The TSR-2 IPMS(UK)SIG will be closing down once the final show for this year has taken place at Telford in November. I would personally like to thank all the people involved especially members of the TSR-2 IPMS(UK)SIG for their continued support during the SIG's lifetime. This website will however remain open for business, although the SIG will no longer attend any shows or have any affiliation with the IPMS(UK).

In place of the TSR-2 SIG, a new SIG has been formed. This is The Cold War IPMS(UK)SIG, and will start displaying where the TSR-2 SIG left off.

The TSR-2 SIG origins date back to 2003 when a few members of the What-If SIG were displaying a variety of the resin TSR-2 models as part of a British what-if theme for the year. We noticed a large number of people were paying special interest to the TSR-2, asking questions, discussing the fate of the aircraft and lamenting on there never being an affordable plastic kit of the aircraft.

This led to a new SIG being created for those interested in the TSR-2 in conjunction with the campaign to persuade Airfix there was a genuine demand for a TSR-2 kit. Due to the interest shown from the displays at model shows, the campaign on-line through newsgroups and forums, Airfix actually took the bold step and announced at Scale Model World 2004 their first own new 1:72 aircraft kit in many years of the TSR-2.

The all new Airfix 1:72 BAC TSR-2 kit finally came out on 17 February 2006. The production run was first limited to 10,000 kits (7,000 - UK and 3,000 - rest of the world). This figure rose to 14,800 (10,000 - UK and 4,800 - rest of the world) by the time it came out.

It is interesting to note that by the time the kit eventually appeared in February 2006, much of the modelling press had forgotten the origins of the kit and instead chose to question the build quality and limited availability of the kit. This has had a double impact on the model, kits are still trading on auction sites and kits dealers at nearly double their RRP and those who do own the kit are reluctant to build the kit due to either the less than favourable build reviews in the magazines or because it was bought as a collectors item rather than a building kit.

After the success and great demand of the TSR-2 in 1:72 scale, Airfix, now under the ownership of Hornby Hobbies Limited will release a 1:48 scale version of the TSR-2 as a Limited Edition. The new kit is expected to be available later this summer. With the 1:48 kit due out very shortly, we decided that the time had come for the TSR-2 SIG to bow out on a high rather than fade away in a few years when interest would be focused elsewhere.


A very big Thankyou goes out to all the people who made the TSR-2 SIG possible.