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Dassault MD 550 Dujin resin 1/72


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I have had this in the box for several months waiting until I had the courage to tackle it. Has anyone here ever finished, or even started a Dujin kit? Anyway discovering this thread means that once started I must put some effort into it and I really want one in my collection of prototypes.

 

 

52633144384_99de0f2f29_b.jpgFirst page

 

The contents

 

52633384473_90d45b69df_b.jpg

 

The fuselage comes as upper and lower halves and you can see at once there are going to be problems with fit and shape. That nose is supposed to be pointed.

52632899601_bd07bc5e66_b.jpgFuselage halves taped

 

First of all the lower fuselage half is mounted on to the wing

52632900356_2eb08f9988_b.jpgLower fuselage on wing

 

Next the upper fuselage half is added. Despite the huge gap seen above the nose section has enough flexibility to enable the upper and lower parts to be sqeezed together

and CA run into the gap followed by a good sqeeze and , glory be, it stuck together satisfactorily. At times I love CA.

Once that was done out came the sanding block and the nose was shaped into something resembling the a/c.

The sides of the nose turn inward and require a considerable amount of filler. The wing to fuselage joint has a considerable gap and as it is faired into the fuselage there is going to be

some fun and games making a neat joint

52633389823_78a0d5c787_b.jpgUpper fuselage added

 

The underside of the nose has a considerable kink which needs to be filled

52632903151_a9af3c30a2_b.jpgUnderside filled

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Yes, it's a twee little thing. Anyway onwards...

Next you have to cut the back end off and replace it with one which represents the original configuration as the current one represents the later configuration after it was modified to have afterburners fitted.

Guess what? It doesn't quite fit being OK in width but too small in depth. not a showstopper but...

After doing that I decided to take the opportunity to hollow out the back end as all that solid resin would, i'm sure, make it a tail-sitter.

52633156294_3393146dee_b.jpgRear end cut off

 

At the same time I decided to cut off the nose because I became aware of a major problem. The cockpit 'innards' don't fit.

The instructions , in French would you believe, would have you fit them before the upper fuselage is added and they wouldn't have fitted even without surgery.

Note those intakes. There will be trouble there I tell you. I will try to get a better picture.

52633152929_223ed83fda_b.jpgFront end cut off

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You've picked an interesting and unusual subject here John. While the kit certainly isn't containing the most polished and usable set of parts they don't seem to be slowing your progress :thumbsup:

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15 hours ago, Col. said:

You've picked an interesting and unusual subject here John. While the kit certainly isn't containing the most polished and usable set of parts they don't seem to be slowing your progress :thumbsup:

You have not seen what is coming next!

14 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Welcome to the build, Ive heard of Dujin but never have seen one get built. 

Not many people have although in my initial trawl of the internet for data I did find a picture of what I think was built from this kit.

52634753239_415e177c86_z.jpgCompleted model from the internet

 

Someone in the WIP section years ago started a Durandal but stopped and I have a Dujin kit of the Sud-Ouest 6000 the fuselage halves of which look like bananas.

John

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Cockpit problems.

There is an obstruction that stops the seat base fitting into the cockpit that has to be removed.

 

52634812224_e0e397f837_b.jpg

 

 After thhas been done onother problem becomes apparent. the seat base is too long to fit into the nose. It is also too wide and has to be thinned

 

52634971713_a8282cb098_b.jpgOverhead view of cockpit components

 

Seen from the side and comparing it with the drawing it is evident that the back of the seat base is too thick

 

52634971693_f79e400b70_b.jpgSeat assembly offered up to the drawing

 

Once the seat base is moved back to get the pilot's headrest into the correct position it shows that much of it (all?) has to be removed

52634971723_87442a69fd_b.jpgSeat where it should be

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Now we are getting to the awkward stuff. This is what happened to the nose

The cross section should be rectangular so a Vee was cut out of the undersurface then closed up. It was then filled with 'Liquid Lead' and an apology for the instrument panel glued to the front.

 

52640299206_ee18343a3f_b.jpgNose stages

 

 

This is what is happening to the intakes. They were by no means the same shape and neither matched the shape of those in the a/c and their leading edges were very rough

The leading edges were buil up using filler ( a mixture of CA and Talcum powder) and some shaping done. I prefer to use this filler as I find that it sands like resin and sharp edges are more sturdy than Milliput

It also has the advantage of setting very quickly (and the disadvantage of setting very quickly). You mix only a little and use it immediately. It is also expensive

 

52640558434_08f859859f_b.jpgIntake stages

 

The back end of the fuselage where the new exhausts were fitted was filled and sanded and some filler was added to the left side of the fuselage aft of the intake after it was widened to modify the shape

 

52640734325_322684e974_b.jpg

 

I cannot see this being finished before the deadline but at least the pressure keeps me going

John

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As you can see from the above pictures there is no way that the intakes are going to match those of the a/c so where is the problem?

I think that there are two causes. One is that the fuselage of the model is too deep according to the drawing I have which has all the hallmarks of orinating from Dassault.

This would explain at least some of the problems I had in getting the seat at the correct height.

The other is that the bottom of the fuselage is not sufficiently rounded which means the intakes are around 9mm deep compared to those on the drawing which are 7mm.

As I reckon that I am not going to be finished in time and as they say 'if there were no fools there would be no fun' I may well try to fix this.

The comparison below shows that the a/c cross section is elliptical whereas the model isn't and how the intake sizes differ

52640635441_11b238e818_b.jpgHead on comparison

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I

5 hours ago, Col. said:

Seems this one has become a labour of love John and quite right to make it right rather than quick :thumbsup:

I'm not sure about the "love" part of that but it is becoming an interesting exercise trying to work out what's wrong and if it can be put right.

So...

Still trying to work out how to get the intakes to look like the a/c I took the front view on the drawing and drew an ellipse with the dimesions of the fuselage height and width

and superimposed it on the a/c drawing and the model and it ended up like this

52644747154_06e8ed8da2_b.jpg

 This shows that there is no way to get the intakes to match those on the drawing so where is the problem?

 

I then made a visual comparison of the side views of the model and the drawing and there appeared to be a 'hump' aft of the cockpit so I cut off the fairing that is behind the cockpit

(it's too large anyway) so I could flatten the hump but before I started the surgery I compared the side views of the model and the a/c and what i found surprised me

 

First of all the with the fuselage cut out of the drawing. It is evident that the fuselage tapers from way back to a needle point.

52644957990_0c2c331eea_b.jpg

 

 I them superimposed a side view of the model on to it and got something that I did not expect

52644953970_434cd4afbb_b.jpg

 

The front is not far wrong but the hump should be larger and extend as far as the wing trailing edge so it's out with the Milliput to build it up.

(Do I really need to do this???)

I think that the sensible(?) thing would be to build a completely new nose from the cockpit forward as the current cocpit sides are far from satisfactory anyway.

The one thing in favour of this is that a 3/8 inch plastic tube, halved is just about the right size for an intake.

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These kit parts aren't much more than a rough approximation of the real machine but your work this far also shows it can be done.

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It makes the travails with the AW52 look like a walk in the park. You are putting some serious effort in there, which you really should not have to. 

Good luck with it. 

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I suppose I didn't really 'have to'. It's the old 'loose thread in a sweater syndrome'. You find one bit wrong and in looking for a correction you find all sorts that are not right either and this coupled with my inability to let well alone got me into this situation.

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Well I decided to work on the top of the fuselage. I think that this is as far as it is going to get before this section is closed. Note that I managed to get a chunk of lead into the space behind the cockpit.

Hopefully it will continue in the WIP section but right now it is close to being put on the shelf of doom.

The big issue to be decided is how to build the nose cone as it needs to hold a fair amout of lead. One idea is to cast a cone from lead and surround it by coat of resin. That would be an intereresting exercise.

Another idea is to hollow out the exposed face of the fuselage before packing that with lead.

 

52654342943_9dfa5a9199_b.jpgRear fuselage built up

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Glad that you're continuing with this one John. Seems you have some interesting options to get enough weight into the nose section :thumbsup:

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