Best basis for a 1/48 YF-16?

[phasephantomphixer]

Hmmm, guess I am confusing the 1/48 Otaki F-16 with their YF-16? I just remember way back in the early 80's (when I would have to save up my model money as a kid)the Israeli F-16's were the Stuff, so I fell for the Box Art trick and bought the Otaki 1/48 Israeli F-16. Inside was the biggest ROACH of a kit I had ever seen. I think it actually made me ill looking at it!

In 1/32, would it not be better to modify the Hasegawa F-16A since it represents an early FSD, and much cheaper?

[Rocky]

Hmmm, guess I am confusing the 1/48 Otaki F-16 with their YF-16? I just remember way back in the early 80's (when I would have to save up my model money as a kid)the Israeli F-16's were the Stuff, so I fell for the Box Art trick and bought the Otaki 1/48 Israeli F-16. Inside was the biggest ROACH of a kit I had ever seen. I think it actually made me ill looking at it!

I just bought an Otaki 1/48 Israeli F-16 on ebay... Sigh. My impression has been that there is one 1/48 scale Otaki F-16, and, like many kits of new jets, they jumped the gun and patterned it after the prototype YF-16, rather than wait for the production F-16. So I am guessing that an Otaki YF-16 and an Otaki F-16 are really from the same mold.

Edited June 4, 2011 by Rocky

[phasephantomphixer]

I just bought an Otaki 1/48 Israeli F-16 on ebay... Sigh. My impression has been that there is one 1/48 scale Otaki F-16, and, like many kits of new jets, they jumped the gun and patterned it after the prototype YF-16, rather than wait for the production F-16. So I am guessing that an Otaki YF-16 and an Otaki F-16 are really from the same mold.

If you didn't get it yet, post what you find when you do. Was so long ago, that I vaguely recall useless weapons, and really bad engineering throughout. Anyone else comment? Would consider finding the YF-16 myself if it is different since I already have some Monogram ones. Everyone wants to do the latest, still some cool backdating to be done such as, A-10 (best camo those first ones) F-15 with Superiority Blue, F-104C, etc.

[Jennings]

The Otaki kit has a hunchback behind the canopy. It's really pretty bad.

Yes, there's only one Otaki F-16 kit.

[Jennings]

The Otaki kit has a hunchback behind the canopy. It's really pretty bad.

Yes, there's only one Otaki F-16 kit.

[Andre]

If you didn't get it yet, post what you find when you do.

All hail the Internet Archive!:

http://web.archive.org/web/20080919060720/http://www.habu2.net/vipers/viperkits/48/more48.1.html

HTH,

Andre

[phasephantomphixer]

All hail the Internet Archive!:

http://web.archive.org/web/20080919060720/http://www.habu2.net/vipers/viperkits/48/more48.1.html

HTH,

Andre

Thanks Andre, but it doesn't show any closeup of the kit parts.

I recall there was something about it that was horrendous-just

can't recall exactly what it was.

[Rocky]

In 1/48 use Otaki/Arii for the main airframe, Tamiya for the intake, nozzle, vertical stab, and NLG doors plus a Hasegawa F-16A for cockpit tub and (modded) IP, canopy rails, aft deck & IP coaming section of the upper fuselage, internal exhaust can parts, wingtip launch rails, MLG bay section, landing gear, cannon muzzle port (modded) and canopy (modded). Plus an aftermarket or spares box Escapac seat. You'll have a Frankenstein YF-16 for sure, but that is the only way right now to make a halfway decent model of one in 1/48.

Why are both a Tamiya and a Hasegawa kit needed? Does the Hasegawa kit have a poor intake? William G posted this:

The Tamiya kit is like the Entex/Otaki/ARII kits in that the fuselage is split into left/right halves, where most other F-16 kit splits the fuselage into top/bottom halves, regardless of scale. The intake interior has no ducting and the nose gear well and the inside of the fuselage are visible through the intake.

It sounds like a Hasegawa intake would be better. So why not just integrate a Hasegawa kit into the Otaki kit? Edited June 10, 2011 by Rocky

[Rocky]

Why are both a Tamiya and a Hasegawa kit needed? Does the Hasegawa kit have a poor intake?

It sounds like a Hasegawa intake would be better. So why not just integrate a Hasegawa kit into the Otaki kit?

I found this from a thread on the F-16.net website:

...the Otaki intake is wrong for any F-16' date=' most of all the YF. The mouth profile is to large and not properly shaped. The Tamiya intake is on the small side to begin with, and an excellent replacement candidate for the Otaki YF-16. However, faring it into the Otaki fuselage is quite the Bee-yaaatch![/quote']

It sounds like the Tamiya intake is a better size match.

[Rocky]

If you didn't get it yet, post what you find when you do. Was so long ago, that I vaguely recall useless weapons, and really bad engineering throughout. Anyone else comment? Would consider finding the YF-16 myself if it is different since I already have some Monogram ones.

The Otaki kit has some major problems, but its the thing to get get if you want to build a YF-16.

On the down side, the top of the fuselage is misshapen from the canopy all the way back to the leading edge of the horizontal stabilizors. It has a hump up front, and it has an incorrect squarish cross section the rest of the way back. The intake and exhaust are trash, the exhaust is blanked off 1/8 inch from the opening. The vertical tail has a blunt leading edge at the base. The cockpit is primative. The canopy does not have the proper bubble shape. The gun port is awful. The gear wells are devoid of detail. I would not buy this kit for any reason other than to build a YF-16. Errors aside, its not an F-16, its a YF-16, which had a substantially different nose and other details.

On the plus side, its a YF-16!! The nose and chines have the correct unique YF-16 shape, and the chines are nice and sharp. It has the smaller YF-16 wings and stabilators, the fuselage and nose have the shorter YF-16 length, the lower aft fins have the correct YF-16 shape, and it has the little YF-16 air intakes behind the main gear doors. The trick is to graft on good F-16 parts from other kits to replace the misshaped areas of the Otaki/Arii kit. There is a very fine ridge on the YF-16 forward fuselage where the chine meets the body. The Otaki kit doesn't really have that, but if you glue on a really thin strip of plastic, like a couple of pieces of flash, and blend the lower edge into the body, it might do the trick.

The Monogram kit has a few YF-16 details, but its not a YF-16 - its an F-16. You might as well start with a block of wood and carve it into a YF-16.

Edited January 29, 2013 by Rocky

[Rocky]

I have a Monogram F-16 that I am doing as a nostalgia build. The question I asked myself was, "What do I do with it?". It was produced with YF-16 markings, its half YF-16, and, of course, I built it with YF-16 markings when I was a kid in the 1970's. My old kit is gone, and I have a new Monogram kit that I wanted to do with the better skills that I have today. So its going to be a YF-16, as best I can make it. It won't be right, but the point is that it will be better than it was. I was pretty much resigned to leave the nose in its F-16 shape...

I have changed my plans. The 1st F-16 FSD aircraft was painted red, white and blue - very much like the YF-16. The Monogram kit is much more like an F-16 FSD than a YF-16. It even has a Stencel seat that only the F-16 FSD had. Vingtor has an F-16 decal sheet with F-16 FSD markings (and YF-16 decals), so I'm building my Monogram kit as an F-16 FSD. I sanded off the YF-16 style ridge below the canopy, and the little intakes behind the main gear doors. It will have slightly different markings than it had when I built it as a kid, but fewer alterations to the kit itself, and it will be far more accurate.