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1/48 Meteor T.7 - Leuchars station flight


Spad

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Hello

I have just registered an almost OOB F.8 but this is one I have been wanting to do for some time so why, I thought, do it as a dual build. I may not get it done as I don't really want to compromise it too much (within my skills that is!) but I figured that I may be able to get some efficiencies in doing them together.

So, this one is the same Airfix F.8 converted to a T.7 using that lovely looking resin conversion from AlleyCat (AC48062C). I shall be finishing it, using Xtradecal X48-046, as WA725 of the Leuchars station flight, used for target towing duties, suitably finished in HSS with black/yellow undersides, dayglo bands (love dayglo!) and joint 43 & 151 Sqn fighter bars either side of the roundel - should be eye catching!

52530696945_f95d09c48b_c.jpg

 

A friend built one and said it was a dream to put together - it looked fabulous, I just hope mine turns out half as well!

Here goes, wish me luck!

 

ATB
Rick

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20 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Another good choice. 

 

12 hours ago, Wings unlevel said:

Keen to see this one, look like just a little bit of surgery required!?

Thanks chaps

Yes, a bit of surgery indeed, but not too bad and, remarkably, not too scary!

AlleyCat have chosen existing panel lines to cut the kit along so using my trusty razor saw I set about the most daunting elements of this build....

 

52534636854_59e7bb16ff_c.jpgIMG_0134 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

Not much original Meteor kit left once it's done! And, yes, I did manage to break the P/E blade!

Think that will do for this evening!

Night all!

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4 hours ago, Dave Swindell said:

And laughs in the face of the reckless! :fool:

Indeed - hence the broken razor saw I guess! 😆

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On 01/12/2022 at 17:47, Spad said:

Indeed - hence the broken razor saw I guess! 😆

It looks like there's no blood been spilt, always a good sign.  A T7 build in 1/48th, this will be interesting to watch. :popcorn:

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8 hours ago, Retired Bob said:

It looks like there's no blood been spilt, always a good sign.  A T7 build in 1/48th, this will be interesting to watch. :popcorn:

No, no blood Bob, just a brief moment of blue air!

But I have been busy trimming edges and refining the resin parts. A quick wash in soapy water as recommended, a spray of primer then a decent coat of Tamiya NATO Black in the cockpit.

52542101214_e34b38e576_c.jpgIMG_0136 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

AlleyCat suggests it might be easier to fit the new nose if the wings are already attached to the fuselage mid section. I reckon this is a food tip as the fuselage once cut is pretty unsupported and flexible so I will be fitting the wing first to maintain the correct cross section and width.

Nothing much to see at the mo' as most of what has happened so far is fettling - so no pics yet.

All for now.

Thanks for dropping by!

Edited by Spad
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6 hours ago, Spad said:

Nothing much to see at the mo' as most of what has happened so far is fettling

It's a good start Rick, preparing the resin nose section and getting it primed and painted.  No ejection seats to bother with, that's a bonus. :like:

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  • 2 weeks later...

So, progress has been slow due to there being lots of fettling and taped-up dry fitting going on while I try to match the resin front end to the kit mid section.

I have built the wings while I'm at it (think I mentioned that I might glue the fuselage section onto the wings to possibly help mating the front end.
like the f.8 parallel build, I similar issues closing the leading edge joints but I think we're there now.

Here's a quick shot of it mocked-up

52563700711_626925e5cb_c.jpgIMG_0163 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

Alongside the F.8 I also addressed the instrument panels where I used the 2 kit decals in an attempt to maintain some level of similarity between the two panels - otherise it was Airscale to the rescue with a high probability of mismatched instrument styles (I know - nerdy! Ziiip!) You can just make out the rear panel - sorry for the blur.

52564233703_2906c2f920_c.jpgIMG_0164 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

That's all for tonight so I bid you farewell and thank you for stopping by.

Night!
Rick

 

 

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The instrument panels are looking very good.  It's always well worth spending the time getting the conversion parts correctly lined up with the kit parts and with a replacement tail section you do not need to bother fixing the short shot Airfix parts.  In fact, you can use the spare complete tailplane kit parts (C2  & C3) from this build in your F.8 build, win, win.  :winkgrin:

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi everyone - hope all had a great Crimbo!?! I know I did!

Now it's all done with I can get back to the bench and show a little progress. As with the F.8, a fair amount of time has been spent tidying the wing seams and refining the edges etc so not much visual to see - no pics.

I have painting the inside walls and adding decals where there appear to be gauges or placards, plus a bit of silver dry-brushing and black wash. Not sure how well it stands up for itself out in the light but I think it should be ok once down in the black hole of a finished cockpit!

Alleycat's designer has tried hard to include the donor kit parts where they can be and here you can see the fuselage halves and floor with the kit forward bulkhead which will take the nosewheel assembly just as Airfix intend.

52590656835_44794377bc_c.jpgIMG_0175 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

I have also spent a load of time trying to get a good match between the resin cockpit section and working on a good fit between the floor and the cockpit halves. To be fair, it is very nicely engineered and once joint faces are cleaned up it literally slots together. Nice one Alleycat! The forward section will hold together simply from the interference fit between the resin parts! The tape here is to ensure stability while I was messing about with the wing, fuselage and cockpit alignments

52589743382_90e6b2447b_c.jpgIMG_0177 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

Like the F.8, I finished of the instrument panels with a matt coat and dabs of gloss for the dial faces

52590656610_55cbff3901_c.jpgIMG_0176 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

Next I need to work out what the seatbelt arrangement is. Nothing is mentioned in the Alleycat instructions but I imagine it to be something similar to the night fighter so I will take my lead from them, in the absence of any hard reference data/pics.

But first, it might be time for bed as tomorrow we're off on the club Annual Pilgrimage to Hannant's where I will pick up a couple of Master pitot tubes for this and the F.8.

 

Night all and thanks for looking in!

 

Rick 

 

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7 minutes ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Getting there looking forward to the next stage. 

Indeed we are! I am also looking forward to the next stage which should be joining the cockpit halves then bringing together all of the primary airframe parts 😜 👍

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hello all and HNY!

Similar to the F.8 scenario, I have been head down beavering at this one due to the rapidly looming deadline (which I note has, thankfully receded a couple of weeks - Thx Enzo!) rather than reporting, so apologies for not being up to date.

I was trying hard to get the nose and tail mounted for the end of 2022 but it didn't quite make it what with fiddly little adjustment and pinickety details etc. I decided that as I couldn't locate any reasonable photo references for the seatbelt configuration, that I would follow a friend's example and use a generic RAF belt set from Eduard and dropped a Sutton (I think) style harness over the seats. Here's where I got to:

52617541622_9a991484c7_c.jpgIMG_0179 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

May not be 100% (or even 50%!) accurate but I think it looks the part.

In general this conversion set is beautifully mastered and moulded - except the canopy. I hesitate to call it the transparencies. Here you can see the windscreen as moulded alongside the main canopy after a session with polishes, various plus a dip in Gauzy Glass Coat - highly recommended. I think good enough for a canopy that will be posed open. 

52617539302_eda5842493_c.jpgIMG_0189 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

As for the windscreen, I am aiming to use the kit example - should fit! I will just have to try to recreate the extra bar in the left side panel the creates the funny little quarter light arrangement - I'm thinking a bit of Evergreen strip (very!) carefully glued in - maybe after a dip in Gauzy or Klear to help protect from fogging - required anyway when attaching to the model as I will need to use cyano.

 

Next update will see the airframe assembled with a bit of paint/primer applied - we're getting there!

Best

Rick

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I am wrestling, however, with the shade of yellow used underneath on the TT stripes. The Xtradecal sheet suggests Trainer Yellow. Feels a little dark to me but not sure. I am aware that later generation aircraft (eg Canberras) use Golden Yellow but can't decide if this is too late a colour for the T.7 I am modelling. Then again, the Boscombe Harvards and their NF.14 chase plane (WS838) were all painted in Golden Yellow and date from the early 60s - anybody any thoughts?

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Well, that was a busy night - got loads done! Yeah right!

This is what the last 10 days have yielded by way of progress.

Both ends of the fuselage resin parts added. A fair amount of sanding, filling with superglue and talc, more sanding and some rescribing. Makes it sound really bad, right? Not at all tbh - it's a great conversion set, fits well and panel lines match to the donor kit. Not a 'shake n bake' by any means but where's the fun in that eh!?

Added the narrow intakes as befits the T.7 and went with the larger tab ailerons. Following comments I read elsewhere in this GB, I filled the panel lines on the intakes as they do seem to be pretty smooth on the real thing. As it is a TT configured aircraft I left the little fairing in place under the rear fuselage. This seems to be a housing for an electrical connector, associated in some way with the TT function.

Got some colour on as well - my old faithful tin of Precision Fluoro Orange came to the fore as ever. I love this stuff and have a number of tins, all dating from the mid 80s

52618986142_004cedd5a2.jpgIMG_0208 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

Masking orange and adding yellow is next I think - just as long as I can find peace with the shade of yellow to use!

 

Night all!

Rick

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 1/11/2023 at 12:22 AM, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Maybe use both yellows. The darker as a base coat the lighter shade as a top coat. Should give it a nice used effect that will blend both colors. 

Well, I'm still plugging away with this one. I took Corsair's suggestion and added a thin coat of Xtracolour Golden Yellow over the original coat of Trainer Yellow.

After a couple of frantic hours masking I got some Nato Black stripes on and here is the result. I sprayed the Golden yellow with the ventral tank in place - you can see here the difference in the colour shade quite starkly demonstrated with the tank removed.

52642021062_6614c486b6_c.jpgIMG_0223 by Rick Smith, on Flickr

 

Quite happy with the colour itself (thx Corsairfoxfouruncle) so next painting step is to mask off and get the HSS topsides on. Before that I need to get the windscreen on - I like to paint the fixed portions attached to the model as they are, after all is said and done, a part of the aircraft structure.

I also need to mask off a bit of the black area to re-apply a section of yellow to create an oblong to go around the underwing serials - silly me for got to do this earlier - just shows, rushing doesn't really pay off!

 

Hopefully more to show tomorrow. Night all!

ATB
Rick

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