Here we go with another Spey powered Phantom:

[XV571]

Well as it’s a fortnight into the group build, it was about time that I stopped chipping in on other peoples’ builds and got on with my own . So here’s my first entry (there may be at least one more if I finish this one). On with the obligatory box and sprues shot:

This was an eBay special in that the box contained a FGR2 kit without the decal sheet and a Hasegawa FG1 without its box! Now, given my username you probably think this is going to be a certain 43 Squadron jet . However as this is a) too obvious and b ) is generally a particularly popular option, I shall leave her for another time. For this GB I’ll be building the FGR2 in the Green/Grey scheme. The squadron will remain under wraps for now but will be one of the lesser seen ones.

Add-ons will include the Aries ‘pit (and maybe their exhausts/auxiliary intakes), Cutting Edge intakes, Two Bobs wheels and some Eduard photoetch.

As you can see I plan on using Maintrack’s ‘clear-fix’ sheet. These are not your usual decals in that you have to place the marking where you want it then apply the water. Like dry-rub markings this is a one time shot – so if it’s wrong, you’re basically stuffed unless you have a spare! I may end up only using the squadron markings and sourcing the standard stuff from normal waterslide sheets.

Wish me luck!

[Duncan B]

The squadron will remain under wraps for now but will be one of the lesser seen ones.

2 Sqn with a recce pod?

[Jabba]

2 Sqn with a recce pod?

Or 41 Sqn.

[XV571]

2 Sqn with a recce pod?

Or 41 Sqn.

2 and 41 = 43: I think I see where you’re going chaps (or am I reading too much into this) . There may be a recce pod involved though; while going through my references I’ve found a rather unexpected combination which really intrigued me.

Anyway, on to the build. While the convention is to start with the cockpit, it’s just one of the areas where I can get a complete block so I’ve just spent the last couple of days preparing parts. As luck would have it, the fuselage I selected has a chunk missing from the rudder, so I removed the two halves and after gluing filled the missing section with filler. Now looks a lot better

The fuselage was cut to accommodate the Cutting Edge intakes. I also fettled the inside of the auxiliary intakes to improve clearance for the Aires exhausts. The lower intake doors were carefully cut off and the inside thinned to give a more scale thickness to the surround. A little more may be needed to get the resin parts to sit properly. After trimming the Aires lower intakes these were offered up to the gap. This highlighted an issue as they appeared too short! There is a lip on the forward and aft edges which should be removed; this then looks much more correct.

Here’s a shot of the internal layout of the intakes and exhaust. The bottom of the bulkhead with the compressor faces interfered with the lower intakes so had to be modified to clear their tops.

As this jet is from the mid-70’s I removed the reinforcing plates from the outer wings and the stabilators (the right stab was yet to be done).

The inevitable thinning of the cockpit floor resulted in breaking through at the front, so will have to come up with a repair.

As well as chopping up the fuselage, I’ve dipped the clear parts in Klear, glued together the fuel tanks and filled the ejector pin marks on the various doors, gear legs and in the nosewheel well.

That’s it so far, now at the point where I’ll have to start painting.

[ghaynes]

I have that decal sheet in my stash but have never used it as I found a lot of the squadron markings for the nose, were way oversize. Might be something to look out for when you select your scheme?

Regards

Graham

[XV571]

Graham,

Thanks for the tip - I'll double check the markings nearer the time. If they aren't suitable, I do have a Plan B!

Cheers for now,

Jonathan

[XV571]

After doing relatively little last week when first painting was started by priming the undercarriage bays and gears using Halfords white primer decanted from the can. The intakes were masked off and after a coat of primer; some Dark Sea Grey was airbrushed on. The exhausts have been painted using various tones of Alclad and the cockpit was started.

The canopies have been masked up and the interior panels installed from the Aires fret. I’ve made an effort to recapture the heavy internal framing by filling the gap between the panel and the canopy using Mr Dissolved Putty built up to a flat profile at the edges. They've now been sprayed Xtracolor Tyre black inside.

Picture of the canopies

Unfortunately I managed to knock the left fuselage on to the floor. As luck would have it the angle it hit caused a fracture right across the half! It also dislodged the fuel dump pipe.

However I’ve made a lot of progress this week. The vents forward of the rear auxiliary intakes were opened out and some tubing added to give an impression of depth. Once the cockpit was at a point where I was happy, the fuselage was joined together and the seam filled for the cracked section.

When building Phantoms, I leave the upper wings off until after the lower fuselage/wings are attached. This allows any gaps between the fuselage and the wing to a minimum and any gaps are underneath! This includes the major gap that occurred at the join under the intakes. I also used a lollipop stick to stiffen the lower wing (a top tip from Bexy!!)

The upper fuselage crack happily wasn’t too much of a problem, after an application of Mr Dissolved Putty it disappeared under a coat of primer. The seams were dealt with and after rescribing the distinctive fuel access panels on the spine, it was on to start the camouflage painting with a coat of Xtracolor Light Aircraft Grey. There's still some seam work to do at that lower wing joint

Once that sorted it'll be on with the Dark Sea Grey and Green.

[Jabba]

That is coming along nicely. Well done with the recovery from the drop.

[XV571]

Cheers Jabba, it was one of those 'oh b*gger' moments when it hit! The saga isn't over either as the seams managed to re-appear when the DSG went on. The first coat was an old tin of Xtracolor which not only showed up one end of the crack and a seam near the fin but remained tacky in places . Oddly enough the tanks, flaps and stabilators painted at the same time are OK ! All that got wiped off with white spirit quite easily though. A coat of Mr Surfacer 1000 is now on and I'll try some Xtracrylics instead.

[Dave Fleming]

There may be a recce pod involved though; while going through my references I’ve found a rather unexpected combination which really intrigued me.

111 perhaps?

[XV571]

111 perhaps?

If you're thinking of these lovely shots: UK Airshow Review I was tempted, but it's not the Tremblers. It is an Air Defence Squadron though...

[Typhoon Tone]

Looking good mate!

[pte1643]

Air Defence Sqn in rarely modelled colours... From that sheet above... 23 sqn?

[XV571]

Thanks to all for the kind comments. Although I've built lots of Phantoms over the years, I'm really enjoying this one despite the trials and tribulations along the way - doing the GB will hopefully stop the dreaded mid build lull I often suffer from. I'm determined to finish this one.

Air Defence Sqn in rarely modelled colours... From that sheet above... 23 sqn?

No, not 23; but you're the closest yet ...

As it's been a while since I posted, a quick sitrep. Not much progress has been made since I sprayed on the first coats of Xtracrylic DSG and DG a week or so ago. This should be fully cured by now so next will be a session of micromeshing and polishing to get a glossier finish for the next coat. Then it'll be Alclads for the exhaust area, some Klear and then hopefully on to the markings.

Anyway, back to the planned subject of this build. While leafing through various references for inspiration before the group build started, I picked up my copy of Bunrin-Do's Famous Airplanes of the World No.82 on Export Phantoms (it's in the last series with black covers). On one page was a picture of a FGR2 landing with what looks like vapour pouring out of the fuselage vent just forward of the upper auxiliary intake on the fuselage. On closer inspection, I noticed that although it was an Air Defence unit, it was carrying a pair of CBLSs and a Recce pod! I didn't believe it at first, but a closer look and looking at other photos with aircraft carrying either the pod or the tank confirmed it. That was enough to convince me especially as if it ever gets displayed at shows, some smartass will come up and declare that the load is completely fictitious. I can then show them the above photo and ask them to comment From this and the pictures in the link I posted earlier, it looks as though those Phantoms with the recce fit filled the gap while 41 Sqn converted to Jaguars and became operational again in the reconnaissance role.

So, the aircraft is:

Ready,

Have another guess before you look...

It's

XV400/I of 29 Squadron circa 1975

Hope it's worth the wait!

[bexwh773]

Hope it's worth the wait!

With that load out???? You bet its gonna be worth it

Great work on the office and airframe so far

Bexy

Edited July 28, 2011 by bexwh773

[nirvanagr]

Well, I think we are on the same path, Jonathan!

I'm right behind you (lol) and watch your work, which is very interesting till now!

Keep going.

Yannis

[XV571]

First of all, apologies for the long gap since the last entry in this thread. Various events over the last few months meant that although I could slowly progress with the build, it wasn’t practical to sit and write updates or take pictures. Here are some edited highlights:

After applying the initial camouflage, two problem areas came back – the cracked section of the upper fuselage and the joint between the lower wing and nose. The first was reasonably easily dealt with. The bottom joint was much more difficult and, although eventually beaten into submission, is an area I’m not entirely satisfied with. I had to move on with the build though as I had the deadline of displaying the Phantom as part of the SIG display at Telford to aim for. Fortunately the model will spend 99% of the time with this out of sight.

Here’s the application of the dark green of the camouflage using a combination of blu-tack, paper and masking tape. RAF Phantoms typically had a tight overspray to the edge of the demarcation point and the blu-tack ‘worms’ achieved this nicely.

After the paint was thoroughly cured it was time to start adding the markings. My original plan was to use the Maintrack Clear-fix sheet, but on closer inspection of the 29 Squadron markings I wasn’t happy with the register of the ‘X’s or the nose shield. So it was on to Plan B - to make my own.

There is artwork available drawn by Richard Caruana for RAF Phantoms but the 29 Sqn stuff has some errors and in any case the nose shield is of the later type, so wasn’t suitable for XV400 as I planned to model it. To address this I found a decent drawing of the shield and scanned it in. After cleaning it up and adding the correct colours and revising the shape of the Xs I was happy with the result. I then drew the tail band and the code letter using a dark grey outline to ensure that when they were printed on white decal paper they could be properly trimmed. I also made the serial numbers for the fuselage, tail and nose door so they would be properly aligned.

The problems with the Maintrack sheet didn’t stop there. Some of the stencils were rather muddy and indistinct so rather than struggling with these, three options were left: i) find another set of the Hasegawa/Revell FGR2 sheet, ii) find the long OOP 1/48 Airdoc stencils or iii) try the Almark FGR2 sheet. Due to the short timescale option iii) was the only realistic (and cheapest!) choice and so an order was duly placed with Hannants. These arrived following the now customary quick turnaround so decalling could commence. They weren’t brilliant themselves but time was now short so had to suffice.

The build trials hadn’t yet finished – when completing the cockpit the rear Radar display housing had vanished. After a frenzied search, the only option was to cut-out the kit version and apply the Eduard photo-etch to it. The LCOSS glass mountings had also vanished so again the Eduard set came to the rescue. After a coat of Alclad ‘Armoured Glass’ to the centre windscreen the canopies were added. Final detail touches were the Eduard aerials and a Hobbydecal AOA sensor.

Here then is the model, as displayed on the Phantom SIG stand at SMW. It's not perfect by any stretch of the imagination but I think I managed a decent go at the subject:

The base was art paper mounted on an A3 foam board painted with Halfords grey primer oversprayed with various browns and the tarmac joints added using a fine permanent marker pen.

More photos on the completed Phantoms thread. As always any comments or questions are welcome.

Epilogue - The EMI recce pod:

The pod as supplied in the kit doesn’t look quite right. I think it’s too tapered at the rear but can’t quite determine if that’s an issue. The most noticeable problem is the two nose inlets. These are far too big and throw off the whole front:

To correct this I filed the upper outer profile and added some plastic card to the upper part of the intakes. This was then shaped to a curve reducing the opening by about half. I think this improves the look tremendously.

[Silver Fox]

Looks like a beautiful job on an unusual bird, I can't say I've ever seen the loadout either so extra points from me!!

I have three RAF machines in the stash in 1/48th which might looks good with the 25 plus RAF/FAA 1/72nd Fujimi ones built.

[nirvanagr]

I saw it at SMW, and it was brilliant! Once again, congrats for your effort!

Yannis

[Jabba]

Yet again saw this at the Nationals along side mine. Well done indeed.