Scale aviation modeller international

Victor tanker and joining the two

together in a refuelling situation

of some sort, but I could not find a

Victor kit at what I considered to be

a reasonable price anywhere in the

UK, or for that matter the world.

Instead, I went for Plan Two,

which was to buy a “posh” stand

for my solitary Vulcan. I found a

nice, shiny chrome example on

the internet, manufactured by a

company called Gemini Jets and

sold on a well-known auction

site by Airbase1125, a Harrogate-

based company. The stand arrived

within a couple of days and proved

substantial enough to securely

support the Vulcan airframe

without fear of it toppling over.

There was now a need to create

a tunnel in the lower fuselage

section into which the top of the

stand would slot. To this end I

cemented a 1/48 scale Hurricane

wheel hub to the inside surface

of the belly section, then drilled

an appropriately sized hole

through the belly section and

into the hub to create a tunnel.

The jet nozzles and the engine

housings in the lower wings are

separate items, and they are

not the best fit. Indeed there is

a fair amount of filler required

around these areas and around

the belly section to blend them

into the wings. I used Milliput to

fill the gaps, which means that

after the excess is wiped away

with a dampened finger or cloth,

no sanding is required to hide

the seams and therefore none

of the wonderful detail is lost.

There is a lot of filler required

too at the points where the front

edges of the air intakes butt against

the leading edges of the wings. This

is a great pity, as the perfection of

those slide-moulded intake tunnels

is somewhat marred by the poor

fit in an area that is highly visible

and yet particularly difficult to

fill and clean up afterwards.

By far the most complex area

of assembly is the undercarriage.

Each of the four-wheel main

undercarriage assemblies

consists of twelve pieces, while

the nose wheel has four. These

items are nicely detailed, but

as already mentioned, I would

not need them for this build.

With the undercarriage doors

and the separate crew access

door cemented in place, my

Vulcan bomber was more or less

complete and ready for paint.

DECALS AND PAINT

I knew from the outset that I

didn’t want to model either of the

Shrike-carrying options supplied

in the kit. Instead I bought the very

comprehensive sheet produced by

Fündekals that contains enough

markings and codes to model just

about every Vulcan B.2 ever to

have entered RAF service (very

reasonably priced and available

at http://www.fundekals.com).

You don’t get any instructions

with the decals; instead these

must be downloaded and printed

on your home printer. Once

downloaded, those instructions

are as comprehensive as the

decal sheet, and feature the full

range of schemes used on the

bomber throughout its service

career, including the overall

white, gloss camouflage and low-

visibility camouflage schemes.

The schemes are organised

in squadron groupings, with

additional information on various

aircraft on a separate sheet. The

decal sheet contains stencilling

for a single airframe – the dark

yellow of which seems much more

authentic than the lemon-yellow

stencils on the kit decal sheet –

and one complete set of national

markings is included for each

of the camouflage variations.

The painting process began

with a shadow coat – an overall

solid application – of dark brown,

on top of which I airbrushed

a patchwork of Xtracolor RAF

Dark Green, roughly following

the camouflage pattern printed

on the colour instruction sheet.

Great Wall Hobby have had the

foresight to print the camouflage

“I BOUGHT THE VERY COMPREHENSIVE

SHEET PRODUCED BY FÜNDEKALS THAT

CONTAINS ENOUGH MARKINGS AND

CODES FOR ALMOST EVERY VULCAN B.2

EVER TO HAVE ENTERED RAF SERVICE”

70 • JULY 2018 • SCALE AVIATION MODELLER INTERNATIONAL

068-73-RAF100-Vulcan-0718.indd 70 11/06/2018 14:01