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1/48 Trumpeter RA-5C Vigilante


ghodges

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Finished the Trumpy Vigi this evening. The build was more enjoyable than I anticipated, with the fit being a little better than expected. I used the Nautilus laser-cut wood re-enforcement set for the interior, since Trumpeter designed it with the traditional left/right half fuselages, which leaves the top and bottom center seams weak if not beefed up somehow. I also used a Black Box resin interior I had for it. It fit almost like a glove. The only adjustment to it was to make it mesh properly with the Trumpeter nose gear well, which had to be removed from the kit cockpit structure. The wing fold is a kit option, as are the deflected leading and trailing edge flaps.

One of the major drawbacks to the kit is a lack of intake trunking....Trumpeter provides two complete engines, but they just "sit" in the fuselage interior with nothing leading into each of the engine fronts. I left the engines out and added plastic card intake covers. That meant I had to do so cutting and fitting of the engines to install the rear halves of the engine exhausts so they'd fit within the Nautilus supports; but that wasn't difficult, and also allowed me to paint and add the burner cans at the end of the build.

I used MM enamels for the gloss white and 36440 Gull Gray. The metal leading edges were done with Alclad. The weathering was done with a wash made from Mig pigments dissolved in water with a drop of dish washing soap. The panel lines were done with a brown colored pencil.

I used some Two Bobs decals that came with the very first issue of Aerospace Modeler magazine back in 2005. The markings are for a Vigilante based out of Albany, Ga @1970; just a few years before I lived there. Rumor had it that the Vigilante pilots would take back to back tours of sea duty just to avoid going back to small town "Allbenny"....Anyway....on to the pics!

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Now I have the recce RA-5C to go along with my A-5A Viglante bomber conversion I did years ago. Questions, comments, and critiques welcome as always. Cheers!

GIL :smiley16:

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Looking good there, Gil.  I have 1 in my stash planning to mark it as a bird from Heavy 7.  Just ordered the Nautilus support set.  May have to move the Vigilante up in my build order.

Edited by nmertes
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Great job Gil!

That Nautilus support is well worth the money for this build.  It's nice to see a black radome on one of these birds.

Cool scheme too.

Bill

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