jeaton01
Well-known member
I'm rebuilding an Aurora XFV-1 that I got as a glue bomb. I want it to be in the manner of an Lindberg XFY-1 that a friend of mine built many years ago and is now in my collection, first picture below. I'm using the Ginter book as as reference, it is pretty good but there are not many photos of the cockpit area. I wish I could find a cutaway of the airplane but I haven't seen one and I've casually looked for many years.
The Lindberg XFY-1 built by James Steel.
I have a kit that has not been started, although all the parts are painted a nice silver, not by me of course. These kits are not easy to find but they don't bring the price of kits like the Ryan X-13 by Aurora.
Here's what the kit looked like when I got it:
I was able to break apart the kit without too much drama, and sanded off all the raised markings and rivets. I've seen steam boilers with less prominent rivets than this kit. I want to display it with the canopy open, and that required a vacuform canopy. The kit has the aft canopy section molded with the fuselage and the front section was glue damaged and coke bottle thick. The pilot as usual for the Aurora kits was a head stuck on top of the fuselage. The area above the cockpit was removed and a cockpit will be made up. I was going to use a resin set from a Corsair to add some interest, but it turns out a cockpit from the Monogram F-80 was a better choice, adding a Yahu instrument board I got for the resin Corsair set, the Yahu panel matches the shape of the XFV-1 panel.
There is of course no vacuform canopy on the market for this beast, but I happened to have this friend who is good at that sort of thing who needed some custom decals made up so a deal was struck and I sent him a master I made for the canopy which he improved considerably, and in good time sent him the decals he needed. I got back a really nice canopy and two extras.
I put in some thin plastic card to simulate intake ducts as the kit had open holes there, and fit a floor and back bulkhead in the cockpit area, The F-80 cockpit will be fit to that, I think this method is easier to get the proper locations for the seat and panel. I'll have to do some shimming to eliminate visible gaps around the F-80 side panels but it fit up without too much drama.
The new cockpit floor and bulkhead with the F-80 cockpit and Yahu panel test fit.
The duct under the fuselage is too wide throughout and too deep at the aft end, as well as the wrong shape where it intersects the exhaust duct. I cut it away and will add it back after the fuselage is joined. Aurora missed the exhaust duct entirely, so more material was cut away there and the upper side of the duct was shaped using brass sheet, I found that easier to shape than plastic. Once I had the shape I drape formed a sheet of styrene over it and fit that to the model.
View of the bottom with the exhaust duct fit and the oil cooler duct reshaped.
The Lindberg XFY-1 built by James Steel.
I have a kit that has not been started, although all the parts are painted a nice silver, not by me of course. These kits are not easy to find but they don't bring the price of kits like the Ryan X-13 by Aurora.
Here's what the kit looked like when I got it:
I was able to break apart the kit without too much drama, and sanded off all the raised markings and rivets. I've seen steam boilers with less prominent rivets than this kit. I want to display it with the canopy open, and that required a vacuform canopy. The kit has the aft canopy section molded with the fuselage and the front section was glue damaged and coke bottle thick. The pilot as usual for the Aurora kits was a head stuck on top of the fuselage. The area above the cockpit was removed and a cockpit will be made up. I was going to use a resin set from a Corsair to add some interest, but it turns out a cockpit from the Monogram F-80 was a better choice, adding a Yahu instrument board I got for the resin Corsair set, the Yahu panel matches the shape of the XFV-1 panel.
There is of course no vacuform canopy on the market for this beast, but I happened to have this friend who is good at that sort of thing who needed some custom decals made up so a deal was struck and I sent him a master I made for the canopy which he improved considerably, and in good time sent him the decals he needed. I got back a really nice canopy and two extras.
I put in some thin plastic card to simulate intake ducts as the kit had open holes there, and fit a floor and back bulkhead in the cockpit area, The F-80 cockpit will be fit to that, I think this method is easier to get the proper locations for the seat and panel. I'll have to do some shimming to eliminate visible gaps around the F-80 side panels but it fit up without too much drama.
The new cockpit floor and bulkhead with the F-80 cockpit and Yahu panel test fit.
The duct under the fuselage is too wide throughout and too deep at the aft end, as well as the wrong shape where it intersects the exhaust duct. I cut it away and will add it back after the fuselage is joined. Aurora missed the exhaust duct entirely, so more material was cut away there and the upper side of the duct was shaped using brass sheet, I found that easier to shape than plastic. Once I had the shape I drape formed a sheet of styrene over it and fit that to the model.
View of the bottom with the exhaust duct fit and the oil cooler duct reshaped.
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Now i see where you are going, many thanks.
