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First time I do a Group Built here, so I hope you'll be liking this one.

Reading quit some background information and stories (including the John Trotti book) on both VMFA-314 & 323, while their based at Da Nang and later Chu Lai, made me wanna built one of these birds.

Although they are from a time before Phantoms got painted brightly, they sure do carry a colored history :thumbsup:

Here's what I'll use to get started with:

IMG_9395.jpg

It's a standard 1/72 Hasegawa F-4B/N, which has slotted stabilo's (I know, I'll have to get some unslotted ones..). To cheer things up a bit, I'll be using a tiny Eduard PE set, which is for the seats and cockpit only. Too, I'll be using KMC PE (canopy), wheels from True Details, Eduard mask, some very old P.P. Aeroparts AAR-probes (just 1 actually, but there are 2 in the bag !), and decals (nearly as old as the Phantom it self !) from both Micro- and Super Scale.

The bird to focus on (not the same BuNo though):

normal_152268_1_USMC_Boeing.jpg

Since a lot of these birds were mostly on the Hot Pad, on standby for Fast FAC and CAS, they normally do not carry any A-A (unless fragged) besides their conventionals...

Work started today:

IMG_9478.jpg

Shown is the Eduard PE set, which is already factory painted (guess that makes me lazy builder..).

First head age comes from the P.P. Aeroparts AAR-probe; it's made to be placed "on" the Phantom, instead of "in"... The instruction sheet suggests to paint the surface black, and thus creating depth...

I just "had" to cut the thing out, and now have to figure out how to fill the hole again.

IMG_9479.jpg

IMG_9486.jpg

IMG_9487.jpg

To be continued.

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Thanks for your comments guys !

Today I only managed to do a little on the F-4, but as of next week I should be able to spend some more time on this one..

but by the way do you plan to build the tanker as well with your probe?

Nope, I'm just a sole Phantom addict :D

C :banana: ant wait to see that f-4 complete.

Ai, I'm not much of a fast builder, you might have to do some waiting there :yahoo:

As said, I will install a AAR-probe, and have cutted a hole in the cockpit for it.

Most of the probe-bay is situated behind the avionicspannel on the right side of the RIO:

IMG_9488.jpg

IMG_9491.jpg

Since this is a 1/72 kit, I'm not shure what to put in the hole (detail pics I have are only from the outside, and the probe it self), but I shure will paint the inside black...

I'll be doing the seats at a later stage (will install them after painting and decals anyway), upcomming week I'll be glueing the front fusalage together and get on wit the rest of the model.

Daniël

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  • 1 month later...

Well, cant say more than that I've been bussy lately... And am sorry I had you all waiting for this next update.

But as of now I hope I'll be able to keep the speed up !

Work on the cockpit has been finished (so far) and of it is to the assembly of all the main parts.

I started of with cutting out the ailerons and rudder, this to get some "action" in to the model.

Too, I did some re-engraving (at some places I over did it to much..) and some extra re-engraving on the slats (also here I was a bot too enthousiast..).

Just a global view of what I did:

IMG_9615.jpg

Next update should show all main parts glued to gether :wub:

Daniël

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A bit more work has been done to this Phantom;

the cockpit has been placed, but not in a very neat way though...

IMG_9619.jpg

The gaps will need some filling and sanding, and should be OK after that.

At first I wanted to fill the AAR-probe area from the inside with some plate material, but did not suceed in that... Now I only just painted the inside black. I think it will look OK later on, this because the probe will camouflage the lack of detail inside the black area...

So far this update..

Daniël

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Thanks for your comments !

Today it all looked like I was making progress:

IMG_9621.jpg

But unfortunately something went wrong, and I got the feeling this was going to be a hangarqueen allready...

I did quit some of these F-4's before, so I was quit amazed to find my self with gaps like these:

IMG_9623.jpg

As visible, the inlet is lined-up nice with the rest of the model, but there's a 2mm gap on the bottom :worship:

IMG_9626.jpg

At first I thought the gap was because I removed some material on the inside (1), I did this because the inlet part which comes in front of it is lower...

But removal of material on the inside could not mean gaps on the outside I figured out...

True cause of the gaps (both sides of the a/c) is the fact that the wings (2) are not nice in place, and need to be refitted..

Since I used superglue to place the wings, I'll be facing a little challenge over here :woot.gif:

To be contignued...

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I suppose super glue will be not so easy !

Be strong.

Who, me or the glue :D

Well, I managed to get the problem fixed and I'm happy with the result !

Even more work has been done:

I started off with the stabilo's, by cutting away the triangles which were on top of them:

IMG_9631.jpg

Put some putty on them and later some sanding will bo done:

IMG_9633.jpg

To get a good finish, I've got to rescribe some of the pannellines, but that should be an easy one.

This is the result of having the mainparts reglued:

IMG_9635.jpg

IMG_9637.jpg

As always, the Hasegawa intakes do not give a perfect fit, but it's workable. Some more filler and sanding will do the job..

IMG_9644.jpg

Actually the intakes are the worst part of the Hasegawa Phantom kits, not only do they have a poor fit, but also the engines (or something that looks like some) are missing...

Resin replacements are only poorly available and are much to pricy for 1/72 kits. For this F-4 I'll have to live with the lack of engines, the next one will have FOD-covers...

Part 2 below..

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For the aft area I used various colors of the Humbrol Metal Cote line and did some light overspray with Alclad II:

IMG_9645.jpg

The parachutehousing will be placed later, when I've figured out which color (should be darker then the rest of the plane) it should be (any one ?).

With the paint dry, I polished the surface to get some detpth in to the paint.

This is from the KMC PE set:

IMG_9646.jpg

I'll have this one painted black and will then do some drybrushing with different paints (silver, grey)...

These are out of the BDRT/scrap-box:

IMG_9650.jpg

These were once (poorly) handpainted, and are now up for their 2nd life ! I'll be trying to make some old fashion Zuni launcers out of them. Both diameter and length are OK.

Last thing I did today was the work (sanding) on the intakes, a little painting on the cockpit. Too, I've started to work on the seats, but they are far from complete...

Here is were the work stops:

IMG_9653.jpg

No more sanding today :D

Daniël

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Phinally it strats somewhat looking like a Phantom;

IMG_9655.jpg

The windshield has been placed and the rubber (is it ?) line has been painted. For painting of the windshield and canopy I used Eduard Express Mask. This was the newer (yellow) type of maks they got now, which is much better then the older (green) one..

Strange that they still have got errors in their instructionsheets....

Work in progress on the Zunilaunchers:

IMG_9661.jpg

I had some problems driling the holes and getting things nicely round. I still hope they'll turn out how I want them to be :)

Ammo:

IMG_9663.jpg

These are standard BLU27 Napalms, from which I cut of the tailfins and nose cone. The alu paint will be polished later on and thus should look more "alive" then..

Some more painting has been done:

IMG_9666.jpg

And these are nearly ready to get the camo painted on:

IMG_9667.jpg

More will follow..

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I've used white primer for the areas that wil be painted white:

IMG_9671.jpg

IMG_9672.jpg

Later on I figured that it might have been whise to use primer on the whole aircraft. This because the grey I'll use is gloss (later on it will be flat)... How ever, it was nice to finally paint a larger area, eventhough it was primer...

Still not finished with these:

IMG_9673.jpg

But making progress though :)

Daniël

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