Here
is my 1/72 scale Avro Vulcan B Mk2 by Airfix. The Vulcan is one of three
aircraft types that made up the V force of bombers, the other two were the
Handley-Page Victor and Vickers Valliant. The Vulcan was the back bone of the UK
Nuclear deterrent force (armed with the Blue Steel Thermo Nuclear stand off
missile) until this role went was taken over by the Royal Navy and its Polaris
armed submarines.
The
Vulcan started out as aircraft specification B35/46, and was developed as a 4
engine delta wing bomber. As this wing design was at that time a fairly new
concept, it was decided to built 1/3 scale study aircraft, the Avro 707A (high
speed), 707B (low speed) and 707C (twin seat trainer). This was done, and with
the basic wing concept proven, the first Vulcan prototype was built in 1952, and
the first production Vulcan B1’s went in to service in 1956. Vulcan's stayed
in service until 1984 and looked like they would end there service life having
never dropped bombs in anger. However, in 1982, the Falklands conflict broke
out; Vulcan’s were pressed in to service to bomb port Stanley during the
'Black Buck' missions, they were flown much further that they had been designed
to do and required multiple refuelling missions (done by Victor K2 Tanker)
dropping 21 1,000lb bombs on Port Stanley's airport runway.
My
Vulcan, XM607, is one of the aircraft that took part in these missions. Apart
from the 1,000lb Bombs, they also carried 'Shrike' anti-radiation missiles to
take out enemy radar installations. These were carried externally, using make
shift pylons, and attached to the under wing hard points that that were left
over from a time when the RAF was considering replacing the Blue Steel missile
with American made ‘Sky Bolt’ missiles.
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This
Kit was purchased at a local car boot sale (along with a number of other kits)
and came with a white metal
K2
tanker conversion set. This one was produced in the mid 1980's and comes
complete with a Blue Steel missile; the parts were cleanly moulded in quite
sturdy plastic, all parts having raised panel lines. The Decals were long past
their best having looked like they had gotten damp during storage. I explained
the situation to the Airfix parts replacement department and within a week I had
a nice new set of decals for my model.
As
usual, work started on the cockpit. Unfortunately the standard Vulcan kit does
not have any cockpit detail to speak of - you can’t see most of it through the
sealed canopy. On my Vulcan, I wanted to see what was inside, so I had to make a
scratch built cockpit. The kit seats were not up to much, so I scratch built new
ones using the kit seats as a base. I also made up new instrument panels and
controls. As the crew access hatch is open I thought that I'd better make up
some details for the access way, I built up some walls and flooring, installing
that in to the bottom half of the fuselage. As the windows in the cockpit are
very small (you can't see much of the interior detail through them) I had to cut
open the canopy. Using a razor saw I detached the front windshield section from
the detachable canopy section. The entire cockpit interior was painted prior to
installation in the fuselage.
The
rear of the aircraft was similarly devoid of details around the engine section,
there being no jet pipes in the kit. I cut four lengths of brass tubing and
installed them in to the engine apertures. So I could get a nice even finish to
the engine nozzles, I cut the rear quarter’s of the upper fuselage so I could
blend them in to the lower half and sandwich the brass rods in place.
The
Vulcan kit comes with the option of having a closed bomb bay, or the insert to
carry the Blue Steel missile. However, I had decided that I wanted to open up my
bomb bay. I measured out the doors from the supplied one piece closed doors and
cut them in to four sections. The next part was to build the bomb bay it’s
self. I had a number of books for reference and the internet, but there’s
nothing like getting some photos of the real thing. We were planning a trip to
London
anyway, so we made time for a visit to the RAF Hendon museum. The Vulcan that
they have there is on display indoors with the bomb bay open, and you can
actually get underneath and take pictures of the interior. I built the bomb bay
firstly by cutting out both ends and the sides of the bay from plastic card. The
ends are approximately the shape of the inside of the upper fuselage. The actual
curved shape of the bomb bay upper was made from plastic strips, braced with a
cross member. Then the inside was detailed with the cross drilled bracing
of the upper fuselage, and other sections of pipe work and fuselage stiffeners.
The Vulcan model is a tail sitter, even more so with a detailed bomb bay and
brass tubing jet pipes, so I installed about 45gramms of lead shot and milliput
in to the nose to keep her straight and level.
The
Airfix Vulcan comes with raised panel lines. As I’d decided to detail my
Vulcan quite a bit, I thought I’d go all the way. This was my first attempt at
a full re-scribing job, it took a bit of practice and I may have cut a little
deep in some places. Using
an OLFA re-scribing tool I went over the original
panel lines with the Scriber, I did all of the large sections before assembly.
The
next stage was to join the two halves of the fuselage together and both wing
halves and the tail. This went together quite rapidly and along with the tail
section the Vulcan grew in to that easily recognisable shape very quickly. There
were a number of fit problems in the area of the wings, I used two part epoxy to
attach the wings to the fuselage, bracing them whilst they set straight; and
then gradual amounts of filler were applied to conceal the gaps. All of this
filling had buried lots of the re-scribing detail that I had done on the wing
roots, so this had to be re-scribed again. All other gaps were filled and sanded
smooth and other details such as the pitot tubes and re-fuelling probe were
added. The landing gear was made up and painted as a separate unit to be
installed after painting the fuselage. The crew access ladder in the kit was
also a bit basic, so I modified it, scratch building a new top half using
plastic rod.
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Painting
the Fuselage was to be the next step. After masking off the cockpit, bomb aimers
window and crew entry door, the first step was a couple of coats of Halfords
grey primer, this was applied and sanded smooth. As I had decided to build my
Vulcan as XM607 of the Black Buck raids in 1982, the underside was airbrushed
with Humbrol #164 Dark Sea Grey. The upper surface has the distinctive
disruptive pattern camouflage, this was marked out in pencil and Humbrol #165
Medium Sea Grey applied first. When Dry I applied Humbrol #163 Dark Green to
complete the pattern. The air intakes were brush painted with Matt White and
when this was dry I completed the camouflage pattern on to the inside edge of
the intakes. Then after some careful masking of the wheel wells and the bomb
bay, they were air bushed with Matt White, details being picked out in grey and
aluminium.
When
the paint was fully dry it was time to apply the decals. I didn’t fancy
spraying the whole aircraft with gloss varnish (to prevent decal silvering) so
as I applied the decals I brushed a small layer of Future (Klear in the
UK
) on to the area I was going to apply the decal. I slid the wet decal on to the
future and dabbed it dry with a cotton but. This had the double effect of
preventing bubbles (so no silvering) and to adhere the decals firmly in place
when dry. I found it almost impossible to remove a Future applied decal with the
cellotape & rip method, resorting to scrapping one off with the back of a
knife. After all of the decals were applied I sprayed about three coats of
Humbrol Matt Cote to seal everything in. the final touches were then applied;
undercarriage, U/C doors and rams and a freshly painted canopy were installed,
the removable section of the canopy was left off, it being a simple matter to
sit the canopy in place when the model was on display. My Vulcan was now
complete.
However,
I was left with the Blue Steel missile that came with the kit, it looked quite
nice and it was a shame to just leave it in the box. So I built up the missile
and made a scratch built nozzle for the Senator rocket motor that powered Blue
Steel to her target. I did a bit of research and found some pictures of the bomb
trolley that carried the missile to the aircraft, so I scratch built one from
plastic card, the wheels are donated toy car wheels that have been modified for
the job. The missile and trolley were painted and detailed appropriately. The
Blue Steel being white not blue was painted using Halfords Ford Diamond white
and the trolley was painted in Humbrol #154 Insignia Yellow. As well as the Blue
Steel missile, I thought I would include in my photos the Avro 707B model; this
as you remember was the test bed for the Vulcan wing design.
I
really enjoyed building my Vulcan, it was a bit of an adventure in more ways
than one, requiring quite a bit of reading of internet and book resources and
visits to a couple of museums that had Vulcan’s present. I’m very pleased
with my Vulcan MX607 model. There were a few fit problems with the old Airfix
kit, and plenty of filler was required and some details were a bit sparse, but I
think it has turned out quite well.
Reference
Material.
The
Vulcan Story, by Tim Laming
Vulcan
– Last of the V-Bombers, by Duncan Cubitt & Ken Ellis
Vulcan
B Mk2, XL318 –
RAF
Hendon
Museum
Vulcan
B Mk2, XM594 -
Newark
Air
Museum
Enjoy!
Karl
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