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Whilst surfing the 1:48 model kits on eBay one weekend I spotted an incomplete Tamiya Avro Lancaster for sale - just the wings, engines, props and tailplane - no fusleage or transparencies. The possibility of making an Avro York sprung to mind - all I needed to do was scratch build a York fuselage; how difficult could that be?

I bid for the parts and won the auction. The easy part was over.

The plan is as follows:

1. Carve a fuselage in balsa wood.

2. Skin this with plastic card and filler.

3. Cut off the front end just before the cockpit and use the balsa masters to vac-form two halves in clear plastic.

4. Cut off the tail cone and use it to vac-form a plastic tailcone.

5. Scratch build a cockpit interior.

6. Graft the vac-formed bits onto the fuselage.

7. Use clear plastic to skin the glazed part of the fusleage (surface painted black beneath).

8. Scribe fusleage panel lines.

9. Use those self adhesive circles that you get in stationary stores to mask the fuselage windows.

10. Make the wings etc. using the Tamiya parts.

11. Connect the wings etc. to the fuselage.

12. Mask and paint as per a normal kit (I will probably paint the wings and fuselage separately).

13. Vac-form the central tail using another balsa master.

14. Make some home-made decals for the Dan Air York G-ANTK.

15. Apply the decals and finish off.

16. Make myself a really a long drink and relax for a while.

Step 1 was completed today using a Surform to profile the solid balsa fuselage. I used enlarged plans from the Profile Publications Avro York booklet.

My arms really ache now and my hair is full of balsa dust!!!

:yahoo:

Darius

AvroYork_01.jpg

AvroYork_02.jpg

AvroYork_03.jpg

AvroYork_04.jpg

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Oh yes I like this idea - the York is a very nice aeroplane - I am sure I flew in one in my well spent youth.

I was trying to picture where abouts in Worthing you live from the photo of the snow - we used to visit there quite a bit.

David.

David

In West Worthing, off Grand Avenue, about 5 mins walk from the beach.

:whistle:

Darius

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Very interesting. I'm looking forward to seeing the vacforming process... do you have a machine, or a gadget you made yourself?

btw - roughly how long did it take to sand the fuselage blank to shape? It looks good :woo:

Mike

I will be using an old Mattell vac-forming machine that should be capable of forming the cockpit area of the fuslage in two separate havles and the tailcone in one. The rest of the fuselage will be plastic card skinned onto the balsa core.

It took a day to get the balsa to shape. I still have to "tweak" it in a few areas but using the surform and a sanding block made "relatively" light work of it - although my upper arms ached for about a day afterwards!!!

Darius, this I will watch with interest. I respect immensely those who can scratch build as you are with this project!

If this works well I have ambitions to try and make a 1:48 Dh Dove... After I have completed the B-47 of course.

B)

Darius

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Steps 3 and 4 completed today (yesterday I was watching the England vs Scotland rugby match in a Brighton pub). I cut off the front end just behind the cockpit area using a razor saw and spit it horizontally in order to vac-form the top in clear plastic and the bottom in plain white. Before the vac-forming process I glued pieces of 2mm thick cardboard to the balsa masters to provide some oversail. This will hopefully give me a margin to trim the parts to fit.

I had considered splitting the cockpit vertically but the main windcreen does not have a central pillar so it had to be a horizontal split. I use a Mattell vac-forming machine to do the necessary and it worked reasonably well.

The tailcone was vac-formed in one go.

:angry:

Darius

AvroYork_05.jpg

AvroYork_06.jpg

AvroYork_07.jpg

AvroYork_08.jpg

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Steps 3 and 4 completed today .......

The tailcone was vac-formed in one go.

What an excellent project - very interesting. I envy your skills, and your initiative - I couldn't emulate this at all. I've often thought it would be great to build a York (and other RAF tansports e.g. Valetta, Hastings) because it would make an interesting project to build aircraft I've actually flown in - and the York was my first. In, er, 1951 or '52 my mother brought me home from Egypt (my dad was stationed at RAF Abu Sueir) to UK via Malta and Marseilles, the only non-servicemen passengers in an RAF York.

I too will watch your progress with enthusiasm - do keep us posted.

Regards, RPG

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  • 7 months later...
  • 2 weeks later...

The York was back on the table this Sunday and I made some progress in the cockpit using the one and only photo that I could find on the net of the main instrument panel. I scratch built the seats and yokes and used the balsa vac-form masters for the floor and front console as they strengthen the rather thin vac-formed outer skins. I was going to cheat and use an Eduard zoom Lancaster instrument panel but the York is much different - having both a pilot and copilot. I will therefore have to scratch build the panel in the same fashion as I did for the Sanger Shackleton. Mike Grant's instrument decals make this a much less daunting prospect.

:whistle:

Darius

AvroYork_12.jpg

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AvroYork_10.jpg

PS - if anyone has some Avro York cockpit interior pics to share they would be very useful...(unless they show something completely different form what I have done, in which case I don't want to know :rofl: ;) )

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Looks good

I am no expert on Yorks but I can't see the instrument panel being all that much different than the Lancaster? Canadian built Lancaster X's had provisions for a co-pilot. Attached is a link to a photo of one.

Link to Lanc

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  • 8 months later...

Some further progress has been made since last October.

I attached the vac-formed tailcone and modfied the balsa fuselage to accept the kit tailplanes.

AvroYork_13.jpg

AvroYork_14.jpg

The cockpit was modified to remove the throttle quadrant which is mounted on the ceiling in the Avro York. I also scratch built the instrument p[anel, utilising Mike Grant's excellent instrument decals.

AvroYork_15.jpg

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AvroYork_17.jpg

The balsa fusleage was then "skinned" with plastic card.

AvroYork_18.jpg

AvroYork_19.jpg

AvroYork_20.jpg

AvroYork_21.jpg

AvroYork_22.jpg

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