Hobbying In Place #1 Building the Airfix Handley Page Victor K2/SR.2

Building the 1/72nd Airfix Handley Page Victor K2/SR.2.

Once more “Joy” springs up like a weed during this time of pandemic meltdown. So let's get down into the weeds and learn how this scale modeler practices the fine art of social distancing. This is an art form in which I am well schooled. Let’s begin.

Victor from Butch O'Hare Show

For the last couple of weeks I have been downstairs building the 1/72nd Airfix Handley Page Victor K2/SR.2. Typically I claim to build either Soviet or Japanese in 1/32nd scale. This is none of those. I purchased it at the Butch-O-Hare show last year on a whim. I saw one on the contest tables and thought (like so many times before) “Hey I should build that”. This meant buying it and here we are.

Crack Town Adventures

I have been lax on “Joyous” updates because I run a weekly Fantasy RPG campaign called “Crack Town Adventures”. In addition I had been preparing four new RPG game experiences to run at Gary Con XII. Lesson one of Social Distancing: Engage in at least two hobbies. Anytime someone approaches all you have to do is start talking about the proper way to roll a d20 and I can personally guarantee they will not approach closer than 6 feet. (And if they were already within six feet, they would be physically displaced).


Having both Scale Model Building and RPG Gaming as hobbies is akin to the “carpet bombing” of social distancing.

Server Smashing Workbench

This is where I hone the craft of Social Distancing. Imagine the virtuoso Liberace sitting at his rhinestone encrusted piano banging out “Ode to Joy”. I found a small tabletop music stand (sitting in front of the two tool boxes, center) and I often tell myself that building plastic models is like a musical performance. Albeit one that involve razor sharp blades and toxic chemicals. I posted this on Instagram to see if I could crash their servers. I am still hopeful.

This is probably my last purchase for a few decades (i.e., because the world has ended). I had the 1/350th one, sold it on Ebay. I saw this at last year's Nats, didn’t buy because it cost a lot. I found one from BNA at a really good price and sold the idea of buying it to my wife by telling her it will hold its value. My building is always by definition a multi-tasking exercise, while engaged on the Airfix kit (which I realize we have not even seen one pic of yet) I went through my Gunze paint stash to see if I had the colors I needed to paint this. It turns out I do not. And yes it is basically red and white. AH...but which red and white?

So finally, here is the cockpit to the Airfix Handley Page Victor K.2 / SR.2. All the cool (and well painted stuff) are at the back and will be invisible once the canopy is put on. The main thing you see are the two pilot seats. To facilitate painting I glued .060 styrene rod to each seat. Corresponding holes were also drilled into the cockpit floor. This aided greatly in both painting and construction. The main areas are all airbrushed, the details are brush painted using Valley-Joe miniatures paints with a brush. I used an oil wash of black thinned with turpentine to make everything pop. Lastly, I dug out the dreaded forbidden “Dry Brush” and used that to highlight the raised areas in white. I felt like I was doing something really bad and that an unmarked van would be pulling up to my house at any moment. Imagine my wife trying to answer a trooper at the door “Are you aware that someone at this location is Dry Brushing?”

The .060 rods in action.

The completed cockpit. Nice and simple. Lotsa seats. Guess these guys like to party. Notice also the black cardboard underneath. I have a bunch of these and they are great for building on because they are so black and matte.

This kit has an extensive interior. I wanted to keep things simple, so none of it is needed. While this is a good kit, I did discover that the fit of the fuselage halves was not ideal. This area here was the biggest problem. The front wheel well is attached to the bulkhead. The bottoms of the wheel well are supposed to be a seamless fit to the wheel well opening. The fuselage section just past the well is bowed outward. I will need to use clamps here to force compliance, however the wheel well box needs to be clamped through the fuselage top, which of course is not possible.

Solution: 1) Thin the area that needs to conform.

2: Cut out two holes in the fuse top (These are covered by the wing).

3) Clamp in place. I use liquid cement and a brush to flow into the seams. Notice the 3rd clamp, the one on the edge of the wheel well. The other side…

...is pushing directly on the top of the wheel well box. I used a soft block of balsa as an extender of the clamp through the hole. The balsa is still enough and soft enough to grab onto the wheel well top to provide purchase for the clamping action.

However, we are out of order, the cockpit is glued in beforehand. You can see here I wrote the word “Weight” in sharpie on the fuse insides so I wouldn't forget the whatever it is...the weight.

25 grams of weight needs to be added. I found this chunk of brass and built a plasticard box around it.

The box makes sure the brass doesn't slide around. The box is shimmed and glued in place.

THEN it’s glued together. Here we see the clamps removed. The wheel well box is nice and flush. There are, however, gaps between the two fuse halves.

I used a small round file and made the gap into an even half round channel. I then took the sprue and stretched it to the corresponding size and glued in place. I really don't like putty. The mauve support blocks are worthy of note. They are cut sections of “Yoga” blocks which are a soft yet very dense foam. They are really cheap (My wife bought these at Aldi for a few bucks) and I band sawed them into matching pairs with notches in them. They are awesome for building on, stable for sanding and soft like a mothers love (The kind from “The Wall”).

To fix the rounded corners of the bomb bay I filed a groove and glued in more stretched sprue. Once dry, sand down smooth.

Working on those fuse seams. So far my only gripe with the new Airfix. I always try to melt such parts together, so I can just file away the mushroomed plastic to a single smooth surface. Again, I hate putty. I cover all the openings to keep crumbs out. I also use the “Sharpie” trick. First blacken the area. As you file away, you can see what’s going on. If you see black, you still have a seam.

The nice people at Airfix give you clear wing tips (although they put the sprue attachment right on the wing light).

The victor has the coolest tail. I want to cut it off and scratch build a spaceship out of it.

Here is the Victor all taped together. I go through test fitting constantly to figure out what can be seen, what is not and how things fit. It also gives a tiny feeling of accomplishment to keep going.

That's it for now. Keep building in an uncertain world.