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Massive 1/18th Tomcat


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The stock engine tubes are a tad small in diameter most noticeable where the nozzles meet the tubes. Rather than disassemble the monster and fabricate new ones I set about to find some acceptable work-a-round. The solution was in the kitchen cabinet... Crystal Light!

As it turns out the little cups that the mix comes in are pretty close to the nozzle size and they are molded with a double lip which helps minimize the step in size. Who knew.

cup.jpg

cups2.jpg

BurnerRingStep.jpg

This pic show the nozzle with and without the Crystal Light fix... although not perfect it certainly helps.

BurnerRingStep3.jpg

One final pic from above showing both nozzles tapped in place.

GEEnginesAbove.jpg

Edited by mcaulk
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Am growing weary of detail work... what I really love is painting hope to get to the paint shop this week.

Would love to end up with something like this.

VF101.jpg

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PortOffice.jpg

Great job so far Mcaulk :rolleyes: Although the heavily salt weathered look is totally awesome, what you've done here really looks incredible as is... with a bit of pastel weathering around the steps this is a real gem. Whatever you decide I will be watching with interest :thumbsup:

/Jesse

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Jesse,

You are right on regarding weathering around the steps. I've spent the last hour scrutinizing dozens of Cat pics an nearly 100% show substantial wear and grim around the port side steps and surrounding fuselage. Thanks for the input.

Mike

f14dkittybg_25.jpg

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Am growing weary of detail work... what I really love is painting hope to get to the paint shop this week.

Would love to end up with something like this.

VF101.jpg

Mike,

I saw that bird at Nellis in 2004 when that pic was taken. If you ever need some inspiration, check out these pics:

http://www.techflyer.net/nellisf-14.html

This pic is really telling about how dirty that bird was that day. I often use it when somebody beaks up that my jets are too dirty.... :P

http://www.techflyer.net/images/nellis04/f-14/F-14-10.jpg

...and this video of the whole performance....

Note the lack of almost all pylons, including the so-called "pallets" on the fuselage. Had I known that this would be one of the last flights of the F-14, I would have taken way more pics, especially of the static F-14D on the tarmac which you could actually go up to and almost climb inside.

Your work on the wing gasket is very, very good. I did the same thing on my 1/32 build and it's not easy to get right. Yours looks better! :thumbsup:

Edited by chuck540z3
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Chuck,

That guy had to be no more than 30 feet off the deck! What a rush.

Thanks for the pics and inspiration. A project like this is less like a sprint

and more like a marathon... I need the boost.

Thanks,

Mike

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WOW!

That is going to ONE HUMONGOUS ,GORGEOUS Tomcat...

Have thoroughly enjoyed following this"

Your fortitude and tenacity knows no bounds and this is

EXEMPLARY build. :worship:

( I can't get enough of the Tomcats and this has had ME drooling like a kid ! )

Thank you for the most amazing build.look forward to more! :yahoo:

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  • 4 weeks later...

These look great!

Former Tomcat maintainer here, going from memory...

Center windscreen should be tinted greenish for the F-14A. This was because the HUD was projected on the windscreen. IIRC, the F-14D had a different HUD using seperate combiner glass, so the windscreen may not be tinted. The "NF-14A" aircraft (developmental aircraft, had the TF-30's but all the D avionics) on display here at Pax River have the canopies frosted.

The tactical paint was almost impossible to clean, so on the boat it got really dirty. The steps and ladder area, plus up onto the wing should be a mess. Basically anywhere that was touched/brushed up against by ground crew...don't forget the big daily/weekly doors under the engines. The two big gull panels right behind the cockpit on either side got opened up a lot, as did the avionics bay portside forward of the intake. Also there usually are smudged footprints on either side of the cockpit, plus over the turtleback between the two UHF antenna (where folks crossed over from one side to another). Sliding down the tails was popular if you didn't get caught, yes there are NO STEP stencils there but many times you would see bootprints there! The high vis paint was much easier to keep clean, and seemed to hold its gloss pretty well when new. The other thing to know is that squadrons were not allowed to repaint entire aircraft, thus spot painting was the order of the day.

Those aren't rivets for the most part...they are either screws (Hy-torque or the ARC "nazi" heads), calfax (aft of the intakes) or Tridare (forward of the intake). The calfaxs would break and become a FOD hazard if overtightened, so that's why they were only used aft of the intakes. Also in one of the real jet pics you can see some gold colored fasteners - that's what they look like new, before paint. The Hy-torques were awful, awful things, always stripping out. whenever we could we replaced them with the ARC heads which were much better. It wasn't easy, as the screws were not always the same length, and putting in one too long would usually break the anchor nut...and get you in trouble with the airframe guys.

Hope that helps

-CJ

Edited by CJ Martin
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  • 3 weeks later...

My deepest condolences for your loss Mike! I don't really know what to say ....

My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family. I can only say I hope and pray that the lord almighty knows why he allowed this to happen and that one fine day we will all understand, if not in this life then whenever/wherever and in whatever way he thinks is right for us. I hope and trust that what the bible says is right and he really never allows to burden us with more than we can carry.

Can't really say anything about modelling right now, just that the metal engines are despite the loooooooong wait not off the table after all. The maker just had to face his own burdens which kept him from continuing work on them but he definitely plans to release them.

Not that this matters right now.

Don't give it up pal.

Bush,

Have not made a lot of progress on the Tomcat project. Probably jumped back in before I was emotionally ready. Am doing some better now but school has started and that is an all consuming proposition. I will post as soon as I have something substantial completed.

Thanks again for the support, it is very much appreciated.

Mike

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  • 2 weeks later...

Mike, doing great work as usual. Following your WIP I guess I build up the courage to get me one of the giant cat as well. I picked one up at a good price and it was their Black Knights release. So, keep up the good work cause I'm going to save it all as reference.

Mike

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  • 1 month later...

Great job so far on the Cat Mike. I am currently reworking my VF-84 F-14A into a B model as well. Filing and sanding seams, gotta love it. Looking forward to following your progress on this one.

Steve

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 4 years later...

So, what ever became of this amazing rebuild ?? I would love to know if it ever got finished. This is one of the reasons why I decided to tackle my conversion.

 

Steve

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