1/32 Fleet Air Arm Sea Vampire F20

[thierry laurent]

1 hour ago, jbrennan said:

Amazing work Thierry,

Will it be in the sky dark sea grey scheem, being the first one ?

jon

Thanks!

 

Yes but this will be VV151 with the classical Sky and EDSG FAA scheme!

 

[Oldbaldguy]

4 hours ago, thierry laurent said:

Hi folks,

 

here's one good picture I found. It looks the IP is very close to the windshield edge but not against it. Look at that picture giving a lot of interesting details:

 

 

This also shows how the cockpit rail looks like. Some work will also be required there!

Having spent most of my life around US naval fighters that get bigger and bigger with each new one, I forget just how small many of the European navy jets were.  Vampires, Sea Hawks, Etendards are tiny!  

[thierry laurent]

3 hours ago, Oldbaldguy said:

Having spent most of my life around US naval fighters that get bigger and bigger with each new one, I forget just how small many of the European navy jets were.  Vampires, Sea Hawks, Etendards are tiny!  

 

Not really! If you look at jets from the same era the sizes of most of them were quite comparable: Sea Hawks and Vampires are not that different from Panthers, Scimitars from Demons and Buccaneers from Phantoms! Nonetheless, for some you are right. For instance, the Etendards are quite small as they are based on a sixties design and the French carriers of that era were smaller than the US supercarriers. THIS is actually the main reason.

The situation became fully different later (end of the sixties-beginning of the seventies). At that step European navies were not anymore considering new large carriers to be affordable and they consequently stopped the development of most naval fighters whereas increasing progressively the size of the NAVY planes stayed the norm in the US. This explains why for decades most European navies only relied on Harriers and ground-based planes, France being the only exception with Crusaders and Etendard generations before the Rafales. Had we developped a European Navy, we would possibly have spent the budget to get some supercarriers and the situation would have probably be comparable to the US one. However, this is just uchrony as Europe powers had lost their empires and had to cope with the Russian bear ground threat.. ;-)

[thierry laurent]

Hi folks!

 

I'm doing my best to keep the pace! Actually, the fact my wife is fully busy with her own projects is somewhat helping!

 

The picture here above made me think about the sills area. If you look closely, you see that the plane had a kind of rectangular rail closed by two side-by-side rectangular strips. If you look hereunder, the kit parts have a pointy head at the rear and just give a plain strip, not a rail with a U section.

 

 

 

Not that bad but not really accurate. I will have to look at that later!

[thierry laurent]

I went back to the gun ammo chute holes. I do not like holes opened on a void when they are sufficiently large to see through them. Moreover, normally, if the guns are installed, you should not have fully opened holes but kind of closed funnels between the breeches and the fuselage skin. So, I built them with sections of Evergreen strips.

 

 

I only used sections of Evergreen strips. Not really difficult but time consuming. Then I closed them to have that 'closed funnel' effect.

 

 

And here's the effect from the external side. Far better I think!

 

 

Last, as already explained, there is a risk that the rear bulkhead interferes with the front holes when the fuselage is assembled. I solved the issue easily: I simply cut the offending area! That way, I'm sure I won't have any problem later.

 

 

As you can see I tried to cut the minimum area to keep a maximum of kit rigidity when assembled even if the bulkhead does not actually reach the lower fuselage. Another box is ticked out of my list.

 

By the way, I did not foresee it but I will possibly formalize a tweak list for that kit as I think I have already done the largest part of a draft for my own use!

 

I also had a second look at the external tanks. They look quite good but it is a pity the caps were not separate parts (possibly photoetched ones). Rebuilding them will be a PITA but as they are very visible, there is no other option. Moreover, as far as I know, I've never seen such a type of cap on any photoetched set...

[thierry laurent]

Another important remark: even if you want to add details in the cockpit, do NOT add the radio part D64 before painting the cockpit. Otherwise, it will be impossible to paint its upper face! I also found that the throttle part (D13) is actually incomplete as there are two large levers missing (one above and one under the body). A small one is also missing behind the lower one located on the left side but it is less visible.

[Alain Gadbois]

Excellent work taking on this tricky assembly process!

The exterior canopy rail is of a triangle section. The kit part might be usable, by sanding the outside to get a sharp edge at top. The exact angle can be determined as it is following the angle of the windscreen side panels. The interior rail can be added from a strip of styrene, exactly the same height as the outside one.

[thierry laurent]

15 hours ago, Alain Gadbois said:

Excellent work taking on this tricky assembly process!

The exterior canopy rail is of a triangle section. The kit part might be usable, by sanding the outside to get a sharp edge at top. The exact angle can be determined as it is following the angle of the windscreen side panels. The interior rail can be added from a strip of styrene, exactly the same height as the outside one.

Thanks Alain. I guess you actually meant ' by sanding the inside', weren't you?

[Alain Gadbois]

38 minutes ago, thierry laurent said:

Thanks Alain. I guess you actually meant ' by sanding the inside', weren't you?

I guess it depends on how the kit part is designed and I don’t have it in hand to be sure, but it looks like a part with a rectangular section. The actual railing is a rectangle triangle, with the 90’ angle on the lower inboard side. The hypotenuse is outside the aircraft.

Hope I’m being clear!

 

Alain

ps: probably easier to make a new one from scratch if you have an evergreen strip of correct height and width.

 

[thierry laurent]

2 hours ago, Alain Gadbois said:

I guess it depends on how the kit part is designed and I don’t have it in hand to be sure, but it looks like a part with a rectangular section. The actual railing is a rectangle triangle, with the 90’ angle on the lower inboard side. The hypotenuse is outside the aircraft.

Hope I’m being clear!

 

Alain

ps: probably easier to make a new one from scratch if you have an evergreen strip of correct height and width.

 

Ok, I understand what you mean. I have Tamiya rods with a triangular section. I will look at that closer. Thanks again.

[Alain Gadbois]

On 9/14/2022 at 4:41 PM, thierry laurent said:

Another important remark: even if you want to add details in the cockpit, do NOT add the radio part D64 before painting the cockpit. Otherwise, it will be impossible to paint its upper face! I also found that the throttle part (D13) is actually incomplete as there are two large levers missing (one above and one under the body). A small one is also missing behind the lower one located on the left side but it is less visible.

Something I posted before for someone asking for cockpit details, if you missed it:

 

 

Alain

[Alain Gadbois]

More info on the canopy rails:

 

 

Look for section M-M:

 

Alain

[thierry laurent]

16 hours ago, Alain Gadbois said:

More info on the canopy rails:

 

 

Look for section M-M:

 

Alain

Thanks Alain. Very useful. BTW do you have any information on the belly lights in that TM? This stays the only topic for which I did not find a good amount of information.

[thierry laurent]

Hi guys, 

 

Nothing fancy to show right now. I'm stuck for some days. I need now to end scratchbuilding the fuselage rear end before adding fragile parts on the cockpit sides. However, the main issue is the lack of any preserved production Sea Vampire airframe as I concluded that area was not fully identical on the prototype kept in Yeovilton. Moreover, I cannot rely either on pictures as there are quite few known pictures of such planes and the ones showing that area are very limited and there are very few close-up ones. And I did not find any useful TM view either! So, I'm waiting now for a book about the French Sea Venom ('Aquilon'). Hopefully I found it for an acceptable even if not that cheap price. I was lucky as that book is now asking for totally crazy prices. It looks it has quite good pictures of that area and I hope that with them as an inspiration, Sea Vampire prototype pictures and the rare pictures showing the production Sea Vampire fuselage tail I should be able to rebuild something that looks acceptable even if possibly not fully accurate! Wait and see.

[thierry laurent]

Hi again,

 

It looks I will now have to share my time between that build and the Tunnan one. For whatever reason, the Venom is even less well covered by printed references than the Vampire. The Venom Warpaint did not really help. So, I ordered two other books. They arrived on Friday.

 

 

They will be useful for the Venom kit I have and hopefully I got good pictures of the exhaust area.

 

 

This will help!