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VF-1B (or D. Or whatever.)


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This build will be mostly out of the box. The exceptions to that are weapons and crew.

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I considered some “modern” jet crew but instead opted to install Macross VF-19 pilots. I’m modifying them somewhat because, as with Macross VF-1 pilots, I think the helmets look too heavy.

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I'm not yet sure what I’m doing for weapons. Hasegawa’s VF-1 set is seemingly the obvious source, but I’m eager to employ some of the ordnance from Bandai’s new set, too.

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I might (also) include some missiles from Hasegawa’s Starblazers Cosmo Falcon kit. They’re small enough to be easy to fit in a variety of configurations. And while different from the usual Macross weaponry, they're also not simply repurposed miniatures of real weapons. Since VF-1s are typically depicted with a gun pod, I think I’ll leave that off this jet, for variety.

This will probably be a slow build. This year's household repair and improvement season is beginning.

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Hasegawa imagines the VF-1 canopies’ cross-section to curve past 180 degrees, so that at their widest the canopies bulge past the canopy sills. This is nifty but production leaves a mold seam running down the top of the canopy piece. To remove that I used fine-grade sanding and polishing sticks, followed by some plastic polish.

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The YF-19 pilots don’t fit perfectly into the VF-1 seats but I thought these pilots looked a little lean to begin with, so I’m adding some plastic to them to “snug” them into the seats. Plus, I sanded away some bulk from their helmets for better fit and appearance.

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  • 3 weeks later...

A little work this weekend: I added some extra plastic to the cockpit parts to suggest more detail. The pilot gets a stick and throttle, supplied by the kit's included photoetch fret. The backseater, per the U.S. Navy's RIO tradition, does not have flight controls. This effectively means I'm building some sort of combat ship, and not a pilot trainer.

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The kit's included photoetch parts are some sort of steel alloy, and so not as easy to cut from the fret as brass. On the other hand they bend neatly where required and don't bend easily when you don't want them to. Some of the added detail seems dubious to me - really, how visible will these stringers be in the finished exhausts? Well, I said I needed more practice and experience in delicate modeling.

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Edited by Fishwelding
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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 3 years later...

Reviving this project, although I don't have much spare time, so this will (still) be slow.  I built up a bunch of sub-assemblies, and began painting.  Most parts are primed, but I'm finishing the cockpit parts before assembling the nose.  

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I wanted some heavy armament of some kind, and wasn't satisfied with various ordinance options from kits. So I cobbled up a set of simple missiles of some sort.  They consist of Evergreen styrene shapes with some rocket pod aerodynamic caps from a 1/48 Hasegawa weapons set.  

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I'm building the kit wheels up, with a pair of pilots, so I need a base on which to mount the flying plane.  From Amazon, I got some cheap electronics hobby boxes and screws, to build something akin to an avionics module.  To add some weight, I epoxied in a bunch of leftover cheap hardware and some BBs.  (You buy a light fixture, shelving brackets, or even a TV mount, and they give you soft-metal screws. If it has to be sturdy, I replace those.)

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I made a base like this before, on a previous project, but the finished base was a bit too big and sort of upstages the model airplane.  So I'm using a smaller box this time.

 

 

Edited by Fishwelding
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