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F-14A Tomcat NSAWC "13", 1/72 kit Hobbyboss


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Nearly forgot to take the necessary picture of the kit before doing any major work on it:

IMG_4289_zpsd6fbae0d.jpg

I will do the "Iranian Air Force"-like F-14A from NSAWC, "13".

0181088.jpg

Decals are already ordered and shipped, Fightertowns Adversary Bad Cats-set for NSAWC and Top Gun Tomcats.

I´m using the Hobbyboss F-14B as a base and will try to figure out what items need to be changed to make it a correct "A". I built the "D" of Hobbyboss some months ago and was very pleased with the kit. In my eyes a worth contender to the Hasegawa-kit!

The "D" while in progress: http://www.arcforums.com/forums/air/index.php?showtopic=267740

HAJO

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This will be my first F-14 without the prominent Phoenix-rails under the belly. Does anyone has an idea if they also flew with external fuel tanks or were they left off during all their flights?

HAJO

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Can never say all. One day the plane might have been needed at a airbase far from home. Having said that I do not recall ever seeing a photo of that paint scheme WITH tanks. But it sure would be ABLE to carry.

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phantom, just a quick question: The instruction says that the underside of the F-14 is painted in two shades of grey: A very light grey under the belly, and something I´d call "US Navy standard grey" under the wings. Is that correct?

HAJO

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Danged if I know. I think your using the Hi decals instructions.????? If I remember correctly that is what the instructions said.

Diego tends to do his research and does seem to get it right.

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Danged if I know. I think your using the Hi decals instructions.????? If I remember correctly that is what the instructions said.

Diego tends to do his research and does seem to get it right.

The Hi Decal instructions also give this Cat pallets, bomb-racks (I assume they mean ADU-73/BRU-32) and AFTs -I can't find a single photo of 'Brown 13' with this fit, so...dunno. Their colour call-out for the underside (Option #6) is Light Ghost Gray except for under the wing root, which is shown as Dark Ghost Gray: presumably following the pattern of a 'regular' all-gray scheme.

There are also roughly triangular areas on the upper surface of the wing fairings that are shown as Dark Ghost Gray rather than the 'Flogger'(?) colours of the rest of the airframe. Note that Fightertown Decals instructions conflict with this, but I imagine the scheme may have been re-worked on the real aircraft over time.

No disrespect to Diego (the decals are awesome!), but if anyone can make a definitive pronouncement on these matters, I'm sure it would be most welcome!

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I will use the Fightertown-Decals, never heard of Hi Decal for this bird...

This is a scan (from the ARC-review-section) of the instructions for the FTD-sheet, hope you can see the different colors for the belly and the wings:

03.jpg

I don´t know what AFTs are, but the pictures I found so far are also showing this Cat "clean", with just the wing glove pylons.

HAJO

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Thanks for the help so far!

I have done the cockpit, for some reason in the "B"-kit the decals for the side consoles are missing. Or, to be more precise, they are not missing, they are simply left away. Only some decals for the main panels are there.

So I went through my spare decal-box and digged out something that looks like instruments.

IMG_4306_zpsfee669c1.jpg

HAJO

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Well, I will use some self-mixed colors. For the sand, I have mixed something out of Revell acrylics, since it´s almost a year ago than I did that I have no real clue what I used. The color is in a #89 "Beige" can, so this must have been the base. Then probably some #35 "flesh", a little #16 "Sand"...

The brown will be #84 "leather brown" which I intend to lighten up with either #16 or #88.

No idea for the green yet, but I will post any progress.

HAJO

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Beautiful work, I wish mine fit that well!

Adversary colours can be somewhat elusive; often they are quite a bit off from their MiG/Su counterparts...this Bad Cat had me squirrelling around for a while. And I'm still at it! This weeks flavours are Humbrol 121 (or Lifecolor UA089) for the stone shade, Humbrol 186 for the brown and Vallejo ModelColor (not ModelAir) 70823 green -maybe with a little yellow?. Of course, there is the additional constraint that the first two need to match the decals maybe more than the actual airframe; although the HiDecal offerings look the part I don't know what the Fightertown ones are like.

Dunno if that helps; maybe there are better options out there?

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This is how the jet looked yesterday evening. Gear is done and the bird is resting on its own legs.

IMG_4309_zpsc0a4bcf2.jpg

And these are the first results from my painting:

IMG_4310_zps698b76cc.jpg

I think the grey between the engines could be a bit brighter, but that would be even more difficult to paint. It´s a mixture I did, don´t know for what model... Maybe the A-4 in MiG-15-suit I did more than a year ago. The slightly darker grey on the wings comes from a mixture I did for my F-14D. Basically Revells #57 with some white, I think...

And the upper side:

IMG_4311_zps136bd542.jpg

Like described above, a mixture I used for two Desert Storm helos. Added some drops of brown...

HAJO

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Great to see a desert 13 jet being built. Not sure of which instructions you have but the actual sand color is 30279. 30279 has no bottling despite a Lifecolor attempt. The way to get there is to mix 9 parts Radome Tan 33613 to 1 part Military Brown 30117.

Can't wait to see this jet done.

Also, if you don't have the insert for the sand decals, I'd be happy to mail one to you. Actually there were 2 but the first one got misprinted color and is too light.

-brian

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Great to see a desert 13 jet being built. Not sure of which instructions you have but the actual sand color is 30279. 30279 has no bottling despite a Lifecolor attempt. The way to get there is to mix 9 parts Radome Tan 33613 to 1 part Military Brown 30117.

-brian

Hi Brian and thanks for sharing this information. I have been trying to get this color right for quite some time now, on an F/A-18 that I'm building from NSAWC in 1/72.

It's always good to hear about details such as, colors' availability or, how we can achieve an FS. Any other suggestions for other Federal Standard codes?

Sernak

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Brian, thanks for your help!

What do you mean by "the insert for the sand decals"? You mean that smaller decal-sheet? In the set I bought were three sheets: A "big" one, a smaller one and a tiny one...

Wait, I post a picture...

HAJO

Edited by Hajo L.
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The canopy of this kit has a seamline running right through the middle of it...:

IMG_4317_zpsb73dcd2a.jpg

So I have to sand it away and hope that I can polish it good enough that it´s not visible anymore.

And some brown color on the Tomcat. Had mixed quite a lot until I got something that looked good when directly compared to the FTD-decals.

Without flash:

IMG_4320_zpsac5f01bf.jpg

IMG_4318_zps323c985f.jpg

With flash:

IMG_4319_zpsa0b1097b.jpg

HAJO

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Ok, now everything is ready for decalling!

IMG_4323_zps215a6e63.jpg

IMG_4324_zps2dc381af.jpg

Still have a question concerning the loadout. I want to do dual Sidewinder-rails and would love to have something additional to the "standard" training load of a training Sidewinder and an ACMI-pod. Any chance to have a third item or do I better stick with those two mentioned above?

HAJO

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