Ben Brown

OK, I'll play: All: Drooped ailerons (I think some folks are mistaking them for flaps. The flaps didn't droop when the jet was parked.) Intake ducts Afterburner nozzles at least comparable to those in Hasegawa's F-104 kits Decent cockpits with sidewall detail Landing gear down locks Aux air inlet detail Canopy frame details!!!! F-4E: ALQ-131 ARN-101 TISEO Open gun gas purge door F-15-style centerline tank Decals for 4th FTW jets (I'm not real happy with the way my Hasegawa F-4E turned out) F-4S: Correct slats Correct decals for VMFA-333 in the TPS camo F-4C/D: I'd just be

I need to push the left one in a little bit more, don't I? :unsure: And where'd that dog hair come from on the right intake?! These things are really cool! You don't have to modify a finished kit. Just drop 'em in. I did have to use a small drop of white glue to hold the left one in. Well done, Harold! Ben

Hi guys, Harold just sent a sample of his new 1/48 intake FOD covers for the Hasegawa kits. These are about the most pain-free aftermarket parts I've ever seen. I grabbed a random F-4 off the shelf, and just dropped the covers into place, without any clean-up whatsoever. The hardest part about these will be painting them. Here's Harold's web site: http://mysite.verizon.net/resqt29j/ These are an inexpensive alternative to expensive seamless intakes. They are such a good fit to the Hasegawa kit that I doubt they'll fit the Monogram kits without looking funny. The Monogram intakes are just a

Hi Kev, The Welsh CRJ kit is supposed to be a "stand alone" kit, but it has some accuracy issues. I'll be adding the Challenger forward fuselage, tail, engines, winglets, and landing gear to it. All I've done so far is to split the resin fuselage to narrow it so it will have a circular cross-section like the real jet. Looks like the Challenger fuselage will fit pretty well with a minimum of sanding on the Welsh fuselage. It's going to be a lot of work to get an accurate CRJ, but will still be far easier than trying to convert a Challenger. I need to clear a couple of other projects off the be

Hi Kev, That's a great idea, putting the foil on the hot sections of the engines before adding the fan sections. I was trying to figure out the easiest way to do the shiny sections on my Welsh/Revell Franken-CRJ's engines. Keep up the great work! Ben

I was browsing eBay and stumbled across this cool bumper sticker for your cars, so you can show the world how you miss the Tweet: http://cgi.ebay.com/T-37-Dragonfly-Tweet-C...oQQcmdZViewItem Ben :blink: (no affiliation with the seller of these stickers)

CE kinda missed the boat with the windscreen. The fairing in front of the windscreen should be rounded, but they have you leave the F's flat fairing. The shape of the windscreen itself is too rounded. I looked all over for a Lindberg windscreen when I built my CE conversion, but never found one. I rounded off the fairing some, but never really got it to look like the real jet. The rest of the conversion is pretty good. Ben

D'oh! I knew it was either Lindberg or Aurora! Ben

Back in the late 1990s, Cutting Edge was going to release one. I even held the masters in my hands. It was resin with white metal landing gear. I don't know why they never followed through. They also never followed through with a B-52D conversion after their NASA conversion. A combat version would have sold a lot better. If you haven't tried a vac kit, Welsh's are a great place to start. I've got their KC-135 and 757 going, with a Vulcan and Victor on the "to do" list. FE Resin makes some very nice little 1/144 kits, too. Ben

I built the Cutting Edge 1/48 F-86A conversion. It was meant for the Hasegawa F-86F, but it worked fine with the Academy kit. If the rumors are true about its re-release, that's good news. If you can't find the CE conversion, you can hunt down the oooooold Aurora F-86A and use it to convert a more modern kit. Ben

Hi Jon, You're better off just converting the kit tail, since CE got the fuel tank vent fairing wrong. See my review of the conversion here on ARC. One thing CE (and myself) missed, is the seat in the F-100A and F-100C was different from the D. The seat from a Pro Modeler F-86D is pretty close. You just need to add the red padding to the seat back to get fairly close. It's actually pretty easy to do the entire conversion yourself. If I can, anyone can! For the tail, you just cut a section out of the tail, do a little filing to shape, and make the new fairing from sheet styrene. There's a how

Mike, I just stopped by to check on your progress with your F-100 and saw the news about your daughter. I'm glad she's doing OK and I wish her a speedy recovery. Ben

Here's one of the best F-100 resources you can find. It's got walk around photos and pics of operational F-100s of all types: http://www.f-100.org/hun.shtml In Vietnam, F-100s did carry napalm, snake-eye, and a lot of other stuff, but the Misty FACs only carried the seven-shot LAU-57 rocket pods, 335-gal drop tanks, and no inboard pylons. There is a walk arond of an F-100F restored in Misty FAC loadout here: http://www.primeportal.net/hangar/bill_spi...100f_walk_1.htm "Bury Us Upside Down" is also by Gen. Don Sheppard. It's a great companion book for "Misty." Highly recommended! HTH. Ben

Hi John, Mistys carried 335-gal drop tanks and 7-shot rocket pods on the outboard plons. I haven't found any pics of their F-100Fs carrying inboard pylons. I seem to remember the kit having 275-gal tanks. The 335s were made by adding a 28" plug to the 275 at the panel line right at the leading edge of the pylon. The real 335 was just a little bit over 23' long. I don't know where to find decals, other than the upcoming Hi Decals sheet. I'm more of a 1/48 fan. F-100 tail codes were 18" instead of 24" like on the F-4, F-105, etc. I can't remember the size of the serial numbers. HTH. Ben

You could use it to fix the nose on the newer Revell F-4E/F. Ben

D'oh! I forgot I had that one! It's in my F-100C file. The Trumpeter pylons are flat as a board and about the same thickness as the 1/48 Monogram pylons. Shouldn't be too hard to fix. This kit has spent so much time on my bench getting measured and test-fitted, I'd might as well start building the sucker! Cheers! Ben

Hi guys, They were supposed to be yellow zinc chromate, but photos seem to show a slightly darker (dirty?) color. There are two great walk arounds, plus some cockpit shots, here: http://www.primeportal.net/the_airstrip.htm Ben

Will these help? http://members.jcom.home.ne.jp/geta-p/F/F-101/F-101.htm Down on the bottom of the page. BTW, if you are using the C&H conversion, don't forget to fix the intakes and splitter plates. Those on the single-seat F-101s were not swept back as far as the one on the F-101B. C&H forgot to mention that in their instructions. The instrument panel is almost identical to the one in the F-101A/C, not the B-model panel included in the conversion. I found the canopy was best left open, since doesn't fit very well. Other than that, it's a nice conversion. HTH. Ben

I Joe, They were maybe a mile or so offshore. They were definitely F/A-18s and not F-15Es, but I couldn't tell if the were Legacy or new ones. I live up the road from Seymore Johnson AFB, and I've seen a ton of Eagles, both from the air and from the ground. They look "taller" than Hornets do. I couldn't tell if the Hornets I saw had drop tanks or not. I wasn't paying that close attention since I was driving. I had been seeing F/A-18s flying over for a couple of days by then, so the only reason these two really caught my attention was because they were dark and shiny. The sun was a little l

Dave's probably right. They could have released other decal versions of some of their other kits, like the F-105, but haven't. They sure don't seem the give a rat's backside if there are errors. Fortunately, there are a lot of decals and resin on the horizon that will let us build a good-looking Vietnam jet. Maybe somebody will even release an F-102 AB nozzle. Ben

Sorry, we sort of strayed from your original topic, didn't we? The tanks in the box are 275s, good for F-100s up to about 1965 or so. If you want to build a Vietnam jet, you'll need to add a 28" plug forward of the pylon, or add some Missing Link noses (from Roll Models) or get some 335s from Fox 3 Studios (gmasher(at)netzero(dot)net). Let me know if you need me to muddy the waters any more! :D Ben

Whoops! I forgot that! A former pilot told me the pylons were airfoil-shaped so they would swing outboard against the brace and away from the jet when they were jettisoned. There was also a fairing for some plumbing on the inboard side of the pylon. Here's a crappy photo that sort of shows the airfoil shape. The fairing is just to the right of the weed, and you can sort of see how the leading edge of the pylon curves inboard (up, in this picture). I think the oddly-shaped 275s may have been "Made in Taiwan" for their F-100As. There are definitely two different types shown in the F-100F fuel

Thanks for the replies, guys! I think it was late Tuesday afternoon when I saw them. They were passing Duck, NC, heading north. I'm thinking they may have been with the Blues, but I couldn't get a very good look at them since I was driving on a twisty, narrow two-lane road. Ben

I haven't been able to find any decent drawings showing the shape and span of the fins, but the tanks themselves are the same. They were hung on a Type VIII pylon. I've got a picture of one somewhere in one of my manuals. I added a 1/4" section to a couple of left-over outboard pylons, but I'm thinking maybe starting with the kit's 275-gal drop tank pylons might be better. The sway braces had a fairing that covered them: Cheers! Ben

OK, I just dug my F-100 stuff out of the closet, dropping a partially-completed Fox 3 F-100F on my head in the process (no damage to the model, but a direct hit between my eyes!). Here's the F-100 drop tanks situation: Fox 3 Studios' 275- and 335-gal drop tanks are the correct length. Kiwi Resin (War Eagle/Falcon) 335s included in their F-100F conversion are correct Missing Link's resin noses will give you correct 335s Monogram's 275's are correct (Ignore mine and several other peoples' previous comments to the contrary! ) Trumpeter's 275s are correct. HTH. Ben