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Tupolev Tu-22 M2 Backfire


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More progress then and I've spent much of the day filling and sanding the intake and nose to fuselage joins. There was also a bit of work required in smoothing out the inserts that cover over the recesses for centre mounted missiles as these didn't fit especially well. Think I've got the worst of it sorted first time round, thought all be revealed once I get her primed. there will be yet more rescribing required here, and i have a rivet tool on order so replenish those that have been lost, something I;ve not done before.....

With that done, I was in a position to finally get the wings on. Pretty good fit here, with only a lick of filler to be required on the underside of the roots. She's getting quite big now! :analintruder:

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I also dryfitted the tailplanes to see how she looked, but in removing them, snapped the pins :blush: So I'll have to see about remedying that tomorrow, along with sorting out the missing gear doors. Quick Q for Andy, am I right in thinking they would be in the 'up elevator' position when powered down? If so, probably best to leave them off until the end methinks :hmmm:

Thanks for looking, comments welcomed

Cheers

Shaun :)

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Looking good Shaun!!...yep as is the case with most Soviet heavies the elevators, (more stabilators really as they also aided roll control at higher speeds) were usually powered down leaving them as you say in the 'elevator up' position, at quite an acute angle too!! I would definitely leave them off 'til last.

Can't quite understand the logic of the bomb bay doors, as you have the cut out for the KH-22 front and back but the doors are standard fit with no recess!, so if you want to fit a centreline missile you will have to do a bit of surgery to get it to fit, otherwise the filling of the recesses involves a lot of extra unnecessary work!! it would have been better to have had separate panels for either standard bomb bay or full missile recess, the same problem exists with the TU-16 Badger C with its huge centreline AS-2 Kipper.

One thing to note for those folks modelling an M3 version. (Rich!!)......the M3 was an improved version of the M2 which was always considered a bit of a stop gap to the M3 as as such had many mods, most notably, (other than the obvious engine upgrades and improved avionics in the reshaped nose), the wing sweep angle which at 60 degrees was noticeably more acute at full sweep than the M2. Don't think Trumpy will have thought of this as the mouldings look the same...but it would make a difference to how the model looks in standard dispersal configuration.

Andy

Edited by general melchett
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Thanks very much guys :)

Andy old bean, I'm afraid Pharty beat you to the punch with the pic, in fact it's the same one ;) However, looking at it again throws up another point that I was thinking of earlier whilst playing around with the KH-22s. It seems from the pic the lower fin is missing, whereas Trumpy have moulded four. Having quickly dryfitted the missiles and pylons, even without the undercarriage in place, I suspect that lower fin will foul the ground. Would I be too hasty if I chopped them off?

In other news, I spent the evening playing around with the missing undercarriage doors. It's all a bit crude, but I've basically curved some plasticard to fill the gap, then cut it at the angle shown in the pic before glueing the outer section in place. the inner section was then glued to the base of the doors that attach to the leg. This in turn has thrown up another potential problem in that the location of the door on the leg causes the section section of the new door to sit above the fixed section, not inside as shown in your pic.

Maybe a bit difficult to understand from that, so I'll get some pics up tomorrow to show what I mean, but I'm thinking of simply mounting the door a little further up the leg so that it sits correctly. I don't think the increase in the gap between the bottom of the door and the wheels would be too noticeable (looking at your pic, it looks fairly sizeable anyway), and certainly not as noticeable as the new doors being in the wrong place.

Cheers

Shaun :)

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Ok, here's the pics I promised. My camera doesn't like close ups for some reason, so they're a little over sharpened (and still out of focus :angry:), but hopefully you get the idea. Using Andy's pic as reference, I fashioned the missing doors from plasticard and attached them in the relevant place, as described above. Attaching the leg door in place creates the problem of leaving the new part of the door sitting on top of the bullet fairing....

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So, I was thinking of merely mounting it lower on the leg so that the door fits within the fairing

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My only concern with this is the gap between the bottom of the door and the wheels being too large. I guess the only other option is to extend the top of the door a little, but having dryfitted it closed, it fits the bay almost perfectly, plus I don't want to make a hash of replicating the ribbing on the inside of the extension :fraidnot:

Any thoughts? :hmmm:

Cheers

Shaun :)

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Shaun....AArggh , don't chop em off the lower one is folded to the right and only extended after take off!!...

thus,

000-Kh-22-Backfire-AP5-20010077-1S.jpg

The undercarriage doors look just fine Shaun, I see what you mean about the gap, it will be very noticable on the finished model unfortunately,

If you look very carefully you can just make out where the small doors fit on this shot and the stowed KH-22 lower fin........quite unusually this M3 is carrying a centre line KH-22....

Something else shows up here too, the panels just ahead of the main doors that you mentioned earlier, definately have doors over them!!!....a bit of scratchbuilding here me thinks,

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This shot shows it well,

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And this shows the fit of the main doors under full load......nice set of wheels!!!

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Sorry they're all of the M3 but that's the one I'm doing, M2 is exactly the same..

Hope this helps, :winkgrin:

Andy...

Edited by general melchett
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Thanks very much Deon :)

Andy, thanks for those pics, top notch stuff :thumbsup2: Seems I'll have to carefully reposition those fins- yet another example of Trumpy's quality research :hmmm:

As for the gear doors, I reckon I can get away with extending the top part of the door a little to get the new doors in the right place. that way, the extension will be largely hidden by the fairing and the main leg, so even if I make a hash of it, noone will know :wicked:

I think I'll just fill over those smaller bays on the underside completely, save faffing around doing more scratch building....

Rich, get it on the bench matey :thumbsup:

Cheers

Shaun :)

Edited by Seamus
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No problem Sean, it's fun to trade information like this when several folks are making the same thing!......I have a LOT of info on this and the Blinder so if there's anything else just ask!....

Rich, if you drag your's out then I'll drag mine, :analintruder: I was going to wait until the TSR 2 was finished but the more I fondle the Backfire the more I want to build the damn thing, first it was the cockpit, then a bit on the U/C, then the exhausts.....might as well go the whole hog!!!

(and I swore that I'd only make one model at a time this year, so that's yet another New Years Resolution down the swanee!! :whistle:.................

Damn.... :banghead:

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  • 2 weeks later...

Evening comrades

Progress has been slow on this one for various reasons, but I have been plugging away on her. There has been several rounds of sanding and filling, which in turn has led to much rescribing and, a first for me, riveting. I've had limited success with the latter, so I'll have to see how it looks after priming. I've also been plugging away on other smaller areas. Another stupid error from Trumpy is the Kh-22 missiles, whereby the lower fin folds to starboard when the aircraft is on the ground to prevent them fouling the tarmac. Obviously, Trumpy haven't thought of this (how I'm not sure, it must have become apparent on the test shot? :hmmm:) so I've had to carefully slice the fin off so that it can be repositioned. One down, one to go....

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The tailplane locating pins were small and fragile, with the port one snapping off inside the fuselage, so I removed them completely and replaced them with some rod I found in amongst my Dad's old RC stuff. My Dremel doesn't have a small enough bit to match the diameter of he rod, so I've made it up from Tamiya tape. Bit agricultural, but it does the job :D

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I've also been working on the gear doors that Trumpy forgot about.....I extended the main doors with card by 1mm or so, filling in with CA and a lick of squadron green. I then fashioned the doors over the bullet fairings from thin card, bending it into shape then slicing down the middle, in accordance to reference photos. The outboard section was glued in place and sanded back (the photo shows there's still work to be done here...) with the other half glued to the top of the main door. Again, it's a little rough around the edges, but it gives a good enough impression of how the doors should look I reckon.

DSC02584.jpg

Note from the pic that I've also faired over those open panels forward of the gear bays- I couldn't be bothered to fashion some doors for them especially as I can't find a pic of them open anyway.

So, still some filling and sanding required, but she's almost ready for priming. Hopefully shouldn't be too long until I get to the best part, spraying the beast up :D

Comments welcome as always

Cheers

Shaun :)

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sometimes wonder if manufacturer's actually bother :bangin:

still, it gives us lot summat to grump about while puttin' it right :lol:

good work Shaun! :thumbsup:

Ah yes but then we are modellers, not just sticker togetherers. it all depends on where one wants to draw the line!

Nice work Shaun, Iv'e really fallen for the Soviet hardware, so much so Iv'e procured ANOTHER big Flanker! :suicide:

Really looking forward to the end product for this.

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Ah yes but then we are modellers, not just sticker togetherers. it all depends on where one wants to draw the line!

Nice work Shaun, Iv'e really fallen for the Soviet hardware, so much so Iv'e procured ANOTHER big Flanker! :suicide:

Really looking forward to the end product for this.

I caught the bug a looooooooooooooooooooooooooong time ago... the best soviet kit i've built (so far) is the Hobbyboss SU-47-awesome fitting, and an awesome plane! I've got a Blinder in the stash, but I don't think I'll be buying the Trumpy Backfire-their Blackjack terrifyed me and put me off them...

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  • 4 weeks later...

Thanks for the comments chaps :)

Unfortunately, I don't think I'm going to be able to make the (extended) deadline with this one. I've still got too much to do, but truth be told, I've sort of run out of steam with it. I'm more used to finishing things quickly, and with the time this one is taking, my interest has waned of late.

Rest assured though, she will get done :)

Cheers

Shaun :)

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Apologies comrade, poor form I know....:(

Just one of those things unfortunately, think I'll keep to smaller kits for GBs in future :hmmm:

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Apologies comrade, poor form I know....:(

Just one of those things unfortunately, think I'll keep to smaller kits for GBs in future :hmmm:

Smaller kits!? Pah! the Flanker of late has been failing and I know just what you mean about running out of steam. It will however get done as I have quite literally a gun to my head!

Edited by Phartycr0c
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