This kit was unveiled at this years IPMS Nationals by the guys at Special
Hobby. At first I wasn't too impressed with this kit, but I've always been
impressed with the subject. This is also my first attempt at a kit made by
Special Hobby. Once I started to get into the construction of the kit I
could see that this is really a modelers kind of model. What the kit lacks
in injected molded detail is nicely made up for in PE and resin parts.
Everything
you need to make a quality looking model is included in the box. I did do
a couple of things that weren't out of the box. I modified the dive brake
hydraulics with some plastic tubing and stainless steel wire to make them
look a bit more realistic. I made my own seat belts for the
ejection seat, also there is an inherent weak spot with the skids. There's
just not much on the rear to glue to so the skids can bear the weight
of the model. What I did was drill out some 1/8 in. holes where
the skids would attach to the rear of the model. I then glued some 1/8 X 2
1/2 in. round stock in the holes so that the rods protruded evenly through
the inside and the outside of the fuselage and at the right angle
that the skids would be sitting. I then glued the vertical part of
the skids to these rods which made a much stronger joint to the fuselage
for the skids to rest on.
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The Building
For
the most part the exterior detail of the kit is nice. The Inconel X
covering is done nicely and all the panel lines are done nicely as well.
Take some time to test the fit of the parts and clean up all the tabs
from the injection molding, especially clean up the tabs on the wings and
the rest of the flying surfaces. The vertical stabilizers are a bit of a
challenge to get together and the tops of each leave some nasty
gaps to fill when completed. Easy fix though. I just covered the tops with
some .010 sheet plastic and sanded to shape. You will have to add
some plastic strip to the top of upper vertical stabilizer to replace
the detail that was sanded off. By far the most time I spent building
this kit was with the cockpit interior. An invaluable source for pictures
of these details were found on the internet and a book I got called the
X-15 Photo Scrapbook, some very nice shots of the instrument panel
and side consoles can be found in this book, however there were no photos
of the ejection seat. The best ejection seat photos I found came off
the internet. The kit offers a very nice and accurate replica of the
ejection seat and is a kit in itself really. Some details need to be
added such as the oxygen hose, but for the most part the seat is all
there in plastic and resin parts. The seat belts are represented in the
kit on the PE but I decided to make my own from some Waldron jet
buckles. The fuselage is assembled in four parts sectioned horizontally
that make up a forward and rear section of the fuselage. It took a little
work with a sanding block to get a perfect fit on the fuselage sections
but it saved a lot of work when it came to putting the two halves
together. The only real filling of seams on the kit involved where the
wings mate to the fuselage I used some sheet plastic and stretch sprue to
fix the gaps at the wing root, then sanded them to shape. The finished
horizontal and vertical stabilizers assembled nicely to the fuselage and
left no seams.
Painting and Decaling
The X-15
represented in the kit is basically the second X-15 produced. There
were three X-15's manufactured by North American. The X-15A-2 was actually
rebuilt from the X-15-2 after it was severely damaged on landing and was
rebuilt into the X-15A-2. This is the one that would ultimately set the altitude
and speed records for the X-15 research program. The X-15-1 now resides at
the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum in Washington D.C.,
X-15A-2 is in the U.S. Air Force Museum in Dayton, OH and the X-15-3 was
destroyed in the only crash with a fatality of the X-15 program when Major Mike
J. Adams* went into an unrecoverable spin and crashed in the Nevada desert. The
X-15's were usually painted in a black color scheme and the decals in the
kit offer this scheme. I started the painting by priming the whole model
with an automotive quality light gray lacquer based primer surfacer. After
making sure that all seams were in good order I finished the sanding with
some 0000 steel wool and set off to apply the finish color. Some Model
Master Flat Black was applied over the entire model followed by a few coats
of Model Master Clear Gloss to form a good base for decal adhesion.
The decals supplied in the kit are of excellent quality. They are very thin
so extra care has to be taken when transferring the decals from the paper
to the model. I used a 70/30 diluted solution of Solva-Set and water to set
the decals in place. After the decaling was finished the entire model was again
sprayed with an even coat of clear gloss and left to dry. After the gloss was
dry the entire model was finished off with a generous coat of Testors Clear
Flat.
*On his fatal flight, Maj. Adams achieved the
altitude of 266,000 ft, qualifying him by USAF guidelines as America's 27th
Astronaut. His Astronaut wings were awarded to him posthumously
and his name is inscribed in the Memorial Of Astronauts at the John F Kennedy
Space Center, Cape Canaveral, FL.
Steve
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