Gannet AEW.3

[zebra]

Time to start another one - the Alley Cat resin 1/72 Gannet AEW.3. Obviously there's the injection moulded kit from Sword, but this was an irresistible bargain on a local Facebook group so I'm going down the resin route this time. Here's what you get in the box:

 

 

Nicely cast resin, small parts in white metal and PE, and a decal sheet with four marking options.

 

I've started removing parts from casting blocks and priming a few of them - hopefully I'll have something worth sharing tomorrow.

 

cheers

Julian

 

[LorenSharp]

This will be an interesting build. Can't wait to see how this develops Julian.

[Planebuilder62]

Hi there @zebra, I have this kit as well but I am not a CA fan for glueing it together. What are your plans?
Regards Toby

[zebra]

6 hours ago, Planebuilder62 said:

Hi there @zebra, I have this kit as well but I am not a CA fan for glueing it together. What are your plans?
Regards Toby

I'm using a slow-curing CA - it's generally slow enough to allow time to position things properly. Some people use two-part epoxy cements for resin kits, I'm not a fan of those, mainly because I can't stand the smell! I've got another resin build going at the moment - the Piaggio P.166 in the Southern Europe GB - and the slow-curing CA has worked fine.

 

I've made a start on the Gannet - not got very far but it's progress. I've attached the nose part to the forward fuselage and painted and inserted the cockpit and IP into the forward fuselage. Apologies for the poor iPhone photo - you really can't see it in the photo but there's some quite nice detail in the cockpit.

 

 

I spent a little time today trying to decide whether I needed to add any weight to the nose. Normally I'd just stick it in but I'm conscious that the model will be fairly heavy as it is and I don't want to overload the undercarriage. Then I realised the rear fuselage is hollow and the radome is one big solid lump of resin and weighed them both - sure enough, the radome weighs about as much as the whole rear fuselage. So this shouldn't be a tail sitter.

 

more soon

Julian

 

[Planebuilder62]

Dear Julian

About the nose weight. If you tape the fuselage, wings, radome and tail planes on, find out if it tips forward standing on its main undercarriage held in place with blu tack or the Ozzie equivalent. Its much easier to add weight to the nose before its closed up.

 

Regards Toby

[zebra]

Fuselage is assembled and I've started preparing the wings and tailplanes. At this rate I'm going to have to think about paint soon - not sure I've got any Sky...

 

 

 

[LorenSharp]

That is one solid model Julian.

[zebra]

12 hours ago, LorenSharp said:

That is one solid model Julian.

Thanks! Although the fuselage is hollow so not quite so solid.

 

Wings are on:

 

 

This has all been pretty straightforward so far. I'd be surprised if the Sword kit was any easier than this. 

 

more soon

Julian

 

[LorenSharp]

Still it's going to have  some heft to it when done.

[heloman1]

Neat choice, I built it a few years back when it was first released. It's it builds well.

 

Colin

[zebra]

Back to the Gannet now the Sea King is done. A few bits added that you can't see here - flaps for example. Radome is on and it's definitely not going to be a tail sitter! I had to repair one of the finlets on the starboard tailplane as it had broken in the box - a bit of plasticard did the job - and also (you can't see it here) reprofiled underneath the tail to better match plans and photos in the area where the hook will sit. Tailplanes will stay off until everything's been painted.

 

 

more soon

Julian

 

[zebra]

Ready for paint:

 

 

[zebra]

Painted and gloss-coated, ready for decals:

 

 

 

[Col.]

Nice work this far Julian. The spinner alone looks to be an exercise of skill and patience.

[LorenSharp]

Now its starting to look proper. Nice work on the spinner Julian

[zebra]

13 hours ago, Col. said:

Nice work this far Julian. The spinner alone looks to be an exercise of skill and patience.

 

11 hours ago, LorenSharp said:

Now its starting to look proper. Nice work on the spinner Julian

Thanks! I'm very pleased with the spinner - I had a plan and it worked. I had planned a different scheme with much thinner yellow and black rings on the spinner and got as far as painting it yellow and trying to mask it, but it stretched my patience a bit too thin. So I was pretty relieved when I took the masks off on the red and black rings!

[LorenSharp]

Did you get any pictures of how you did the spinner? That's always been a pain in the backside fro me to do. I lucked out with the Dynavector kit as it had separate plates which made painting easier.

[zebra]

20 hours ago, LorenSharp said:

Did you get any pictures of how you did the spinner?

Sorry, no. But I could take some to illustrate the process, which was this: A while back I bought a few of Maketar's generic pre-cut mask sets including one for nose cones which includes various different thin curved strips, and one with circles of various sizes. So I used the pre-cut curved strips, and the key was to find a way to position them so that they would be concentric with the spinner. I assembled the spinners (separate parts for the front and rear spinners, which push fit quite snugly) and painted them red, then marked out the positions to put the curved strips in using appropriately-sized pre-cut circles: For example, if the edge of the red stripe was to be 3mm from the base of the spinner, I would use 3mm circles (four of them, so had one mid-way between each blade root) and positioned them so the edge of each circle would be at the base of the spinner. If the curved strip is then positioned such that it touches the edge of each circle, it should then be 3mm from the base of the spinner and concentric-ish with the spinner. Repeat for the other edges of each curved strip, remove the circles, and you should then have a pretty good red stripe masked off.

 

It wasn't perfect, but good enough, particularly considering there will be 8 blades getting in the way and helping to hide any flaws!

 

Meanwhile I've got most of the decals on:

 

Most of the stencils on the other side still need doing. Have I ever mentioned that putting on stencil decals is my absolute least favourite modelling task? I've also got the undercarriage components (mostly) painted and I'm halfway there on the prop blades. Forgot to paint the exhausts though, must get them done ASAP.

 

more soon

Julian

 

[zebra]

Nearly there - just some PE blade aerials to paint and attach:

 

 

 

[Thom216]

Great looking finish!

[zebra]

Finished, just in time for the end of the GB. More photos in the gallery shortly.

 

 

thanks for looking

Julian

 

[LorenSharp]

Beautiful job Julian. Thanks for sharing with us!

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Great work on the Gannet but you know … The more I spend time here at the Forum the more Im becoming British. I never thought about wanting to build a Gannet and before that it was the Beaufort. These aircraft are really really growing on me. 😉

Edited November 26, 2023 by Corsairfoxfouruncle

[LorenSharp]

Before long Dennis, you'll be wanting to order some bangers and mash and a good meat pie along with  a fine pint o'bitters  .Not to mention barracking for Manchester United. But be careful. they drive on the wrong side of the road in the States.

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

1 hour ago, LorenSharp said:

Not to mention barracking for Manchester United.

Already a huge fan of United…