Xtrakit 1/72 scale
Supermarine Scimitar F Mk 1

by Roger Hardy

Supermarine Scimitar F Mk 1

Airfix's 1/72 scale Spitfire Mk.22 is available online from Squadron

Brief History

The Supermarine Type 525 first flew on 27 April 1954 and proved sound enough to proceed with an outwardly fairly similar looking aircraft, the Type 544 Scimitar, to specification N.113. A total of 100 were ordered although the Royal Navy had changed the specification to a low level strike aircraft with nuclear capability rather than a dedicated fighter.  It had no radar

The first of the Type 544s serving as prototypes for the later production series flew on 19 January 1956. The aircraft evolved more with the third Type 544 incorporating different aerodynamic changes and a stronger airframe strengthened for the new low level role.  Various aerodynamic "fixes" to try and counter pitch-up effects at high speed and altitude included flared-out wingtips and wing fences. The tailplane was also changed from dihedral to anhedral.  The combined modifications led to the final Type 544 being considered the "production standard". The first production Scimitar flew on 11 January 1957.

At the time of introduction the Royal Navy had only a couple of large carriers. Most were still quite small and the Scimitar was a comparatively large and powerful aircraft. Landing accidents were common.  Overall the Scimitar suffered from a high loss rate; 39 were lost in a number of accidents, amounting to 51% of the Scimitar's total production run.

The aircraft was perceived by many as too innovative mechanically. It pioneered fuel flow proportioning and integral mainplane tanks along with "blown" flying surfaces to reduce landing speeds. At one time, it held the notorious record of 1,000 maintenance hours per flying hour!

Although the Scimitar could be configured as a fighter (with no radar!), the interceptor role was covered by the De Havilland Sea Vixen (with radar). In the attack role it was replaced by the Blackburn Buccaneer, which rendered the Scimitar rather surplus to requirements. The Scimitar was, however, retained as a buddy-buddy tanker to allow the underpowered Buccaneer S.1 to be launched from aircraft carriers with a useful weapons load.

The Scimitar was the last in the line of Supermarine fighters which began with the Spitfire.

The Kit

There are some aircraft that just look cool. They don’t have to be famous or have done great deeds, they can just sit there and look cool.  The Scimitar is one of those aircraft.  This is a kit by MPM made for Hannants, the big model mail order organization in the UK.  It is a limited run kit and has all the usual features of such kits; no locating pins, big ejector pins and large gates, flash, rather soft detail and the necessity to trial fit everything a dozen times before committing to glue.  At long last,a relatively mainstream injection moulded kit of the Scimitar!

My example exhibits a slight scar running down the intake and nose side of one of the fuselage halves but not difficult to eradicate. There is an adequate cockpit but little undercarriage bay detail (the main gear doors are closed on the ground); a nice resin ejection seat, no wing fold option (not a problem for me), four of the later style pylons plus four drop tanks but no weapons or other stores; these aircraft normally also carried Bullpup missiles, sidewinders, bombs or a buddy refueling pod.  The nose appears to be a little too short.  A basic IFR probe is supplied. The vertical fin is about right but the lower part, below the tailplane, where it meets the fuselage, should follow an almost vertical line and this means adding plastic or filler to remove the curve.  Some sources claim that the fin is too large but my references reckon it’s about right with a little trimming. The tailplane is a littleoversized and the shape is a bit awry, so needs to be cut down at the tip and trailing edges. I have compared the parts with drawings and, although I don’t usually trust drawings, I didn’t regard any of these problems as being insurmountable.  Incidentally, I read a very critical report of this model elsewhere (http://www.thunder-and-lightnings.co.uk/scimitar/models.php) where it claims that the kit tail span is 19 ft instead of 15.5ft.  Well, their model must be different from mine.  I was suspicious about the wing tip shape and planned to check the span when the wings were assembled.

Moving on, the fairings behind the exhausts are too shallow, a little tricky to build up with filler but it needs to be done. The arrestor hook and tail bumper are crude but usable. The area ruling of the fuselage sides should be more pronounced but this would be rather difficult to do and is difficult to notice.  Only two of the gun ports are moulded open (and are too shallow), the other two are faired over, presumably based on a preserved example.

Two decal options are provided.  The first is XD321 coded 116/E which could also be fitted with a buddy-buddy refueling pod as the tankard emblem on the fin indicates an air-to-air refueling role.   I have a photo of this aircraft and can confirm that the markings are correct, although there shoud be additional numbers on the inboard flaps.  The second option is XD332, coded 194/C (should be 192/R). The 194 decals actually represent the aircraft as it is now, having been slightly incorrectly painted for the RIAT air display some years ago. 

On the plus side the overall shape of the wings looks to be good, there's a fair stab at the intakes with good engine faces; as usual, finely done panel line detail - and of course, finally, we have a Scimitar kit in 1/72 scale.  The last time I built one it was the old Frog kit in 1963!

Construction

Construction starts with removing the ejection pins from the inside of the intakes and fin, then drilling out the gun ports.  The cockpit is small, simple but adequate; I’ve spent half my life putting in super-detailed photo-etch cockpits only to find that you cannot see anything.  This one is black as a coal mine and as long as the ejection seat is well done, the rest doesn’t matter that much as the aperture is so small.  I installed the intake plates (to which the cockpit attaches) and decided that I needed to sort out the jetpipe pen-nib fairings before installing the jetpipes (which is done from the inside, before gluing the fuselage halves together).  Basically, Xtrakit give us a suggestion of these fairings but in reality they are far more prominent.  I did this with Milliput shaped with a wet paintbrush handle and managed to get the desired form to minimize the amount of work to get the final shape and finish.  This proved easier than I had expected.

The fuselage went together well as did the wings but locating the wings fore-and-aft was tricky as there is no positive tongue. The easiest way is to ensure that the open and closed undercarriage doors on the underside line up.  The wing trailing edge is very thick and will need thinning and the joint between wing and fuselage will need a little filler, although there is no wing-to-fuselage fairing on this aircraft; the wings butt against the fuselage. 

The model wingspan is 153mm.  It should be 157.4mm (11.33m wingspan) and I decided to add the extra to the tips which will also allow me to correct the shape because of the two drawings I referred to, both showed a more curved tip and this is backed up by photographs.  Also, I extended and fattened up the nose because it looked a little ‘pinched’…more like the 525 prototype than a Scimitar.  All of these corrections were made with Milliput which can be shaped when wet to get close to the final shape and the process doesn’t destroy surrounding panel detail as the excess can be washed away.  When dry it can be shaped and finished like plastic.  Whilst waiting for it to cure, I tackled the tailplanes which were easy to rectify.  The wing trailing edges were thinned by scraping…a lot...then wet-and-dry.  Then I re-scribed the lost surface detail.

Because the fit of major assemblies (wings, etc…) is a little approximate, I resorted to superglue here and there, and decided to assemble as much of the aircraft as possible before painting as I didn’t want to mess around trying to fit pylons and undercarriage parts on a newly-painted model.  The tailplanes were secured by Superglue as they are the weakest part of the model; they have anhedral (they droop) but there is no other way of determining the correct angle or that each side is the same.  Superglue!  Remember that there should be no gap between the rear part of the tailplanes and the tail bullet as this was an all-moving tailplane; a little filler was required here.  There are lots of little intakes and other details to add; the intakes are rather prominent (and a bit over-sized) so I drilled out the openings rather than painting them black. The location of the fuel tank pylons looks like a mystery but, get it wrong and the undercarriage doors and main wheels will not fit.  In fact, there are some very faint marks under the wing to show where they should go.  Don’t sand them away!  I only found out too late and had to reposition the inner pylons.

Painting

The paint job was straight-forward.  I used Tamiya rattle-can white primer which was the underside colour and a satin extra dark sea grey which I mixed myself, applied with the Testor Aztek airbush.  The jetpipe pen-nib fairings were hand painted (over masking) in two different shades of dark metallic paint.  The wheels were added and I noticed that the aircraft has a slightly nose-high sit, which is OK, but maybe a tad too much.  The only way to deal with this would be to shorten the nose undercarriage leg by a half-millimetre or so.  The fuel tanks should all be parallel to each other and with the ground but I found that the pylons made them point down, so these had to be trimmed. 

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

• 

Thumbnail panels:

The decals are more gloss than satin, are very thin and rather brittle and I found them frustrating to handle.  The white is slightly see-through over the dark grey but I could live with it.  The underwing serials go under the pylons, so if, like me, you have already put the pylons on, the decals need trimming. The photo I have of XD321 116/E shows the numbers ‘16’ on the inner flaps.  These are not on the decal sheet so I added them from what I had, in yellow, I’m not sure whether they would have been white, though.  There should also be red decals for the airbrake surround aft of the wing.  I applied Microset and Microsol to settle the decals down.  I had some silvering on the matt white undersurface, which is barely noticeable, but none on the satin upper surface. I sprayed the model with thinned gloss varnish to give an overall satin effect as these aircraft only became matt after long exposure to the elements.

The canopy is in two pieces so can be posed open.  They components are clear but a little thick. The frame colours include some white around the arch and windscreen side panels which I added from decal film which is actually a bit too thick but as thin as I could make it them.  Then came the final little touches, the wing-mounted pitot, nose refueling probe and antennae.  That’s it.

Conclusion

Overall, I’m very pleased with the result.  It’s no prize-winner but it looks the part – a really cool aircraft.  Obscure, powerful, elegant but rather useless; very British!  The kit was what I had expected and I was happy to spend the extra time in sorting it out to my satisfaction.  Having said that, I think that my modifications were not so great and that this kit would probably make up into a perfectly acceptable rendition of the Scimitar without the extra attention to reshaping the various bits and pieces.  I certainly don’t agree with the critical reviews I have read of this kit and I suspect that Hannants may have revised the moulds after those reports.  Recommended?  Yes, of course.  The only alternative is the Czech Master Resins model at a magnificent £79.99!  Of course, I still hope that Trumpeter will issue one of these in 1/48 scale.  Well, why not?  They’ve done the Spiteful & Seafang….

Model, Images and Text Copyright © 2014 by Roger Hardy
Page Created 18 July, 2014
Last Updated 29 July, 2014

Back to HyperScale Main Page