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Iconicair Supermarine Attacker FINISHED.


ericg

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A small update. 

 

You hear lots of modellers complain about weak undercarriage but never try to do anything about it, or just hope that an aftermarket company comes to the rescue with brass replacement.  The tail wheel on this model is reasonably strong but I felt that it needed some extra strength, espescially the oleo as a lot of weight will go through it.

 

Built up out of the box

 

IMG_4942-X3.jpg

 

I cut off the oleo, and drilled a hole right through the length of the part and then drilled a smaller hole through the bottom with the aim of having these two brass parts meeting in the middle.

 

IMG_4943-X3.jpg

 

The brass parts inserted.

 

IMG_4944-X3.jpg

 

I milled a flat spot on each of the tail wheels (my pet hate is seeing nicely done models without any weight simulated on the tires)

 

IMG_4948-X3.jpg

 

The built up assembly which is now considerably stronger

 

IMG_4959-X3.jpg

 

IMG_4960-X3.jpg

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The Instructions are a little bit ambiguous with regard to the next step so some thought was required as to how everything was going to work. It took a few goes at test fitting and comparing the assembly to walk around pics to get it right but doing it this way makes it easier that the instructions call for. I glued the splitter plates onto the intake halves first before sticking them into the fuselage.

 

IMG_4952-X3.jpg

 

I ended up deciding against putting the engine in, as hardly any of it will be seen through the intakes when the fuselage is closed up. I painted the inside of the fuselage black. Still yet to work out a fix for the lack of jet pipe.

 

IMG_4969-X3.jpg

 

Once the fuselage was together, the test fitting of the cockpit/nose section began. A fair bit of work is required here to get the parts to fit well. As can be seen on the right side, a fair bit of material has been removed from the intake half. The cockpit fits in between the splitter plates and the intake, so it is critical that the parts will fit together without too much force.

 

IMG_5018-X3.jpg

 

The corresponding nose section. As can be seen, I have had to thin this part as well.

 

IMG_5019-X3.jpg

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16 hours ago, scvrobeson said:

Would it be possible to just use the core of the engine to attach the rear pipe to?  Probably don't need to add all of the detail, since it'll be invisible, but something to hold the jet pipe in place?




Matt 

Not sure how I will tackle it yet Matt.

 

The completed cockpit (minus the throttle) just before close up.

 

IMG_5033-X3.jpg

 

There is a large gap which will be visible in the rear of the cockpit that will require some attention.

 

IMG_5022-X3.jpg

 

i made up a small bulkhead with plastic card.

 

IMG_5032-X3.jpg

 

With the ejection seat in it may be possible to see behind it, hence the fix.

 

IMG_5062-X3.jpg

 

It was apparent fairly early on that the nose section was going to be a poor fit to the rest of the fuselage, especially around the intakes. There is a reasonable size difference between the mating parts here and it could be a difficult fix. Here is the problem:

 

IMG_5036-X3.jpg

 

It would be easy to dump a stack of filler behind the intake lip and blend it back toward the rear of the aircraft, but there would be no way of saving the prominent vents in the top and bottom of the fuselage.

 

IMG_5037-X3.jpg

 

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I decided to approach this from two ways, to shift the area that needed to be blended to a different part of the model where there wasn’t so much detail to be lost.

 

Firstly, I split the fuselage join a fair way down the line. I haven’t actually glued the intake lips to the fuselage here, as I had anticipated this issue and fix. Rather, the area behind the splitter plates has been glued allowing me to align the two parts but keep the intake lips free.

 

IMG_5039-X3.jpg

 

I drove some thick plastic card into the cut to expand the radius of the fuselage, fixing up approximately half of the mismatch in the parts. I will probably pour some very hot water over the rear of the fuselage to relieve the stress in the join further back.

 

IMG_5040-X3.jpg

 

I filled the rest of the gap with plastic card.

 

IMG_5041-X3.jpg

 

This still left me with a fair bit to fix up.

 

IMG_5042-X3.jpg

 

I made a cut straight through the intake lip (this is why I didn’t glue this part together), allowing me to tighten up the top part of the lip against the fuselage.

 

IMG_5043-X3.jpg

 

Next up I cut the bottom fairing of the intake lip off aiming for the corner of where it joins the fuselage on the outside and the corner where it meets the splitter plate

 

IMG_5046-X3.jpg

 

Glued back in place and blended in, it is 1000 times better now and I haven’t had to use any filler apart from the bottom part of the intake lip.

 

IMG_5060-X3.jpg

 

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Some extensive work to get it to fit but it didn’t take too long and is fairly easy to do if you are comfortable with a razor saw.

 

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Whilst I was dealing with the intakes I noticed that the leading edge of the lips are very blunt and could do with some work.

 

IMG_5058-X3.jpg

 

A few minutes with a sanding stick and they were fixed.

 

IMG_5059-X3.jpg

 

The state of play on my workbench at the moment. No idea how I ended up with two resin kits of fairly obscure types at relatively the same stage of construction on my workbench at the same time!

 

IMG_5065-X3.jpg

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Thanks guys.

 

4 hours ago, npb748r said:

I am so pleased you are doing this, I'm not going to start mine until you finish - really sorry you get the hard work and I copy but given this will be my first resin kit I suspect your fixes will be far more effective than mine !!  Thanks for posting the build, brilliant work !

 

I enjoy these types of challenges as it requires a bit of thought and it keeps the hobby interesting. Something you don’t get modelling from the safety of a Tamigawa box. As far as your first resin kit, this is the easiest resin kit that I have worked on to date!

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