Gloster Gauntlet 56 Squadron

[galgos]

So this is the Silver Wings Gloster Gauntlet.....1/32 scale.......with some AIMS additions which were designed for the Gladiator I but which apply equally well to its predecessor the Gauntlet.  First some eye-candy:

 

 

I'm intrigued by the dull matt patches below the cockpit on the fuselage sides, anybody any thoughts about this please?  And my references to date:

 

 

both really excellent books, well worth every penny!  And to the kit, which of course is almost entirely resin:

 

 

 

The Silver Wings prop is really rather awful I'm afraid, but I'd always planned for a two-blade Gauntlet, so much more characterful!

 

Celine didn't pack my kit quite carefully enough!!  Simon at Silver Wings has been contacted asking for the missing bits.

 

 

The Silver Wings pe above, the AIMS Gladiator/Gauntlet pe below:

 

Silver Wings instruction booklets are, shall we say, rather enigmatic! 

 

 

 

....especially in some areas:

 

 

So I've made a start on the Mercury engine.....love a decent engine!

 

 

More soon I hope, if this heat wave continues.......😒

Max

 

[Alpha Juliet]

Nice one - what is the quality like?  What glue are you using?

 

I'll be watching this, if you don't mind. Keep up the good work!

[galgos]

AJ.....the quality is always good from Silver Wings in terms of resin moulding and finish, but always rather lacking in instructions so it helps to have good refs and imagination!  Please join in if you're able, the more the merrier....and I'm using CA throughout.

[bigbadbadge]

Hi Max 

I know you love this type,  looking forward to following and seeing this beauty develope. 

Good luck with your build.

Chris 

[Sandy Crawford]

Looks good so far Max. Glad you like the book.

[galgos]

7 minutes ago, Sandy Crawford said:

Looks good so far Max. Glad you like the book.

Thanks Sandy!  I bought your book initially because I was planning to convert the ICM Gladiator to a Gauntlet, and there is so much essential info in your book so it was a good investment.  Then Simon and his team came along with their Gauntlet which made life much easier for me, but the book is still a "must have" and is going to prove a regular source of information and detail.  I rather fancy doing a spatted version but probably not with this one! 

[galgos]

Good photograph of the Bristol Mercury engine:

 

 

[galgos]

First minor problem, there had to be one didn't there!  The 2 exhaust pipes running from the front of each cylinder don't quite meet with the inside face of the collector ring, and it's very noticeable so something is going to have to be done about it:

 

 

Looking at this excellent picture from Sandy Crawford's book, it's clear that there is a faired bump where each pipe mates with the collector ring, though the profile of the SW ring doesn't really enable me to try to replicate this, so I may need to re-shape this, or do I simply cut off the pipes and replace with more precise ones? 🤔

 

 

Max the Mystified

 

[Mattlow]

Nice work

 

I see there's a much bigger faired bump at around the 3:30 (clock speak) mark. I wonder if that is taking two exhausts in order to leave room for the trajectory of the bullets which must fire through there somewhere?

 

Or is it where the main exhaust pipe joins the collector?

 

Matt

[galgos]

Good questions Matt! I noticed that larger bump too (is there one the other side?) 😀 but have no answers. I’ve cut off the existing 18 pipes but I now need to gauge the space between the front of the cylinders and the inside of the collector ring before deciding which route I’m going down. 

[Patrik]

4 hours ago, Mattlow said:

 

I see there's a much bigger faired bump at around the 3:30 (clock speak) mark. I wonder if that is taking two exhausts in order to leave room for the trajectory of the bullets which must fire through there somewhere?

 

Or is it where the main exhaust pipe joins the collector?

The main exhaust pipes would not make sense that high. I am sure the installation was very similar to Gladiator,  so I would try to get the inspiration from there. I will do so for my 1/72 Gauntlet build.

[galgos]

So here's the cockpit parts cleaned up, plus the brass AIMS bits that I'll be using.  I don't think the Gladiator IP is 100% accurate but it's good enough for me!  The AIMS seat is a thing of beauty:

 

 

The engine is progressing but it's a bit like rubbing your tummy and patting your head at the same time, I'm not sure about the order in which to do things, so cogitation is the name of the game at the moment.  I have a cunning plan for the exhaust pipes coming from the cylinder fronts but need to do a trial or two first....talking of which I've been doing quite a bit of research and have found a very knowledgeable and helpful gentleman over on iModeler, Christopher Amano-Langtree.  He knows a great deal about Gauntlets and has responded quickly to all my questions, including the interface between the exhausts and the collector ring, picture:

 

 

This is a Swordfish but the principle is the same, so the "bumps" are the pipes themselves!  The other thorny question was the matt panels on the fuselage shown very clearly in this photo:

 

 

Christopher's explanation:  The panels were aluminium and were anodized as an anti-corrosion measure. An anodized aluminium panel will appear matt in finish.  The Gauntlet was a transition between polishing and painting. The early Gauntlet Mk.1s (the K40-- series and only with No. 19 Squadron) started out with highly polished panels like the Furys and others before them. The Mk.2s, however, came into service as the polishing policy was actively discouraged and used unpolished anodized panels. The Gladiators were painted overall aluminium as paint formulas had improved to the extent that anodizing wasn't needed.

 

So there we are....sorted!! 

 

 

 

 

[bigbadbadge]

That seat is a thing of beauty Max , looks fantastic,  the engine piccie you have posted is a help to me with my Swordfish build thanks .

Chris

[galgos]

You’re very welcome Chris! 😂

[galgos]

This photo from "On Silver Wings" shows the anodised panels in question very well.

 

 

 

[galgos]

It's been a good day.....we've had some rain, not enough but every little helps!  And I've made solid progress with the cockpit structure, in fact as Silver Wings cockpits go, this was a breeze:

 

 

 

 

 

Nestles very nicely:

 

The 2 horizontal “prongs” in the centre of this structure were part of the original seat moulding, but I carefully cut them off to form the shelf on which the new seat rests. 

 

There is no indication in the instructions about which way the doors fit, but Sandy's book came to the rescue:

 

 

Eagle eyes in the photo above this one may have spotted that I've added the pull chord opener!

 

I've no idea what colour the cockpit interior is but I'm inclined to go for a black framework, aluminium seat, a silverish interior to the panels and the usual pinkish doped fabric.  If anybody knows more, please tell! 

 

Almost forgot....I've nearly finished the engine:

 

 

 

 

Max

[galgos]

Mainly a day of gathering information today, three key points learned.  Firstly about the only (certainly flying) Gauntlet in the world in Finland, albeit not with the "proper" Mercury engine.  I watched 28 minutes of an in cockpit flying display of this aircraft, and right at the end as the pilot got out of the plane I managed to grab this screen-shot:

 

 

So much information in this picture, with the obvious caveat of course that this is a machine flying 80 years after the RAF ones, but the AIMS seat design is confirmed and that interesting apparently leather "handle?" on the port side of the seat.  Also the "handbrake" on the starboard side.  I have since been informed that the leather “handle” is in fact a patch designed to prevent chaffing from the parachute metalwork (short for more technical terms). The “handbrake” on the starboard side is a seat-adjusting lever. Other cockpit shots:

 

 

 

Quite a bit of modern equipment in there, I need to sort out what is and what isn't!  Which leads on to the next point, a drawing from AP1487 which is the manual for the Gauntlet:

 

 

Two factors interest me with this drawing: firstly the large "loopy" seat belt in the cockpit which goes back into the rear fuselage which suggests it's very much like those on the Gladiator....and why shouldn't it be.....and what I'm taking to be a trim wheel which oddly isn't numbered despite there being a leader line going to it.  This drawing was from "On Golden Wings" - I copied it, cleaned it up a bit and pasted it into "Pages" to optimise the size, but when I put the Silver Wings fuselage half on top of it:

 

 

Hats off to Silver Wings for accuracy, spot on!!   A few fascinating finds to finish with:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[alt-92]

15 hours ago, galgos said:

 

That is a very nice shot, look at those antenna wires bending in the air flow!

[bigbadbadge]

The engine looks sweet Max, nice work.  There's some lovely piccies there too.

Chris

[Dunny]

Lovely work Max - having just completed a Mk.II Gladiator I shall follow with interest to see the evolution of the Gloster family,

 

Cheers,

 

Roger

[galgos]

7 hours ago, alt-92 said:

That is a very nice shot, look at those antenna wires bending in the air flow!

Yep, they certainly aren't tight are they?

7 hours ago, bigbadbadge said:

The engine looks sweet Max, nice work.  There's some lovely piccies there too.

Chris

Thanks Chris, just the oil drain to add then it's finished!

[galgos]

6 hours ago, Dunny said:

Lovely work Max - having just completed a Mk.II Gladiator I shall follow with interest to see the evolution of the Gloster family,

 

Cheers,

 

Roger

The heritage is obvious Roger isn't it, though extra struts on the Gauntlet making rigging a tad more challenging! 

[galgos]

Not a lot of time for modelling today....hedge cutting was a greater priority, however I did manage to get the trim wheel (I assume that's what it is) completed.  I found a disc (I think from HK's Meteor kit wheels) which was the right size, but solid so I spent a couple of hours cutting out some plastic!  It's not perfect, but given the location and how much will be visible it's good enough.   

 

 

Once again, plaudits for Silver Wings for getting the framework size and position absolutely spot on!!   There's one other feature that I want to add to the cockpit, but I'm not too far from closing up.  A couple more pics of some Gauntlets in tight formation:

 

 

 

 

 

[galgos]

Getting there with the cockpit:

 

 

A couple of random placards added, the seat belts are the AIMS Gladiator ones.

[galgos]

A little work on the IP(s).....it's going to be a bit of a mongrel!  The AIMS Gladiator is clearly not 100% accurate as I knew it wouldn't be, but it's better than the Silver Wings one which is very much based on the surviving Finnish Gauntlet which is not typical of 1930's Gauntlets.  So I'm opting for the AIMS main IP.  But the SW lower one more like a Gauntlet one than the AIMS offering:

 

 

And a slightly puzzling photo of a line up of Gauntlets; you can see what appears to be the "firebird" symbol on the tail fin of the second plane which definitely suggest 56 Squadron, but "On Silver Wings" says these were allocated to 19 Squadron.  Further investigation required!

 

 

OK, so it's not the 56 Squadron phoenix, but 19's dolphin between wings, apparently adopted because the squadron flew Sopwith Dolphins in 1918.  Excitement over.....