Colombia Kfir C10 Revell+Isracast

[red Dog]

After that long while spent correcting my own mistakes, I needed some motivation going on, so here 's where I am now.

Tail, AAR probe & canards are dryfit only

 

 

That finally looks like a Kfir C10

 

[alain11]

that looks perfect , one can't guess it 's the old revell kit ... well done 

[spyrosjzmichos]

Coming along nicely! 

 

[dodgem37]

Looks great.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[red Dog]

Thanks gents.

 

Collected parts from the stash to create the Derby-ER AA missiles. 
Thanks again Nick for the dimensions.

 

Main donor will be 1/32 sparrows from unknown origin (although I think they are from a Revell Phantom. 

Back fins will be 1/32 Sidewinder rear fins

Front fins will be 1/48 sparrows back fins:

 

 

The best side view I found on the web was scaled to 113.125mm lenght and used as a template for modification of the sparrow body

 

 

The old and the new. The pointy end is not exactly like the real Derby, the cone starts too early on the sparrow

 

Another one to do and the inner wing station will be complete (except I still need to find a suitable pylon) The AA rail will be also provided by a old Revell phantom.

The outer wing stations will be loaded with Python AA missiles from the F-16 Sufa.

 

Centerline will be loaded with a Spice 1000

The forward two intake pylon will be loaded with a targetting pod (also from the Sufa kit) and a GBU-49 on the other side

The GBU-49 will be either sourced from CMK GBU-12 or l'Arsenal new GBU-49 or I'll convert one GBU-12 from the Sufa kit myself

 

[Marcel111]

Looks beautiful and nice work on that Derby!

 

Marcel

[D.B. Andrus]

Love that long nose on the Kfir....and your work as well.

 

Cheers,

Damian

[red Dog]

I needed to smell paint this week end so I put the airbrush out and basic painted the KFIR weapons.

 

I still do not have the Spice 1000 but there's the rest of the weaponry: From left to right:

The two Derby-ER made from scratch, the 2 Pythons 5 from the Sufa kit, a GBU-49 converted from a GBU-12, and the Raphael Litening pod.
(Sorry for the angled pictures)

 

 

 

 

Paint was H308+ white for the grey. It's a mix I largely use for Air to air missiles usually.

The metallic grey is MRP gun. The pod is H305 gunship grey and the training round for the GBU-49 is a Vallejo blue
They are not complete obviously and some touch up will be required here and there. 

 

The GBU-49 conversion was interesting, I converted a couple from GBU-12 and I reviewed on my blog the CMK so called GBU-12 which looks more like GBU-49 but IMHO are not accurate. Made two distinct conversions from real pictures. The top one is from a GBU-12 from the Trumpeter F/A-18E and the bottom one is from the Academy Sufa.
 

 

None are totally perfect, especially at the rear end but they are good enough for my use for now. The blue one is for the current KFIR project, the green one is for the future Mirage 2000D.
I have seen that L'arsenal now offers resin GBU-49 but finally doing them yourself is not that hard.  

[red Dog]

Now with a question:

 

Anyone know the spec (or name) for these Derby ER pylons? 

 

The Isracast kit supplies the wing bag pylon but these are obviously not the same.

 

I am thinking about flipping them over (to get the correct forward angle) and reshape the rear of the resin but looking for such pylons on the web didn't yield much results.
Do we know how they are called. 

 

The smaller missile guide is sorted, this is the same as the python missile in the first post above and have been sourced from a Revell Phantom

[red Dog]

I finished modifying the pylons. 
Center line and outer missile rails as good as is but the left chin and both the middle wing pylon needed modification.

 

The chin pylons are different, the right one used for the pod is the usual C2 pylon but the left one loaded with a GBU-49 is a C7 type and needs to be modified.

I started by scaling the shape from a side picture and then sanded the pylon accordingly. It's not perfect but the real showstopper was that the bomb was too much forward with the regular pylon (I suppose changing the airflow into the intake?) and with the modified pylon, the bomb is loaded a bit more aft.

 

The middle wing pylons are meant for the fuel tanks and are not suitable at all for AA missiles.

I modified them by flipping them upside down relocating the wing inserts and made them shorter to match the picture I posted earlier.
I also had to modify their angle as I wanted all AA missiles to point in the same direction. So I took the outer wing missile rails as reference.

Missiles rails were taken from a F4 Revell Phantom and glued to the modified resin pylon.

 

 

 

The centre line was only slightly modified by cutting the forward and aft bomb attachement point and I will create a new set in the middle for the Spice 1000.
The Colombian KFIR centre line pylon does not have the big countermeasures ejectors like the original C2/C7 had.
 

Also visible on the following picture is the difference between left and right chin pylon:

 

 

[red Dog]

I also elected to open the aux intake doors. Something rarely seen from Mirage III in flight models. 
When speed is not high enough these doors are open. Since this one will probably be displayed in a take off phase, I needed to open the doors.

 

I elected not to cut the door off but to rather use an X-Acto blade to go through the plastic at the 3 aft sides and make a single pass on the front side.

 

This allowed me to push the door inside at the desired angle.

 

 

The harder to do was to clean the mess after the cuts and thin the aft wall to give a better representation of the aircraft skin. This was done with the proxxon tool and a conical rotating head as my other hand pushed the door in with a toothpick. 

 

The left pylon wasn't modified yet, just placed in its position.

It looks like the Isracast pylon are not perfect for the chin pylon of the block 60 Kfirs but I can live with the small detail.

 

It was well worth doing. It wasn't as complicated as I thought and it really changes everything. 
The right chin pylon will be loaded with the targeting pod. It's only placed in position and not glued yet.

 

[red Dog]

Finally some paint...

 

Obviously there is no decal for this model and everything will be homemade. I started by doing decals artwork for this one but knew that the light coloured decals on the darker colour skin wouldn't work. Luckily I had access temporarily to a cameo 4 and cut some masks. 

I tried to cut stencils but it seems these were either too small or my experience with the hardware is too limited

Anyway, In the end I will try with a mix of masks and decals.

 

All this to explain this weird looking first colour patchwork 

 

It's always easier to mask a red line with a single strip before base coat rather than paint it after base coat with a double strip which is most of the time in difficult places.

The white basecoat is mostly for future decal or masks location

 

Same patchwork on the bottom and with a very crude pre-shade with black 

 

Masking was done with Tamiya tape strips and silhouette masks. These red lines really colour the KFIR wings

 

The reason I masked the tail squadron patch is that my only chance to make this work is with a decal but I need a white background. 
Can't print homemade decal in white and yellow and expect it to stand out on dark grey. So 2 steps: 1 mask for background, then decal on top.

 

Top surfaces were sprayed with Gunze H305 and post shaded with a darker IJN Tamiya grey. Very subtle colour variation, but it's there. 

 

Bottom surfaces were painted with a 50/50 mix of Gunze H311 and H308. few spots needing corrections due to me not being careful enough.

The border line between the top and bottom colours were masked with white Tamiya curve tape so have a straight curved edge between the 2 colours

 

 

 

[Lothar]

I've been following this thread with utmost interest since you've tackled an aircraft that's unique - and I love Kfir variants!! I only wish I had your gutts to start such a project. In the end you'll have showstopper on the table 

[red Dog]

Thank you Lothar, I appreciate your interest.
It won't actually be on the table  rather above the table as I intend to display something like this:

 

The gear in transit should be very dynamic

 

That picture seems also to answer one of my previous question about the colour of the gear bay. I see yellow chromate in there, which is how I painted the main gear bay 

 

Edited October 12, 2020 by red Dog

[alain11]

Wow !!!!!! that turns very nice !!!!!! , you can be proud , I think we won't see a lot of Kfir C 10 on this scale , and you did it  can't wait the next steps 

Alain