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CD48138 - F-117A Nighthawk


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CD48138 will be a new 1/48 sheet featuring the F-117 "Nighthawk"; including all the options on my earlier 1/32 sheet (CD32001) as well as several Desert Storm aircraft never done in decal form, with unique weapon bay door artwork. 

Edited by KursadA
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Nice. Looking forward to it...anything other than "Toxic Avenger" would be nice.

The old "Out of Production" "Hard To Find" "Ridiculously Priced on Ebay" Cutting Edge sheet from Desert Storm is also full of inaccuracies so this will be a welcome addition.

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"Vega 31" will be included?

Twobobs decals have some inaccuracies (stencils grey, name on the canopy spelled wrong, tail number wrong...)

Vega 31 would be a good addition. Who is the local expert on this airframe here? Please send me the references and/or what needs to be fixed, and I will add it to the sheet.

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Nice. Looking forward to it...anything other than "Toxic Avenger" would be nice.

Could not agree more. Could this sheet be made available in 1/72, because again the only option that I have seen for bomb bay nose art from desert Storm is "toxic Avenger" and there are lots more better ones than that.

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Could not agree more. Could this sheet be made available in 1/72, because again the only option that I have seen for bomb bay nose art from desert Storm is "toxic Avenger" and there are lots more better ones than that.

There is a reason for that; Toxic Avenger is one of the very few that were documented well enough with complete info on the full combination of crew names, tail markings and the weapons bay art. Photos/drawings of the individual weapon bay art and the associated serial numbers are somewhat easy to find, but full crew names are not. This was a period where the F-117 force was still very much shrouded in secrecy, and there was a war going on. I have been trying to piece together the information for the last two years, but there are still large gaps and I had to make some educated guesses as well.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have worked on this sheet for some time this past weekend. One detail that I missed on the 1/32 sheet were the markings on the folding cockpit glare shield.

These markings are very prominent on any F-117 with the canopy open, and I would like to get them right on the 1/48 sheet. Does anyone have a good reference photo showing these clearly? I think the yellow warning markings on the glare shield changed at some point during the F-117's service life, I am looking for both early and late styles.

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2 hours ago, Whiskey said:

The Tamiya kit is still the only available option to build correct?

 

No, there are 1/48 F-117s from Testors/Italeri , Monogram/Revell, and Academy as well.

 

Tamiya is likely the best of them however.

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My rating, Tamiya definitely the best.

 

A close second would be the Monogram kit, there were two releases, IIRC the only real difference was that the ProModeler release had a PE fret and different markings. 

 

The Academy kit is a rebox of the Hobbycraft kit, and is underscaled at about 1/50th.  Other than that it looks fairly accurate. 

 

The Testors kit was “first out of the gate” and IMO suffers from shape and accuracy issues. 

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  • 7 months later...

As I get close to finishing this sheet and offering it in January, I need help with one of the options I would like to include.

 

Toward the end of the F-117's service, each of the three units at Holloman had their own squadron commanders' jet that had "9th FS" etc. on the tail right above the serial number, and the tail fin marking in the unit's color. There are photos of the 8th FS jet (82-0800) and the 9th FS jet (84-0809); but I could not find one showing the 7th FS jet's tail number.

 

We know this jet existed, because there is an official USAF photo that clearly shows the blue 7th FS marking and the "7th FS" on the tail, but not the serial number.

 

Does anyone know the serial number of this jet?

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Hi Kursad,

 

it should be 84-0828. Check out this site on Aviano/Operation Allied Force: link

The site has it as 84-1828, but that must be a typo. The pics are not very clear, but the first one has the 7th FS tail marking and 828 is legible. No clue on the name on the canopy though.

 

HTH,

Joerg

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To rephrase a Desert Storm meme, this sheet is shaping up to be "the mother of all F-117 sheets", and I think you will like the result.

 

It looks like 8 post-war Holloman jets, Vega 31, an Edwards test jet and 4-5 Desert Storm aircraft (all with bomb bay artwork and correct crew names) will fit on this sheet - stay tuned while I still work on it for a few more nights.

Edited by KursadA
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So I have a Tamiya kit started and a Monogram one in the stash. Sounds like this will be a nice sheet Kursad and I hope I can do 2 of the schemes which I think is normal for your releases. Looking forward to your profiles.

 

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I am also including the crew names for the aircraft assigned to Sqn Ldr Graham Wardell, as a "tip of the hat" to my hundreds of British customers who have supported me since the very first days. This is technically not a Desert Storm aircraft since this RAF exchange pilot had left the unit prior to the hostilities.

 

Unfortunately, the exact serial number of the jet seems to be unknown. There is a recent drawing that suggests that this may be 85-0825; and I will go with that. The instructions will mention that the serial number is speculative, though.

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Kursad, 

 

Scramble gives this as 7FS CO's bird in 2006; 
 

81-10797 HO F-117A A4022 Tonopah Test R Stored     '7 FS' feb06

 

Found some other squadron CO's birds too, but at various times - not sure if they may help you out? 

 

82-0800 HO F-117A A4025 Tonopah Test R Stored    

'8 FS' jul07

 

 

80-0786 HO F-117A A4011 Tonopah Test R Stored     '9 FS / War Pig' sep01

 

84-0809 HO F-117A A4034 Tonopah Test R Stored     '9 FS' may05
Edited by Niels
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Joe Baugher writes; 
 

81-10792/10798		Lockheed F-117A Nighthawk
				Originally serialed 81-0792/0798 when they first came into the "white" world, but reserialed when it was found that the
					numbers conflicted with a batch of F-16s.

Hence the "strange" serial compared to normal USAF standards. 

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