The Hawker Beechcraft Dragon MRA1, the Nimrod's replacement- Resurrected!

[Gondor]

Maybe it should be renamed Phoenix?

[kerick]

Maybe it should be renamed Phoenix?

I'll go with that!
Sometimes I think just letting the paint cure until it's hard then sanding it off can be a better solution compared to chemical stripping. Too much organic chemistry wizardry.

[Rick Lowe]

Maybe it should be renamed Phoenix?

I'll go with that!
Sometimes I think just letting the paint cure until it's hard then sanding it off can be a better solution compared to chemical stripping. Too much organic chemistry wizardry.

Yeah, and you don't know how the various chemicals will react together...

So it's on the go again - good news! 

[PR19_Kit]

I'll go with that!
Sometimes I think just letting the paint cure until it's hard then sanding it off can be a better solution compared to chemical stripping. Too much organic chemistry wizardry.

That wasn't really an option due to the complex shape of the airframe. It was virtually impossible to get to some parts of it, specially round the tail area.

The M'box 125 is relatively crude compared to Sword's offering, but I think I can manage something with it, things are going OK so far, but Telford takes priority for the next few days of course..

[PR19_Kit]

The re-build of the Dragon has started, I'm calling it the Dragon B for my reference, but I think 'officially' it'll be a Dragon MRA2.

I saved quite a bit of the bits from the Dragon A, including the entire cockpit assembly, and with a bit of filing it fits the nose of the M'box 125-600 a treat.



That saved me ages of painting the rather basic M'box cockpit, and hopefully some of the other saved bits will fit just as well too.

[scooter]

The re-build of the Dragon has started, I'm calling it the Dragon B for my reference, but I think 'officially' it'll be a Dragon MRA2.

I saved quite a bit of the bits from the Dragon A, including the entire cockpit assembly, and with a bit of filing it fits the nose of the M'box 125-600 a treat.

Resurect, Reuse, Recycle

[PR19_Kit]

The fuselage is buttoned up now, and I've glued Colin Frieghtdog's superb radar nose in place too. The M'Box nose contours aren't exactly the same as the Airfix DH 125's, nor the Sword U-125's nose, but it's close enough for a bit of PSR to solve the problem.

Fitting the under belly radome from the U-125 was a different matter. The two fuselage shapes are quite a bit different in that area and it'll need LOTS of PSR before it's sorted. I placed the radome in position over the pristine -600 fuselage and scribed around it, then chain-drilled all the way round and spent ages shopping and filing the styrene till the radome fitted, sort of.

Here's the current situation with the gaping hole om the belly and the radome sitting underneath prior to me gluing it in place.

[PR19_Kit]

I've had it with the ResKit missiles, or whatever their name is etc. 

I built the two Harpoons I needed for this model some while ago, and they've been primed and painted for ages now, But I've had to re-glue most the tail fins at least once, sometimes twice, and now I've found of them have come off again! The trouble is the fins are PE stuff and they're TINY, so there's no glue area on their bases to ensure they stay in place. I've chooped all eight of them off now and I'll replace them with styrene ones, and then I'll have to repaint the whole missiles again of course, Grrrrrrrr.......

I had 4 Sidewinders of theirs as well, but they'll be staying in the box, and I'll use some ex-kit 'winders from my spares box now.

[PR19_Kit]

I'm starting to think the 'P' on my IPMS membership card stands for 'PUTTY' rather than 'Plastic'! 

I'm on the 3rd PSR session of the Dragon B so far, and many of the parts I'm puttying have been puttied once already when they were on the Dragon A!

The M'box plastic is nice and easy to work with though, a hidden advantage over the Sword 'plasto-concrete'!

I'm getting there, but slowly.

[PR19_Kit]

A few more PSR sessions and it's a bit better.



The nose is just about OK, but the belly radome needs more PSR round its edges, and there's a small amount under the tail.

The -600 has a totally different shaped ventral fin to the U-125, so I chopped it off and have scratched up a copy of the U-125 fin to replace it.

[PR19_Kit]

At LAST I've finished the PSR melding all the old Dragon A bits onto the Dragon B, and it only took ELEVEN PSR sessions, 

So you may well ask, having done all that, why the devil have I sawn a gert great hole in the forward fuselage now? Well, the Dragon A came with two rather logical looking extra deep windows there, one on each side. They're on the U-125s so observers can search for survivors, as their main task is ASR work around the Japanese coast. In the Dragon B's case they'll do just as good a job searching for periscopes sticking out of the sea, so I saved the window bits from the Dragon A and I cut the hole just slightly smaller than the saved window bits, and then filed it to suit so I can glue the windows in later.

That's one of the saved window bits ringed in red below the all over primed fuselage.



Of course I'll have to do the same on the starboard side, but that's tomorrow's job after I've glued the port side insert in place.

[PR19_Kit]

I've managed to graft the port side observation window into the Dragon OK, needs a bit of PSR but it'll do, but I made a bit of a mistake waaaaaay earlier on.

The -600 has oodles of windows along each side and I wanted to retain the rather bare 'look' of the U-125s with only two small windows each side. What I should have done was blank off the centre three windows each side BEFORE I glued the fuselage halves together of course. 

I've cut the hole in the starboard side for its deep observation window and I vainly hoped I could manoeuvre a styrene strip into place inside the fuselage through the hole, but I don't have any remotely operated, double jointed tweezers to hand. So the current idea is to try and blank the un-needed windows off by filling them with putty. I've NO idea if this will actually work, but fingers are crossed, and superglue is handy in case the putty plugs look like they're going to fall right inside.............



You'll note I've glued on the tailplane/fin, complete with the satellite aerial etc. but what you can't see in this view is the small underfin I've added plus the two chaff dispensers under the wing root.

[Hobbes]

To close windows on both sides, I sometimes use a length of styrene rod that I can insert through one window, through the fuselage and out the window on the opposite side.

[PR19_Kit]

Ahah, sounds a neat idea, thanks Harro. 

If the PSR'd windows idea doesn't work I'll do that.

[Captain Canada]

That's looking really good !