll stay there this time.

One of the other ones had the front ‘rod’ broken off, so I fitted another from the spares box (an Airfix B-25 Mitchell gun pod barrel). It’ll get trimmed to length tonight.

 

I painted the missiles white after I had drilled a 2mm hole in the tail to hint at the exhaust outlet.

 

Talking exhausts, the main exhausts had the side extrusion blocks removed as well as the flash all round them. The top and bottom blocks were file to angle them - one to the font and one to the back. They were painted with Tamiya Metallic Grey and the insides (once the ejector pin marks had been removed) were painted Nato Black.

The exhausts were then fitted to the fuselage.

 

The front of the refuelling prove was cut off and sanded square. The tip of the spare refuelling prove was cut off and attached to the Javelin’s probe. Once dry, it was painted silver. 

 

A few more touch ups paint wise were done as well.

[AdrianMF]

Despite all the problems, it is looking superb. The paint job with your home made markings is really something special.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[Brigbeale]

I realised today that the Firestreak missiles should have a black nose cone instead of a red one so I repainted them. The missiles need two red stripes around them which I hope to do with thin strips of printed red decal sheet.

 

The fuel tanks will not fit under the wings even though I took files a large chunk out of the inner face, so I’m going for plan B and fit two more Firestreak missiles to the inner pylons. The kit does give 4 pylons for the missiles while the fuel tank pylons are moulded to one half of each tank.

 

Today, I made negative coloured decals for the serial numbers. It would have bugged me if I’d just done them with black letters/numbers. The printed colour for the surround wasn’t that far off. A little touch in with the grey should camouflage the slight difference in colour.

 

A couple of days ago, I gave the original decals a coat of matt lacquer to help to stabilise them. I also took a photo of them in case I needed to print my own set. 
I wanted them for the walkway lines on top of the fuselage. 
None were the correct length and had to be measured and cut to fit. 
The lacquer improved them a lot but a couple still broke. 
I got there in the end with them.

 

The Javelin is in the cabinet while the decals set.

 

[ed-209]

Very nice You've inspired me to have a crack at my kit and try and combine bits from a scrap t3 need to work out which marks are possible been reading all the threads I can find with the result of now thoroughly confused  any way a javlin to be proud of from an old kit 

 

 

[Brigbeale]

It all came to a messy climax tonight (ooh-er-missus!).

Earlier today, the other two Firestreak missiles were cut from the sprue, had 2mm holes drilled into the tail and painted white.

They were dry by the time I started modelling tonight, so I began by shaping the inner pylons bu gently applying a piece of 10mm tape to the port outer pylon and, using a knife, cut the shape where it meets the wing. This piece of tape was transferred to the inner pylons and they were shaped to fit.

The red stripes were added using the aforementioned thin strips of red decal paper. 
One of the already fitted Firestreaks came away during fitment of the stripes but in the end it made it easier to fit them.

The rear fins on the inner Firestreaks needed trimming to allow them to fit with the pylon vertical in the correct spot. 
The missiles were then fitted to their pylons using superglue and the pylons fitted to the wings. 
That took more doing than was necessary as I had to make sure they lined up when viewed from the top, side and front. 
The caps of the inner two Firestreaks were painted black to match the other two.

 

Then, it was a case of going round and touching up the nicks and marks in the paint.

The two air intakes were painted grey with a long bristle brush. Then the intake cowls were touched in with black.

Somehow a red bit of paint had got on the underside between the fuel tanks so that was touched in with the extra mix of Aluminium/Grey. The missile pylons were also given a coat to cover the seams where they fit to the wings.

The dark green had a black mark and a red bit of paint from somewhere so they were touched in as well - and then it happened!

 

Stupidly, I had the pot of paint nearish the edge of the table. Now I had a 2.0 pair of glasses on and as I went to get a dab more paint, my focus was off and I knocked the pot of paint off the table. expecting a big mess in the carpet I was surprised to see just a couple of spots which I cleaned up immediately. 
Now the pot was near empty, so where did the paint go?

Down my jeans, that’s where! And over my left trainer.

So off with them and give them a soaking with Airbrush cleaner and then a scrub with Vanish to hopefully remove the paint. They’re currently on a wash cycle so I’ll see what happens later.

 

Returning to the Javelin, all that was required was another coat of Astonish Floor Polish to blend the touched in spots where the paint was matt.

 

Despite it not being the best of Javelin kits, I’m happy with the way this turned out.

 

I’ve also pictured it with its contemporaries and the Meteor.

[AdrianMF]

It looks great. The red bands round the missiles somehow give it the finishing touch.

 

The other day I got away with spilling half a pot of Revell acrylic chocolate brown over a 22-year old t-shirt, with nothing more than prompt application of soap and water to clean it up. If it had been a new shirt I’m sure it wouldn’t have cleaned up half as well!

 

Nice modern RAF jet collection too. Time for a Harrier?

 

Regards,

Adrian