Royal Navy Handley Page Privateer S.2

[CammNut]

First, an acknowledgement: this build was inspired by Zero-Sen's amazing profile of the Handley Page Valkyrie GR.IIE on this very site.

The Handley Page Privateer was conceived as a backup in case the Royal Navy's Blackburn Buccaneer carrier-based nuclear bomber encountered development delays. The aircraft was developed by the "simple" expedient of scaling down the Victor bomber then in development for the Royal Air Force.



The Privateer S.1 entered service with the Fleet Air Arm in 1959. Designed solely for nuclear strike, this aircraft had a glass nose for the bomb aimer (similar to France's Sud Aviation Vautour IIB). In the end, only a single squadron of Privateers became operational.

When the Buccaneer S.1 entered service in 1962, the Privateers were modified to the S.2 variant equipped for maritime and land attack. The glass nose was replaced with two radars: one looking forward for ship detection and one downward for ground mapping.



When the Buccaneer S.2 became operational, the Privateers were moved over to the aerial refueling role, the big wing carrying ample fuel for offloading. But operating an extra type on the decks of the Royal Navy's small carriers proved too burdensome.

The Privateers were then confined to operating from land bases, providing aerial refueling in support of training and other tasks, but eventually the aircraft were retired and broken up – not even one survivor making it into the Fleet Air Arm's museum at RNAS Yeovilton.



The kit is an Kader (Lincoln) model of the HP.80 Victor prototype gifted to me by collector and modeller friend David (many thanks). The scale is 1/148, which made it ideal to be "rescaled" as it is about the size of a Buccaneer in 1/72.

This ancient moulding is ultra simple: no landing gear, wheel wells or any other detail and only a single thick transparency for the cockpit. So I decided to make it gear up - just glue it all together, sand the nose smooth and make the modifications.




These are the refueling probe; tandem cockpit; canopy and spine from an Airfix Buccaneer; taller fin for directional stability on carrier launches and recoveries; twin engines; wingtip tanks; pylons and the armament, anti-radar Martel missiles, again from the Buccaneer donor.

The Fleet Air Arm colour scheme, markings and stencils are from the same Airfix Buccaneer.



(Apologies for the amateurish editing-out of my back yard past the edges of the white background sheet!)

[sandiego89]

Wow, great result. Poor old Victor kit never looked so good...

[kerick]

I thought that was a Bucc canopy.
Nice work! Looks very plausible.

[Dizzyfugu]

THIS is beautiful! Great scale-o-rama work and execution, love it!     

[deathjester]

WOW!!  that is astoundingly beautiful - definitely a should have been!

[kitbasher]

Very nice.

How would that work with the front end of a Sea Vixen or B-57 Canberra, I wonder?

[rickshaw]

Damn, you beat me to it. I was thinking about something similar with a 1/96 Victor...   

[zenrat]

Very nice bit of scaleorama.  Good job.

[loupgarou]

Beautiful idea, and realization!
Would cause a lot of head scratching at shows.

[CammNut]

Thanks folks. The design evolved as I made the kit and I am pleased with the result. And looking back at Zero's profiles I, too, am now thinking about what could be done with a 1/96 Victor!

[Hobbes]

Nice job!

[eatthis]

thats FANTASTIC 

[KiwiZac]

I remember seeing those profiles and thinking it would be cool to build one. I don't think I'll bother as I doubt I can come close to this. Top job!

[PR19_Kit]

What a brilliant idea, and execution of same! 

[NARSES2]

That is nice