X-Plane Fan

Yes, I have seen the POD version, I went through the proof and made minor density corrections before approving it for release. Specialty Press gave POD a bad rep with the low quality crap they put out. The cover is high gloss paperback and pages are medium weight, bright white paper. Think high quality laser copy. Not quite the top quality, offset printing we've seen in the past, but for lower volume printing of obscure subject matter, this is most likely the way of the future.

A new illustrated history of the General Dynamics F-16XL book was just released from the AFMC History Office. It’s available as a free pdf download here: https://wss.apan.org/public/AFMC-History-Office/Shared Documents/F-16XL Book_Final-web (1).pdf Or printed copies can be ordered from Amazon here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0CFZFXBCR/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 The printed paperback books are high-quality, print-on-demand, 248-pages, all color with over 1,000 photos and 125 illustrations. I had a great time putting this one

EDWMatt, Great to see you back here. We've missed looking at all the great photos you have to share.

Make and model of the kit doesn't matter. I'm restoring an old metal 1/48th F-104 desk model and just need something that looks correct to fill the empty space. Any help is greatly appreciated. Tony

Well, I think it's about time I wrapped this up. In actuality, it took about 4 months to finish this model, but it was time well spent. With wet sanding and final details addressed, I painted the intakes and splitter plates before they were installed. The big challenge was getting the correct color. I knew the movie mockup and models were not black, so I reached out to my friend John Eaves, who has been in the movie model business for much of his life. Having worked with the guys who made the actual mockup and models, he informed me that the color used was not paint at all, it was Dietzgen Opa

Final primer applied. Time to check for any flaws, wet sand and then final paint.

Once the scribing was completed, I was able to install all the control surfaces. The canards were pretty easy, but the rest had some minor issues. The vertical stabs aren't labeled left & right, but there is a small difference between them, the angle of the aft-facing weapons. Once installed, the holes should be level, glad I found that. The slots for the vertical stabs and ventral fins weren't fully modeled into the CAD and required some trimming and cutting to get in place. With those issues resolved, final assembly was pretty straig

Time o put the large part aside and focus on the cockpit. The model comes with a sitting figure of Gant, so let's get to it. The entire cockpit consists of 6 pieces of red resin, it doesn't sound like much, but the end result is impressive. Hours of trimming, test fitting and cleanup made for a slow start. I found I couldn't have the instrument panel attached when sliding into the cockpit, so adjustments were made for that. With test pit complete, I made sure it would attached to the next section before painting. Also trimmed out the windows in the forward fuselage here.

I just received my kit and the parts appear to be well-designed and nicely cast. My kit appears to be missing a few small parts and I have sent an email to the address received in the email order confirmation as I could not locate one on your web site.

Main fuselage assembly was pretty straightforward. Several coats of fill primer were needed to get a relatively smooth finish. While many panel lines were visible, many were were lost under the paint, requiring me to scribe ALL the lines back into the surface. A tedious, but necessary part of building larger 3D printed models. Next up will be the cockpit and front fuselage. Sanded model with one side scribed.

For the larger inlets, I asked a friend to create a 3D CAD I could print to extend the inlets. The upper inlets are extended about 2 inches while the lower inlets are a bit deeper. The end result was well worth the efforts. Now, I can assemble the main body sections.

As deigned, the model has the intakes blocked off not far into the inlet, very similar to the actual movie miniature models. I wanted to add a bit more depth to mine. I started with the small, center inlet where the guns will be located. I few pieces of plastic card took care of this one.

Your model is very nicely done, one of the best I've seen. There are a few, very small details that were unique to the SR-71 LASRE program that are easily missed. The LASRE pod had two pitot tubes, one on the very front and one on the top. There was also a pitot on the top center of the LASRE canoe and fuel vent tubes on the back. There are also instrumentation fairings located at the bottom of each rudder base. There is one on the outside of the left rudder and inside of the right rudder. Although not actually part of the LASRE program, this SR-7

I'm not the designer of this model, just the builder of the supplied parts. The link posted in the opening post will take you to the designer.

I started on the front and rear portions of the fuselage first, just to get some practice working with this material. 3D PLA is generally pretty rough to begin with, but with lots of sanding, it can be made into a nice smooth surface. Fortunately the panel lines are pretty deep, so they show up well after primer. This is the forward fuselage after initial sanding. Still looking a little rough, but it's a good start. Here is it sanded after first fill primer coat. Looking much better after second primer coat. With this section done, I can no