¹⁄48

English Electric Lightning T.4

Introduction

After my decision to convert the very fine detailed Airfix 1:48 scale E.E. Lightning F.1 kit to the early trainer version T.4, I searched for necessary and possible materials, Conversion Sets and of course literature. If you do some hunting, you can find a number of informative books about the subject. A must have for any Lightning project is the comprehensive guide „MDF 7 The English Electric Lightning“ by Richard J. Caruana & Richard A. Franks, SAM Publication. Here you can find all what you need.

Lightning T Mk.4/5 conversion

I used for this conversion the following CMK Detail Sets: Lightning Undercarriage Set, Lightning Control Surfaces set and Lightning T Mk.4/5 conversion set. Let me say, only the last one is realy necessary, the other stuff is needless. After a direct comparison with the Airfix parts and the cast parts I realized that Airfix made a good work! Fitting of the CMK fuselage parts was more than poor as you can see on my photos. I could not compare my resin cast parts with other boxes, because I've not found any modeller who used this Conversion Set yet. Before the assembling of all main parts I used my „Rosie the riveter“ for surface detailing. The avionic bays on the fuselage back, as well as the side and wing leading edge, are selfmade with plastic profiles. There are enough photos available to make more even details than I did. The little Oxygen Trolley is also selfmade though I used the fine Flightpath kit as template. The kit unfortunately very hard to find here in Germany.

Markings

My choise was the T.4 of the 92. Sqdr.. (EA), Geilenkirchen, Germany 1968, with serial number SN XM955. For the painting job I`ve used Alclad and Gunze Colours, for the weathering I used oil colours, pigments and Inks from Games Workshop. Unfortunatly the new decal brand Baracuda was at this stage not available, so I decided to use the Airfix Maintenance Decals (cut off the unnessesary decal film and used Future Wax for the base) and the rest from an old Aeromaster Decal Set. The Numbers are from Carpena decals.

Conclusion

This was my second Lightning in scale 48 and let me say this: If you wonna do one from Airfix, so do it. It's a real cool kit and it's easy to built. So don't hesitate to get one of this dinosaurs of the golden sixties!