1/32 ROYAL AIR FORCE FAST JETS

When I was young, my family used to take holidays in west Wales, not far from RNAS Brawdy.  In those days it therefore pretty common for me to see the beautiful Hawker Hunter fly over in the hands of trainee RNAS pilots – as well of course as Fairey Gannets and Westland Whirlwind helicopters.  Such was the activity at that airfield that I used to be left at the end of the runway with a Coke and a sketchpad to watch the planes landing and taking off.  What could possibly have gone wrong…

The FGA9 was exported all around the world but is famous as the jet that flew through Tower Bridge!

I built this Revell kit FGA9 in 2005 straight out of the box and it remains one of the easiest and best-engineered 1/32 kits I have ever built.  The wings almost clip together without glue and the undercarriage is nice and secure – even in plastic.  I used the kit decals to depict a late service Hunter from $% Squadron based at Wittering in the summer of 1976.  I know that more modern kits of the Hunter have been released more recently but I cannot believe that they can be any more satisfying to build than this super-looking variant with its distinctive classic mid-70s colour scheme and colourful decals.  

As a young boy, I remember being taken to airshows at Benson and Greenham Common. At that time, the Lightning was the spearhead of the RAF and I can still (I think) remember the shattering noise as it shot up into the sky.

The plane was designed in Preston (quite near where I now live) with engines stacked on top of each other rather than alongside each other. It must have been a nightmare to maintain and the slightest problem with one would immediately cause problems for the other.  As a result, they used to crash regularly as the famous photo from Farnborough when the early planes were tested rather attests.  (The pilot in this case was called George Aird.  He survived - albeit with two broken legs.

Still when they were flying, they were one of the fastest planes in the world and I like the sheer ungainliness of them! 

Having seen the Harrier many times at airshows, my abiding memory is of the sheer noise of a jet that is stationary in the air and is not moving towards/away from you.  I was reminded of this at the RIAT 2022 when for the first time, I watched a F35 do a similar “bowing” manoeuvre to the one that the Harrier used to do.  My goodness  it was loud…  

In my opinion this aircraft was another victim of civil-servants and RAF management colluding to force the MOD to buy new planes to replace “old” kit – that in truth had many years of service ahead of it.  The same might be said of the Nimrod, Tornado and – going further back – the Jaguar.

Trumpeter produced about 4 variants of the Harrier in 1/32 all containing white metal undercarriage parts and photo-etch details for the cockpit.  Clearly the dimensions of the plane were well-known to Chinese kit manufacturers…

I cant honestly remember much about the build other than being somewhat spoiled for choice about what weapons load to depict.  The canopy is removeable and I chose to show the aircraft as it might be “parked” without extended fuel probe but with lowered airbrake at Wittering in 2008 with 4 Squadron.

Eurofighter EF2000-A Typhoon FGR4

RAF 29 Squadron, Coningsby 2014

I am clearly biased but I maintain that the Typhoon is one of the best looking jets in the world – up there with F18C and the Fulcrum MiG 29.   

This is another Trumpeter RAF subject in 1/32 and I have augmented the kit with an aftermarket set of decals to depict the 2014 RAF solo display aircraft.  It was based at Coningsby and was attached to 29 Squadron.

Like Trumpeter's other 1/32 RAF offerings, it has a solid white metal undercarriage and an excellent level of surface detail.  I used Alclad to achieve a nice “burnt” look to the jet cans and I had fun weathering the aircraft to achieve that “slightly-used” look.  In general, these planes are kept pretty clean in my experience but the black tail and canards look really smart, along with the gold-tinted canopy.  I built this in 2019 and I warmly recommend it if you can find an unbuilt one…!

This is a Gulf War colour scheme  re-boxing of the MR2P using the colour scheme from 42 Squadron's deployment to Saudi Arabia in 2003.  

My only 1/72 model - but this subject in 1/48 would be too large to show.  As it is, it a seriously impressive model and the first I had made from the "new Airfix" in about 2016.  Sadly the actual aircraft had been taken out of service by then and I actually saw one cut up lying on th eground awaiting reconstruction at RAF Cosford at that time.  I had been shown over a mock-up of the MR4 version with Ben Wallace (then simply MP for Garstang) and I must say I felt it was so sad that so muich money had been spent on a project that never saw the light of day.