Pioneeer 1/72 D.H. Sea Venom FAW.21

PIONEER 1:72 D.H. SEA VENOM FAW.21

Reviewer: Kenneth Parsons (rec.models.scale)
Kit Review submitted: 11 October 2007

Kit Details:

This kit is a re-boxing of an old Frog tooling, in this case dating from 1973. The same moulding has been re-issued a number of times by different companies, including Eastern Express and Toko.

Aircraft History:

The de Havilland Venom was designed as a logical successor to the Vampire, which by the early 1950s was becoming very dated, even in the ground attack role. Fitted with a much more powerful Ghost engine and thinner, swept wings, the Venom carried on the twin boom tail layout of its predecessor. The Sea Venom, the naval version, was developed to fill a gap before the introduction of the massively more powerful Sea Vixen and served as an all-weather fighter with the Royal Navy from 1954 to 1960. They played a prominent role in Suez operations in 1956, providing CAP cover to the British carriers but also providing a cab rank of aircraft performing the ground attack role over Egypt. The Sea Venom served with the Royal Australian Navy and they were also produced under licence in France. The basic land-based Venom design was long-lived, continuing in service with the Swiss Air Force into the 1980s, where its precise flying characteristics endeared itself to pilots who habitually had to fly round mountains in order to land.

The Sea Venom is a neat compact aircraft, with a squat undercarriage. Compared with its successor it seems tiny – the later Sea Vixen had getting on for four times the thrust and is a brute of a plane, the application of pure power to overcome drag, whereas the Venom achieved its modest success with a certain economy of design.

The Kit:

The kit comes in white plastic with very a fair amount of flash, the parts needing some cleaning up before use. There are 8 under wing rockets provided as stores, with empty rails also included as an alternative. The kit dates from the era when thick clunky parts were the norm, and hence the instructions do suggest replacement of many of the crude parts provided in areas such as undercarriage doors, pitot tube and the finlets on the tanks.

Alternatively you could use aftermarket offerings, although the cost could then outweigh the price of the basic kit by several times over. Aeroclub do a replacement canopy, which is actually a must if you are going to make a cockpit interior and want it to be seen. Airwaves produce a cockpit interior set (AC72162) and also an exterior upgrade set (AEC72163), both of which could be worthwhile investments.

Instructions:

The instructions come on 6 sides of A4 paper, including 3views of both colour schemes provided and a rather weedy exploded diagram to show construction details. The instructions are very comprehensive indeed, insofar as they provide detailed guidance on how to upgrade the basic Frog-based offering to bring it up to modern standards. Full guidance is also provided if you want to construct a detailed cockpit interior, although the thickness of the canopy moulding effectively hides any fine detail inside. Additional detailing suggestions, such as improving the intakes, are comprehensive and authoritative.

Every possible improvement to the basic kit is listed – a really useful document and an excellent effort by the importer.

Construction:

This is fairly straightforward if done out of the box. Parts do fit together reasonably well, with alignment of the tail booms an area where care is required. The ejector seat head restraints leave little or no clearance for fitting the cockpit canopy and a dry run is definitely needed. Generally the relatively few parts fit together surprisingly well for a kit of this era and very little filler is required. The large nose radome makes it dead easy to provide nose weight – I used a metal nut held in place by plastic filler – crude but effective.

Decals:

The vast majority of Sea Venoms were finished in the standard extra dark sea grey topsides with sky undersides. Units seem to have used the tip tanks to distinguish their individual units, giving the options of a touch of colour to the basic scheme. Another alternative would be to model an aircraft with Suez black and yellow stripes.

The current boxing provides decals for two schemes, RAN and Royal Navy 890 Squadron, both in standard sea grey and sky. The decals are provided on a continuous sheet so need close cutting if they are used; they are also fairly crudely printed. Nicely printed decals for a couple of Sea Venoms appear on the Model Alliance HMS Ark Royal Air Wing set, which I used. Model Art also include markings for 2 Sea Venoms on one of their sheets. I actually applied the replacement decals for an 890-squadron aircraft, which has a black and yellow checkerboard on the tip tanks. The reproduction of these on a surface curving in 3 dimensions requires very careful placement of decals to get it right and also touching up afterwards to ensure that the design covers the full area.

Accuracy:

The basic shape of the kit is surprisingly accurate, the finished model having the look of the real thing, making it a good basis if you do whatever additional work you desire. As stated, ancillary parts such as the undercarriage are very crude, with the doors provided as thick slabs of plastic and little detail on the wheels or in the wells. Conversely, the underwing rockets are quite finely moulded and are usable without modification.

Overall Recommendation:

This – or other reincarnations of the original Frog mould – are the only way of getting a 1/72^nd kit of this plane. It can be made into a nice little model with some extra work. The excellent and very detailed instructions on how to do this do remove the need for detailed research – guidance is provided for you on a plate. This model is available quite cheaply on eBay and a Venom or Sea Venom needs to be in any collection of 1950s aircraft. So go for it, but be prepared for some work to bring it up to modern standards.

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