DMBK Hawker Sea Fury 1/32 scale

[BarryW]

I was not originally going to post this as a build thread, just as a completed build.

I have changed my mind 6 days into this build.

Before I say anything else, I am loving this build. The plastic is well engineered and so far has faultless fit.

This is one of DMBKs first two releases, the other being a DH Hornet. The Hornet is a low pressure limited run kit that I will be building soon, while this Sea Fury is a high pressure mainstream production kit which DMBK say will be more typical of their releases. They have announced an ambitious release schedule that covers both 1/32 scale and 1/48 scale kits and we have a lot to look forward to from them.

They are also a U.K. company and this Sea Fury was moulded in the U.K. (Hornet being outsourced to Ukraine). Future releases will also be U.K. mouldings (by the same U.K. company Airfix used for their 1/24 Spitfire IX)

Now for the kit box

A beautiful box art.

This is how far I have got in six days.
The main airframe. Minimal filler has been used

There is a lot of pe in this kit and I am not a fan of pe. Some of it is useful and by building the wings down rather than folded I will significantly reduce the amount of pe I actually use.

The good bits of this pe (Eduard produced pre painted) are the instrument panel and seat belts. This kit is engineered to take this and with the seat belts it really makes life easier to get them positioned in the right way. In the cockpit however a lot of very, very small pe levers need to be glued into the side panels, about 15/16 or so of them and that's never a good thing. By the time I closed the fuselage I actually had just 4 in place, the carpet monster had a field day, some lost during fitting, some knocked off between fitting and closing the fuselage. It is infuriating and whoever decided using pe in this way should be lined up against a wall and shot under charges of unusual and cruel punishment.

DMBK say that they are going for a mix of accuracy and buildability. By simply including all this pe (exceptions being the seatbelts and instrument panel) they have undermined both buildabiiity and accuracy. After all, how many people can honestly say they find gluing tiny barely visible levers into place has 100% success!! In this way they sacrificed buildability for accuracy and in so doing compromised accuracy! A better balance is needed here in future releases. I would like to have seen the levers moulded in in the manner of Kotare.

However I still ended up with a nice cockpit

A couple of parts have broken way

The tail wheel is very weak. I will drill it and use a metal rod to repair and strengthen it.

The gunsight, I will refit later. I spent a lot of time on that sandwiching a transparent piece between pe and gluing it into place. Very fiddly indeed. I would prefer not to have had that process and just have a transparent part to mask and paint. Again some compromise is needed for buildabiiity. In fact I feel lucky that the gunsight survived this process denying the carpet monster another tidbit.

The centre wing section built up.

Good fit with just a little filler needed.

I spent hours on the wheel wells. A lot of plumbing needed to be fitted. To be honest I found that a little tedious even though I missed some out.

They provide a chart to wire the dividing bulkhead. To be honest I could not be bothered with that. It would have taken hours more for little gain as not a lot will be seen. I just stuck with the plastic parts. A few elements of pe is also included for this but, again I left it out, though there is one part of coloured pe that I will add after painting.

As you can see below even with what I did not bother with, I still have a really nicely details when well.

So that's where I am. A few other points

1- the instructions could be better, some part call numbering is wrong and the build sequence could be better in places. There is some vagueness in places but then that might be because I have been spoiled by my last half dozen builds being mostly Kotare and Zoukei Mura. Nothing here though was problematical. Easily sorted.

2 - the parts are generally well moulded, crisp and flash free. There are a couple of 'short shots' however and DMBK need to address this issue for future releases.

Whatever I have said, this is a great kit of a much needed Sea Fury in 1/32. Don't be put off by anything I have said. This is a great first release by DMBK and I look forward to many more.

I will post a few more progress shots along with a full range of completed photos when done.

 

[BarryW]

I thought I would post this picture.

The fuselage to wing fit is excellent but it needs cementing in sections and clamping. In a couple of hours I will switch the clamps around and cement the other half.

Four clamps were needed in various angles to make sure it all lines up.

 

[BarryW]

Inexplicably I have found some bad fit. The two inserts in where the wing fold is. They simply do not fit at all. I had a lot of carving to do below the wing of the end struts in order to create space for these parts to slide into. I still had a little filler to apply though.

I wondered whether I made a mistake somewhere and checked the instructions and also whether there might be a part numbering problem somewhere. I found nowhere I could have gone wrong. It really is the design and engineering of the kit that's an issue. All solved though. Look closely and you can see some crude carving out that will be hidden when the wing is attached A dry fit looks good

Anyway. It's all sorted now.

 

[BarryW]

This was never intended as a full build so please excuse me for now jumping ahead. This kit, with the few exceptions mentioned, has gone together beautifully with no issues.

I have completed the main construction and have moved on and done the painting.

Below you can see her masked up to paint the Extra Dark Sea Grey topside

Below you can see the Sky underside

EDSG done

Below some details painted.

Next I need to mask up the bare metal areas behind the exhausts to then spray a semi-gloss coat to protect the paintwork and decal.

 

[BOATMAN]

HI Barry nice to see what you are building again as you also build in my fav scale 1/32 an yes that ole p/e i had enough of that on my big hornet an then now on my hustler im enjoyin the build but i near had enough of that big main undercart gave me a big headacke but got over it now an its not a bad build for a 60 yr old kit fair fit so far so im im lookin forward to this sea fury build as they were a big plane wernt they ?
anyway hopeing for more pics
ATB SIR
chrisb

 

[Bear43]

This certainly is a nice looking kit and the paint looks fantastic. Looking forward to seeing more of your progress.

 

[BarryW]

Given the level of surface detail on this kit a sludge wash works best and you can see it below after the application of the Flory dark dirt wash.

When dry I will wipe it away.

 

[BarleyBop]

'short shots'

Not familiar with that term.

 

[BarryW]

Not familiar with that term.

It's where plastic has been injected but doesn't reach all the mould.

 

[Schaf]

Very nice so result so far!
I have a question if I may, what is your recommendation for the Hawker Primer called out in the instructions? I have seen it referred to as a tannish yellow, mustard, and something similar to chromate yellow. I would appreciate your insight.

 

[BarryW]

Very nice so result so far!
I have a question if I may, what is your recommendation for the Hawker Primer called out in the instructions? I have seen it referred to as a tannish yellow, mustard, and something similar to chromate yellow. I would appreciate your insight.

A good question. I use MRP and even with their huge range of colours they don't have it so, for the first time I had to do a mix.

I used Yellow Chromate as the base and mixed in some tan, about 20%, so it's MRP 129 80% and MRP 80 20%.

 

[Schaf]

Thank you for the info, I use MRP so I will follow your mix, thank you again!