RAF FG.1 XV571 WILD HARE Phantom Conversion

[Anthony in NZ]

1 hour ago, AlbertD said:

I think you need to be a bit off kilter to take on a project of this scope in the first place. You will no doubt figure it out and do a magnificent job.

LOL I agree!

 

Studying the photos I might have to go back to 'Plan A' which is use the kit ones and update them and slide the trunking in from Real Model

 

Here I am now correcting the conversion. I have worked out that I needed to take a 2mm slice out of the fuse intake section and epoxy it together...kinda like reversing the conversion. One good thing is that this is still the resin section and boiling water enabled me to manipulate the two ends back together.

This takes some of the coke bottle 'waist' shape out of the conversion.

[Anthony in NZ]

Sick of this yet??

 

Right-O after much deliberation and measuring, staring at photos and fettling plastic card, I have come up with a solution to this whole intake situation.

 

I am going with the kit intake pieces as I am going to loose all the detail on the Real Model ones anyway, I will use the trunking instead.

 

Shimming with 40thou plastic card widens the intake perfectly to the 14mm.  Problem is that there is definitely a trunking  shape difference running back from the intake lip, up across the top (mostly corner I think).  I will look into that further after I get the opening sorted.

 

I cut a slot on the upper corner of the intake as the Tamiya one is slightly too square here...easy fix.  Cut with a thicker saw blade and pinch the two sides together.  This I believe gives the correct lip opening.

 

I will tidy that up later when I am finishing off the surface details.  You can see here that  have shifted the intake backwards off the ramp, this is how I will shorten the intake length and extend the second section of the ramp back to the intake lip.  The length needs to be taken off the rear of all of this.

 

Now, because I have to set up for the intake reprofile I found myself in all sorts of a mess.  The intake 'shoulder' is up higher on a Spey bird and to do this properly you really need to make a cut along the shoulder and lift it a small amount. this is then where I discovered the intakes on the Tamiya kit are slightly too deep...but this is a good thing!

 

That is because the 'shoulder' is in the correct place for a Brit Phantom!  Hence the intakes are too deep at the front lip (according to Derek's depth measurement he sent me). I shaved a little off the depth when I address the corner and took the file to the splitter top  and bottoms.  It is still slightly too deep but maybe by only 1 mm-ish, which I can live with. Now I have a 'pinched and silly looking forward intake section.  I filled the little recess in the kit intake that locks in the splitter and added a square of 40thou to raise this section back up to the shoulder.

 

This seems to have instantly set me up to tackle the new contour of the Spey intake....completely by accident, but it looks 'right' to my eye.

 

See below with what I have ended up with.  Still a long way to go but I feel like I made a breakthrough today, phew!

 

Not perfect, but  feel like I am a long way through dealing with these

 

I am sure none of this made sense so hopefully photo's will as I proceed.  Better get on and do the other side now before I forget all the intricacies of what I did

 

Thanks for tuning in

 

Cheers Anthony 

[Chek]

I'm not sure some of your assumptions are right Anthony.

I asked a Duxford volunteer to take some comparison measurements for me and these are the results.

The yellow dots are the data points to avoid the problem of measuring the curved edges.

The central figures are the verticals (A-B; C-D)

I'm not entirely visually convinced of the 5.5cm* difference between A-D and B-C, but thems the data.

*(On reflection, it may be a typo and meant to read 51.5 as per the F-4J and identical as per the lower edge measurement.

Visually that seems much more consistent)

 

 

Edited December 6, 2020 by Chek
added info

[Anthony in NZ]

12 minutes ago, Chek said:

I'm not sure some of your assumptions are right Anthony.

I asked a Duxford volunteer to take some comparison measurements for me and these are the results.

The yellow dots are the data points to avoid the problem of measuring the curved edges.

The central figures are the verticals (A-B; C-D)

 

 

Hmmm, now that's really interesting.

 

Good thing that vari ramp is not glued etc....

 

Thanks very much!

[Anthony in NZ]

Thanks for the Edit @Chek...I have been drawing up and studying photos and thought something was wrong there.  I agree with you on that measurement

 

Back to studying...

Edited December 6, 2020 by Anthony in NZ

[Anthony in NZ]

The Tamiya kit measures about 1mm too high, which matches up with my intake measurement.

 

What we need now is the second section of the vari ramp measured

 

EDIT: Which begs the question...are the intakes slightly shorter as shown in drawings?

Edited December 6, 2020 by Anthony in NZ
New question

[Derek B]

I'll see what I have Anthony.

 

Derek

 

[Derek B]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Derek

[Anthony in NZ]

@Derek B, that is GOLD mate!

Thanks so very much to yourself and Iain @AeroNut  for this information.

 

I have to say that I went to bed and woke up this morning feeling burnout on this project. I made myself a cuppa and looked at my SOD and thought it might be time for a break from this.

 

That was until I logged into LSP this morning!  I have no excuses no to get this right now and I feel energized!

 

Thank you sir!

 

On first thought is that the intake shoulder seems to be in the right position on the Tamiya kit for a Spey engine, almost a little too high, which is within my tolerances.  The intake length is a mm or 2 shorter on Spey engines, but the leading edge to lip stays the same by the looks of it.  I will need to look into this further

 

This should all make sense after a few hours study tonight after work!

 

Again, thanks very much!

 

Cheers Anthony 

[scvrobeson]

This place is just a gold mine of information.  Always so informative.

 

 

 

Matt

[Derek B]

Apart from my own images, these are from other stalwart LSP members such as Nick Moor, Jennings, Check, Barry Chandler, warriormcv, and Iain amongst others (you know who you are Gents), whom have my eternal thanks. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Keep smiling

 

 

Derek

Edited December 8, 2020 by Derek B

[scvrobeson]

Has to be kind of annoying that despite the price of the rare conversion set, the kit intakes are a better basis for an accurate rendition of the intakes.  At least you've got all the options to compare and contrast.

 

 

Matt 

[AlbertD]

There's nothing wrong with stepping away for a bit if you need to. When your doing so much exacting work for so long things start to look the same. On the other hand you have all of us behind you and learning so much along the way. Maybe work on some of the easy stuff for a bit or something.

[chuck540z3]

Wow.  Looking at all those photos, dimensions and suggestions throughout this thread, one thought keeps jumping into my head:  "Too much information!"

 

Anthony, model on!  A few mils out here and a slightly wrong angle there will never be noticed when you're finished.  Getting pulled into the accuracy rabbit hole can suck the fun out of any build as it drags you down trying to please everyone.  Please yourself- and so far this build is super interesting and demonstrates your excellent modeling skills.

 

Cheers,

Chuck

Edited December 8, 2020 by chuck540z3

[Anthony in NZ]

On 12/7/2020 at 2:39 AM, MARU5137 said:

Awesome  progress Anthony.

I am loving all the information and learning 

a lot more  about the phantom.

 

 

 

And Derek B, OUTSTANDING  information , details  and photographs  from you.

 

Thanks Maru!

There is a lot to learn for us all for sure! 

 

5 hours ago, scvrobeson said:

Has to be kind of annoying that despite the price of the rare conversion set, the kit intakes are a better basis for an accurate rendition of the intakes.  At least you've got all the options to compare and contrast.

 

 

Matt 

 

I suppose Matt, thankfully Mike didnt sell it to me for what he could actually get for it!  But yes, those intake are a mile out and I am using the kit ones, in fact you can do this conversion without using much of it at all I am sad to say. In reading the various builds of Franks he made it clear that he was doing the best he could with what info was out there and never admitted to the conversion to being the be all and end all to accuracy.

 

Having said that, Kudos to @fmitche for pioneering the way for a brit Toom, without his ideas and foresight, I would probably have never attempted it.  If you are out there Frank...thank you sir!!!

 

1 hour ago, AlbertD said:

There's nothing wrong with stepping away for a bit if you need to. When your doing so much exacting work for so long things start to look the same. On the other hand you have all of us behind you and learning so much along the way. Maybe work on some of the easy stuff for a bit or something.

Thanks Al, I really appreciate your thoughts, it was doing my head in figuring out fact from fiction with these intakes especially!

 

Now @Derek B, @Chek, @Iain, @Barry, @Jennings Heilig etc have presented such conclusive info I have my Mojo back...thanks so much guys!

 

Also thanks to all of you in the background helping me out as well as the guys on BM....I gotta keep going now!!

 

Cheers Anthony