Ben Brown

Agreed, Hasegawa was good for its day, but it’s past due for a replacement. I’ll definitely be getting the new kit, as well as the Jag T.2. I hope we’ll get some good aftermarket 892 NAS decals for FG.1. None of the far too many manufacturers I tried for my Hasegawa kit were worth a damn. Ben

I agree with shopping around. Many eBay sellers have the import taxes included in the prices. I've still been able to find some decent prices when ordering from Asia. Europe, on the other hand, has been hit and miss. Some countries are still not shipping to the US, and even if they are, many companies still won't because it's too much of a PITA for them to ship here due to the increased work required of them.

Hi Gwen, Re. your question about the radar warning receiver fairing on the tail. It was a later addition to the FG.1 and FGR.2 fleet. Here is a great blog post about British Phantom tails: LINK Ben

If you don't like the "flatness" of the XF-86, you can add a small amount of X-21 Flat Base to it. You'll have to experiment to get the right amount. I've found that Tamiya acrylic flats tend to need extra mixing to get all of the stuff that gives you the flat finish (I have no idea what's the technical name for it) off of the bottom of the bottle. Same goes for Microscale Clear Flat. I've used it for years, and found it requires a lot of mixing. I thin it with water. Ben

I'm not seeing anything readily available to build a Euro 1 jet, so you might have to piece something together from several decal sheets. The only full color 117th TRW badges I found were on an old and impossible-to-find Repliscale sheet. Here's a pic of it. All of the standard Euro I F-4 markings could be pulled from Caracal's RF-4C sheet 48231 or Fundekals 48039, and there are several available sheets with black 24" tail codes. Microscale sells yellow decal trim film that you can cut the tail stripe from. HTH. Ben

Tamiya primer, thinned with Mr Leveling Thinner. I primed a resin car body with it a couple of weeks ago and didn’t experience any lifting when I masked it for painting.

Sergei, I'm always happy to help! That's a great comparison of the two tires. BillS, wasn't there some bulging on the underside, too, so the gear doors and speed brakes were slightly different? I don't have access to my F-4 models to check. Ben

Hi Sergei, All F-4Cs had the thicker wing to make room for the wider main gear tires, so they would have what you're calling the later speed brake. I can't find any photos of FJ-188, but I do have one of FJ-187, which was one of the 29 F-4Bs loaned to the USAF by the Navy. The two lower photos are of a jet with the F-4B thin wing and narrow main gear tires, so I'd say that FJ-118 was one of the 29 F-4Bs. Only the F-4A (F4H-1), F-4B, and all but the last 12 RF-4Bs had the thin wing. Ben

Not to take anything away from ARC, you might get more answers by asking over on Hyperscale or Britmodeller, due to the higher amount of traffic they get. Ben

Good luck! A couple I've scaled down to 1/144 have occasionally had parts that became too thin to print properly. Could've been the printer, though. Ben

Imgur is blocking access from the UK due to a new age verification law rather than setting up a way to comply with it. Further ensh*ttification of what was once a great image hosting platform. Ben

There's an OV-10 3D print file on Cults3D that you might be able to resize: LINK It looks like it's intended for about 1/48, so scaling it down might cause some print problems with some of the smaller parts. Ben

Good to know! Thank you! Ben

Kopecky getting blocked in the US must’ve been a glitch. It opened right up for me just now.

Now that I'm back on my computer, here's what it looked like when I saw it yesterday. So is it an OH-6, or an olive drab civil bird? Either way, it was good to see the type flying again. I don't recall seeing an OH-6 since I saw the Silver Eagles as a kid, and the last civil one I saw was WRAL's Sky 5 back in the early 80s. I've always liked the design, especially with the original tail. Ben