A Harrier Built for Two! The Harrier T6

[Gondor]

I have been toying around with this idea for a couple of weeks. Decided today that I would commit to building, or rather starting this build.

Recently, some of you may remember, I was looking for the old Matchbox two seat nose which Kit kindly supplied to me. Well I am going to "adjust" it to fit onto the front of an Esci Harrier kit I have half built. The seats  that are part of the Hunter nose will be replaced with ones from some Revell Hunters, the height that the seats sit at may be adjusted as well as the vertical placement of the cockpit area, the nose will be re-profiled, not sure if it will get the Laser nose or not, and the tail will be lengthened possibly from the remains of an old Bobcat kit. Hope to get a little work done tonight, Cat permitting 

Gondor

[sandiego89]

Love 2 seat harriers! 

Laser nose adds an extra level of ugly....

[Gondor]

I have managed to start work on this build. The Hunter nose has been glued together after some card bulkheads were made to replace the one by Matchbox that includes the seats and one for the floor. The cockpit parts from the ESCI kit have been glued together, then cut up after I determined how much I needed to retain for the intake sides and what was required for the nose undercarriage bay.
As I had a good idea of how much of the ESCI cockpit I would have left, I set to with my saw and reduced the Matchbox cockpit into smaller pieces. The "engraved panel lines"  make great places to cut up the nose which is what I have done in front of the cockpit, I also cut a section from the rear of the nose sections that the ESCI kit parts will fir up against.
The other donor parts have been found lurking in an Xtrakit FA2 box which was to become a sidescan aircraft but I have decided to pass on that for now as a scratch build seeing that LoneWulf are going to reissue their kit/conversion so that's parts for this build in the bag, or box in this case 
Pictures tomorrow possibly.

Gondor

[Gondor]

No modelling done today, but I did take pictures 

First up is a general overview of the components so far.....



Next is the remains of the ESCI cockpit section. The almost vertical black line is where the front of the Intakes is so that I know not to modify anything to the rear after that line.



This picture shows a side profile of the remains of the Hunter cockpit





The last picture here shows the tail. The Green plastic is the remains of a Bobcat Harrier T4 while the greyish fin is from a Sword T.Mk.2/2A.



Hopefully more work tomorrow.

Gondor

[andys]

It's going to be an Israeli one?!

[Scotaidh]

So this is going to be a side-by-side twin seat aircraft, instead of a 'fore-and-aft" set-up?  Interesting! 

[Gondor]

Not going to be Israeli,  those decals just happen to be laying on the bench.
Yes it is a side by side trainer rather than the usual one behind the other seating arrangement.

Gondor

[Gondor]

To be a little more precide about the Israeli decals, they are for a Mirage V 

I wonder how many will think its a Nesher when it's done 

Gondor

[Doug K]

Francis K Mason's Harrier book (which I've had for 30 years) shows a side by side trainer study before the prototype even flew. Looking forward to seeing this one.

[Gondor]

A little more work done tonight, mainly cutting away more of the Hunter cockpit as I noticed that the contours changed on the underside. They apear to curve gently inwards then outwards again as you move towards the rear around the single cannon so I have removed the slighlty wider area. I have also glued a couple of lengths of square section together along a side to form a spine between the rear of the cockpit rear bulkhead and the front of the nose undercarriage bulkhead.

Gondor

[Gondor]

More work done today. Now that my cat is getting outside I have more time to do modelling 

First the frame I am using to join the dissimilar front fuselage parts together



Next up is a front shot



A little bleary but I had to take these pictures with my phone because I left the DSLR camera switched on and the battery went flat 

Side view next!



I am following the bottom line that the real trainer version did with the under nose profile, or at least similar. The fuselage to intake join is going to be interesting but I have marked out the area which is to be kept clear. I am toying with the idea of making my own intakes to accommodate the wider fuselage but that would take a lot of work and be fairly complex matching various curves both concave and convex.

More later.

Gondor

[Gondor]

Managed to get a bit further with the build. The rough shape is coming along but I am not to sure if I have the cockpit sitting at the correct angle. Is it looking nose up, nose down or just right?



Here it is propped up with the fuselage to show the relative angle better



And again, but this time with a Sword two seater for comparison



Gondor

[Devilfish]

Francis K Mason's Harrier book (which I've had for 30 years) shows a side by side trainer study before the prototype even flew. Looking forward to seeing this one.

What about the tuning fork trainer?  That would be an impressive build too!

[Gondor]

Francis K Mason's Harrier book (which I've had for 30 years) shows a side by side trainer study before the prototype even flew. Looking forward to seeing this one.

What about the tuning fork trainer?  That would be an impressive build too!

There is/was an Ardvark kit of the tuning fork trainer which doesn't float my boat so I am not likely to get it. Not seen a drawing of the side by side trainer in Mason's book, any chance of posting it here or sending a copy of the drawing to me via pm?

Gondor

[silverwindblade]

Forgive my ignorance, but what is a 'tuning fork trainer' ?