Building the 1/48 scale Airfix Buccaneer kit in SAAF markings stems from the fact that I have always had a great admiration and respect for this aircraft, performing its duties whenever it was called for silently and without much fanfare.

Because I wanted to build my Buccaneer as a bulged belly fuel tank version as was used in the latter part of the war, I had great problems because Airfix did not supply the S50 SAAF kit version with that belly tank.  It only came in the early part when the fuel tank was not used that often. This was kindly rectified by Airfix that supplied me with a spare tank. Mating the top to the bottom half of the fuselage after I inserted the Neomega Cockpit Set, did pose a huge problem around the air intakes in front.  This caused quite an overlap between the top and the bottom that needed a lot of sanding and filling until I could get it right but eventually succeeded.  I also had great problems in the back part where the exhausts of the engines were employed and managed to mask it with great difficulty.  The only way  I did manage to get the two halves together was by doing it piecemeal from the front to the back and waiting for the first part to dry before doing the next part.  The canopies I added last as I wanted my cockpit open but I can already state that in sequence on the plans, here I did not remove the  shatter wires as Sinuhe mentioned.  It also states on the instructions, Option 31 b or c that one must be careful of the antennas and on looking at all our photographs I chose to use part no. 60 which was the two small antennas as seen under option 31c.

Wings were no problem getting the top to the bottom half together on the outer wing parts but once I added them to the fuselage section there was a massive step between the inner segments of the wings and the outer segments which is supposed to the folded.  As the SAAF never employed folded wings we could only build them in the active flight position and again a massive step was found after even trying to display it open on the insides which I did as recommended by some articles.  I still had to put a thin strip of plastic card down first and over that lie my putty which I then sanded to get the wings smooth.  Tail was not warped as Sinuhe found.  I managed to get that okay without any problems although the option under step 36 has to go for 36b as mentioned in the instructions.  I did not put on the ferry tanks as I wanted mine clean for operational use and I did not have access to the AS30 missiles as Sinuhe alluded to. As there are no kits  available of these missiles and I was not interested in trying to scratch build them so I put on the pylons as was used for that configuration and put it on the wings.  My Buccaneer was now ready for painting.

Painting was done in the late colours, also no.416,ie in which Dries Marais won his HC as was described by Sinuhe.  The two colours were PRU blue on the bottom part  from Testors and the grey top colour was Life Colour UA022 or FS36118 which is the closest to the dark grey that I could work out from actual samples of the aircraft that is accessible to us.   Painting went fairly easy without a problem until I wanted to put the silver edging on the wing. when I pulled the masking tape off, (3M Magic Scotch tape) the whole left wing came off at the junction where the inner half meets the outer half.  This was of course catastrophic, at least it happened before I had the decals put on, and then the whole sanding and filling and re-painting had to be started as from scratch.  The fact that I did not end up throwing this Buccaneer at great speed into the closest wall, must mean that it had not given me enough problems before that would discourage  re-starting half of the modeling project and sanding all over again. Decals for the late version as seen on the photographs was very easy i.e. a serial number and a squadron badge as well as the emergency escape lettering and stenciling for the canopies.  No other markings were carried during that time giving it quite a bland appearance. I elected to do some shadowing on the spray painting and that made up for the blandness of the aircraft.

So overall I agree with Sinuhe , people lambasting this kit obviously want  a free meal.  Any model can be built into a respectable model if you take care and if you have got an interest in it and I can guarantee that nobody else is going to bring out a better kit of the Buccaneer in 1/48 scale.  I therefore thank Airfix for filling a big gap in the SAAF’s inventory in kit form and also to Neomega which I must add is what makes this kit stand out at any display that I have taken it to.