Skybirds'86 1/72 Scimitar *FINISHED*

[JamesP]

Before adding to the canopy, just time to remember to add the coaming and seat. I added a small fairing behind the seat that was shown clearly in a contemporary photo. The parcel shelf appears to be EDSG.

 

 

 

The vacform canopy is moulded so that it will fit over the top of the forward fuselage before that is glued in place, aligning perfectly so that the cuts can be marked. Unfortunately, I seem to have forgotten to take photo of this. There is a recess around the windscreen to allow the vacform to provide this area and avoid having to glue/fill around the windscreen - a very modern idea that we are only seeing recently in mainstream kits. Well sort of, the sides are fine, but the very front of the windscreen butts up against the metal nose.

 

I marked the cuts with tape before trimming back, then the usual back and forth of creeping up on a good fit - and then still slightly over trimming some bits. Note, the sides of the canopy flare out to meet the fuselage. Gluing this in position of was faff too, even with it taped down the CA didn't grab enough and there was a bit of movement.

 

I got the nose lined up and glued on well enough only to find it was angled slightly to one side. I removed it and a 10thou shim brought it back into alignment - all the cleanup of the joint etc means my spotless canopy is now home to a flock of dust mites. Most of the sanding was to round off the bottom of the fuselage to match the nose.

 

 

 

At least the nose is straight

 

 

Here is the whole thing, tailplane dry-fitted - I may paint it separately

 

 

[Planebuilder62]

I really enjoy you building this model James. Have you tried fitting yhe main undercarriage legs yet? I understand they are of a novel design.

 

Regards Toby

[JamesP]

2 hours ago, Planebuilder62 said:

 Have you tried fitting yhe main undercarriage legs yet? I understand they are of a novel design.

 

 

Yes, they fit very snuggly. I show how they fit in detail when I get to that stage.

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Beautiful work in getting to this stage!  It's such an attractive warplane, it's a wonder no mainstream or near-mainstream manufacturer has attempted to market it.  As long as your dust is on the outside of the canopy, it's all good!

[marvinneko]

I feel your pain on the canopy. Coming together though with your persistence!

[JamesP]

8 hours ago, TheyJammedKenny! said:

Beautiful work in getting to this stage!  It's such an attractive warplane, it's a wonder no mainstream or near-mainstream manufacturer has attempted to market it.  As long as your dust is on the outside of the canopy, it's all good!

 

Short service life, saw no action, sole operator, no flying examples. If the Xtrakit had been half decent we'd be laughing.

 

 

...about half that dust is on the inside...

[scautomoton]

Sterling effort thus far. I must admit, canopies are the bit I like least about the hobby. I've yet to do one where I got it absolutely spot on.

[Gondor44]

As I have one of these in the stash, which I have looked at a few times before putting it back, what glues are you using other than the superglue?

 

Gondor

[JamesP]

5 minutes ago, Gondor44 said:

As I have one of these in the stash, which I have looked at a few times before putting it back, what glues are you using other than the superglue?

 

Just Revell Contacta and Tamiya Extra thin.

[JamesP]

Thanks all. As mentioned, the canopy, though very clear, portrays almost no framing at all, and so it's up to you to work out where to add it.

 

Various widths of tape were used to work out where the actual framing should be.

 

 

Then filled in the gaps with more tape, and removed the framing ones

 

 

The model is currently in the paint shop getting various layers of primer applied so the gloss white can go on. 

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Looks great!

[marvinneko]

8 hours ago, JamesP said:

The model is currently in the paint shop getting various layers of primer applied so the gloss white can go on. 

 

Layers of primer and paint also help build up framing on canopies to give a 3d effect

[Romeo Alpha Yankee]

This is going really well for such a basic kit. Very tidy work too!

[JamesP]

The Hycote primer got a rub down, then I lightened the underside with a coat of Mr Surfacer 1200. This was also applied to all the other parts that were to be white, to even up the tones. Then, a base coat of Mr White Base was applied, followed by four coats of Xtracylix White. Xtracylix are not the best paints to spray, but I really like their RAF/RN colours. The white is subtly "off white" and doesn't look too stark.

 

 

Edited September 18 by JamesP

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Again, it looks great.  I too had trouble with Xtracrylics until I discovered Vallejo's "flow improver," and that made all the difference.  I usually add a few drops of flow improver, and Xtracrylics respond well to Vallejo's acrylic thinner, too, at a paint/thinner mix of 3-1.  They go on smoothly for me at about 20psi.

[JamesP]

I’ve switched to using Tamiya thinner rather than the Xtracrylic own brand. Less clogging and less prone to spidering 

[AdrianMF]

On 12/09/2025 at 10:18, JamesP said:

Short service life, saw no action, sole operator, no flying examples.

Never seemed to stop the Luft'46 crowd! ISTR the same discussion about the Bristol Beaufort just before Airfix finally did the right thing.

 

Your work on this has been a shining example of how to build the "unbuildable". Bravo!

 

Regards,

Adrian

[JamesP]

On 21/09/2025 at 08:43, AdrianMF said:

Your work on this has been a shining example of how to build the "unbuildable". Bravo!

 

Thanks for the comment. I don't think many consider these kits "unbuildable", just challenging and involving. Which is how I like 'em 🤪 

 

It took three sessions to get the masking done. Anything with where the top colour wraps around the leading edge is a massive pain in the butt, as you really have to fully mask the underside. I use a pair of dividers set to a scale 6" to lightly mark the extent of the Extra Dark Sea Gray. The exhausts were also masked so I didn't get a paint edge through the middle of them.

 

 

I also took the opportunity to mask the wheel wells.

 

 

A couple of coats of Xtracylix EDSG, the second really just to touch up, were applied. I still had to wait before removing the tape as the tail hook recess needed to be masked so I could spray it and the wheel wells aluminium.

 

 

A couple of minor oversprays were removed using a buffing sponge stick.

 

 

We're not quite there yet, as the scheme requires the tail to be painted too and I need to sort out the intakes.

[JamesP]

The tail and exhaust masking was enough in its own, I needed to protect the wings in case I overshot the rear fuselage. I wrapped some parafilm around them. Those in the know will guess the markings I'll use.

 

 

A bit of lifting on the PE where the Hycote primer had been sanded through, and as always some overspray to deal with, but that's the painting down bar clear coats.

 

 

 

 

[Planebuilder62]

Ark Royal, right James?
 

Regards Toby

[JamesP]

I sat down, ready to cut out the decals last, then realised I still had to paint the tip of nose black. So decalling started this morning. The kit decals aren't great, but provide a good range of schemes. One innovation/novelty is that they include the leading edge of the white undersides, the idea being that they give you a neat demarcation where the grey wraps around, saving you the tricky masking. Definitely more novelty.

 

There aren't a lot of options when it comes to decals sheets for the Scimitar. ModelArt did one many years ago, which I would have liked to get hold of. Surprisingly, I couldn't find any from Xtradecal to supplement their XtraKit release. It was more luck than planning that I had the Model Alliance sheet for the Ark Royal which includes a couple of options for their red tailed 800 Sqn aircraft. A cursory look at the schemes reveals load of small errors in the drawing and schemes - so it's time to double check everything against photographic sources.

 

 

Be aware that the demarcation of the red fin is wrong, it should be truncated over the the spine.

 

Airframes XD276 100/R  circa 1961 and XD280 104/R circa 1964 provided, the main difference being the tail serials and titles changed from white to black during the period. However, they show 104/R  with black tail serials with white titles which, as far as I can tell is wrong. Unfortunately they only supply white tail serials for 104/R which was the one I wanted to model, so I used the white titles.

100/R has ROYAL NAVY on the wing undersides, I not sure if the whole Sqn used these during the early 60's as there was a four ship display team and it seems likely the serials would be replaced for this purpose. There are pictures of Ark Royal aircraft with the white tail marking and underwing serials.

 

The decals are very thin and the colour density is just adequate, though the white will show through where the grey/white meet - yeah, I should have added some white discs. The main problem though is that the underwing serials are just too long and even squished right up to the roundels over lap the wheelwells, which they should just stop short of. Checking photos, the character spacing is wrong and should be half a line width not a whole one. As the decals were on the model I didn't have lot of immediate options so I sliced between the numerals and moved them closer together. It's a bit of typological nightmare but will do. The Skybirds decals also have this problem ~45mm long but need to be ~40mm

 

 

There are no stencils provided (the kit has some thick stripes for the drop tanks) so I will have to source/print these myself. Most notable on the  white underside they will help break the area up.

[Planebuilder62]

Nice work James.

Do you have a second set of roundels to put on the fuselage ones to help the colour bleed through?
Regards Toby

[JamesP]

Yeah, the sheet does supply enough roundels and is something I’ve had in mind. I want to let the first set settle down first. 

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Nice! I take it these aircraft had a range-only radar for the gunsight in the nose, so good catch on painting the radome.

[JamesP]

The kit only provides the drop tanks to go under the wings, each in two halves. The inner tanks are fine but the join of the outer ones is terrible, with the nose and tail not wanting to meet. I later realised these parts are too thick and need about 0.5mm removed from the inner faces. However it was the impetus I needed to add something more interesting.

 

 

 

The Scimitar was capable of carrying the American Bullpup missile. Looking around Eduard did some reasonably priced resin ones but are no longer available. Some Hasegawa plastic ones on Ebay looked terrible. So I threw money at the problem and got the ResiKit 3D printed parts. The detail is very nice but is OTT in comparison with the rest of the kit. The outer pylons were removed from the tanks and the extensions fashioned from card.

 

 

 

If you think the missiles are over the top the decal sheet is nuts, I just used a fraction of the supplied stencils - ResiKit provide these Bullpups in 1/48 and 1/32 scale so everything is just scaled up/down.

 

 

The tanks got some stencils from the spares box so they wouldn't feel embarrassed.

 

 

The metal undercarriage parts have superb detail, though the scissor links on the main legs needed a lot of fettling. The doors are very thin and  I don't know how they moulded the double jacks on the nose leg. Painted aluminium, dark wash and dry-brushed with more aluminium. The oleos, I scraped the paint off and burnished.