Mirage IIID2Z 1/48 Conversion

To build an SAAF 85 Advanced Flying School Mirage IIID2Z I am using the Heller Mirage IIIB,raised panel lines sanded off and rescribed along with the Aconcagua (spelling?) resin Mirage IIID conversion (Nose and tailcone and engine exhaust)

This is my first attempt at "re-scribe" of a complete kit and the victim is the Heller 1/48 Mirage III B/C


Anyway, I drew over the raised panel lines with a pencil and ruler and scribed under and above the wings, this went better than I expected.
I cleaned the panel lines after a light sanding and need to clean up a bit more.

I have highlighted one fuselage half so far and hope to finish scribing the fuselages soon.
I have not scribed a lot of the smaller panels, I will do those with a template at home when I am in the mood.

Awaiting scribing, panels on upper fuselage highlighted with pencil to help the scribing process, bottom one awaiting its turn


Wing scribing completed


Here is the Heller kit and conversion parts, I still need to make the arrester hook for the D2Z.



JL-100 rocket pods.


I have been trying to figure out how to do the blast vents on the pod and I think I will just scribe them on, It will be too fiddly to cut them out etc.



So I then changed from the original plan from converting the Heller Mirage IIIB to a D2Z and have finally settled on converting the Hobbyboss Mirage IIIC to a D2Z by grafting onto it the Heller forward fuselage and spine along with the Aconcagua resin nosecone, ventral tank, and engine outlet area.

The pencil striped sections are areas to be removed.
The JL-100 rocket pods are assembled I had a look at scribing the blast vents on the rocket pods but its a fiddly job that could look a mess so I am leaving my options open on that for now but I may well just leave them off.



The new nose section


Origional nose section removed and new section to compare


A rough idea of how it all fits together

So I removed the tailcone which turned out to be a bad Idea!
My resin tailcone was designed for the Heller Mirage III kit and has a much slimmer rear fuselage than the Hobbyboss version.





Here you can clearly see the size difference, grey is hobbyboss and brown the resin one.
Plan "B" was to re-shape the origional Hobbyboss CZ tailcone into the D2Z shape which did not come out too badly, it still needs some work to be done on it.



And this is what my sad Mirage IIICZ soon to be D2Z looks like at the moment!

More surgery on the Mirage III's to create the IIID2Z.
I am having a little difficulty getting it all lined up properly and a few "fit" problems but it should all go together ok if I do it carefully.



I attached the lower wing to add rigidity to the fuselage then removed the "C" spine and added a long tab made of plastic card under each edge of the "cutout" to rest the new "D2Z" spine on





Then using the twoseat nose section and the spine together I worked out their positioning on the fuselage and cemented the spine in place.

I was really struggling to make the Heller two seat nose fit the Hobbyboss fuselage and lower wing/nosewheel area.
Eventually I just closed my eyes and jumped in...sort of and "Voila" my preplanning and measuring actually did work out ok, not perfect but workable.

Current state of the build:
Nose section added
Air intake strakes modified and shaped.
Tail fin lower leading edge reshaped to final form
Two seat spine mounted
D2Z ventral tank re-shaped as I discovered that it was indeed a different shape to the other Mirage III ventral tanks, also started cut out groove to later insert arrestor hook.
Area around nosewheel bay blended in, some more sanding to do here and a little re-scribing
Top of main wings attached to fuselage, got a good join on right wing, not so good on left wing but only glued wing fuselage join for now, rest of wing will be cemented today.
Managed to break off a bunch of "petals" off the resin exhaust nozzel!

Again I must apologise, I cannot get better pics with the cell phone, I tried all the settings, close up, prtrait, sport etc but at least you can get an idea of the progress being made.

Re-shaped tailfin

The wings are now properly attached, I thought that I had done a good job with the wing join area but it seems that I didn't get the nice finish that I was looking for so I needed to use Tamiya filler and some sanding to fix it.

I also puttied the spine hump and sanded it, this join was not as bad as I had expected.

I reshaped the ventral "bulge" to be a closer match to the D2Z side profile and cut the groove for the arrestor hook.

And here is where we are at the moment.







I have made a little progress on the IIID2Z, filled in the gap around the modifed resin ventral strake/fuel tank



I added the air intake "shock cones", added the resin nose which was a really bad fit and I have used a lot of putty and done a lot of sanding to smooth it in.

The "petals" on the resin engine nozzel got broken and are difficult to fix so I had a spare resin "Scaleworx" Mirage F1AZ engine nozzel which has some very nice interior detail so I did a lot of sanding of the exterior of it to get it to fit so it looks much better now.
I origionally cut the rear fuselage off for the resin replacement which was way too narrow for the Hobbyboss fuselage so I reshaped the the cut off IIIC rear fuselage to the IIIE/D/D2Z shape and re-attached it, the modified rear fuselage does not fit great but will be ok.

The nose and air intakes have been "blended" into the fuselage and rescribed.

Cockpit given a coat of very dark grey, I am going to use decals for the cockpit interior as the canopy will be closed.



Finally got some paint onto the D2Z, not bad.

The Surgeons' ln the house - well done Dr Greg - outstanding surgery

DUDE!!

Now, that is some nifty work there!

Keep up the good work!

Update needed here Mr Gory!

Damn I cant wait to see more

Sorry about the delay, I have made progress, Photobucket is not working for me at the moment.