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Revell 1/72 SE.535 Mistral

Hi everyone!


This is my Armee de l'Air .
The SE.535 Mistral (aka FB.53) was a licensed upgraded Vampire built by French SNCASE, basically utilizing a more powerful Rolls Royce Nene engine and a Martin Baker ejection seat. While not faster than the standard Vampire, due to the airframe’s Mach limitations, it was among the best performing and most refined single seat Vamps.

The Mistral emerged from the need to power up the somewhat underpowered Vampire.

The post WWII rapidly developing French aircraft industry resumed studies to install the more powerful, yet slightly bigger Rolls-Royce Nene engine (also licensed built in France by Hispano) in the Vampire, in place of the Goblin.

The required modifications included a slightly wider fuselage and new air inlets, with their prosperous design eliminating the need of the top mounted paired scoops witnessed at British and Australian Nene-powered Vampires.

The first Mistral to see service was the SE.532 using the Nene 102 engine and a fixed seat, of which 97 entered service.

Later on, the SE.535, of which another 150 were delivered was introduced, featuring a licensed built Martin Baker ejection seat, using the Nene 104 and capable of carrying bombs or rockets.

The Mistral operated with the Armee de l'Air from 1952 and was eventually phased out of service in 1961. All Mistrals were built in the SNCASE Marignane plant.


The Revell kit is a reboxed mold with, a nice, sweet (if not at times challenging) build. It was built as a participant to our friend's Erik @airbum very successful de Havilland Aircraft Company 100 years GB.
Should you want to read the full build review, you may do so by visiting my beloved site Modelingmadness:
https://modelingmadness.com/review/korean/french/penmis.htm

Happy modeling!
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24 responses

  1. Profile Photo

    Felix said on May 10, 2022

    Jasou Spiros @fiveten, this is a beautiful build of a beautiful plane! I like the smooth metallic finish a lot. That is hard to achieve!

  2. Profile Photo

    Bernard Bedeur said on May 10, 2022

    How nice Spiros. I love the scale and results you got with the Metallic finish.

  3. Profile Photo

    John vd Biggelaar said on May 10, 2022

    Extremely nice looking Mistral, Spiros @fiveten
    It was a pleasure to follow your build thread.
    Definitely going to read your MM article as well.

  4. Profile Photo

    George Williams said on May 11, 2022

    Nice French Vampire. I wish I could get hold of one of the new 1/48 Airfix kits, but they don’t seem to have made their way to China yet, maybe I’ll have to wait for Halloween.

  5. Profile Photo

    John Healy said on May 11, 2022

    Nice work, Spiros. Vampires are all the rage!

  6. Profile Photo

    Lis said on May 11, 2022

    Nice looking NMF!

  7. Profile Photo

    gary sausmikat said on May 11, 2022

    Cool!

  8. Profile Photo

    Andrew Alexander said on May 11, 2022

    Beautiful work, Spiros! The Vampire is an elegant design, as are all de Havillands.

  9. Profile Photo

    Reinhard Spreitzhofer said on May 11, 2022

    nice little bloodsucker!
    Gonna show it´s still British made relative in 1/48 soon 😉

  10. Profile Photo

    Greg Kittinger said on May 11, 2022

    A nice-looking Mistral. Well done!

  11. Profile Photo

    George Schembri said on May 12, 2022

    Nice work with the NMF Spiros, nice looking Mistral.

  12. Profile Photo

    dale travis said on May 12, 2022

    Another nice one Spiros.

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