1:24 Airfix Hawker Typhoon Car Door Version Start-to-Finish Build

Happy Monday. My Monday's are happy because my wife and I have a deal that I don't work in the shop on weekends. So Mondays mean getting back to the Typhoon.

I masked the for engine compartment to paint the firewall semi-gloss black. I decided to not paint the cockpit side since it wil be almost entirely obscured by the instrument panel and masking in there was much more difficult than the engine compartment. In addition to Tamiya tape I used some Microscale liquid mask to close off any missed areas around the tube joints. After painting I went back and touched up the flat aluminum and got a decent job. The paint seemed pretty flat.

I then used one of my disposable eyeliner brushes (Amazon 100 for $7.99). They're very, very pointy for great detail work. And at 8 cents a piece, while I do clean them, I don't clean them very often. Some of the piping was hard to reach and I was reconsidering my decision to glue it all in before painting. But I perservered and got the job done. I dealing with the masking tape I partially broke the flight stick. With some Bondic and then thin CA, I did get it glued tightly. If it breaks again, I'm making a new one out of soldered brass.

Since I'm displaying the model with all the covers off the front end to show off the Napier Saber engine and all it's plumbing, having a pilot in the cockpit wouldn't be appropriate, so I used the option where you glue the seat belts in. The upper seat belts are the kit's molded styrene. I broke one of the lap belts and thought I lost the other (found it later). Therefore; I made new ones out of wine bottle foil. The seat "leather" color is Tamiya Nato brown. The seat belt buckles are picked out with the Molotow Chrome Pen.

The last thing I did (not shown) was paint the compass and it's support struts. The part is all transparent so I used liquid mask to protect the clear lens and painted the bottom with the chrome pen to give it some more interest.

Work continues tomorrow on more cockpit details.

Day 2 Typhoon construction. 

More framing pieces. The beauty of building a large scale kit is that you're really building an airplane. You might get some of this detail in 1:32 (See my Tamiya Corsair build), but small than that you'll build skin, but not much guts. This plane is ridiculous. Engineering is pretty good and confirms what I've been told about new Airfix kits. It compares nicely to Tamiya with clean parts with little or no flash. 

When I was attempting to install the X-bracing in the bow, it wasn't going in right. Problem? I had installed the main spare reversed. Good have been a disaster, but with careful weakening of the lap joint with the #11, I was able to wiggle it apart without breaking anything, turned it around and glued it in correctly. When I did that, the front under-engine bracing went in perfectly. The arrow points to this spar, now placed correctly.

The rear area also has lots of X-bracing/trusses. These went in without difficulty. These steps also included the hydraulic emergency hand pump which actually has piping molded leading to it. It included the rudder pedals and its trim wheel and the elevator trim wheel. I used some medium CA on a few critical joints that I felt needed some more boost, and this included the flight stick.

The armor plate behind the pilot seat must have been different in the "Car Door" version than the later one which Airfix came out with first. I know this, because there was an added sprue, "Z", that was out of alphabetical order. The letters ended in Sprue "R" and then there was Z. So Z includes all the Car Door variations from the other model. The arrow points to this part.

It's getting to the point where I have to start painting something. If I wait much further I will be unable to reach certain parts. But it's clear that painting the frame parts before gluing would have been a mess since every glue point would have to be cleaned for good adhesion. The level of detail is so intense that you feel like you want to jump in and fly it.

Typhoon construction has begun! Page one has you building the inner framing of the fuselage. I had at least three parts reversed due to my inability to clearly see just how they were orienting the images in the plan. Nothing was irreparable. You have to stare at the drawings with serious concentration to see which direction they're actually facing the image. It's very much like the psychological figure/ground illusions. You can see it facing in two directions, however, only one is correct. I almost finished the first page.

In this image you see an X-bracing that sits at the bottom of the cockpit floor. At first it looked like it sat on top of the frame, but after closer inspection, it dropped down into the bowels of the frame and latched onto some tabs jutting out of the side rails. The arrow shows this piece.

The bulkhead (firewall) is supposed to be semi-gloss black. All the frame materials, aluminum. Becuase I wanted to have all the glue surfaces pristine in these critical parts, and the glue surfaces are small at best, I decided to asseble the frame, air brush the aluminum and then with some careful masking, air brush the firewall.

The parts are pretty clean and have very finely molded details. I've been using a micro-razor saw more and more to cut parts from sprues since it leaves almost nothing left to file off. I spend a lot of time to do parts cleanup. It makes a better job and ensures good glue contact area.

Thanks!

When I saw that picture of the Bear bomber I thought that was one of the 1:24 kits in your stash and I freaked... trying to imagine how big that model would be. Then I came to and saw it was in your signature line. Whew!

Great idea, mental note made for when I start the 1/24 F6F.  Will try out on another kit before then

Have 5 other 1/24's in the stash besides the' 'Cat, so it will come in handy.

Hey gang, I'm back. My last post in November was when I picked up the Typhoon. Since then I finished two projects: the massive engine house and a cute little appliance store.

Today I installed the "chain link" fence (bridal tulle and soldered brass). There's still some odds and ends detail work, but for all intents and purposes, it's done.

The appliance store is one of the few structures on my model RR that I did not build. But i did do and entire 1970s ish interior. I 3D printed all the appliances and painted them an anachronistic mix of 1970s Havest Gold and Avocado and some modern stainless. 

The sign flashes and is an electro-luminescent product from Miller Engineering. I bought the sign nearly 10 years ago just for this project.

So the Typhone project is now officially underway. First up was creating another sprue rack. I learned from the one I created for the Corsair to make the slots wider. And instead of working with real wood and wood glue, I just cut up a couple of cardboard cartons left over from two Costco LED shop light fixtures. I'm pretty good at "cardboard engineering." This time I cut the slots with my paper cutter and used hot glue to put it all together. It really didn't take long. 

After opening up the box I laid out 1 inch spacing for the separators.

I hot glued the side tabs to form a 90 degree angle. The separators are 6.5" inches and I folded over the 1/2" to make one of the glue tabs. The other tab was a separate piece of cardboard bent at 90 degrees.

Work continued until the rack was filled. I needed something like this to organize the massive sprues in this big kit. Even so, they are enormous and hang way out of the rack. I found with the Corsair that it really speeds up the build when you're not fiddling through all those sprues to find the one you need. 

Here it is all loaded. One inch spacing was not a guess. I actually measured the thickness of some of the sprues with the curvy parts. I made the slots to tight on the Corsair rack. Nice thing about cardboard, if it gets wrecked, I just glue together another one. Cost? About a 1/2 of a hot glue stick.

Now that my sprues are in control, making the plane will begin. You need a big space just for the sprue rack.

Until next time...

I was looking into any aftermarket for the kit, but after looking at all the Eduard stuff in detail, I don't think the kit really needs it. PE for PE's sake is not always a good or thrifty decision. Some remarks were made about plastic landing gear versus metal, but even there, the decision was to stay with the kit gear. Any thoughts? I am going to buy the Eduard mask set. I have found that masking sets do make building more fun.

Beautiful engine house!  That engine is terrific.  Love building engines myself. 

Ochen Eenteresno!