Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late' **FINISHED**

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Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late' **FINISHED**

Post by JamesPerrin »

Having enjoyed my Airfix McDonnell Banshee I thought I'd carry on in the same vein and pulled out this recent acquisition. Admiral (aka AZ models) seemed to also have had a similar idea as the main legs and wheels are a copy of Airfix Banshee parts!

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This is a short run IM kit, somewhere between Amodel and MPM from a few years ago. Resin, PE are included along with three option for this 'late' model (has the tailplane finlets). Not a great success the Pirate the 30 airframes being only used for evaluation (which it failed) and testing arrestor gear. It's claim to fame though was having one of the first afterburning engines.

This is quite a basic kit, though the resin cockpit plug is nicely detailed there are some areas that they haven't even bothered with. One is the roof to the nose wheel well (though it appears magically in place in the instructions). I added a piece of card to the base of the cockpit that extended to the length of the hole.

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The cockpit just has a stick and PE/film/IM sandwich IP added and needed not trimming to fit into the fuselage which was a nice surprise.

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The other area sorely lacking in effort is the intakes. Just a couple blanks that are located only a few mills beyond the lips.

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I discarded these in favour, once again of forming the intakes from milliput. A couple of blobs were just shaped with quickly brush handles and toothpicks.

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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by Jagewa »

Nice work James, those seamless intakes are a neat idea.

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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by ShaunW »

Good work and I echo Jim's comment regarding the intakes, that's a great idea and well worth nicking :-D
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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by martin hale »

Nice fix on the intakes James. I enjoy watching your builds.

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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by Barry »

Well James, don't see one of these very often. I built mine from a Meikraft kit quite a few years ago. They were a cottage industry outfit down in, I think, Texas. It's a nice little jet to have on the shelf. As I recall, the last few built flew straight from the factory to a storage yard somewhere to await scrapping.
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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by JamesPerrin »

Thanks for the kind comments already guys.

This is where I am this lunchtime. Wings on, seams have had initial fill and rub down. The wing fuselage joint is pretty good. The lower wing needed a bit of putty front and back. The upper wings meet the fuselage square on, the port need not filler but the starboard hadn't twisted slightly when I clamped it to the lower wing and need some card stuffing into a gap along the fillet :roll: If you're not bother with the intakes the upper wing can go on after the lower wing has been attached to the fuselage.

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As usual with these kits someone has over estimated the curvature of the fuselage and hence the base of the tail need quite a bit of sanded to lessen the curve to match the fuselage. This work distracted me until after I glued it on that it is bent into two directions! I tried the hot water method but the plastic didn't really soften much however it looks much straighter than it does above.
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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by ShaunW »

Warpage is a complete bind. If it looks much straighter than the pic then it might be a case of letting sleeping dogs lie. I would imagine that it would be difficult to clamp and immerse in v. hot water now that the tail is glued on.
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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by JamesPerrin »

I got it within my "it'll do" threshold. This is meant to be a quick holiday build while I'm off work not a "this will be my best yet" build ;-)

That said I did notice the starboard wing had too much dihedral so I broke the upper join the the fuselage and inserted another shim of card. Easily done.

Tailplane and finlets added. Nose cannons attached and drilled out.

The wing tip tanks should both have lights in the nose so I cut these off and will crash mould so new noses soon. The tanks have a slot that fits the upper half of the wing but not the lower as well. I could either open up the slot and try to match the curve of the wing or file the lower wing tips flat. I went for the latter option. With fore knowledge the simplest thing would be to cut the tips off the lower wing altogether.

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Just some liquid putty on the tanks and finlets, to fill small gaps, to sand off.
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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by MerlinJones »

Definitely an interesting looking beastie.

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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by JamesPerrin »

MerlinJones wrote:Definitely an interesting looking beastie.
Admiral also has this boxed as the 'early' or rather the earlier version which is the same minus the finlets. The true early version (first two a/c) didn't have the afterburner, with an undercut rear fuselage that instead of the NMF exhaust.
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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by JamesPerrin »

A little detail added to the parcel shelf ( found a system schematic online which gave some clues) and a basic gun sight. I've also painted the joins with Hu56 Aluminium to show up issues. I have been remiss in not performing this simple step lately, instead waiting till the primer stage. This can be a bit late for addressing major issues as the canopy is on and we risk contaminating the inside with with dust sprites! The metallic finish makes errors stand out even more than grey, though probably still not as much as whatever the final colour is :roll:

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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by ShaunW »

This is a very interesting machine, a sort of 50's vision of the future. Silver paint is a good one for the joins, but of late I've also been a bit too lazy to use the technique - it will cost me dear at some point, naturally :grin:
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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by pkwong »

You could also use a silver Sharpie pen to get a similar effect. No clean up needed. The silver colour can be removed by rubbing alcohol (or nail polish remove or isopropyl alcohol).
That is what I use to check the seams.

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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by JamesPerrin »

That's a great tip Peter, cheers.
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Re: Admiral 1/72 Vought F6U Pirate 'Late'

Post by Eric Mc »

Very interesting machine.
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