Subject: Re: Classic Airframe French Vampire Fb5
From: "Submissions for ARC" <[email-masked]>
To: "angus" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Sep 2007 10:26:28 -0700

Hi,
I just wanted to let you know your article went on ARC today.  Thanks again for sending it in.

Steve Bamford
Aircraft Resource Center
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com

Live like there is no tomorrow;
Love like you've never been hurt.
Work like you don't need the money.
Dance like nobody's watching.
Sing like nobody's listening.
Live like it's Heaven on Earth.

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: angus 
  To: [email-masked] 
  Sent: Sunday, September 02, 2007 7:17 AM
  Subject: Classic Airframe French Vampire Fb5

  Gallery Template #05

  "1/48th Classic Airframe Vampire Fb5" 

  by "Laurent "Angus" Beauvais"
  --------------------

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  Hello all. Back again with a non French aircraft in French markings, this time the legendary de Havilland Vampire Fb5. From what we know 95 Fb5, ex RAF, were used by French Air Force and French Navy before France did modify the Vampire to become the Mistral (name of a wind in the south of France) :

  -         Different engine implying a larger fuselage with plenty of small rectangular air intake trap on the back

  -          Ejection seat

  -          Triangular air intake

  -          Different wheels

  A lot of things have been said about the Classic Airframe kit, amd they are true, the air intake and the engraving are false, but for any experienced modeler this is a pretty easy thing to correct that cost nothing. It seems that Classic Airframe inspired himself from the Warpaint book dedicated to the Vampires, one prouf being that the 3 paint scheme proposed are the 3 drawings of French aircraft existing in this book. Here are the modifocations I've done, refer to the numbers on the pictures:

  -         02 and 03, you will see most of the modifications I did on mine to obtain something realistic. I did only the fuselage, not the wings, the engraving is false too but it does not change the look of the vampire. Added to this 2 pictures I added 2 small air output on the back of the fuselage.

  -         01: cockpit is in resin and is wonderfull, just paint it and dry brush it. Two defaults: nothing to represent the instruments and no seat belt.

  -         04: trailing edges have to be fined 

  -         05: Front landing gears are really not great, they have to be enhanced. Trap doors have been rebuilted to make them finer (ruler is in mm). 

  -         06: gag, the rear trap door of the front landing gear is on the wrong side, it has to be on the left side of the aircraft and not on the left. So it has to be completely recreated (easy)

  -         07: finer trap doors. At real size it would have done 30mm thick sheet metal parts.

  -         08: canopy has been over-molded to be clearer. To compensate the thickness, it has been over-moulded with 2 sheets, 1 is then cut to represent the inside frame.

  -         09: Wind screen is too vertical and has to be corrected. All this makes a cockpit that looks better, but I don't pretend to have the exact shape, I've not found 1 drawing that looks reliable.

  -         10: Lights have been recreated in a piece of transparent plastic, method is quite easy:

  o        Cut a piece of transparent plastic.

  o        Cut 2 sides only orthogonally to be able to glue it

  o        Drill a 0.3mm hole and fill it with paint (red and blue of course)

  o        Glue it and wait a full day 

  o        Then file off the transparent light. Finish the file by poilishing with a diary paper sheet, it's a jeweller trick

  Now regarding the paint scheme, the one in the box didn't look interseting to me. Unfortunately, French Air Force Vampire were not colorfull. The only intersting paint scheme I've found possible is a Fb5 of the La Fayette squadron (EC 2/4), the one of the famous american volunters in 1917 in France, with the sioux head on the left side and the stork on, the right side. Strangely,  Vampire n°8 was never assigned to the La Fayette group, but a photo does exist.

  Picture 11: Insignas are coming from a Heller decal sheet, they are certainly not the exact shape and size of that time, but it looks correct. Unfortunately, the fork is in the wrong direction, so I glued it in the reverse side, and hand painted the red and black details. Lettering has been drawn on a PC (8mm height, I think 7 would have been better), then printed and cut to make masks.

  Aluminium is teh Tamiya X11 one, that I did polish with a car polisher product. You have to be fast and light, don't wait the polish to be dried before cleaning it. Weathering is done with oil paint. 

  That's all. OK it makes quite a lot of modifications, but there is nothing complicate and that little legendary is to be displayed in every showvase.

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  Photos and text © by "Laurent "Angus" Beauvais"