1/48 Hasegawa F-4C/D Phantom II "Bicentennial"

[Kurt H.]

I have long had an interest in Bicentennial models, and an interest in the F-4 phantom II. Even when I was pretty dormant in the hobby, I was always on the lookout for cool phantom kits. So back in the slowest part of my modeling career in 2008/2009 I found this kit at Sprue Brothers and had to have it.

Since then, the Academy F-4C/D has been released and I figure if I wanted to build a C/D I would use the new Academy kit. This poor kit languished in my stash, but now I have the perfect reason to build it. I am slogging through painting the white parts, and the cockpit parts.

Here is a start at the cockpit, a tricky task for me, but I am getting better at it each model I build

and the Instrument panels

It is very humid here in VA so paint is taking days to dry, so I figured I would get a jump on structural assembly, so I glued together the wing

And the fuel tanks, but I forgot to take a picture of them.

Hopefully tomorrow I can continue with the cockpit

Edited July 5, 2016 by Neo

[Andrew D. the Jolly Rogers guy]

Nice start! This is 1/48 I take it? I have the same Hase kit in 1/72, though I'm going a different route with the markings....

[Kurt H.]

Ooops, it is 1/48th, even as the Mod of this GB i can not change the topic title.

[Neo]

There you go. Btw you have to go to full edit mode to change titles

[Kurt H.]

There you go. Btw you have to go to full edit mode to change titles

Thank you!

[yardbird78]

Love the Phabulous Phantom in any and all of it's iterations. You're off to a good start.

[Kurt H.]

I finished the cockpit

notice the ejection handles on the top of the rear seat are different. I think they are from the testors kit, one of the rings broke off, and I could not find it so I used a seat top from my spares box.

The cockpit and the nose gear well mounted easily in the fuselage half, with good positive locators.

So I figured it was time to seal the fuselage

next up mating the wings and intake

[Kurt H.]

It has been a few days since I have had time to work on this one, I moved from 2nd shift to 3rd shift at work so in addition to working different hours, getting used to a whole new daily routine has been a bit of a challenge. but I am in a groove now so let us pick up the build...

Here is the wing, after 1 round of putty & sand. I know there is a panel line here, but it was pretty gnarly so I had to fill it in.

I assembled the intakes and was about to install them when I realized I forgot to do something with the intake area on the fuselage, so a swipes with some tamiya flat black fixed that issue

With a little fiddling the intakes went on leaving the least amount of putty / sand needed

And while I was at it I attached the wing

We almost have a phantom!

[Grandboof]

Looking good so far

Martin H

[Spectre711]

Nice progress!

[speedlimit]

Getting there. Good progress.

Eric

[Kurt H.]

I had to have a "saftey stand down" this week as my work bench and the whole room was getting to the point it was so messy even I was bothered. I lost some bech time, but it was worth it to be able to have more space to work

Any way. as we revisit the phantom, I have since done one round of putty & sand and it is looking good so far

I realize I still needed to add the blanking plates for the area where the catapult bridles go on a naval model, the AC vents, and the fairing at the rear of the cockpit. Those parts were added, and It was time to remove the hump on the wing, I think this is for reinforcements for the landing gear on J or S models.

I taped off the area and got out the destroyer grade sanding stick

The tape ended up being a bit of a hinderance, I kept getting shred of tape on the sanding stick, so the other wing I just proceeded slowly and carefully and there was not too much extra damage

Still more sanding to do, but I am pleased so far.

[Kurt H.]

Putty and sand continues, much most of it is finished. I found a few more spots which needed a fresh application

http://media.fotki.com/1_p,rtwbdtqrqtdfgrwxdwgqgdggqfbw,vi/bsgbrssfgxbrqggwgwsxbsgrftrgk/1/910521/14007612/IMGP8224-vi.jpg

I made a mess of the IR seeker .. the kit depicts a much later F-4C/D with a modified IR seeker, which the instructions indicate to cut away. I was a bit clumsly, and it required more sanding/filling. Any way this nice gash was full of sanding sludge , and I did not notice until I cleaned it off. I have since added more putty and will sand it later

If I am lucky, primer and paint soon.

[phantom]

Nice job, might have to build one of those someday!

[Kurt H.]

I finished shaping and sanding, and went on to "finish" sanding down to 600 grit.

I washed the model and it is in my dish rack drying.

while the airframe was unavailable, I decided to mask the canopies, so I can work on fitting those in place.

I find this is one of the more challenging tasks, the consequences for messing up a prominent part are harsh, it can make an otherwise great model look like doo doo

in our next episode, Fitting the canopy and on to primer

Edited August 5, 2016 by Kurt H.

[speedlimit]

Nice work Kurt!

Eric

[Kurt H.]

I had time to primer this model today. Primer gives you a chance to notice issues before it is too late to fix.

Any way, primer did reveal a few problems

despite my best efforts, the canopies are not quite right

Why does hasegawa only supply the one piece canopy with only a few of the phantom variants???? why is there not a vac 1 piece canopy available?

then one other booger....

This pylon is not quite flush

I wonder how hard this would be to fix, I used CA to attach it, I wonder if I will make more of a mess than leaving it.

Oh well, I have time to think it over, since it is august in northern VA we have 400% humidity and this primer will not dry anytime soon.

till next time ....

[Niels]

I've had trouble with the pylons too - usually because the locating pins are too big for the holes in the wing. Try reducing the diameter of the pins, alternativelly remove them completelly.

[Kurt H.]

I removed the canopies, and trimmed and sanded where needed to tweak the fit. I glued them back on with testors clear parts cement. Once it sets, it does hold fairly well

Here we are after sanding. No putty was required

I am determined to have proper fitted canopies on this F-4. I am too embarrassed to show my other phantoms due to the mess I made of the canopies.

Time to stop for a bit, I am all out of my beloved mr. surfacer 1500, but more is on the way.

Edited August 13, 2016 by Kurt H.

[Kurt H.]

In the past week I re-primed and was able to start painting

here is the camo gray applied to the belly

and the tail has been painted white

the white seems to still be ever so tacky, and since I will need to mask it to paint the camo, I am holding off for now.

[Kurt H.]

I have painted the tan part of the Camo

I am going to use silly putty to mask the camo pattern. It will probably still require a few rounds of touch up.

[Mike J. Idacavage]

Hi Kurt

This is looking good! What paint are you using for the camo? I like the way it is looking on your model.

Have fun modeling

Mike

:cheers:/>

[Kurt H.]

It is mr surfacer1500 primer, and the camo is model master enamel.

[Kurt H.]

Picking up where we left off, I used silly putty and tape to mask the areas to remain tan

 

 

And painted the light green. Since the MM 34102 is bright out of the bottle, and almost fluorescent I mixed in a little of the tan to to tone it down

 

 

 

And more silly and putty and tape

 

 

and after the fs34079 and a few rounds of touch up, where I lost my mind trying to achieve  a good consistent line with different pressures and paint thickness and needles and airbrushes....

 

 

next up is the dreaded masking of the natural metal area 

Edited October 9, 2016 by Kurt H.

[Kurt H.]

The natural metal area was not as bad to mask as previous phantoms I have built. I guess I have just gotten accustomed to it

 

 

Next I primered it with Alclad black primer

 

 

and finally the base for heat staining "dark aluminum" Alclad II

 

 

The first color I tried was "airframe aluminum" but it was almost a chrome finish, so I looked around and found the dark aluminum which was more what I had in mind. I tried masking and going for more shades immediately, but it lifted the alclad so I am letting it dry for a few days.

Edited October 14, 2016 by Kurt H.