Rick's Westland Sea King HAR3 (x2) 1/144 by Sweet Decal

[rickoshea52]

Here's a little pair of Sea Kings that I got while in Japan this summer. I used to work on D Flight 202 Sqn at RAF Lossiemouth and by coincidence the paint schemes offered by this kit include two of the cabs (IIRC) that were on the flight during my time there. As well as the classic yellow SAR cab we also had one painted in the grey Falklands Islands scheme, the latter had RWR heads on the nose and under the tail pylon.


The kit describes these as HAR3 A's but the cabs were in fact HAR3's - the only obvious external difference is the HF aerial mast layout so these could be modelled as either Mark. It's a simple kit but there were no instructions so I had to find some on the Internet. Another deficiency of the kit is the lack of EAPS/SNIPS intake filter, there are two cockpit options one of which has the older FOD deflector - this version won't be modelled so a scratch built filter will be required.


I plan to display them on a base modelled on the SAR dispersal at Lossiemouth.


[ATTACH]123466.IPB[/ATTACH]



[ATTACH]123461.IPB[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]123462.IPB[/ATTACH]



The two halves of the fuselage go together nicely and the sponsons fit into a slot with the stay a separate item.


[ATTACH]123463.IPB[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]123464.IPB[/ATTACH]



The underside had some detail sanded off that wasn't appropriate for this Mark.


[ATTACH]123465.IPB[/ATTACH]



The main rotor blades offered have grooves along the entire length, the upper sides were sanded smooth, I left the underside as they won't be seen.

[rickoshea52]

The cockpit glazing has had a coat of translucent green over the eyebrow panels and light grey on the others, there is no cockpit detail. One of the glazing pieces had had a hole drilled for the RWR head with a scrap of plastic through it for illustration


[ATTACH]123467.IPB[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]123469.IPB[/ATTACH]



The horizontal stabiliser needed trimmed as per the decal sheet instructions!


[ATTACH]123470.IPB[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]123471.IPB[/ATTACH]

[rickoshea52]

This kit only gives you the option of having the FOD deflector intake guard or no guard at all so I have cut and filed a block of 3.2mm plastic rod to represent the EAPS/SNIPS intake filter box that are/were fitted to all Sea Kings sometime in the early 90's (I think). These will need painting before fitting because of the vortex screens, could be tricky.


And the canopies have been masked and glued to the fuselage too.

[takeslousyphotos]

I'm going to have to watch this Rick........... at 1/144 scale, I'd have thrown it at the wall well before I got to that stage.

[rickoshea52]

I'm going to have to watch this Rick........... at 1/144 scale, I'd have thrown it at the wall well before I got to that stage.

Well the intake filter was straight forward, the RWR fairing for the nose and under the tail boom for the grey cab will be a challenge.

[yak face]

Nice work rick , the sweet kits are great arent they. Another little chopper (!) thats a great kit is the revell 1/144 puma in any of its boxings , were there any of those there while you were ?

[papa 695]

Very nice Rick and a great start

[rickoshea52]

Nice work rick , the sweet kits are great arent they. Another little chopper (!) thats a great kit is the revell 1/144 puma in any of its boxings , were there any of those there while you were ?

I don't recall seeing any Revell aircraft kits in any of the model shops I visited in Japan Tony but I remember your Tigermeet build from a year or two ago. This is a nice little kit but a bit rudimentary, the fuselage windows are decals and the bubble windows will need some imagination to replicate. I'm just happy that the kit features a pair of cabs and the paint schemes that were applied to the pair on D flight when was posted there. Making a dispersal base for them is planned.

[rickoshea52]

Both cabs were primed tonight but I haven't taken pictures, my next post should feature a DSG and a bright yellow cab.

[Guest]

Nice modelling so far.

[rickoshea52]

Paint on.

[papa 695]

They look very good Rick

[rickoshea52]

Something was bugging me with the grey cab after I painted it DSG, it is too dark. The real cab was quite faded so a lightened shade was applied and it looks better, the same cant be said for the yellow cab. The clear part that is the cockpit isn't taking the yellow paint too well.


The rotor blades have been painted on the under side and two have been painted yellow on the upper surface (not pictured).

[flyjoe180]

Superb Rick.

[rickoshea52]

One of these cabs has been gloss varnished and ready for decals, the yellow one is causing me trouble though with coverage. Anyway, I put the main rotors together and ran the blades through my thumbs to create the droop effect and noticed that I have painted the black/grey blades upside down...did I mention I worked on these for three years? Ooops!


I also made a start on a little base for them using Scalescenes sheets cut and glued to a piece of mounting card. The yellow circle on the dispersal was created using a Woodland Scenics paint pen and the lid of a large yoghurt pot as a template which just happens to be a little bigger than the rotor disc. Before I did all this I created a sillouette of the helicopters to help me with the spacing and size calculations of the dispersal. Next I will add some grass around three of the edges and weight it down to straighten it out.