Ilyushin IL-62M "Aeroflot Moscow Olympics" [1:144 Zvezda] - DONE

[Alex]

1 hour ago, jenshb said:

That white finish on the fuselage - before you clearcoated it - looks fantastically smooth.  The end result looks very nice too.  How about a Super VC10 for comparison?

The fuselage was done with Tamiya gloss white right out of the spray can.  It levels extremely well, by dint of having a lot of solvent in it.  For that reason, it is also hard to get it to be opaque over any small ridge or groove in the surface - it tends to flow away and let the color underneath show.  I primed this model with white and still had a bit of trouble with that (primer had the same tendency).  Next time around I will supplement the white aerosol primer with some targeted applications of white Mr Surfacer using the airbrush to make sure that I have a really dense white primer coat.

 

the VC10 would be an apt comparison - maybe I’ll need to add a copy of the Roden kit to the stash.  What’s one more at this point...?

[Alex]

What are the key differences, do you think, between the two?   To look at the basic specs, they seem pretty similar (size, number of passengers, power, range...).  But I'm far from an expert on these things.

 

3 hours ago, Jennings Heilig said:

Actually, other than the basic four engine aft configuration, there's almost no comparison between the VC10 and the Il-62.  A more apt comparison is the 707-320B Intercontinental and the DC-8-62/63.  The VC10 was designed to do one very narrowly defined, very specific job, not to be a far ranging intercontinental airliner as the 62, 707, and DC-8 were.  Comparisons are often made, and totally baseless claims of copying, but they're not well informed on either count.  By almost any metric, the Il-62 was a far better airplane at its job than the VC10 ever was.

 

[jenshb]

True, the VC10 was designed initially for a very specific customer with very specific requirements, and by the time the aircraft entered service, the short runways at hot and high airports were no longer short.  So, BOAC were certainly lacking in foresight on the specs, and then tried to pull out of ordering an aircraft they had themselves specified.  Sometimes one wonders if British airlines were the worst enemy of the British aircraft industry...  However, there is more to operating cost and revenue than the fuel burn.  The VC10 had a higher structual weight proportion than the 707, as well as fuel burn, but the maintenance costs were lower, and the load factors of the VC10 were higher than for BOAC's 707 - passengers simply preferred the VC10's quieter cabin (because of the engine location) than the noiser 707, and that brought more money in the coffers.  The Super VC10 improved the situation somewhat (made the aircraft even more elegant in my view), but allowing greater passenger numbers.  For truly uncompetitiveness, the Convair 990 surely takes the biscuit.  Although a good looking aircraft too...

[Alex]

12 hours ago, Jennings Heilig said:

I think the sales numbers for DC-8s and 707s vs. VC10s and Convairs speak for themselves.  Money talks.  Passengers universally loved the VC10, but it just wasn't an economical machine for what most airlines used it for.  

 

As far as the differences between the VC10 and Il-62 - they're utterly and completely different birds.  Here's a great piece on the nitty gritty details about it in far greater detail than you're probably interested in, but it's very well done...

 

http://www.vc10.net/History/Comp_il62.html

Thanks for that - very interesting.  It seems like the different ways of adapting to the (forced?) decision to use the aft-engine design (tail prop versus very large horizontal stabilizer) do make them different in pretty fundamental ways.  

[Panzerwomble]

Nice jet - turned out really nice