Falklands War Chit Chat

[Graeme H]

Both San Julian and Rio Grande are about 650km to bomb ally, so you're at max range already and that's with maximum tanks. You'd have to have three 1300l tanks at very least (confirmed by most pictures) giving 800l less fuel. You're not going to be able to carry the Mk 17 on the center line hard point nor 4x250lb bombs on an MER. It would make sense that with 800l less fuel, you're not going to be able to carry maximum pay load and besides that fact, you've only the two rear fuselage hard points for bombs available. Thus if you want to build a Dagger, I'd say three 1300l drop tanks and two 250lb bombs on the rear fuselage mounts is your only option.

I think at the beginning there was a move to get the most amount of bombs possible, but that proved impractical range wise
and you are correct in that they went with 3 tanks, and 2 x 250lb bombs on the rear mountings

The first 2 photos here show both configs
Note that C432 doesn't have the yellow ID bands, and C415 does
http://www.dagger-lamarinete.com.ar/resenadagger.htm

This is my HPM Dagger kit, with the Freightdog resin set, which is sadly no longer available
I felt that the position they gave for the bomb mountings may be too close in, as I can't see those not hitting the tank fins



But as you can't really see them, not bothered
This is the only photo of it, as the wind took hold of the back board, which landed on the kit, and broke one mainwheel and a tank off, as well as one bomb and pylon, not repaired it yet


One thing I could not confirm was if the yellow ID band was painted on the bottom of the wing, the HPM kit says no, and the colour details are credited to Argentinians, but the Argie decal maker Condor says it is.
The closest photo I could find is that second photo of C415, but if they were there, they didn't paint the mainwheel doors, so my reasoning is they weren't painted, and relied on the drop tanks being painted yellow on the bottom.

[_BlackHawk_]

You have to be a little careful regarding pictures. '432' and '415' actually survived and underwent finger III conversions, so that picture of '432' may have been taken after the war.

As for the bomb racks, I think they are in the correct position, just lacking the angle on them. They should angle out as to put the bomb outboard of the rear fins on the drop tank. In any case, I'm sure the center tank was used first and dropped inbound.

As for the bands, some pics show them, some don't. I'm not sure they were universally applied.

[hrtpaul]

Awesome Dagger Graeme mate I just got an email from a guy in Argentina and it appears I could be acquiring a 1/48 Pucara *insert dancing smiley here* and a 1/48 Meteor F.4 conversion. I guess I should probably learn how to build and work with resin very soon

[Adam the Akrodude]

Very cool Paul.
Don't sweat the resin. I've built a number of resin kits and used many resin detail sets. It's nothing to fear. Just ensure you have a good razer saw. Measure twice, cut once!

Cheers

Adam.

[_BlackHawk_]

Awesome Dagger Graeme mate I just got an email from a guy in Argentina and it appears I could be acquiring a 1/48 Pucara *insert dancing smiley here* and a 1/48 Meteor F.4 conversion. I guess I should probably learn how to build and work with resin very soon

Working with resin is fun...ahhh the smells...oh yeh, that's the stuff.

[hrtpaul]

I've only ever done seats, wheels, exhausts and props in resin. Might have to get a High Planes Moth Minor as a practice run http://www.hpmhobbies.com/products/High ... 72%29.html or maybe some other simple resin kit that won't cost a kidney

[_BlackHawk_]

There's really not much different from working in plastic. Just more time on prep of parts and the use of superglue.

[Ansett A330]

Apologies if it has been mentioned before but "Seconds to Disaster" was on the other night (and will probably be repeated again sometime this week) and this episode covered the loss of HMS Coventry. Worth watching if you haven't seen it already.