1/32 Tamiya F-4E post-Vietnam- Kicked up a notch.

[chuck540z3]

PM me as i have some info on the SUU-21, the CF-104 carried the MN-1A which was basically the same as the SUU-21.

Jari

Thanks Jari. Will do when I get around to them.

Well, I put the Revell "Royal" tank together and I've decided to bail on that option. Whereas the Tamiya Royal tank on the F-4J fits neatly around the center pylon area, the Revell one just sticks there as a solid piece, so I'd have to carve off a lot of good looking detail on the belly to get the sucker on. I wouldn't mind making all that scratch-built stuff like the sway braces and rear fins to make it look more realistic, but when it starts out fighting me already before I start, I think I have to give in. Too bad the Tamiya tank doesn't come on a smaller sprue or I'd buy one.

I think I'm chickening out on the Pave Spike pod as well. There is NOTHING I can find other than pics of one from 20 feet away. How about an ALQ-119 pod? It comes in the Revell kit and it has decals to boot.

[Finn]

Here's a Pave Spike, with signs in the way, but you could always use the Hasegawa 1/48 one as a guide if necessary:

Jari

[blunce]

Here's one pic I found. The enlarged size gives some pretty good details.

Edited November 27, 2011 by blunce

[Finn]

Here's another view of the above pic, you can tell it's the same a/c by the shadow of the GBU-12s and the lower hump of the ALQ-119 on the other side:

also note the ext tank's condition.

Jari

Edited November 27, 2011 by Finn

[Hueyrob]

Hi everyone!

First of all: THANKS for that impressive report. Jawdropping skills added with fundamental research.. Just WOW!

Ramstein F-4s bring back a lot of memories! I was raised in Southern Germany during a time when all kind of jets were criss-crossing the skies in more or less low altitudes. Hiking to the open houses in Ramstein, Hahn, Bitburg and Zweibrücken were a crutial part of my teenage years together with the first 1/32 shark-mouthed F-4 from Revell.

When I joined the forces, all F-4s were gone and had been replaced by F-16s.

Too bad those times won't return but the memories remain!

I enjoy following your thread and really looking forward to every update!

Well, just to bring up some encouragement and motivation, here's something fine.

Check it out!

I know it's German F-4s but nevertheless...

Keep up that awesome thread!

Thanks again and cheers,

ROB

[chuck540z3]

Thanks for all the help and comments Guys!

Now some real PAINT!!!! I love painting aircraft because this is one area that we can all be a little artistic and try to create something special and unique. I try different techniques with every build and I learn a lot by doing so. I have a few new things up my sleeve for this build, but first I need to get a primer coat on the entire model to reveal all the boo-boos I'm sure to have created along the way. With all the multi-colored resin and clear CA glue used to fill seams and gaps, there's no way to see what's OK and what's not without a coat of paint.....

To fill up the wheel wells and front gun, I used the traditional wet Kleenex trick using Tamiya tape, but to get a real clean line on the curved lips that are already painted white, I used liquid mask then just wiped off the excess with my finger.....

That front gun area was a bit more challenging to do. Note the apparent panel line above the formation light. You'll see later that it disappears with a little paint.

I use Model Master enamels exclusively and if I do a good enough job of sanding the entire model with 2000 grit sandpaper, I don't ever feel the need to use Mr. Surfacer. I've spent way too much time creating lots of tiny rivet detail, so the last thing I want is something cloggin up all my hard work. I don't use MM primer because for some reason it takes FOREVER to dry, so for this model I'm just using the Camouflage Gray (FS 36622) that I'll be using on the bottom of the jet anyway. Here's a couple of shots of how things look today after a first coat with the vertical stabilizer stuck on temporarily...

Things look pretty good, but upon closer inspection I found a few screw-ups like some depressions I needed to fill with putty underneath......

....and this. The formation light looks wonky and that panel line shown earlier directly above it (where the two main fuselage pieces join) has now disappeared. I need to re-scibe a new one....

I also discovered that I broke off one of the leading edge slat actuator hinges on the right along the way- and lost it of course!

So I made a new one out of some styrene that matched fairly closely. Parked under the slat, you'll probably never see it- but I will, so......

This is also a good time to create and glue on those wing fences I made earlier. I tried to get the shape and length as accurate as possible, then I cut a slit into the resin wing tip with a scriber so that it will fit within without showing glue marks- and it will add a lot of extra strength.....

Edited December 2, 2011 by chuck540z3

[chuck540z3]

After gluing it in and re-painting the fixed wing, it looks pretty good, but I still have to sand some areas yet and fill in that cut at the front.....

.... and it fits right in the middle of the outboard leading edge slat like it should. Note that I added "bolts" to the new hinge with a couple spots of CA glue.....

I'm really happy with the front nose area I spent so much time on before, with new panel line and rivet detail. A light sanding with 2000 grit sandpaper and I'll have this area as smooth as the original plastic. I'm not happy, however, with that pop-up vent. Back to the drawing board on that one......

The other side looks good too. You can barely see that filled in vertical line where the nose cone attached beneath the windscreen (which does not exist).....

Other areas also look pretty good, but I need to re-scribe a few of those panel lines again. The wing roots, however, are just about perfect....

The stabilizer is sitting too high because of the tape at the back, but you get the idea....

A quick sanding and it's as smooth as a baby's bum....

While I fool around with painting, it's finally time to deal with the wing pylons and all the junk that I'm going to hang underneath. The kit pylons look very sparse with hardly any detail, but Jari (Finn) earlier gave us a really terrific link to an F-4 Crew Chief handbook which has all sorts of valuable information on rivet and panel line details of this jet. Check out Page 45....

http://www.scribd.com/doc/31294674/f-Rf-4c-d-e-Crew-Chief-s-Handbook

Which is what I used to sort of re-create a better looking pylon. The unaltered pylon piece is to the rear....

THIS stuff, as usual, is going to take awhile!

Thanks for your continued interest in this build.

Edited December 2, 2011 by chuck540z3

[VA-115EFR]

You're a sick man Chuck! This bird is absolutely fantabulous!!!

[zaxos345]

Awesome just awesome Chuck, keep....walking

John

[Billabob]

Chuck

I've been enjoying following your WIP. I am blown away by your skills. I hope some day to be half as good as you.

I'm very new to modeling and have been learning as much as I can from the forums here and elsewhere. One new thing for me is what you stated here about a wet Kleenex trick.

To fill up the wheel wells and front gun, I used the traditional wet Kleenex trick using Tamiya tape, but to get a real clean line on the curved lips that are already painted white, I used liquid mask then just wiped off the excess with my finger.....

Could you tell me what that entails? I'm looking for different masking methods.

Alan

[chuck540z3]

Thanks Guys,

I'm very new to modeling and have been learning as much as I can from the forums here and elsewhere. One new thing for me is what you stated here about a wet Kleenex trick.

Could you tell me what that entails? I'm looking for different masking methods.

Alan

Sure, it's really very simple. To mask in the wheel wells and other areas that are not flush to the rest of the model, you need to build up the cavity so that you've got something for the masking tape to stick to when it is attached to the outside edges of the depression. The easiest and cheapest way to do this is to insert bits of slightly dampened tissue into the cavity. The moisture allows you to conform the tissue around objects and against the sides of the cavity. Once dry, you then mask the outside edges then work your way inwards onto the dried tissue. For straight outside edges like the wheel well below, thin Tamiya tape is usually enough, but for curved surfaces like the main gear wells on this Phantom, I needed the added covering properties of liquid mask to get into and around some very fine detail.

For my last build of a 1/32 CF-18B, I used some foam inserts from Leading Edge to accomplish the same thing with almost no effort at all. If you're making the Academy kit, this cheap add-on is a must.

[blunce]

Stealing this idea (among others)

Foam Cradle! Awesome!

[Tomartista]

Excellent, beautiful work-I watching every update with great pleasure.

[chuck540z3]

Stealing this idea (among others)

Foam Cradle! Awesome!

Thanks. That foam edged cardboard box is the best modeling idea I've ever come with, although I'm sure others have done the same thing because it's so obvious and simple. These 1/32 birds are big, so you need something to rest them on all the time without scratching them. With the open bottom, you can even let landing gear dangle beneath without fear of breakage. Just buy some foam pipe wrap at your hardware store to line the edges, which brings me to my other best idea for modeling construction: Blue shop towels. I use these automotive shop towels all the time because they are soft, absorbent and they don't shed debris like paper towels. When the ones on my workbench are getting a bit dirty, I cut them up into small 3 X 3" towels to clean paint brushes and remove paint from the rims of jars. Although it wasn't planned that way, they also provide a good background color for these WIP photographs.

Edited December 2, 2011 by chuck540z3

[Finn]

Before you get too carried away Chuck, if you plan to add a Pave Spike or ECM pod in the left fwd Sparrow well, an adaptor replaced the launcher so the detail you added to the well will have to be removed. Some adaptor pics can be seen here:

http://www.b-domke.de/AviationImages/Phantom.html

Also as for the i/b pylons, if you note in the F-4 Crew Chief handbook pg45 you'll see a smaller panel had been added to panel 238 at the front of the pylon. I think it was added to allow for electrical access to those stores that had electrical connections at the front, like ECM pods. Note 6 says it was added to F-4Ds after a certain serial number and F-4Es. You may want to see if the particular airframe you are doing had them.

Jari

[chuck540z3]

Before you get too carried away Chuck, if you plan to add a Pave Spike or ECM pod in the left fwd Sparrow well, an adaptor replaced the launcher so the detail you added to the well will have to be removed. Some adaptor pics can be seen here:

http://www.b-domke.de/AviationImages/Phantom.html

Also as for the i/b pylons, if you note in the F-4 Crew Chief handbook pg45 you'll see a smaller panel had been added to panel 238 at the front of the pylon. I think it was added to allow for electrical access to those stores that had electrical connections at the front, like ECM pods. Note 6 says it was added to F-4Ds after a certain serial number and F-4Es. You may want to see if the particular airframe you are doing had them.

Jari

Thanks Man, I was wondering how I was going to attach that sucker- assuming I make one at all. Some of you guys have sort of "dared me", so I don't really have any choice but to give it a try. ;) I'll also add that smaller panel, amongst other tweaks like a small panel on the very front which I neglected until I get the two pylon halves glued together.

Since we're on the topic of pylons and adapters, what should go above the SUU-21 bomb dispensers I'll be using to attach them to the pylons, if anything? The ones I have are made for the F-104.

Edited December 2, 2011 by chuck540z3

[Finn]

The SUU-21 attached directly to the rack in the pylon so no adapter would be required. The SUU-21 wasn't specific to a particular a/c, you could use them on F-104s, F-105s, F-4s and F-111s among others.

Jari

[Billabob]

Thanks for the Kleenex info.

[Gene K]

Not to be pedantic, but the correct terminology is "intake ramps" or more often "vari-ramps", not splitter plates. FWIW, in six years of working on F-4Cs and Es the only time I heard anyone use the term "splitter" was when it was a civilian, usually a modeller.

The non-modellers I know refer to the front of the ramp as the "splitters" (as in splits the air)and the moving parts as the vari-ramps.

Gene K

[Scott R Wilson]

Thanks Man, I was wondering how I was going to attach that sucker- assuming I make one at all. Some of you guys have sort of "dared me", so I don't really have any choice but to give it a try. ;) I'll also add that smaller panel, amongst other tweaks like a small panel on the very front which I neglected until I get the two pylon halves glued together.

Since we're on the topic of pylons and adapters, what should go above the SUU-21 bomb dispensers I'll be using to attach them to the pylons, if anything? The ones I have are made for the F-104.

Chuck, the Revell F-4E has a missile well adapter on the ALQ-119 it comes with. I haven't looked at it to see how accurate it is, but it'd be a good starting place if nothing else. The Spike pod had a stub pylon built into the top of it that attached to the missile well adapter, go back and look at the photos of the Pave Spikes I posted (I'll post them again).

Finn's right, the pylons have a bomb rack built into them, and the SUU-21 had suspension lugs that attached to the bomb rack, no adapter required.

Here's my photos of the Spike pods:

Here a few phots I've found on the web:

Forward missile well adapter on the Munich F-4E, from the web:

Part of the underside of the inboard pylon, from the web:

[Scott R Wilson]

The non-modellers I know refer to the front of the ramp as the "splitters" (as in splits the air)and the moving parts as the vari-ramps.

Gene K

Hi Gene, you flew F-4Cs, right? Could be aircrew called them splitters, but since I was enlisted and couldn't fraternize with officers I wouldn't know. The enlisted maintainers I knew at Kelly, George and Ramstein always called them ramps or vari-ramps, and when I once used the term "splitter plate" on duty (at Kelly AFB in 1981) I was met with blank stares and was asked "what's a splitter plate?" Could be at other F-4 bases they did use the term splitter plate, but like I said, I personally never heard it except as said by modelers and in books written by people who didn't actually work on the jet.

Scott W.

[Gene K]

Hi Gene, you flew F-4Cs, right?

F-4C,D,E, and Slatted E...a LONG, long time ago. As I recall, we generally called the thingee going into the duct the splitter plate, which had a fixed front part and a rear moving part - the two part vari ramp, the front part of which had the 12,500 (never counted them) boundary layer holes. As the airplane approached supersonic, the ramps would start to pivot out to control air going to the engines by keeping the shock wave on the outside edges of the intakes (air in front of the shock wave is supersonic, while air behind is subsonic). The back seater would check to make sure that the ramps were working as advertised, both in opening and closing (he could see the top of the ramps as they pivoted on the splitter plate). I think (don't quote me) that the max extension of the ramps occurred at Mach 1.4.

I've really enjoyed your posts (words as well as pictures) through the years, Scott, and in particular in this thread! Quite an amazing build that Chuck has going.

Gene K

[blunce]

Thanks. That foam edged cardboard box is the best modeling idea I've ever come with, although I'm sure others have done the same thing because it's so obvious and simple. These 1/32 birds are big, so you need something to rest them on all the time without scratching them. With the open bottom, you can even let landing gear dangle beneath without fear of breakage. Just buy some foam pipe wrap at your hardware store to line the edges, which brings me to my other best idea for modeling construction: Blue shop towels. I use these automotive shop towels all the time because they are soft, absorbent and they don't shed debris like paper towels. When the ones on my workbench are getting a bit dirty, I cut them up into small 3 X 3" towels to clean paint brushes and remove paint from the rims of jars. Although it wasn't planned that way, they also provide a good background color for these WIP photographs.

It must be Christmas, cuz this thread is the gift that keeps on givin'! Gonna have to check out the blue towels. I usually buy regular paper towels from the dollar store and haven't really paid attention to if they are linty or not, but I do remember the blue towels being very low/no lint.

[Scott R Wilson]

F-4C,D,E, and Slatted E...a LONG, long time ago. As I recall, we generally called the thingee going into the duct the splitter plate, which had a fixed front part and a rear moving part - the two part vari ramp, the front part of which had the 12,500 (never counted them) boundary layer holes. As the airplane approached supersonic, the ramps would start to pivot out to control air going to the engines by keeping the shock wave on the outside edges of the intakes (air in front of the shock wave is supersonic, while air behind is subsonic). The back seater would check to make sure that the ramps were working as advertised, both in opening and closing (he could see the top of the ramps as they pivoted on the splitter plate). I think (don't quote me) that the max extension of the ramps occurred at Mach 1.4.

I've really enjoyed your posts (words as well as pictures) through the years, Scott, and in particular in this thread! Quite an amazing build that Chuck has going.

Gene K

Good to hear from you again Gene. If I'm messing anything else up here, let me know.

The engine airflow was really an amazing bit of design work. As you guys might already know, moving air is at lower pressure than static air, and the faster it moves the lower the pressure. With the aircraft parked and at slow speeds with the gear down, the air being pulled in by the engines flowing past the perforated ramps created a low pressure across the surface of the ramp, so air would flow in from the top and bottom rear corners of the ramps and the louvered sections on the outside of the intake ducts just behind the ramps, flow through the interior of the perforated ramp and come out through the perforations to go down the duct, adding to the air mass going to the engines. As the airflow in the duct crossed the variable bypass bellmouth right at the engine face, it was of course moving quite fast, so the low pressure would pull more air in through the aux air doors, through the engine bay to the bellmouth, through its perforations and into the engine, cooling the engine bay and adding more airmass for the engine. The exhaust stream flowing through the inner nozzle created a venturi effect, pulling air from the engine bay that flowed out through the gap between the inner and outer nozzle, that air also coming in from the aux air doors and flowing across the rear of the engine to cool both it and the rear engine bay.

When the gear was raised after takeoff, the aux air doors closed, and as the jet sped up at some point the airflow reversed. The ram pressure of the air at the intake and the low pressure of the outside airflow across the louvered vents just behind the intake lips pushed (and pulled) the boundary layer air through the perforations on the first variable (perforated) ramp, and it dumped overboard through the rear corners of the ramp and louvered sections behind the intake lip.

In the meantime, the outside airflow air flowing across the outside of the louvers at the back by the nozzles and the venturi effect of the jet exhaust flowing through the inner nozzle created a lower pressure than was inside the duct and engine bay, so air was pulled through the bellmouth, across the engine to cool it, finally being dumped out through the gap between the inner and outer nozzle flaps and through the little louvers just above the nozzle. If the duct pressure was high enough, there could be enough pressure through the bellmouth to actually push the aux air doors open to dump overboard there as well. The pressure sensor probes inside the intake duct were for the bellmouth controller, not the variable intake ramps.

There was a discussion about the ramps not long ago on the F-4 Google group, and I learned that the ramps are positioned by the CADC (Central Air Data Computer) according to the total temperature probe air temperature (outside air temp adjusted for friction heating I think). That surprised me, I'd always incorrectly thought it was by the airspeed inside the duct, and incorrectly thought that those were pitot probes in the duct. Also, if the perforations in the first variable ramp had too many holes blocked by paint or whatever, it could cause a compressor stall at high mach numbers.

Here's an Air Force tech order drawing reproduced in a Detail & Scale showing the airflow at high speeds. Note the top left drawing showing the ramps and shockwaves has the subsonic and supersonic airflow positions reversed:

And here's a schematic for the bellmouth controller:

Edited December 3, 2011 by Scott R Wilson

[chuck540z3]

More technical stuff! I love it!- and welcome Gene to my build thread. Like Scott said, if I'm screwing anything up, please let me know.

As mentioned earlier, I wasn't happy with some things after the first coat of paint. For past builds, I would often think that I was so far into the build that everything was "good enough" at this stage, but I have ALWAYS regretted it later if I didn't fix them. Besides the wing area mentioned earlier (and now fixed), that front gun vent just doesn't look right. Here's a close-up of it. What looked pretty good earlier now looks like crap painted....

Sooooo, I tore the sucker out!....

And made a new one out of the kit part (L47). I avoided this earlier because I initially didn't think that Tamiya supplied one, but I also wanted to make the rectangular one out of styrene. The kit part is crudely made, but much like the rear fin vent, it can be thinned and made to look more presentable. Here's how things look now, using the kit part in the cutout vent hole. MUCH better, I think.....

A view from the side after a light sanding with 2000 grit sandpaper. This is just about right for angle and scale....

You want that recess line at the rear of the vent to be shallow, unlike how I had it before, so that you can envision it popping down flush when the engines are started....