CF-188AM

[ixgr1]

ok.....no going back now

btw - thanks again Charlie

Edited April 10, 2011 by ixgr1

[Charlie Cheetah]

No trouble at all, make it a good one!

[ALF18]

Welcome to the GB. Just remember, when building a Canadian Hornet, the wheels go on the bottom, and the canopy is on the top... contrary to those down-under ones you're used to! :-)

If you have any questions about specifics of configuration, just ask - I'll be happy to help, as will the usual other suspects here.

ALF

[ixgr1]

Welcome to the GB. Just remember, when building a Canadian Hornet, the wheels go on the bottom, and the canopy is on the top... contrary to those down-under ones you're used to! :-)

If you have any questions about specifics of configuration, just ask - I'll be happy to help, as will the usual other suspects here.

ALF

-Thanks for setting me straight on that one....Eh ?

[ixgr1]

Gdeeh !

Obviously these attentioned areas, are Chaff and Flair Buckets ..................... ?

But how common are they ? and are they aircraft specific ?

(yes I know it looks slightly rude !)

[ALF18]

Gdeeh !

Obviously these attentioned areas, are Chaff and Flair Buckets ..................... ?

But how common are they ? and are they aircraft specific ?

(yes I know it looks slightly rude !)

Charlie

It wasn't until you mentioned "rude" that I noted the similarity to certain drawings I've seen in bathroom stalls...

What you've circled are definitely the chaff and flare dispensers. 928 in the pic is sporting the newer ones (ALE-47). CF-18s originally had the ALE-39, and they have all been replaced with the ALE-47. The whole fleet has chaff and flare buckets. During the transition period (upgrades partially done), there was a mix of ALE-39 and ALE-47 installed aircraft to aircraft, but they're all -47s now.

The way to tell them apart is easy. The ALE-39 is a single 'bucket' on each side (30 holes per bucket). The ALE-47 has two 30-hole buckets per side, so we now have double the number of expendables.

What era are you going to do? Original (pre-mods) or latest? There are many nuances between the pre- and post-upgrade aircraft that show up externally.

ALF

[ixgr1]

.

The way to tell them apart is easy. The ALE-39 is a single 'bucket' on each side (30 holes per bucket). The ALE-47 has two 30-hole buckets per side, so we now have double the number of expendables.

What era are you going to do? Original (pre-mods) or latest? There are many nuances between the pre- and post-upgrade aircraft that show up externally.

ALF

-these apper to be single 30 'hole' buckets ? -just "blistered" or raised away, from from the airframe. Well,..... one does.

I intend to do a post-mods airframe. Which will include the "Bird Slicers" IFF, sweapt dorsal aerial and a combination of chaff/flair buckets, GPS ?. Do I need to do the Tail Stiffeners ?

From advice from another post I shall be arming her with Mk-82 Snakeyes.....at this stage. Q - Do the CAF use the Duel Bomb Racks ?

Edited February 24, 2011 by ixgr1

[ixgr1]

-here's the 'pit

enjoying this build - just love the curves of a twin 'bug

[Neo]

looks good

hope you dont plan to give thoise beers to the 1/48 pilots that are going to fly this baby !! :)

Btw what kit is that ?

Cheers

Neo

[ALF18]

-these apper to be single 30 'hole' buckets ? -just "blistered" or raised away, from from the airframe. Well,..... one does.

I intend to do a post-mods airframe. Which will include the "Bird Slicers" IFF, sweapt dorsal aerial and a combination of chaff/flair buckets, GPS ?. Do I need to do the Tail Stiffeners ?

From advice from another post I shall be arming her with Mk-82 Snakeyes.....at this stage. Q - Do the CAF use the Duel Bomb Racks ?

Do add the GPS domes to the rear spine.

Tail stiffeners would be common - anywhere from 2 to 4 of them (inside/outside, left/right).

Yes, the CF uses the VERs (Vertical Ejector Racks) to carry 2 small bombs like Mk 82s.

ALF

[ixgr1]

looks good

hope you dont plan to give thoise beers to the 1/48 pilots that are going to fly this baby !! :)

Btw what kit is that ?

-Hasagawa 'D' (which is not a D but a dressed up B ?)

beers are for the constructon technician.......

ALF18 - Thanks for the info.......

Edited March 23, 2011 by ixgr1

[ALF18]

-Hasagawa 'D' (which is not a D but a dressed up B ?)

beers are for the constructon technicians........

ALF18 - Thanks for the info.......

The Hasegawa D may not be just a dressed-up B - there are two types of F/A-18D in USN service:

-one type is a pilot trainer (i.e. two-seat C) with two sticks and very similar front/back cockpits

-the other type is night attack, with no rear control stick; only two side-stick controllers and quite a different display arrangement in the back.

Canada has upgraded Bs, which resemble the USN pilot trainer aircraft.

I quite forgot to mention that the beers made for quite an authentic look to the cockpit...

And I think you've done a 'smashing' job on the cockpit.

ALF

[ixgr1]

The Hasegawa D may not be just a dressed-up B - there are two types of F/A-18D in USN service:

-one type is a pilot trainer (i.e. two-seat C) with two sticks and very similar front/back cockpits

-the other type is night attack, with no rear control stick; only two side-stick controllers and quite a different display arrangement in the back.

Canada has upgraded Bs, which resemble the USN pilot trainer aircraft.

I quite forgot to mention that the beers made for quite an authentic look to the cockpit...

And I think you've done a 'smashing' job on the cockpit.

Thanks for your Very kind words ALF - I am improving with every build, thanks to the good folks like youself.

The kit is a Hasegawa D- Night Attack #PT3:5300. And is one of the First 'D's in the market (I think). The WSO's Display is what was in the kit, and I was just presuming this was a dressed up 'B'. Certainly it is, when compaired to the HB 'D' I have ?

The Beers ..... I thought it would help give a nice Canadian touch/flavor to the construction ? (and it gave me a laugh, durin my afternoon shift !)

Arming - I am contimplating 8 x VER mounted, retarded Mk82's (+ centerline tank) -I presume this credible, whilst not perticualy usual ?

[ALF18]

Thanks for your Very kind words ALF - I am improving with every build, thanks to the good folks like youself.

The kit is a Hasegawa D- Night Attack #PT3:5300. And is one of the First 'D's in the market (I think). The WSO's Display is what was in the kit, and I was just presuming this was a dressed up 'B'. Certainly it is, when compaired to the HB 'D' I have ?

The Beers ..... I thought it would help give a nice Canadian touch/flavor to the construction ? (and it gave me a laugh, durin my afternoon shift !)

Arming - I am contimplating 8 x VER mounted, retarded Mk82's (+ centerline tank) -I presume this credible, whilst not perticualy usual ?

Charlie

That load-out would be OK. Back in the days before LGBs, we used to plan often on that sort of load. During Gulf War 1, the CF-18s performing ground attack flew with exactly that - except the Mk 82s were low drag, not retarded, for dropping above the AAA envelope.

Performing CAS in a low-altitude environment, a bunch of retarded Mk 82s allows the pilot to kill APCs or troop concentrations.

A long way of saying that this load is less likely in today's combat environment (higher altitudes, guided bombs), but was very common in the past.

ALF

[ixgr1]

Cool Charlie,

I'll just have to wack on a pair of LGBs then - darn it !

:blink:

[ixgr1]

ok Charlie.....

I'm thinking about paint........

FS-36375/Humb-127 for the lower 1/2

But I see FS-35237/Humb-145 is recomended for the upper bits ? looks to Bluey to me ?

I whant to do a modern hornet which seams more a dark grey

[Emvar]

Here is a picture of a newly painted AC and a faded one.....

CAF Combat Camera

So I would say the 237 is good for the upper and the 375 is good for the lower...

HTH

Emil

[ALF18]

ok Charlie.....

I'm thinking about paint........

FS-36375/Humb-127 for the lower 1/2

But I see FS-35237/Humb-145 is recomended for the upper bits ? looks to Bluey to me ?

I whant to do a modern hornet which seams more a dark grey

Like Emvar said, 35237 is perfect for the top colour. I used Humbrol 87 sometimes - it's a pretty good match. Mostly, I use ModelMaster Acryl FS 35237.

The colours have not changed since inception into service of the type. If they seem a little darker grey now, it may be because of the accumulated grime on the paint.

Personally, I use a lot of pencil lead to weather the paint job. I scribble pencil lightly in appropriate places, wet a finger, and rub away in the sense of the airflow. This tends to darken up the paint and highlight some of the panel lines (which I never use a wash on - I just trace a fine point mechanical pencil lead into them to give them a bit of a shadow effect).

If you look over at Large Scale Planes, you'll see one of my CF-18s in work, where I describe the pencil weathering.

http://forum.largescaleplanes.com/index.ph...alf18&st=60

ALF

[ALF18]

Gdeeh !

Obviously these attentioned areas, are Chaff and Flair Buckets ..................... ?

But how common are they ? and are they aircraft specific ?

(yes I know it looks slightly rude !)

While looking for something else, I stumbled on a very good shot of the ALE 47 dual-bucket arrangement on a Malaysian Hornet.

http://www.f-4dablemodels.com/our-projects/ale-47/

I don't have any pics of Canadian ALE-47s (not close up anyway), but they should be similar to the ones on the f-4dablemodels site.

ALF

[ixgr1]

Thanks again Gents,

I will give Humbrol-87 a G.O. I still have doubts about the H-145; it maybe is the correct colour, but looks too much like an RAAF 'bug colour to me ?

CAF Hornets must weather quicker, sun v's snow ?

- I also think I have 'licked' that deep/blistered Flair bucket - photos shortly !

Edited March 26, 2011 by ixgr1

[Emvar]

Thanks again Gents,

I will give Humbrol-87 a G.O. I still have doubts about the H-145; it maybe is the correct colour, but looks too much like an RAAF 'bug colour to me ?

CAF Hornets must weather quicker, sun v's snow ?

- I also think I have 'licked' that deep/blistered Flair bucket - photos shortly !

The RAAF bug colours are almost Identical to the CAF..... so there might be similarities.

I would say that pretty much all types of weather hot sun cold & snow wind rain people grease grime and alot of time between repaints adds to the weathering.

ALF could correct me if I'm wrong but the CAF rotates all the CF-18's through storage quite frequently to prolong the life span of the aircraft, I have seen CF-18's in the older Symetrical era markings flying in the last 10 years as these aircraft might have been in storage and never made it to the paint booth before being put back into operation.

Emil

[ALF18]

ALF could correct me if I'm wrong but the CAF rotates all the CF-18's through storage quite frequently to prolong the life span of the aircraft, I have seen CF-18's in the older Symetrical era markings flying in the last 10 years as these aircraft might have been in storage and never made it to the paint booth before being put back into operation.

:(

Emil

Emil

You used to be right... back in the good old days when our fleet was larger, and especially when the number of units and active aircraft was reduced.

Nowadays, we are only flying the upgraded aircraft - and each one that went through the upgrades got a fresh paint job as part of the deal.

For many of them, it's been a few years since they got fresh paint, so the weathering is becoming pronounced, coupled with some repairs here and there (paint touchups done as a result in small patches sometimes).

For sure the Canadian climate is hard on the paint jobs. In Oz, the main enemy to paint is the omnipresent sun (especially at Darwin), while in Canada we deal with dirty runways a lot. Slush, urea (used to melt ice on runways), and even fine abrasives can be present, and kicked up during taxiing and take-offs. In flight, we deal with a lot more icing in cloud, 3 seasons out of 4.

ALF

[ian_maw]

Just catching up with the threads, (sorry been away for a month)

The ALE-47 still only has 30 holes. There is a big difference to the side you cant see when its loaded on the airframe, but there should be no noticeable difference on the payload side. And there is still only one bucket per side.

The twin store carriers are still in the inventory, but I have not seen them used since the last of the rockets were fired.

What is loaded where changes when you mount a targeting pod, so there are a lot of assymetric load outs that may interest you.

As for the paint job. Each time the aircraft goes through major maint., it's finish is scored. Each area is scored based on everything from the number and depth of scratches in the paint, to it's thickness, and IR reflectivity. So if the paint is there, and the airframe is safe from the environment, then that area is not refinished in spite of fade, or markings. It's a very time consuming, and costly matter to totally refinish a CF-18, so if you see one with fresh paint, it's because it really needed it so badly that a total repaint is actually saving money.

If you know what tail number your going to finish it as, I can probably post a number of pics here before you get too far

And since I see Alf is here, I'll post this link for old times sake, hard to believe it's been 20 years already

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Shows/1221254309/ID=1851846207

[ALF18]

Just catching up with the threads, (sorry been away for a month)

The ALE-47 still only has 30 holes. There is a big difference to the side you cant see when its loaded on the airframe, but there should be no noticeable difference on the payload side. And there is still only one bucket per side.

The twin store carriers are still in the inventory, but I have not seen them used since the last of the rockets were fired.

What is loaded where changes when you mount a targeting pod, so there are a lot of assymetric load outs that may interest you.

As for the paint job. Each time the aircraft goes through major maint., it's finish is scored. Each area is scored based on everything from the number and depth of scratches in the paint, to it's thickness, and IR reflectivity. So if the paint is there, and the airframe is safe from the environment, then that area is not refinished in spite of fade, or markings. It's a very time consuming, and costly matter to totally refinish a CF-18, so if you see one with fresh paint, it's because it really needed it so badly that a total repaint is actually saving money.

If you know what tail number your going to finish it as, I can probably post a number of pics here before you get too far

And since I see Alf is here, I'll post this link for old times sake, hard to believe it's been 20 years already

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Shows/1221254309/ID=1851846207

Thanks for posting the link... we ribbed Hillbilly relentlessly after that. The boys got called down from an air to air CAP to deal with the boat - seems there were no other assets (with suitable armament and enough fuel) nearby, so our guys got vectored onto the boat. They disabled it enough to keep it from threatening the fleet in the tight Gulf waters, until an A-6 finally showed up and sank it with cluster bombs.

ALF

[Emvar]

Emil

You used to be right... back in the good old days when our fleet was larger, and especially when the number of units and active aircraft was reduced.

Nowadays, we are only flying the upgraded aircraft - and each one that went through the upgrades got a fresh paint job as part of the deal.

For many of them, it's been a few years since they got fresh paint, so the weathering is becoming pronounced, coupled with some repairs here and there (paint touchups done as a result in small patches sometimes).

For sure the Canadian climate is hard on the paint jobs. In Oz, the main enemy to paint is the omnipresent sun (especially at Darwin), while in Canada we deal with dirty runways a lot. Slush, urea (used to melt ice on runways), and even fine abrasives can be present, and kicked up during taxiing and take-offs. In flight, we deal with a lot more icing in cloud, 3 seasons out of 4.

ALF

This is why I'm not a subject matter expert. :D

Now 777's and minty colour schemes I know.....