The Scimitar FB-2, the RAF's heavy hitter

[PR19_Kit]

Well yes, why not? That's pretty well what the FAA did for the poor 'Observer' in the Sea Vixens, and the RAF themselves did it for the Nav in almost all Canberra variants.

I'll give the idea some thought, thanks Chris. 

In the meanwhile here's the kit contents, all in flimsy plastic bags, one full of strangely shaped small styrene parts (Mike Eacock, who made the Skybirsds86 kits, only had a small IJ machine so the parts had to be small..........) a couple of bags of white metal parts, one of PE, one of smaller styrene bits, FOUR sheets of decals, albeit small ones, and SIX pages of instructions! Well, paperwork anyway..........

[PR19_Kit]

Thanks Dave, I have a couple of 'standard' Red Beards en route already actually, and a supersonic version 'in hand', as well as a Mk 7 too!

I'm almost an independent nuclear power in my own right! 

[Gondor]

Why bother with an extended canopy for the rear seater ? After all he's probably only an NCO, not commissioned and one of "Us" plus the dark will help him concentrate on his poorly illuminated screens 

Semi serious suggestion, just put a fuselage "plug" in behind the existing canopy ?

Makes me think that perhaps a Javelin canopy if the GIB doesn't need his head too high.

As with almost all Skybirds boxes they're not large enough to contain all the kit parts once you've opened them the first time. This goes for their MB5, the Scimitar, and the Hornets, every one's the same, bursting at the seams once it's been opened.

My boxing of the same kit is exactly the same. Open the box and not only can't you get all the bits back in, the box falls to bits as well!

Not sure how well the "plastic" glues together for a fuselage extension. If I was to do something like that I would use the Xtrakit version, Ideal for chop and shunt work seeing how accurate it is.

Gondor

[kerick]

Why bother with an extended canopy for the rear seater ? After all he's probably only an NCO, not commissioned and one of "Us" plus the dark will help him concentrate on his poorly illuminated screens 

Semi serious suggestion, just put a fuselage "plug" in behind the existing canopy ?

Another "coal hole"?

[PR19_Kit]

Construction's proceeding apace on the Scimitar.

The Skybird86 styrene feels like concrete as it's so brittle, but it files and sands superbly. They recommend removing material to get the parts to fit rather than using filler later on, and I'd agree but you need a large flat second cut file for the job, there's LOTS of filing in store.

Here's the three wing parts glued up, two upper halves and a lower section that spans the fuselage and bridges the two outer wing parts.



It looks a little agricultural compared with modern day kits, but it's finely engineered and all the joint lines align perfectly once you've filed the rough edges off properly. Adding the lower fuselage half needs more precise filing, mainly on the front and rear edges of the wing recess marked below.



You need to ensure you know which fuselage half is which as they look remarkably similar, but the upper half is thinner and it has bits of the spine on it as well. Which brings me to the next point. There are two recesses cut into the spine, marked with red arrows below, one of which needs cutting out as it's flashed over quite heavily, and you're meant to glue two white metal castings in there to make up the air-con intake and an aerial section. Sadly my kit has neither of them included, and it's a bit tale to claim under warranty as Mike closed the firm down aeons ago now.

No matter, this is an RAF FB2, not an FAA F1 so the intake and the aerials could well look totally different, nothing that a little scratching and backstory modification won't take care of anyway.   



Again, you'll need to file the upper surfaces of the wing mount to ensure it fits nicely, but that's par for the course for this kit.

[PR19_Kit]

My confidence in a) Skybirds and b) this country's kit reviewers has been badly shaken!

I've assembled the nose and tail sections after much filing to remove the flash etc. and they both went together quite well. The nose section has to be left for a while as the cockpit assembly is inserted into it from the rear so it's no good gluing it in place yet, but the tail could be glued on. I needed to file the two extension pieces that protrude from the centre section quite a bit before it would slide on nicely, and it looks pretty good from above.



But from below.....................



Something SERIOUSLY wrong there! I either need to file the extension down a lot and add packing and lots of PSR to sort it, or pack up the rear fuselage section but it'll need some checks of the drawings to find the correct shape.

It doesn't say much for my own belief in Skybird's accuracy, but how can something THAT bad get past the umpteen people who've 'reviewed' this kit in the past?     

[Wardukw]

From that last pic Kit ..the underside has a  F4 Phantom look about it 😳 

[PR19_Kit]

From that last pic Kit ..the underside has a  F4 Phantom look about it 😳 

It does a bit, doesn't it?

But the Scimitar's exhausts come out of the sides of the fuselage. The kit has a couple of SOCKING great white metal castings that fit into the big slots in the sides of the tail mouldings. They'll be fitted in later on in the build.

After studying the drawings I'll have to add packing either side of the lower extension, and do LOTS of PSR later on of course.

Plus I think I've sorted the nose extension, so long as the Nav is buried under a hatch like the Sea Vixen's.

[Wardukw]

From that last pic Kit ..the underside has a  F4 Phantom look about it 😳 

It does a bit, doesn't it?

But the Scimitar's exhausts come out of the sides of the fuselage. The kit has a couple of SOCKING great white metal castings that fit into the big slots in the sides of the tail mouldings. They'll be fitted in later on in the build.

After studying the drawings I'll have to add packing either side of the lower extension, and do LOTS of PSR later on of course.

Plus I think I've sorted the nose extension, so long as the Nav is buried under a hatch like the Sea Vixen's.

Looking at the side profile of that and imaging an extended nose I am wondering what or how a F-4 canopy would look 🤔
It's low at the back without being to high at the front .

[PR19_Kit]

Yeah, it might work quite well.

At the moment I'm still thinking of 'burying' the Nav behind the pilot, if only so I don't have to make a new cockpit and find another ejection seat, but I'll see how that goes.

I've got the first of the two exhausts in position, and it's a HEFTY casting, but amazingly it still won't be a tail sitter, even with both exhausts in place!

[PR19_Kit]

I did Mr Eacock wrong about the missing spine parts for the Scimitar. I was looking for some plastic bits, but it turns out they're white metal and just looked like two slabs of it, maybe 3 mm x 5 mm. 

They took some filing to get into shape to fit, and they're so small I couldn't hold them very well either, so had to use flat jawed pliers, but even they marked the surface of the white metal.

They're glued in place now though, and will need some PSR, along with the rest of the model, and you can see the result below.

I also had a brain wave about the 2 seat cockpit, as I just happen to have one of Colin Freightdog's excellent tandem 2-seat Hunter conversions with me (as you do.....  ) and it comes with TWO canopies! 

So I eased the Scimitar's cockpit section forward about 6 mm, leaving a small gap behind it that can be filled with some scrap styrene, and then perched the Hunter canopy on top.



With a suitable fairing astern of it, and a 2nd bang seat in the newly carved cockpit well underneath it, I reckon that  should work quite well.

What does anyone else think?

[Gondor]

With a suitable fairing astern of it, and a 2nd bang seat in the newly carved cockpit well underneath it, I reckon that should work quite well.

What does anyone else think?

Looks really good to me. With the slight angle downwards towards the nose the GIB won't get covered in coal dust! 

Gondor

[Old Wombat]

 

[kitbasher]

Anyone built the Xtrakit Scimitar?

[PR19_Kit]

Anyone built the Xtrakit Scimitar?

I was going to buy one, to 'save' my Skybirds kit for posterity, and then found the Xtrakit ones go for STUPID money on ebay! The Skybirds ones are ASTRONOMOCAL though!