Ariane 4

Brand : ShipStarModels

Year : 2003

Scale : 1/47

Materials : PVC, resin PU, polystyrene foam, plastic card, polyester putty

With the first Ariane 4 launch in 1988 opens a new page of history, begun fifteen years earlier. The commercial and technical success quickly grow up. The Ariane 4 can launch two heavy satellites simultaneously. Existing in 6 different versions according to the nature and the number of supplement boosters, this trocket allows to satisfy very wide range of payloads.

For this model presented here, I reproduced Ariane 4 "model V31" ( the biggest version on six existing ) having the following standards:

Total height : 58,40 meters

Mass in takeoff : 480 tons.

This Model in the 1/47 scale gives it 1,30 meter in height.

You will say to me, why the 1/47 rather than the 1/48, scale used usually on the business

It is very simple, because in the first place this model is a complete scratch and because with regard to the real height of the rocket which is of 58,40m, this scale allowed me to reproduce a model about 1,30m rather big to appreciate the forms and not also too much to put it in the corner of a room. Secondly, my Ariane 4 is made with PVC tubes and with regard to the real diameters of the various fuselage parts, I had to find existing tubes in the business at the true size. I can say to you that I calculated more than a morning the most appropriate scale. So, I focused on the 1/47th which was the best scale giving me respectively 8 cms in diameter for the nose cone and for the low part and 5 cms for the central part.

The nose cone is an plexiglass armature with polystyrene foam, covered with filler putty. The triangular central rocket part is made in the same way.

Elements streaked on the various places of the rocket are in plastic card, shaped.

Lateral boosters are in PVC tubes of 4,5 cms in diameter. The booster nose cone is in polyurethan resin as the detail serving for fixing bells. It seems to me that in the reality, they are masks to protect the rocket bells mechanism.

These bells are in resin, painted in " metal cote ", polished then covered with adhesive aluminium foil (not totally). The pieces receiving ailerons are in resin. Ailerons are in plastic card.   
    
I used for the painting an acrylic white sprayer for motorcar.

All details model are in plastic card, "Evergreen" plastic tubes, brass foil, adhesive copper foil, plexiglass, resin. Circles strips on the tubes are in aluminium foil. Decals are made from computer, printed on a film adhesive transparant.