The Atom Furnace: Lindberg 2 Pack - 1/48 Fairey Flycatcher/Hawker Fury MK1

I found this online for a very nice price. Lindberg plastic is rather soft and I knew going in of the lack of certain details, but the kit went together quite well and the molding positions of connecting points is quite good making for easy assembly and rigging.

Let's begin with the Flucatcher!!

The sprues as they came out of the single parts bag.

I chose first to work on the 14 cylinder Armstrong radial. I painted the prop right off as it needs to be installed in order to close up the two 7 cylinder parts. The kit is supplied with molded push rods that add to the engine detail, but exhaust pipes are not, so if you want that extra detail it is DIY and I used bits of sprue and evergreen rod as you will see. Just cut the bits to preferred lengths, bend them a little and glue to the nubs on the cylinders. Photos of different models and historical pics show all sorts of arrangements so I followed my instincts.

The push rods.

Starting to add exhaust.

For ease of construction, this assembly is painted and set aside and installed at the very last.

To close up the fuselage we must always detail cockpit parts to the extent possible. The pilot is a four part construction and painted in inter-war flight colors. Some evergreen rod has been added and the instrument panel is a separate installed piece.

With the fuselage closed up it was time for some paint. Silver is always tricky (for me at least). This build was more suitable for spray and not hand painting, but what to use?? I chose to experiment with a Testors rattle can lacquer - It's called Diamond Mist and I like the way it turned out.

After attachment of the bottom wing (caution as this is one fit that needs putty and sanding) the tail and gear legs are installed in order that spray painting can continue.

The axel was painted separately after the wheels were installed. The hubs are painted silver and decals applied. Finish paint is done on the funky gear legs and now some decal work is needed.

Under side of the wing is first (note that tail supports have been added and painted). Also, wire rigging has been added to the gear legs. I will note here that decals are supplied for Flight 401 of the HMS Eagle circa 1930 as seen below.

The pilots loved the Flycatcher. She was easy to fly and built specifically for the carrier. The forerunner of the Fairey Swordfish!

Cabane struts are one piece which facilitates rigging before attachment to the fuselage - which is NICE.

The rigging for this 1/48 build is from my stash of gauge 26 silver wire which looked appropriate based on historical and model photos. The wire is easy to bend and straighten as needed and Loctite gel (cyano) is great for mating metal to plastic. Keep snipping until the length is correct.

Both the cabanes and the Vickers guns, previously painted in Gun Metal, are installed.

Fuselage and tail decals are applied now - easier before the top wing is installed. Speaking of which...

The top wing is first glued to the cabane struts in the molded holes. The N struts have been painted on the sprue waiting to be inserted into the molded holes in the bottom wing, then pushed toward the molded holes in the underside of the top wing. Everything popped into place - amazing! Well done Lindberg!!!

Wing rigging begins with the double wire for which holes are provided. This is followed with the single wire always working from the inside to outside. Per the instruction for rigging I have drilled through the wings for the full aileron control wires. It allowed me to thread wire through and then bend to the control arms. Small pieces of wire are cut to fit from the control arms to the front of the wing. Note that top wing decals are previously applied. This was a delicate operation due to having to punch through for the control arms. I suppose I could have added the arms after the decals but hey, that's hindsight.

This just shows the measurement of the rigging wire.

With the rigging completed the engine is mounted - not bad!

I did dullcoat the decals on the wings and had to carefully mask to do it as dullcoat is not good on the of the Diamond Mist.

Put her on the deck.

Onward to Kit 2 of 2

This is the real thing and the only air worthy Fury there is. Since the kit includes the decals for this airplane, that is what we build!

Strangely enough I began with the huge propeller. With a 600HP engine it is no wonder that the Fury was the first 200MPH+ biplane fighter.

Since I decided to emulate the existing Fury, my decision was to forego a pilot (it was the same figure as in the Flycatcher) and do more interior DIY. Wine foil to the rescue once again!

Extra instrument panel and fiddly bits in my stash help out.

Visibility is not too bad. Note the opening in front of the cockpit - this is for the twin Vickers guns.

Let's jump ahead. This is an easy assembly kit so the wings, tail and guns(panel) are installed and I once again gave her a Diamond Dust spray - same as the Flycatcher. More on that later. I used my fine ink pen to highlight the guns. Also notice the molded depressions for the strut connections. This is one of the strong points of the Lindberg kits.

The afore mentioned depressions/holes allow for ease of gear leg installation.

In keeping with my static display I sanded a flat spot on the "tires" as the wheels will not be rotational, unlike my work on the Flycatcher.

We jump forward once again as the 3 piece upper wing has been glued together and sprayed with the Diamond Mist lacquer and attached to the cabane struts that had been glued to the fuselage. The gear wire has been added along with install of the prop - the only moving part of the aircraft.

Time to show the silver wire (gauge 26) from my stash used for rigging on the Flycatcher and now on the Fury. Lindberg supplied wire in the kit(s) but it was slightly heavier and therefore not used. Monofilament thread is too thin for use as rigging but will be adequate as radio wire!

I flipped her over to add the tail strut supports and the bottom decals. You can see that the N struts have been glued in place. Above you saw the molded holes for the struts (same as on the Flycatcher) so popping the struts in place was an easy task.

This shows the port side rigging in place. Cutting the wire to to proper length from hole to hole was a tedious trial and error effort and once they were to proper length it was awkward getting the wires in place. I don't know exactly why but the distance between wings and the angle between them made wire placement much more frustrating than when rigging the Flycatcher.

Only single holes were molded into the wing and fuselage for the forward most support wires even though photos show a dbl rigging same as the Flycatcher (which had two holes) so I made the inside wire just a bit shorter and then glued the two wire together. This made the install a cinch!

All decals when down just fine, with no tears, using Microsol, of course.

Rigging is completed and then painted a light gray to dull down the wire against the paint. My only disappointment was that the nose of plane does not "shine" they way I wanted. My technique of simply using the Diamond Dust Lacquer and trying to overspray a gloss clear coat was a failure.

Tail skid and painting of control wire.

I pulled out some acrylic red to finish the spinner and wheel covers but the paint is flat, so I will have to repaint with gloss, but that is the only remaining task.