Tom's Skybirds DH Hornet **Finished**

[TomW]

Still taking things slowly and carefully in the insectarium.

The cockpit is installed and I'm quite pleased with the harness, seeing as it's my first attempt at one:







Looking at photo's of the real thing there should be some sort of tanks that sit on the parcel shelf behind the pilots headrest, which is useful 'cos scratchbuilding something will hide the seam

Also fitted the belly panel and the nose, not a superb fit with some sanding required for smooth contours:






Finally just a quick test-fit of the wings and that gorgeous shape becomes all too apparent:








As an aside I had a dig throught the stash this afternoon and found a FROG Hornet that I had forgotten about, which is good 'cos the marking options are exactly the same as the Skybirds kit ergo I have spares should the unthinkable happen. If I get this build finished in good time then I'll have a go at the FROG but it does need a replacement canopy if anyone has one available??

Regards

Tom

[TomW]

Thanks for the heads up there Bruce

Today's progress report sees me mostly sanding and filling to get the airframe sorted.

In my last post I showed the nose had some large steps which I suspect have come about as a result of my cockpit installation hamfistidness, an attack of the sandpaper has gone some way to rectifying the situation:




I will need a smear of filler to sort those last dips and then some more sanding but definitely an improvement.

The belly pack has also had some re-shaping to sort out shape issues:




This mold mismatch has been filled since this shot was taken and is nice and smooth :





Moving further aft along the fuselage the instructions remind one to remove the unwanted Naval accoutrements, namely the arrestor hook fairings and the camera ports. The Skybirds Hornet kits share fuselage and wing mouldings and as the naval version has more lumps and bumps it obviously made sense to mold that version and ask the modeller to remove them for RAF planes, no big problem and a few swipes with sandpaper see's them disappear:





Finally the rudder and empennage are on, all three parts took some sanding and reshaping before a positive fit could be achieved, especially the rudder that needed a few mm taking off the locating stub in both depth and width. A little clean-up and the job will be a good'un




More soon

Regards

Tom

[splash]

It's looking good, I'm enjoying your thread.

Regards
Splash

[JamesPerrin]

Coming along well Tom. The belts are a simple but effective way to give that lived in feel.

Couple of suggestions if I may. I know you're a brush man but I'd suggest going over the sanded areas with some fine wet'n'dry to rid yourself some of those larger scratches. Secondly you'll note around the camera port there are is still some shiny plastic, this suggests that the raised port hasn't quite been eradicated. A couple of more swipes should do it.

Look forward to seeing how it compares with the Magna kit which I built some time ago (http://gregers.7.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?t=6428;) I've been told this is a copy of the Frog kit and features it's rather thick wings. Afraid I don't have the spare canopy though, I passed on it to someone else a few back.

[TomW]

Thankyou for the advice James I should have mentioned that these shots are 'work in progress' mainly to show the reshaping I've had to do to the kit. I'll be going over the areas with progressive grades of wet'n'dry till I get up to 2500 grit, That's usually smooth enough to avoid showing through paint.

Regards

Tom

[AceSeafire]

Enjoying watching this one progress. Good work going on here

[ShaunW]

This is very good - certainly not a shake and bake kit

[splash]

Skybirds 86
I had the greatest of pleasure back in the 80’s of attending the Yeovil Model Club every month where Mike Eacock the man behind Skybirds 86 used to attend.

Mike was not only the designer and manufacture of the kits, it was all done in his house as a one man cottage industry.

Mike used to bring all his latest projects to the club and get us to test build them, he used to say her wanted to design kits to be built in a logical way and spent hours writing the instructions so as to make it easier for you to build, the kits were not shake and bake but if you followed all his instructions to the letter, you would finish up with an excellent kit.

If you look at the MB5 he made he even treated the white metal instrument panel with a chemical to turn it black so you could give it a slight rub and all the instruments would stand out. He also made a wooden jig to put the wheels in and then smack it with another lump of wood, this gave you wheels with flat spots straight out of the box.

Regards
Splash

[TomW]

At first glance this kit does indeed look daunting but, and its a big but, the instructions are so good that provided you can read there are no real nasties waiting in the build process


I shall begin today's update with another gratuitous nose shot to show further clean-up progress:




And another of the Hornets' rump for the same purpose:




With the whole airframe assembled so far given a damn good going over with the wet'n'dry I was ready to attach the nacelles, this has resulted in some mis-matching of parts but nothing that will be a hassle to sort:






And one to show overall progress:





At this rate I might even get some paint on by the weekend

Regards

Tom

[JamesPerrin]

Smooth as a baby's proverbial

[TomW]

I've been a busy bee these past two days gently re-shaping the nacelles. The steps shown in the last post have been eliminated and the rear of each nacelle has been blended into the upper wing assembly.

Here was how she looked first thing this morning:





And how she looks now with a first thin coat of Medium Sea Grey on the upper surfaces:






I plan to get a second coat on before end of play this evening and to start on the PRU Blue tomorrow I may even have time to start the (minimal) cleanup of the white metal parts.

Regards

Tom

[JamesPerrin]

She's shaping up beautifully.

[Taurusboy]

The metals look nice Tom are they
by the kit makers or someone else?
Pete.

[TomW]

All included in the kit Pete, the detail is as good as one see's on modern resin replacement parts

Regards

Tom

[TomW]

Minor hiccup with my painting plan as it appears my Hornet has a skin allergy :





In actuality of course the first coat of paint showed a couple of surface flaws that needed attention, so out came the wet'n'dry to remove the paint and I could apply a topical cream to those areas causing distress :





I'll get those patches sanded smooth in the morning and repaint.

Regards

Tom