A 'virtual' Short Sealand amphibian

[PR19_Kit]

Umpteen years ago I bought a 1/72 resin Lift Here Short Sealand kit, at humunguous expense I might add! Decades ago I had a FROG Sealand kit, but that's long gone by now of course, and I saw a real one at Farnborough back in the 40s-50s and always liked the look of it.



So far I've resisted building it, and the original plan was to do it in an RAF scheme, which didn't happen in the real world of course, but recently I've changed my mind.

In other areas of my life I do a bit of Flight Simulation, and a group I 'fly' with recently held a flight rally along the south coast of Australia and up the east coast, with numerous stages of course, and I flew a Sealand for it. To make life difficult for myself I also flew it out to Australia and back home again, all the way round the world anti-clockwise! Needless to say a lot of it done on auto-pilot, but such is FSX life. Here's my FS Sealand parked up 'somewhere in Australia'.



It's in the scheme of my old 'Virtual FS Airline', Albion Air Cargo, and those of you with longish memories may remember my AModel CMC Leopard model done in a similar scheme. The beauty of this system is that I've already drawn up the decal sheet really, as it's a small section of the FS model's texture file. 

The kit is wonderful, albeit all in resin and it has LOADS of parts, most of them small!



I've done a lot of chopping and sawing off the moulding blocks, but still many more to go, but I've done the first step in building it.



That's one fuselage side on top, and the cabin floor underneath, with a large overload fuel tank right in the middle of the floor! It's a sawn down Hase Lightning F6 overwing tank, which is what the backstory for the FS model says it needed or it'd not have had enough range to fly some of the very long stages en route home.

You can see where the 'Virtual' bit comes from in in the thread title now, can't you? 

[Wardukw]

Oh im gonna be watching this ,,i like a seaplane 

[Old Wombat]

Virtual Unreality made Actual Reality!   

[scooter]

You can see where the 'Virtual' bit comes from in in the thread title now, can't you? 

Ah yes, the old "resetting the fuel quantity as you near zero" trick.  Did that back when doing GPS direct freight runs to South Africa from Western Australia with Cargo Hauler.  

[PR19_Kit]

Ah yes, the old "resetting the fuel quantity as you near zero" trick.  Did that back when doing GPS direct freight runs to South Africa from Western Australia with Cargo Hauler.  

Hehehe I used to do that, but having found some gauges that showed the fuel flow rate, and the amount in each tank, I always did some trial flights at various altitudes to find the most economical fuel burn rate. Then re-built the .cfg file and fuel urn rate in the FS model to somewhere near reality. An amazing number of FS models have rubbish tank sizes and burn rates! 

The Sealand needed an extra 100 gallon tank to get enough range with its real world fuel burn, thus the one in the middle of the cabin in the model itself.

[kitbasher]

Prime candidate for Harbour Air markings (other Vancouver Harbour-based operators available)!

[PR19_Kit]

Surely, but I can't get another World Bank loan for another Sealand kit. 

[kitbasher]

Surely, but I can't get another World Bank loan for another Sealand kit. 

Well.........you could either change your plans 😂👹

.....or get another one of those Xtrakit SARO jet flying boat thingies and drill portholes in the sides 😉

[PR19_Kit]

.....or get another one of those Xtrakit SARO jet flying boat thingies and drill portholes in the sides 😉

Yeah, that SR.A1's hull is quite a bit deeper than the Sealand's!   

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

[kitbasher]

Raise the Saro's wings/jet pipes, move the cockpit forward a bit and there you go.

You're welcome 😉

[PR19_Kit]

The Sealand's proper assembly has started. 

After I'd painted up the interior of both sides and the cabin, I glued the cabin floor, seats, cockpit etc. into the starboard fuselage half. It sort of fitted, but where it didn't liberal quantities of gel superglue made sure that it stayed there.



Even though can't see them in the pic, I did paint he seat belts on all the seats, and you might see the crew's belts through the canopy, but it's not that vital.

I'm still not decided on upgrading it with a pair of turboprops, those Gypsy Queens not only look puny on the Sealand, but they really are puny too! Flying it in FSX with a real world .cfg file is an exercise in full-on concentration till it reaches cruise altitude, which is around 7500 ft on a good day.

[kerick]

Reminds me of a Grumman Albatross. I'll be watching this one!
The idea of a personal airline is very interesting. The decal options are endless.

[PR19_Kit]

The Albatross is a much larger boat than a Sealand but the concept is similar.

The 'Virtual Airline' thing is very prevalent in the Flight Sim world, there are HUNDREDS of them, often with a couple of hundred pilots each. The one I was in, Albion Air Cargo, was only very small, maybe 8 of us at a maximum ever, but we operated like a British version of 'Air America' 

[Gondor]

Was that airline based at Llanwern International?

[loupgarou]

The Sealand is a very pretty plane. One of my first build when I was VERY young (the Frog one of course). I still have one (or two) in my stash, your build makes me want to start one.