Air-to-Air

Yes. I have a question regarding the riveting. I assume you used the RB productions mini riveter as you had for parts of your QF-4 build in 2011. Do you recall what tooth spacing you used on this build? Was it 0.75mm or one of the larger tooth spacings?

This may have been what Honza was pointing out... Compare this... With this... On the port side, the metallic area ahead of the vent does not stop at the first panel line, it is painted to the second panel line. Not so on the starboard side, which, to me, looks to be the more appropriate panel line at which to conclude the metallic area. The rest is...sensational!

I'm impressed, you're not building one model, you are actually building five! To be frank, learning all these new methods to build a complete aircraft seems somewhat daunting. However, I realised I was looking at it the wrong way. These methods could be used on a smaller scale by a novice to begin with. For example, designing a single component such as a missile, or a weapons pylon, a side console for the cockpit or a more accurate wheel bay. These individual components could then be printed using 3D printing technology. It's definitely something I'm keen to learn more about so I will contin

Truly outstanding work! Thank you for sharing your progress with us. I would expect that the development of a highly accurate computer model could potentially have quite a number of applications. You've identified two uses: paper models and flight simulators. Another use may be computer generated artwork. Understandably, a kit manufacturer that can access a highly accurate and detailed computer model may, ultimately, develop a highly accurate kit that meets the demanding requirements of contemporary modellers. If, for example, this model were converted into a kit, would there be any "true"

That's a very nice display you've got there.

I think it is bloody amazing! This is the kind of 1/72 detail work I aspire to. Looking forward to seeing this one progress to completion.

It's been a while since I checked out this build but having just looked over the last 2 months work, I am very impressed. The scratch work is top notch, that launcher in the weapons bay looks amazing. The meticulous weathering is creating a richly detailed surface that looks very realistic. I know it's time consuming to produce a detailed WIP such as this, and I just wanted to register my appreciation of your efforts in doing so. It's a beautiful build.

I only joined ARC relatively recently (compared to your previous posts) so I hadn't come across your work on these two before. I am very glad I did because not only is your work nice to look at, it was terrific to find some good pictures of Aussie Phantoms, Mirages etc on your website. Bookmarks all round for future reference. I am looking forward to seeing you finish these off, keep us posted, even if it takes another few years.

You've completed some very impressive work on this build. Looking forward to seeing the completed aircraft and following your next build.

Very nice work.

Hello again. Thank you for contributing to my build log, all of you have raised some good points and I appreciate those. There won't be any updates for the next 4 weeks as I will be moving residence. Looking forward to seeing my lovely daughters more often. I'll be back at the bench as soon as possible as I can't stand the whole process of moving and I am likely to be in dire need of some stress relief when it is all done. Until then, feel free to hijack this thread with your own pursuits. Cheers

Getting more use out of Micro Mesh Sanding Pads After some use of my 3200 Micro Mesh Sanding Pad it started to be less effective. You can see why in the image below: Despite cleaning it constantly and wet sanding most of the time, over time the grit at the edges gets worn down. The product loses its effectiveness. As this is the pad that I have been using the most, it is the only one in the set of 9 that has this problem. When I was in the local hobby store I checked out the cost of a replacement kit (i.e. set of 9 pads). It was about $30. I couldn't bring myself to part with such a rela

When I examined my progress the other day I realised I hadn't been keeping you guys up to date. I know how much you like regular progress reports so I thought I'd better make more of an effort to keep you abreast of what's happening. Let's start with something controversial: panel lines. I'm filling the panel lines on this bird. My desire is to build something beautiful that is a scale representation of the F-14A. The panel lines on the Trumpeter kit are very good, there's nothing wrong with them. However, they betray the small scale nature of the model and that's something I want to avoid

Hello Mikkod. I think the Trumpeter kit and the Revell offering are both pretty good. We're spoilt for choice when it comes to 144 scale Tomcats. Our large scale brethren will get jealous. Joel, thank you for the sharing your experience. In that past I have filled ejection pin sinks in intakes with plastic card and putty, just as you have recommended. I think I was in too much of a rush when I started this build. I should have taken my time and done things properly. No harm done, another lesson learned. I'll also heed your advice concerning primer filler. Thank you for tagging along Taggor.

Impressive work! The cockpit green certainly looks the part.

My thanks to Sebastijan, ChippyWho and Flankerman for adding to my understanding of the available kits. I'll pick up a Zvezda Flanker for a future build.

Air Intakes Clean Up As mentioned in the walk around above, each air intake contains three ejection pin sinks and two attachment point sinks for the external fuel tanks. I wasn't happy to leave things as they were. I used these tools. To begin with, I used a glass fibre pencil to clean up the ejection pin sinks as best as possible. This still left three depressions and the two attachment point sinks… I attempted to fill the depressions and attachment sinks with Thin CA (the only CA I had on hand at the time). Note to self: Thin CA is not a great filler, capillary action draws it away

Tow Bar Attachment Points Clean Up The tow bar attachment points at the rear of the ventral fins have been moulded as a solid block… Given that these are so fine as to be almost unnoticeable on the real aircraft, I removed them.

PARTS CLEAN UP Canopy Clean Up The first part to receive some clean up attention was the canopy. It came out of the box looking like this… That's a nice seam line down the centre of the canopy and the static discharge rods have been moulded on the outside of the canopy rather than on the inside where they belong. Here are the tools I used to get this part into shape… I scraped off the seam line and moulded in static discharge rods with a No.11 blade. I used the 2800 grit to smooth out the canopy contour. I initially started with the 3200 grit but I found it wasn't shaping the pla

This is an interesting project you've given yourself. I will be following with interest, as always when it comes to Australian aircraft.

Looking forward to seeing more of this one - it looks outstanding. I came across this survey of the various 1/72 kits recently: Flanker Survey. The author of that survey thought the Airfix kit provided the most accurate shape although a modeller would have to overcome some significant construction hurdles to get there. What are your thoughts, how does the Svezda kit stack up in terms of general shape?

I've been a bit tardy on posting an update on this one but progress is being made. I've got a busy weekend ahead of me but I'll see if I can post an update in the next few days. I bought the Revell 1/144 F-14A Tomcat last weekend. It cost less than half what I paid for the Trumpeter. If you'll excuse the pun, the Trumpeter trumps the Revell in terms of exterior detail and fine panel lines, I am really impressed with what I have here. The one area that Revell goes one up on the Trumpeter is the cockpit. There are decals for the instrument panels and side consoles. I have a strong feeling that

Good job on the cockpit. I am particularly impressed with your weathering and seat belts, they look realistic to me. I'll have to pick up some yoghurt foil myself, much cheaper alternative than an expensive bottle of wine, but perhaps not as enjoyable.

It's just art, and very good art at that.

Thanks for sharing the "squiggles" technique, it's a reasonable representation of accumulated grime. To date, I've not been a fan of pre-shading techniques because they often produce an extremely uniform pattern of grubbiness around panel lines that I find generally inconsistent with the weathering on the subject aircraft. However, I think judicious use of the pre-shading technique and more extensive use of the squiggles technique goes a long way to representing the inconsistent colouring and grime accumulation on operational military aircraft. Your Viggen is an excellent example of what can b