New Airfix 1/72nd Blackburn Buccaneer S.2C

[General Melchett]

Hi guys, it's been a very long time since I posted anything here so hopefully this will be first of many, in this case an early test shot of the much anticipated 1/72nd Airfix Buccaneer S.2C that I built back in June and appeared in last months issue of Airfix Model World. A great little kit with excellent fit, good detail, easy assembly and an accurate overall shape, thanks mainly to LIDAR, though there is a slight issue with the shape of the rear tailplane fairing which should be a smooth cone on the S.2C. The Buccaneer was fitted with three styles of rear tailcone fairing during it's life and unfortunately the kit part depicts the later 'stepped' version, fitted following the ARI 18228 RWR  upgrade program (a simple matter of reshaping). Also, with regard to the decals, if you look at yellow hatching that runs around the canopy, there are way too many segments...there should be only five along the canopy sides (plus two 'L' shaped end pieces), four at the front and three at the rear. I just applied them and then carefully painted those out that weren't required. Minor issues.

 

As no kit decals were available at the time of building I was sent Xtradecals sheet 'Buccaneer Collection Part 2' which, while excellent, didn't include any stencils. Fortunately Airfix managed to send me a test sheet just after I'd finished painting and decalling so I was able to add said stencils in time. Just as well as many of them, particularly the highly visible white ones, are unique to the Bucc. The model was painted using a mixture of Mr.Hobby H333 Extra Dark Sea Grey and MRP-113 Dark Sea Grey and highlighted using MRP-112 Medium Sea Grey. While Abteilung 502 oil washes, AK leaks and stains and AMMO MIG pastel powders were applied during the weathering process, everything was kept to a minimum as the Senior Service tended to keep these aircraft in tip top condition even in the rough conditions suffered aboard ship.

 

Personally, I don't particularly like the look of the wing slipper tanks, so I modified the war load a little by replacing them with an extra pair of 2in rocket pods and moved the two 1,000 pounders into the weapons bay. Along with reshaping the rear RWR tailcone fairing I also drilled out the lightening holes on the faces of the airbrake petals, which adds a lot more to the look of the finished model.  To me the only real disappointment was the cockpit which is really very basic, relying on decals, (though thankfully the seat off-set is included. I added seat-belts from Aizu tape and ejection seat firing handles from lead wire. I chose to use Mike Grant's British jet dial decals for the instrument panels and Airscale items for the side consoles. 

 

Thanks for looking...

 

Cheers

 

Andy

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Hajo L.]

Great, thanks for showing the model!
 

 

HAJO

[Bravosierra001]

That looks really nice! Great job on the build.

 

 

Brandon

[General Melchett]

Thanks guys, appreciated.