During my come back to building scale model kits, mainly aircrafts, my midlife crisis of kits purchase took a path over french planes at some points and the Dassault Rafale C from Revell quickly became a must have on my stash.
Quite a good price, good reviews in general (except for some rivets counters here and there), scale 1/48, I was able to source the C version (single seater) but also a B version (two seater) that’s also from Revell but only available on the used market.
This build finally took a funny turn by becoming my first ever commissioned build ! My dad was discussing with a friend of him and when he discovered that I was building model kits, my dad took the initiative to propose the build of a Rafale … without telling me !
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If you want to skip this post and move directly to the full build gallery of this 1/48 scale Dassault Rafale C, you can follow this internal link and bounce to all available pictures :
Revell Rafale C : the kit
Kit is moulded in grey styrene with nicely recessed panel lines. Cockpit offers basic details but allows to generate OOB something clean with an opened canopy. The first great aspect of the kit is coming from all available ordinance : SCALP cruise missile, sidewinders type air to air missiles, GBU bomb rack, choice of drop fuel tanks in various sizes … everything you need to build your dream loaded Rafale. Even if the kit does not allow to build the Marine version with the decals, you’ll find all specific parts for this one too on the sprues.
Last but not least as we will see later on in this post, decals allows to build two version from the french air force : a standard grey one, classic, and a “tigermeet” one from a past NATO meeting in Europe called arctic tiger. But we will see the issue with this one more precisely.
Let’s start with the office
As for many aircraft model kits you will start with the cockpit and interior. Ejection seat is made out of 5 parts and a few more will make a decent place for the fighter pilot to work. My model is supposed to be displayed with landing gear out on take off so I purchased a REEDOAK 3D printed figure that looks very nice and fit quite well.
Major modification on the pilot was to sand down its back to have a nice seating position on the seat. The fit is very good from the beginning and allows to start with enjoyable first steps.
A well engineered model kit with overall great fit
In general, this kit presents a good engineering and provide quite a good fit in many areas. The only struggle I faced was by fitting front air intakes sections to the fuselage wihch requested more work and some putty. Front “canards” are made of a single piece to ensure good alignment in between left and right. I really like that halves fuselages are separated from top to bottom, allowing for a more easy to manage gluing line compared to the classic left and right assembly you’ll find on most models.
As you can see engraving is finely recessed and presents well in many areas especially bottom.
Preparing the model for in flight display
Request from the customer was to get a Rafale shortly after take off, on a left banking turn, wheels down, with a pilot and lots of ordinance under wings. To Do so I choose an extra mounting support I got from an old 1/24th scale Airfix model kit.
I chopped the top of the support, added a piece of acrylic tubing and epoxy glued a larger tube inside the fuselage to give a strong support for the plane WHILE allowing to remove it if necessary.
I thought it was nice to help during transportation but also to display the Rafale on its landing gear more classicly.
Build, Colors and panel wash for a custom made “TigerMeet” decoration
The build goes on as for so many planes. I choose to avoid the preshading session and went to a Vallejo black primer directly to a mix of Tamiya greys for the main color.
To add some changes and variations in tone, I applied a lighter grey (got it with a few drops of Tamiya white). Some maintenance panels and areas on the top got it with light touches. And then comes the time to consider the decoration …
Customer was willing to get the tigermeet scheme as shown on the artbox, but I quickly found a major issue : big areas of white and black should be painted on the model but without any template or masks provided. I could have tried it but my main concern was on the result quality : as the model was set to go for a customer, I was afraid of getting a bad result.
Instead of taking a bet on the scheme, I checked with the person and created a decoration seen on many real aircrafts now : just decorate the vertical fin.
I used the provided decal and applied it on a white based fin and the result, even if far from the artbox, is really good in the end.
Finishing the model
Decals were applied on a coat of Tamiya clear after using a black panel wash of the same brand cleaned with white spirit. The vertical fin is really nice !
Landing gear was simply sprayed with Tamiya flat aluminium and darkened with panel wash too. I never paint tires in black but instead use Tamiya NATO black that gives a realistic result.
Ordinance on the model is based on two 2000L drop tanks, air to air sidewinder style missiles installed on wing tips and a load of GBUs (3 under each wings on the pylon).
A first customer for my models, and a happy one !
Very happy to deliver this completed Dassault Rafale C from Revell to its customer. He even said he will send a picture to the monthly “fana de l’aviation” !
Please go to the Gallery page dedicated to this model build to enjoy all available pictures :
