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Revell/Monogram F-89C


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Jon, the modifications you done to your F-89C did not necessarily make it totally accurate. After seeing yours which looks terrific and reading about your mods I decided to get out all my material on the F-89 since it peaked my interest again. Went thru my Detail & Scale F-89 and my F-89 Photo Chronicle ( 124 pg Black & White & Color pics ) I found a close up shot of the right side of the nose wheel. It,s exactly like the kit nose wheel. No spoke and smooth. Apparently some aircraft differed. So the kit nose wheels would not really be wrong if you wanted to use them. I also have a copy of Airpower Magazine Special Issue on the F-89, May 1981, Volume 11 No 3. On page 20 it shows a B&W photo of an F-89C with the ground crew installing rockets. The writeup for the photo states that, installation of 8 HVAR on A, B and C models was in compliance with the ground attack requirement which was also well supported by the 6 20mm guns in the nose but that requirement was eventually dropped. The adding of the tank fins like you said is essential. In essence ,using the kit nose wheels and leaving the racks for the rockets or even adding the rockets would be alright according to the photo and writeup. Thanks for tweaking my curiosity again.

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Jon, the modifications you done to your F-89C did not necessarily make it totally accurate. After seeing yours which looks terrific and reading about your mods I decided to get out all my material on the F-89 since it peaked my interest again. Went thru my Detail & Scale F-89 and my F-89 Photo Chronicle ( 124 pg Black & White & Color pics ) I found a close up shot of the right side of the nose wheel. It,s exactly like the kit nose wheel. No spoke and smooth. Apparently some aircraft differed. So the kit nose wheels would not really be wrong if you wanted to use them. I also have a copy of Airpower Magazine Special Issue on the F-89, May 1981, Volume 11 No 3. On page 20 it shows a B&W photo of an F-89C with the ground crew installing rockets. The writeup for the photo states that, installation of 8 HVAR on A, B and C models was in compliance with the ground attack requirement which was also well supported by the 6 20mm guns in the nose but that requirement was eventually dropped. The adding of the tank fins like you said is essential. In essence ,using the kit nose wheels and leaving the racks for the rockets or even adding the rockets would be alright according to the photo and writeup. Thanks for tweaking my curiosity again.

Hi Seamaster,

Thanks for the feedback. It was years ago that I did the research on the F-89, and I got a lot help via the web from people like Roger Jackson (IIRC). I seem to remember that the spoked wheels were for the C model and that smooth wheels were added to later variants - is the photo you have definitely of a nosewheel on an operational F-89C, or could it be another model (I know the smooth wheel is correct for a J, and I think maybe a D as well)? I am not doubting you, but the only pics I could find of smooth nosewheels were for later Scorpions.

As for the rockets, again, is the picture of an operational machine, or a test example? I definitely saw some pictures of rockets on F-89Cs, but they were all for testing purposes. It would be interesting to know for sure if operational squadron aircraft carried them. I rather assumed they were like the dual sidewinder fuselage pylons for the F-104C - able to be used in theory, but not done so in practise (at least in the USAF).

Thanks for the info. I'd be very interested to see where this goes. Do you know if my fuselage mods to remove the rear fuselage air intakes were also correct?

Jon

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