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VADM Fangschleister

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Posts posted by VADM Fangschleister

  1. 8 hours ago, Shaw said:

     

     


    Actually, I don't know where that one is, but the other one (encased in Lucite) is part of the Smithsonian's collection. Here is some of my research on those models...

     

    ewp-1967-preview.thumb.jpg.7468abf39e198e3f6a14ab24becc32d3.jpg

     

    They seemed rather fragile, so I'm not sure the one outside the Lucite would still be around... but if it is, it counts as both prop and studio model (having represented the Enterprise in "The Doomsday Machine").

     

     

    Very cool.   I did not know it was used in The Doomsday Machine but it makes sense for all the forced perspective things they had to do.  Your rendition of the replica is aces!   Might even do a 'shop of yourself in a similar pose as The Great Bird Of The Galaxy with your model properly positioned.   No, I'm not being snarky.  Just something fun to bring smiles. 

     

    In other news, and possibly due to intrusive algorithms in my web searches, a metal replica of the Cat's Paw Enterprise appeared in my eBay feed and I bought it.  Made by a feller in the UK.  Not as precise as the original but not bad and not too expensive ($30 w/shipping) and should be here in January some time.  

     

    Glad the Lucite-encased model still exists.  You may be right that the 'unsecured' one simply got broken.  However, with all that said, I think that the Enterprise was and is simply the most iconic of science-fiction creations.  If I remember correctly, everyone wanted something believable and 'serious' and not some cartoonish/ridiculous creation.  Something that people would accept as a logical creation that had functionality.  Granted, some of it is quite fantastic but in the very best of ways.  Matt Jeffries was a national treasure.

  2. On 11/10/2023 at 7:17 PM, Dave Williams said:

    I expect the 999 price is a placeholder that will get updated as the kits get closer to release.  If you look at the 50002 kit, the AH/MH-6 kit, it’s showing 258 yen for the full kit and 20-30 yen for individual sprues or the decal sheet.

     

    My advice would be to just be patient.  If you really want something, preorder from Squadron.  They don’t charge you until it comes in, so if it never arrives, you aren’t out any money.

     

    Wellllll goll-durnnit!  I BEEN patient a'waitin' fer these dang critters ta come back, sheriff!  My patience is a'wearin' mighty thin these days.   Ain't much I can do 'bout it though.  Jest don't like waitin' is all.   Shucks.

  3. I've been following the F9F-8 single seat on eBay for some years now.  Prices on the Bay varied widely but nothing I could afford/was willing to pay for.   The listing for this new mfr shows it at ¥ 999 which is about $140 US but I think since lots of their kits have this amount, it may just be a 'place-holder' or approximation.   In any case, $140 is a lot but considerably less than what's being asked on eBay.  Would love to see it under $100 but that is likely a pipe-dream.   Should have bought the Cougar and the F-101B when first offered.   

     

     

  4. Looks pretty nice.  Nice effort on the fan blades, something nobody else seemed willing to tackle to that level.  Nose also looks really good.  As "slow" as kit production is these days, the ones coming out seem to be setting a better standard.  The old argument of them being in the money business and making kits that have a wide appeal  still holds as they need to make money to stay in business.  So the off-chances of seeing this quality in a 1AB1F2 Wifferdill is unlikely.  

     

    Still Jonesing for the Trumpeter 1/32 F-106 they promised in 2003.    :-/

  5. I had a long ago brief email exchange with Trumpeter back in the early 2000's about a 1/32 F-106.  The respondent told me that Trumpeter would definitely be producing that kit.  I do not intend to make this a wish list entry...the emails really happened.  Then, I believe Kitty Hawk intended to do a 1/32 T-38 but went OOB.  Their 1/32 F-5F has the complicated canopy bits...and I would guess that although the two aircraft are completely different, the canopy bits are almost identical.  

  6. On 7/27/2023 at 6:59 PM, Dutch said:

    Don't forget hats on those businessmen with their skinny ties. They were all the rage back then, and.. they are making a comeback.

    Indeed!

     

    The old fedora.  You could tell a lot about a man by his hat.  How he wore it, what kind of condition it was in, his manners with women and his chapeau.  

     

    I got my kit this week and immediately started trying to figure out how to add a passenger window on each side, in-between the two that are there.  The plastic is a bit thick but I think making a stencil on tape from the holes and then slowly dremeling out a new one might work.   Not absolutely necessary but for the purposes of accuracy with what I want to build....I'm thinking it's necessary.  I'll figure it out.

  7. This kit is a welcome addition to my collection.   

     

    This airplane started its life long ago as a product of Mitsubishi Aircraft in the 1980'sand then was bought by the Beechcraft Aircraft Company and marketed as the Beechjet.  A nice purchase by the USAF for an aircrew-type trainer, designated the T-1 Jayhawk put some life into it and Beechcraft did fairly well in the newly evolving light jet world with it.  It's final rendition as of about 10 to 15 years ago is the Nextant with a light engine upgrade, winglets and Garmin avionics has given it quite a new lease on life.  

     

    Upon examining the parts, the only gripe I have is the fuselage seems to not replicate the slightly oblong vertical stretch it has but is not that noticeable in this scale.  It's actually not that noticeable in the real aircraft until you sit down in the passenger cabin and you don't have the overhead curving into your scalp like in the Citation.

     

    I taught this airplane for two years at Flight Safety in Wichita and it was fairly complex and requires a second pilot although Mitsubishi designed to originally fly with just one.  Over the  years the cockpit has changed configurations and other systems were modified with the last one rolling off the line in 2009.  I recall my program manager demanding I "check all our pubs" to make sure they were up to date.  Interestingly, there are no "up-to-date" pubs other than what Beechcraft published in 2009.  

     

    However, as for the model it appears to scale out correctly and the parts for thrust reversers are there but the bottom "skeg" is not, which for a Mitsubishi is fine but for anything Beechcraft is required.  It's for gear-up landings, for the fuselage to scrape along the runway.

     

    Since the cabin door is closed there are no parts for an interior.  The almost full-span flaps are etched in properly, as are the outboard trim tabs.  The roll spoiler hinges are a tad oversize but can probably be filed down to proper width.  The instrument panel decal on my kit will be replaced by a photo-edited picture of the diagram handed out on day one of class for initial.   

     

    It's an impressive little kit.

  8. On 7/23/2023 at 6:58 PM, GeneK said:

    Not sure I fully understand your dialect, but I think I get your intended meaning!🙊

     

    Thanks for the write up -- hope you post more as you go along - the F-5 is such a beautiful airplane and I know you'll do the kit justice.

     

    I fully appreciate your frustration learning CAD, but there are so many great downloads available just waiting to get printed  that you may just want to unpack the printer and Just Do IT!👍 It helps the learning process when you have something you want to edit vice trying to follow some of the talk-and-click-too-fast pros who assume they are lecturing to folks of equal intelligence and experience. Thankfully there are also very good Sesame Street level intros on Youtube!

     

    I'm using Fusion 360 ("using"  is an overstatement) and have to shake my head at the CAD folks who call it intuitive ... yeah, maybe to a CAD person.

     

    Gene K

     

    Thanks Gene.  Moral support in misery is still moral support.  I just today re-discovered my shelf-of-doom Anigrand Jetstar.  I'm afraid to track back to my old posts and see when I gave up on it.  But in that time, I've moved four times, lost a job because of Covid, retired and settled down in a small bungalow in my beloved state of South Carolina and hopefully will get back to work.  

     

    The Anigrand kit was put away and all the nice work is still there, so it may be worth picking up again.  Plus with all the 1/72 Biz jets coming out, I think it may want company.  I've ordered the beechjet, the last aircraft I ever taught and also the T-39 Sabreliner thanks to the open box review here...but needs an Academy F-86 for slat cannibalization.  

     

    But back to the F-5F.  The family model is sleekness defined and, like I said, may make it a fantasy of "my" personal jet if I ever had the $$$$ to own one.  That's the fun we can have with modeling.  I intend to pick the Fusion back up but it's exactly as you said.  The first time he shifted the whole map over to one side...with no explanation how to do that....the look on my face was like Fred Flintstone getting caught by his boss at the ballgame.  I had no idea how to do that so I was stuck.   I accidentally did do it one time with again, no idea how it happened.  But I did the Lego block and that helped and got distracted doing the soda bottle.  However, some of it stuck in my head but, like wet putty, fell off the walls of my brain and got scooped up by the vacuum-cleaner.  Review, review, review....I guess.  

     

    I have a few very personal goals for the 3D printing and want to do them before I die.  Seriously.  Most are 1/48 business jets to provide for fellow modelers and after I'm gone, maybe leave them as open sourceware.  I don't know how to do that, yet but someday.   :-)

     

    The watchmaking doesn't always keep me busy but I get an order here and there.   That's a lot of fun and the decal-making is part of my well-rounded toolkit now.  I can do the graphics thing and make a squadron patch and so on.  I may even go for a laser printer before too long but I need cash for that.  

     

    Thanks again for the support, sir.  Very kind.  

     

    Cheers

     

    fang

  9. Thanks much for the photos!  I may find myself purchasing the kit!  Looks every bit the part.  Might need the Hobbycraft 1/2 F-86 kit as a slat donor.

     

    Much appreciated.

     

     

    My dad flew this one out of Poughkeepsie for IBM.  I have a goal of 3D printing the model in 1/48.  In 1962/3 this was one EXPENSIVE paintjob. But hey, in a ramp dio, door open, a few businessmen with thin ties and white shirts....

     

    Yeah.

    IBM Sabreliner.jpg

  10. The Storm factory 1/32 F-5F, of the Kitty Hawk molds, arrived yesterday.  It survived the many thousand mile journey from the Chinese supplier and upon opening the box, I was pickled tink over the fineness of the plastic and the entire well-doneness of the kit.  The panel detail was not canyon-deep and the sprues were all quite crisp and flash-free.

     

    I can supply photos, if I wish to spend the hours of downloading pics from my phone, a sometimes tedious process, though I fully grok how sprue-pron is approved of here.  

     

    In short, I originally bought this kit because 1) I missed out on the KH offering and 2) had some crazy idea about using the canopies for my resin 1/32 T-38 that lays in a box, awaiting being cussed and fussed at for the purposes of feeding my modeling mojo.  But they would work and quite well at that.  

     

    One little gripe:  I am uncertain if Northrop removed the windscreen in front of the second cockpit or if the kitmaker omitted the perspex for the framing.  The framing part is there but no clear part.  "Easily" fashioned from some clear plastic sheet, I would imagine.  Is there a 3D printed instrument panel set for this kit?   

     

    It really is quite nice.  The tires are a little overly-done with "bottom-flatness" but there is exquisite detail in the speedbrake area and the seats beg to be superdetailed.  There are separate open or closed aux air intakes (nice!) and lots of goodies to include a resin exhaust set from the seller.   

     

    I give it an A and have been toying with the idea of making a WIF of "my personal jet" with either  polished aluminum or a zazzy paint scheme.  We'll see.

     

    Still suffering with 3D CAD for personal enjoyment.  My 3D printer is still in the box while I cry about my difficulties learning CAD.  

  11. As a former A-10 muzzle f**er, old school, Cold War, Green Meanie jets, I have a particular fondness for the machine and I endeavored to get to fly them when I earned my commission.  Alack and alas, such was not to be but the old girl has outlasted so many critics and detractors.  I had no idea.  I was certain that a new gun platform would have been developed and the Warthogs retired or relegated to another role.  But how to improve on perfection?

     

    It was designed to counter the Soviet tank threat if the balloon went up and found itself employed very effectively in wars of the middle east.  This prompted a paintjob change back to a similar original gray and I would have loved to see it in desert tan.  In any case, it has endured, survived and won.   The fighter mafia continues to hate it which makes me satisfied as to just how good  great it is.   

     

    But it cannot last forever.   It's time will pass.  I would hope another machine takes up the mantel of its legacy.  

     

    I hope the GWH kit is totally the shizzle.  I have the HobbyBoss rendition and it's really nice.  GWH might take the new gold if they did it right.

  12. 2 hours ago, JackMan said:

     

     

    Yeah, Ebay may be cheaper but I'd rather put my money on reliable places like Hobbysearch and HobbyLinkJapan.  For peace of mind.

     

     

    That's good stuff!

     

    I had a brief email exchange with the eBay seller and he assures me that the model will be sent out.  He explained some of the logistics he deals with so the lower price is attributable to how he gets the kits.  Family op?  I don't know.  In any case, I feel more confident that it will show up at my door.  He was a very nice fellow and completely acknowledged my concerns and admitted many others have the same.  

     

    So I look forward to it.  The thought of going to HobbyLink occurred to me shortly after I first posted and that will likely be the way I'll go in the future.  

  13. Hey everybody.

     

    I have lamented here once or twice about the fate of Kitty Hawk's molds and apparently my pleas did not go unheard.  Or, I'd like to imagine as much.  

     

    It seems, as has been discussed here, a company called "Storm Factory" is or will be producing kit #32002, F-5F which was one of Kitty Hawk's "crowning" achievements, though some may debate that point.  In any case, it was a really nice rendition of the family model F-5 and I liked it because it had two crew ladders and would possibly be a good graft for the 1/32 resin Collecr-Aire T-38 for the cockpit coaming and canopies.  Not that that was my initial instinct (I'm lying).   

     

    But I diddled about and did other things while thinking that Kitty Hawk would be around forever, only to find that forever lasted only a couple of years (making a note of that).   

     

    So, cutting to the chase, I found Storm Factory's listings on eBay and the kit was $90 with $1.50 shipping, set to come out of China in July to September.   

     

    Now, the disclaimer is this:  I have no news about Storm Factory other than they have the molds.  However, the listing on eBay may also be total BS.  I have my suspicions as things like this have happened before.  If so and I never receive the kit, I'm......"pretty sure" that eBay will refund my money.  There are still a great many crooked folks out there who happily make off with other people's money but I was willing to take a chance with the confidence eBay would protect my risk.   

     

    As time goes by, I tend to lean toward never seeing the kit.  I may have also thrown my money away.  Fully aware of that but the reason for this post is that if anyone has more or better information on this particular subject, please, by all means, bring it on.  We modelers have an excellent information network at times and this is one of those times

     

     

    Cheers

     

    Fang

     

    EDIT:  EHOBBYLINK JAPAN shows both the F-5E and F in-stock so I'm guessing I may actually see the kit come a few months down the road.

  14. Would it at all be possible to purchase acrylic sheet, of your desired thickness, a used or inexpensive bandsaw, make a template or copy an existing shape and cut the pieces out, glue them together and have what you need? 

     

    Sometimes, the need to be "more than just a modeler" is key.  I'm not criticizing but I found that to properly display various models I've built, I've had to make a case or a stand.   Sometimes  the stand is a nice piece of hardwood, routered with a fine, decorative edge, a stout brass rod epoxied to the side, gracefully curved to insert into a custom-made brass receptacle at  the bottom of the model.  I've also heat-treated acrylic rods, heating them carefully  over a stove burner then bending them til they cool.  

     

    Many innovative ways to tackle the problem.  Wish there was a book on the subject.  

  15. On 12/25/2022 at 8:59 PM, JohnEB said:

    Neat to see!

     

    It is obviously the larger version of the two Comet releases, so what's it's length?

     

    Aurora used those molds for years, passing it off as a KC-135.

    Are you going to build it or keep it as a collector's item?

     

    Many years ago, after reading a kit history article online, I found some Comet kits for not much money online. They are rather neat.

     

    Some of the Aurora releases, like the Cessna 310, Aero Commander, Beech 18 and Piper Apache, go for big money.

    Wow, signs that  I'm getting old.  On a side note, I remember when ARC was brand spanking new and I joined at a time when I was living in a third floor apartment, had an adopted Labrador mix and was scraping by working for a horrible, awful airline.  

     

    All my things are still in storage, John.  In my previous life with the airline, I ended up selling my home, moving three times and finally settling back to a place I can call home.  But decades have passed and there's much to do before I can get to cutting plastic.  

     

    As for the Comet kits, I am torn between building the prototype to a high level or just 3D printing one. I believe he model is about 10" log with a similar wingspan.

     

     

    I'm learning CAD now and it's an uphill slog and I'm not one of those guys "you feed under the  door" but I'm not too far off of it, either.  A nice 1/72 "Dash 80" would be pretty cool.   It would have to be pegged at one particular time in its development as it rolled out or when it got a cargo door or when it got a refuelling boom or with the big wing and JT-33's or whatever.  I like the initial rollout, blunt-nose uggo version.   To think that Boeing actually drew up a 377 with swept wings and four jets on it.  Hey...there's a WIF idea, eh?

     

    When I go to an air museum, it's really quite an adventure to examine human technological development over time.  The last century saw powered flight and in just a very short time, on the human scale, man was going to the moon.  From 1903 to 1969.  I'm approaching 66 year old and seeing how short a time that is now.  My grandad, born in 1899 saw the transition from sail to steam to diesel to flight and more.   From the old cash register to the digital blue LED things they had in the 80's.  But he could still tell you how many pallets of red bricks you'd need for a new wall, right off the top of his head.   :-)

     

    So the Comet kit may stay in its box.  I can probably draw and print a 1/72 one....in spite of the option of modding a 1/72 KC-135 kit which is the closest thing to a "Dash 80" in any scale and with some clever rework, can be narrowed and modded to be the rollout jet of the 1950's.  I originally bought it for an in-flight dio of refuelling a B-47 but later discovered the KC-97L/Q with jet-pods on it.  So....there's that.   

     

    In any case, I hope to get back to "la plastica" soon.   

     

    Cheers

     

    Fang

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