1/72 Novo Fairey Delta

by Toby Bird

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If ever there was a plane that looked as if it was travelling at 1,000 mph while standing still, this has got to be it. On 10th March 1956 Peter Twiss set the new air World speed record in this plane by travelling at an average speed of 1,132 mph, that was 310 mph faster than the old record set by the F 100. The record stood for a year before the F 101 raised the record to 1,208 mph. Powerful stuff for something designed and built over 50 years ago.

I like building special record breaking planes and I bought this on e-bay for not much. There weren't many parts to the kit and I was surprised to see that it featured a good deal of fine engraved panel lines which surprised me for a kit that started life in the Frog factory back in the sixties. As you would expect there wasn't a lot of detail on the kit but that's what I like about these old models. Apart from filling the odd sink marks and taking the time to trim the parts so they fit really well before gluing there wasn't much that has to be done apart from blanking off the fuselage see through effect, thinning the intake lips and making new canopy windows from a bit of food packing. Then it was onto the NMF finish. I started by polishing the complete kit with a nail buffer to make the surface smooth and then I used 3 grades of Bare Metal foil, matt, chrome and utlra bright chrome, one panel at a time to give the shiny finish. I liked the therapeutic effect this had as it is a job that cannot be rushed. I have found that the foil works best if you can wrap it round edges and planned accordingly. The Novo decals disintegrated in contact with water so I used some old Modeldecal roundels and codes that I had in the spares box. The decals were finished off with a couple of coats of future and then it was done.

Now this is standing on my shelf with my other kits you can see that this was a very small plane but an amazing achievement for 1950's British areoplane design, I can't wait to get onto Airfix's TSR 2 when it finally arrives to have that on the shelf next to it.

Toby

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Photos and text © by Toby Bird