Mirage 2000-5F EC 1/2 Cigognes - finished, phew!

[Wings unlevel]

7 hours ago, Sam said:

might be priming mine today. You too?

Hopefully. But I still need to prep all the landing gear struts/doors/wheels etc which I’d like to do at the same time. But I think the airframe is pretty much ready, finally!

[Wings unlevel]

Primer on today.

 

 

Really happy with the wing join gaps, but the spine seam needs more work. Still, getting primer feels like real progress.
 

(Primed my Draken at the same time - it’s a much simpler kit which has come together much more quickly.)

 

 

 

[Sam]

Very very neat! 
Priming is the first moment of truth, you seem to have gotten away with little extra work. 
 

 

[Wings unlevel]

10 minutes ago, Sam said:

Priming is the first moment of truth

There’s no hiding those seams!

[Wings unlevel]

A just for the record post. I realised today the kit instructions have you fit the inboard main landing doors deployed, but looking at images I can see they only open when the gear extends/retracts, and are closed when the aircraft is parked or taxiing. That had me excited for a moment, two fewer fiddly doors and hydraulic arms to fit, what’s not to like?

 

 

Well what’s not to like is the doors don’t fit closed particularly well, and I had to hack away at the beautiful internal detail to make them fit as they were too thick and were sitting proud without some wielding of the knife. Now they sit relatively flat but the fit is not the best. Not sure if my hacking hacked away too much…

 

Anyway, that, plus a few splashes of Mr Surfacer, was the sum total of my modelling today,

 

But I had the Fighter Pilot Podcast’s M2000 episode for company while I did so.

 

 

The guest was a former French M2000-5 pilot so it was particularly relevant/interesting.

 

I also found this short video on M2000-5s being deployed on a NATO air policing rotation.

 

I’ll base my load out on what’s in the video - the two big tanks, a Mica IR and a Mica EM.

 

So a productive hour or two, even if the build didn’t progress too much further.

 

 

 

 

[Sam]

6 minutes ago, Wings unlevel said:

But I had the Fighter Pilot Podcast’s M2000 episode for company while I did so.

Jello is doing an exceptional job with his podcast and now youtube, and the guests are always very very well chosen. Even if he doesn’t represent the DoD or any of its components… 😂😂😂

 

 

[Wings unlevel]

20 minutes ago, Sam said:

Jello is doing an exceptional job with his podcast and now youtube, and the guests are always very very well chosen. Even if he doesn’t represent the DoD or any of its components… 😂😂😂

 

 

He is really good. He’s a good interviewer, lets his subjects speak, he keeps the show from drifting into it being ng about pilots swapping war stories, asks knowledgeable questions but at the same time keeps the show accessible for a more general audience. What’s not to like, as he would say!

[Wings unlevel]

After a bit of TLC cleaning up a few joins I wasn’t happy with (primarily the spine), and the primer touched up, it was on with some marbling this morning.

 

 

Hoping to get just a little variation in the base coat colours when they go on.

[Sam]

Goodday @Wings unlevel

that‘s looking good! 

[Wings unlevel]

1 hour ago, Sam said:

that‘s looking good!

Thanks Sam, seems to have been reasonably effective. I’ve now put down the first of the base coats, AK Real’s light ghost grey:

 

 

Looking ok so far I think.

 

Under my desk lamp light the ghost grey seems a bit too blue perhaps. Will see what it’s like once I’ve applied the intermediate blue tomorrow.

[Rabbit Leader]

Colours can always be deceiving, especially the many variations of Grey. I’m sure it will look different again under another light source. Looks great to my eye! 
 

Cheers.. Dave 

[Cookenbacher]

This is looking so cool!

[Wings unlevel]

On 23/04/2023 at 10:17, Rabbit Leader said:

Looks great to my eye! 

 

9 hours ago, Cookenbacher said:

This is looking so cool!

Thanks Dave, Cookie! It’s been a slow reveal, this build, but it’s looking alright.

 

Continuing that progress to looking alright, I sprayed the intermediate blue on today.

 

 

Think the colours look pretty good actually - depends what reference photo you choose! But they’re pretty close I think.

 

I’ve got a few spots to touch up (missed a few spots!) but I’m happy with how it’s coming together.

[Sam]

@Wings unlevel, the colour looks good like this. It‘s pure intermediate blue as I understand? I compared my bird with the pictures of my reference book „M2000 under the skin“ by eagle aviation, and it did not look blueish enough. Maybe different paint manufacturers have slight differences in the intermediate blue. 

[Wings unlevel]

4 hours ago, Sam said:

the colour looks good like this. It‘s pure intermediate blue as I understand?

It is, I used AK Real’s RC235 intermediate blue, which looks close to spot on I think.

[Cookenbacher]

Very convincing colours - I would never have guessed intermediate blue - thanks for that!

[Wings unlevel]

11 hours ago, Cookenbacher said:

I would never have guessed intermediate blue

I’ve just gone off the instructions colour call-outs, which look pretty accurate, at least for the AK range. 

What looks a lot less accurate compared to the real thing is an aeroplane without its nose! 😱

 

 

I painted the nose today, but not long after I managed to knock it off! You might recall that to build the 2000-5F from this kit you have to saw off the original 2000C nose and replace it with the 2000-5F’s radome/nose. But that means a but join which obviously is/was not the strongest!

The model slipped from my fingers while I was handling it today (turning it over to begin masking around the landing gear bays). It didn’t fall very far at all, but far enough it seems! 
 

It’s a very clean break but I’ll leave reattaching it for another day when I’m feeling not quite so clumsy - I’d like to avoid as much clean-up as I can!

 

 

[Biggles87]

I expect you said something like " Oh dear!" when that happened didn't you?

Good luck with the repair, I'm sure we won't be able to see the join.

 

John

[Wings unlevel]

12 hours ago, Biggles87 said:

I expect you said something like " Oh dear!" when that happened didn't you?

Good luck with the repair, I'm sure we won't be able to see the join.

 

John

Something along those lines, yes! 

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

On 4/25/2023 at 7:41 AM, Wings unlevel said:

You might recall that to build the 2000-5F from this kit you have to saw off the original 2000C nose and replace it with the 2000-5F’s radome/nose. But that means a but join which obviously is/was not the strongest!

In the past when I have butt joins like this I take 2-3 .5-1 inch long pieces of sprue or plastic rod. I drill holes inside the safe zone at the rear of the resin nose. C/A the plastic strips. Then when that is hard/set I slide the nose and plane together gluing the plastic with tube cement. Then adding gel C/A to the resin. 

[Wings unlevel]

3 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

In the past when I have butt joins like this I take 2-3 .5-1 inch long pieces of sprue or plastic rod. I drill holes inside the safe zone at the rear of the resin nose. C/A the plastic strips. Then when that is hard/set I slide the nose and plane together gluing the plastic with tube cement. Then adding gel C/A to the resin. 

Good advice, Dennis, thank you. I had thought of using plasticard tabs but didn’t have any stiff enough. But using sprue is a great idea (so obvious I didn’t think of it!). The nose for the -5F is styrene too, so that simplifies the process a little.

Edited April 27, 2023 by Wings unlevel

[Wings unlevel]

Nose is reaffixed. Per Dennis’s suggestion I used a bit of sprue as a strengthener, hopefully. Then some Mr Surfacer to clean up the join best I could, without over sanding and snapping the nose off again. Phew!

 

 

So happy enough with that. Cleaned up/touched up the paint too. So far so good.

 

But then I inserted the exhaust, which I’d assembled and painted up, and now I have another gap. 🤦‍♂️

The exhaust nozzle comprises three sections which mount around the end of the internal exhaust. It’s a fiddly design and I now I can see the three nozzle sections are not completely aligned and so don’t sit flush when mounted in the airframe.

 

At least the exhaust is not glued in, but it is jammed in pretty tight, so I may need to force it out and have another go. That’s if I don’t break anything in the process!

[Cookenbacher]

Beautiful!

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

5 hours ago, Wings unlevel said:

Nose is reaffixed. Per Dennis’s suggestion I used a bit of sprue as a strengthener, hopefully. Then some Mr Surfacer to clean up the join best I could, without over sanding and snapping the nose off again. Phew!

 

 

So happy enough with that. Cleaned up/touched up the paint too. So far so good.

Happy to hear it worked out. 

[Wings unlevel]

Lost a little enthusiasm with this build between the nose join and the exhaust nozzle gaps, both of which are cruder than I’d like, plus work has been busy, so this hasn’t had a lot of love lately. But last weekend I finished up paint touch ups and applied a gloss coat, and today I started decaling.

 

 

Decals on the whole behaved well and weren’t troublesome to work with. My only real complaint is the blue in the French roundels is too light. But on the whole I think it looks pretty good. Lots of stencil decals to go, but I’m pleased to have some progress to show!