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- #41
Crimea_River
Marshal
The humdrum of priming, sanding, and scribing continues. These pics were taken before yet another coat of primer was applied so you can see where the filling is happening.
GB-47 1/48 Hawker Typhoon - WW2 D-Day and After – Western Front
- Thread starter Crimea_River
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T Bolt
Colonel
Lot of work done there Andy. Bet your fingers are tired
Good work so far Andy!
- Thread starter
- #45
Crimea_River
Marshal
Lordy, time's flying. While I was clearing my workspace of Spitfire and Il-2 remnants, I've been thinking about this build but doing nothing substantive. My fixation was, and still is, on the chin intake and the way it's been depicted in the two Hasegawa kits that I have. Going into this build, I had always known of the existence of various installation styles around the radiator but never really understood what was going on, until now.
After reading up on this, the short version of what happened is this, as I understand it: The as-designed combined coolant and oil radiators housed in the chin intake featured concentric ring vanes to split the air flow between the coolant radiator, the oil cooler, and the carb intake duct which was in the center of the oil cooler. After transferring over to the continent after D-Day, Typhoons immediately began experiencing engine issues resulting from the ingestion of dust through the unfiltered intake duct. A quick stop-gap measure was introduced, whereby a dome-shaped deflector was added to the front of the carb intake duct that deflected the dusty air while the aircraft was on the ground but these proved to adversely affect performance. These were quickly replaced with the so-called "cuckoo doors" which forced air through a filter while the aircraft was on the ground and switched to a direct air flow, bypassing the filter, when the doors were opened in flight. These again were found to adversely affect performance were often removed, especially as the 2nd TAF Typhoons moved beyond the dusty French advanced airfields and into Belgium and Holland where less dusty (bit more muddy) conditions prevailed . Once removed, the original concentric splitter vane rings were often not replaced, and so we have a common installation that looked like this:
Chris Shores, author and authority on Typhoons and Tempests, notes that " looking through a large number of 143 Wing Typhoon photos it does seem that the cuckoo door filters were removed in the winter of 1944/45. …..When the filters were removed the concentric circular vanes (which would have been removed to allow the fitting of the filters) were more often left off than replaced." (Ref Some Hawker Typhoon colour questions) My subject aircraft. having operated out of Eindhoven through the autumn of 1944 up until Christmas day, very much fits this description. In fact, the above picture also features a 440 Squadron aircraft, a co-combatant with my subject, and so it's my intent to replicate the intake as bare, stripped of vanes and without the cuckoo doors.
With that established, here's the issue:. The kits that I have give me only two options. The first is to use the basic kit part that features the concentric ring vanes. The other kit includes a resin intake that features the cuckoo doors but there is no option that represents the installation that I want to portray, namely the one in the above picture. There are appropriate aftermarket parts for the 1/24 Airfix kit but I didn't see any in 1/48, so I'm left with having to modify the kit part. Here are the raw materials:
At the bottom left is the front of the kit radiator moulding featuring the concentric vanes. To its right is the back of the same unit with the protruding oil cooler. Above both is a potential insert for the front of the oil cooler - a moulded radiator from an old car model from my younger days.
Work started with drilling out the vanes using progressively larger drill bits:
And after some cleanup, I was left with this:
Though the plastic left behind by the removed vane is a bit thick, I should be able to work with this and hopefully come up with something that looks convincing.
Thanks for looking in and for tolerating the long post. My next update will hopefully show the successful next steps in recreating this feature.
After reading up on this, the short version of what happened is this, as I understand it: The as-designed combined coolant and oil radiators housed in the chin intake featured concentric ring vanes to split the air flow between the coolant radiator, the oil cooler, and the carb intake duct which was in the center of the oil cooler. After transferring over to the continent after D-Day, Typhoons immediately began experiencing engine issues resulting from the ingestion of dust through the unfiltered intake duct. A quick stop-gap measure was introduced, whereby a dome-shaped deflector was added to the front of the carb intake duct that deflected the dusty air while the aircraft was on the ground but these proved to adversely affect performance. These were quickly replaced with the so-called "cuckoo doors" which forced air through a filter while the aircraft was on the ground and switched to a direct air flow, bypassing the filter, when the doors were opened in flight. These again were found to adversely affect performance were often removed, especially as the 2nd TAF Typhoons moved beyond the dusty French advanced airfields and into Belgium and Holland where less dusty (bit more muddy) conditions prevailed . Once removed, the original concentric splitter vane rings were often not replaced, and so we have a common installation that looked like this:
Chris Shores, author and authority on Typhoons and Tempests, notes that " looking through a large number of 143 Wing Typhoon photos it does seem that the cuckoo door filters were removed in the winter of 1944/45. …..When the filters were removed the concentric circular vanes (which would have been removed to allow the fitting of the filters) were more often left off than replaced." (Ref Some Hawker Typhoon colour questions) My subject aircraft. having operated out of Eindhoven through the autumn of 1944 up until Christmas day, very much fits this description. In fact, the above picture also features a 440 Squadron aircraft, a co-combatant with my subject, and so it's my intent to replicate the intake as bare, stripped of vanes and without the cuckoo doors.
With that established, here's the issue:. The kits that I have give me only two options. The first is to use the basic kit part that features the concentric ring vanes. The other kit includes a resin intake that features the cuckoo doors but there is no option that represents the installation that I want to portray, namely the one in the above picture. There are appropriate aftermarket parts for the 1/24 Airfix kit but I didn't see any in 1/48, so I'm left with having to modify the kit part. Here are the raw materials:
At the bottom left is the front of the kit radiator moulding featuring the concentric vanes. To its right is the back of the same unit with the protruding oil cooler. Above both is a potential insert for the front of the oil cooler - a moulded radiator from an old car model from my younger days.
Work started with drilling out the vanes using progressively larger drill bits:
And after some cleanup, I was left with this:
Though the plastic left behind by the removed vane is a bit thick, I should be able to work with this and hopefully come up with something that looks convincing.
Thanks for looking in and for tolerating the long post. My next update will hopefully show the successful next steps in recreating this feature.
Snautzer01
Honourably banned
- 40,411
- Mar 26, 2007
Thanks i never knew that about the radiator.
most interesting....continue....
T Bolt
Colonel
You learn something new every day here
Airframes
Benevolens Magister
Good stuff Andy.
I remember having to sort this on a conversion of the old Revell 1/32nd scale kit, into a 'bubble top' from the original 'car door' version, around 30 years ago (an it's still 'on hold' after starting a refurb and up-date !).
I remember having to sort this on a conversion of the old Revell 1/32nd scale kit, into a 'bubble top' from the original 'car door' version, around 30 years ago (an it's still 'on hold' after starting a refurb and up-date !).
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- Thread starter
- #50
Crimea_River
Marshal
Thanks guys. I didn't realize this was new to many of you so FWIW, here are a couple of pics of the other installations. This is the dome cover, the original official mod:
Source Sabre Miscelleny - napiertrust
Cuckoo doors (source **** DONE: 1/48 Hawker Typhoon Mk.1B 245 Sqn "Sharky" Commonwealth Group Build
The latter pic also has a mesh stone guard installed.
I haven't worked on the rad since posting earlier but hope to do some work on it tomorrow.
Source Sabre Miscelleny - napiertrust
Cuckoo doors (source **** DONE: 1/48 Hawker Typhoon Mk.1B 245 Sqn "Sharky" Commonwealth Group Build
The latter pic also has a mesh stone guard installed.
I haven't worked on the rad since posting earlier but hope to do some work on it tomorrow.
- Thread starter
- #51
Crimea_River
Marshal
Well, I got to the bench tonight and hit my stride. The session started with cutting out the spare car model rad and gluing it into the housing:
The next step was to drill a hole to represent the carb intake duct. I started with a small centering hole and graduallyincreasing the drill size until it matched the hole on the back of the rad moulding.
Next, because the carb intake is a duct, I CA glued stacks of styrene card over the hole until it was high enough to touch the back part:
I then clamped the front into a vice and drilled through the stack with a hand drill.
Though I tried to keep the drill vertical, I did manage to misalign the hole:
No problem. Just clamped it and backdrilled.
The radiator halves are now glued together and drying. I'm pretty happy with how this is going so far.
The next step was to drill a hole to represent the carb intake duct. I started with a small centering hole and graduallyincreasing the drill size until it matched the hole on the back of the rad moulding.
Next, because the carb intake is a duct, I CA glued stacks of styrene card over the hole until it was high enough to touch the back part:
I then clamped the front into a vice and drilled through the stack with a hand drill.
Though I tried to keep the drill vertical, I did manage to misalign the hole:
No problem. Just clamped it and backdrilled.
The radiator halves are now glued together and drying. I'm pretty happy with how this is going so far.
Airframes
Benevolens Magister
Neat !
Looks good but i am a little confused !
the part with the raised cylinder is the rear of the radiator and the part where you can see the old car radiator part is the front ?
the part with the raised cylinder is the rear of the radiator and the part where you can see the old car radiator part is the front ?
so after a bit of google research, i am slightly more edjumacated !
i thought the the rear part of your kits radiator was in fact the bit that sticks out of the front !
you do learn something most days on here
i thought the the rear part of your kits radiator was in fact the bit that sticks out of the front !
you do learn something most days on here
- Thread starter
- #56
Crimea_River
Marshal
Thanks guys and that's correct Karl. The raised part now left on my unit faces the rear.
Nice work so far Andy!
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- #58
Crimea_River
Marshal
Onward. The front of the radiator at the start of last night's session:
And this is after some detail was added. The ring around the carb intake is made of lead wire. First I wrapped it around a brush handle to form a circle. Then I flattened it to create the flange. I need to do something with the larger ring too as it still looks a bit rough.
The upper surface of the intake duct was inserted and glued. Not liking the big seam here so there will be sanding dust.
While the filler was drying there I moved on to the wings. The kit is moulded with two landing lights but the starboard one was almost certainly faired over though photo confirmation is missing.
On the underside, the wheel wells got a shot of NMF from paint left over from a previous session. In this pic, I CA glued the starboard landing light lens in place so that I can can blend it in for painting.
Ejection chutes needed drilling out so that was done. I thought about fixing up the wheel well details but this would be a lot of work to correct and I don't think that I'll have enough time before the end of the GB. Maybe on the next one.....
Thanks for looking.
And this is after some detail was added. The ring around the carb intake is made of lead wire. First I wrapped it around a brush handle to form a circle. Then I flattened it to create the flange. I need to do something with the larger ring too as it still looks a bit rough.
The upper surface of the intake duct was inserted and glued. Not liking the big seam here so there will be sanding dust.
While the filler was drying there I moved on to the wings. The kit is moulded with two landing lights but the starboard one was almost certainly faired over though photo confirmation is missing.
On the underside, the wheel wells got a shot of NMF from paint left over from a previous session. In this pic, I CA glued the starboard landing light lens in place so that I can can blend it in for painting.
Ejection chutes needed drilling out so that was done. I thought about fixing up the wheel well details but this would be a lot of work to correct and I don't think that I'll have enough time before the end of the GB. Maybe on the next one.....
Thanks for looking.
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nice work
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