1/48 Tamiya F-14A

[jbryan911]

12 hours ago, Jay Chladek said:

 

666 as it appeared in 1987 may not quite work, but it was part of VF-111 earlier than that. There are a few excellent VF-111 candidates that could be done in the gull gray scheme from the kit. They stood up in 1978 and had jets without the L brackets at least early on. They are block 100 jets, which should be more or less identical to the Tamiya kit configuration. Some possible candidates from Dave Brown's book include (according to the dates they were photographed):

 

160670 #202 (June 1980) No L brackets

160672 #203 No L brackets (crashed in 1979 before it could get them)

160664 #213 (10 May 1982)

160665 (not sure about the nose #) delivered June 1978

160666 (not sure about the nose #) delivered June 1978

160676 #205 (March 1979) no L brackets

160680 #207 no L brackets

160684 #211 (March 1979) no L brackets

160686 #212

160688 #213 (March 1979) no L brackets

160690 #202 (April 17, 1982) might have brackets

 

 I've got some parts from 160690 from the Tomcat Sunset build. It's been on my to do list, looks like it might get moved up soon. 

 

[Alpagueur]

161621 (Miss Molly) has the L brackets?

[Anders_Isaksson]

On 2016-10-11 at 9:42 PM, Darren Roberts said:

It's been delivered to Sprue Bros. Now it's just a matter of them getting them into the system. It should be a matter of days.

Had a look but nothing up on Sprue Bros yet.

 But I'll keep checking. :)

[82Whitey51]

If I wanted to build that VF-32 bird (with the Bicentennial stripes on the tail, a/c 220, BuNo 159612)...can it be built from the Tamiya kit? It's an earlier block without the nose pitot tube (an option in the kit according to the VF-2 profile), but is the beaver tail correct for it? I'd also imagine there are no tail stiffeners and that it has the proper gun vents?

Edited October 13, 2016 by 82Whitey51

[zerosystem]

1 hour ago, Anders_Isaksson said:

Had a look but nothing up on Sprue Bros yet.

 But I'll keep checking. :)

 

The set was listed in yesterday's "new items" but apparently they sold out since.  Just add yourself to the stock notification.

[A-10 LOADER]

1 hour ago, 82Whitey51 said:

If I wanted to build that VF-32 bird (with the Bicentennial stripes on the tail, a/c 220)...can it be built from the Tamiya kit? It's an earlier block without the nose pitot tube (easy fix), but is the beaver tail correct for it? I'd also imagine there are no tail stiffeners and that it has the proper gun vents?

 

The VF-32 Bicentennial jet can be built from the Tamiya kit Whitey. This particular jet is a Block 85 aircraft.

I personally don't have the Tamiya kit although I have seen it. As long as the kits beaver tail looks like the #3 option, your good. The kits gun vents are correct as well.

[Anders_Isaksson]

19 minutes ago, zerosystem said:

 

The set was listed in yesterday's "new items" but apparently they sold out since.  Just add yourself to the stock notification.

 

Hmm, good idea but I can't even find the set at the Sprue Bros site - in stock or out of stock.

The other Steel Beach sets are listed though.

 

Can you (or anyone) please provide a link? Thanks! 

[zerosystem]

1 minute ago, Anders_Isaksson said:

Can you (or anyone) please provide a link? Thanks! 

HTH

 

http://store.spruebrothers.com/product_p/sba48162.htm

 

 

[82Whitey51]

51 minutes ago, A-10 LOADER said:

 

The VF-32 Bicentennial jet can be built from the Tamiya kit Whitey. This particular jet is a Block 85 aircraft.

I personally don't have the Tamiya kit although I have seen it. As long as the kits beaver tail looks like the #3 option, your good. The kits gun vents are correct as well.

Yes, the kit beavertail is like the No. 3 option there...and I noticed looking at sprue shots that the pointed nose part is included in the kit as one of the options is the VF-2 bird (BuNo 159625) of the same block. Cool! Thanks for the info, didn't want to blow money on decals that wouldn't match.

[Anders_Isaksson]

57 minutes ago, zerosystem said:

HTH

 

http://store.spruebrothers.com/product_p/sba48162.htm

 

 

Excellent, thanks! :)

[Darren Roberts]

5 hours ago, 82Whitey51 said:

If I wanted to build that VF-32 bird (with the Bicentennial stripes on the tail, a/c 220, BuNo 159612)...can it be built from the Tamiya kit? It's an earlier block without the nose pitot tube (an option in the kit according to the VF-2 profile), but is the beaver tail correct for it? I'd also imagine there are no tail stiffeners and that it has the proper gun vents?

One small detail to keep in mind is that on jets that don't have the alpha nose probe, there is a probe on the left fuselage just under the windscreen. The good news is that it's the same shape as the probe on the right fuselage under the canopy, and Tamiya has two of them in the kit.

[Jay Chladek]

15 hours ago, Alpagueur said:

161621 (Miss Molly) has the L brackets?

Miss Molly had brackets since it didn't come about until 1988-89. The nose art was painted on while VF-111 was attached to the Carl Vinson since the carrier's previous "Miss Molly" a C-1A Cod, was retired.

[Anders_Isaksson]

9 hours ago, Darren Roberts said:

One small detail to keep in mind is that on jets that don't have the alpha nose probe, there is a probe on the left fuselage just under the windscreen. The good news is that it's the same shape as the probe on the right fuselage under the canopy, and Tamiya has two of them in the kit.

 

A bit hesitant to ask this considering your deep knowledge on the Tomcat, but is that correct?

I had the impression that all Tomcats (regardless of version or block) had a probe on the left side.

 

Just hope I'm not confusing things here... :)

[gb_madcat_sl]

4 hours ago, Anders_Isaksson said:

 

A bit hesitant to ask this considering your deep knowledge on the Tomcat, but is that correct?

I had the impression that all Tomcats (regardless of version or block) had a probe on the left side.

 

Just hope I'm not confusing things here... :)

 

Actually I was wondering the same thing. AFAIK, the AoA probe has always been on the port side near the nose. The one that I *think* moved was the TAT probe.

 

You can see it just below the windscreen in this photo.

 

 

And it moved to just above the roundel in this one.

 

 

Mark

Edited October 14, 2016 by gb_madcat_sl

[Darren Roberts]

Good questions. It's not the AOA probe (small spiking-looking thing) I'm talking about, it's the TAT probe that madcat mentioned. I didn't think they moved it. I'll have to check some references. Initially I believe there were two of them, one on each side. I'll do some checking and edit this post with the answer.

 

Edit: In all of the pictures I've looked at, the TAT probe is present almost always when the alpha probe isn't on the nose. There is a picture of a jet that went through depot and got the alpha probe on the nose. The TAT probe was removed from the left side. There does seem to be a small group of airframes that didn't have it even without the alpha probe. The VF-2 markings in the Tamiya kit would be one of them. It appears to be the block of aircraft that got the standard gun vent. If you look at the picture in the link, you can see the probe just below the windscreen. 

 

Early Tomcat

 

In this shot, you can see the probe (looks like a black dot) on the aircraft with the original 7 holed gun vent, but the newer airframes with the standard gun vent don't have it.

 

Early Tomcat 2

Edited October 14, 2016 by Darren Roberts

[Anders_Isaksson]

1 hour ago, Darren Roberts said:

Good questions. It's not the AOA probe (small spiking-looking thing) I'm talking about, it's the TAT probe that madcat mentioned.

...

Thanks for clearing that up, Darren. I am with you now. 

[kurtd123]

Just ordered mine from Tower using a coupon code and it cost $63.99 with free shipping.  Not bad.  (I already have one on order from Lucky Model and it was significantly more expensive with shipping.)

[tosouthern66]

23 minutes ago, kurtd123 said:

Just ordered mine from Tower using a coupon code and it cost $63.99 with free shipping.  Not bad.  (I already have one on order from Lucky Model and it was significantly more expensive with shipping.)

What code did you use. When I ordered mine last week it cost me 71.99 with free shipping 

[flanker27]

yar interested to know the code too :D

[jacobp51]

Hope you guys don't mind answering another one - the collective expertise here is inspiring!  How about the VF-33 bird on this Furball sheet? I'm guessing by 1992 something was modified on the airframe beyond what's in the Tamiya box.

 

[Darren Roberts]

4 minutes ago, jacobp51 said:

Hope you guys don't mind answering another one - the collective expertise here is inspiring!  How about the VF-33 bird on this Furball sheet? I'm guessing by 1992 something was modified on the airframe beyond what's in the Tamiya box.

 

 

 

I just painted my Tomcat for that very VF-33 scheme. You'll need a NACA gun vent and the L shaped tail brackets. That particular airframe didn't have the Block 125 upgrade, but many of VF-33's jets did. I'm working on the NACA vent now. Hopefully I'll get it done in the next week or so.

[jacobp51]

14 minutes ago, Darren Roberts said:

 

 

I just painted my Tomcat for that very VF-33 scheme. You'll need a NACA gun vent and the L shaped tail brackets. That particular airframe didn't have the Block 125 upgrade, but many of VF-33's jets did. I'm working on the NACA vent now. Hopefully I'll get it done in the next week or so.

 

 

Thank you very much, Darren!  Good to know I can build the kit almost straight out of the box. Do you happen have any good top-down references you can share of the anti-glare profile around the canopy?  The sheet reference does not show it for some reason.  probably easy enough to extrapolate, but I always like good references to work from.

 

Your products are superb.  I'll look for the upgrades when they're ready.

[kurtd123]

3 hours ago, tosouthern66 said:

What code did you use. When I ordered mine last week it cost me 71.99 with free shipping 

I just googled "Tower Hobby Coupon Code" and found a $15 off code.  You never know if they will work, but this one did.  Unfortunately it isn't displayed on the invoice, but I think it was this one:  01A39

[Don]

4 hours ago, kurtd123 said:

Just ordered mine from Tower using a coupon code and it cost $63.99 with free shipping...

Now that's a score! I already have two but boy at that price its tempting...

[Brian P: Fightertown Decals]

For that VF-33 you'll also need the standard wheels. Tamiya kit comes with early wheels 1972-1977. 

 

Staring in 77/78, you need to check for standard wheels and by 1980 there were only a small handful of jets that still had the old wheels. 

 

I did notice the Tamiya kit comes with a pair of tall Tacan antennas, on all F-14B/D jets and A's starting in 1991...

 

FYI - on checking aircraft by buno, hat works great for delivery jets but on the A, those jets were updated over the years so just having a buno won't tell you how the jet was equipped over time. You need the timeframe as well.

 

Standard wheels and rudder braces came out in 1977/78. 

 

Im having a tough time deciding what to build my first Tamiya Tomcat as. Thinking VX-4 Vandy 1 all black (Fightertown Decals 48058) or VF-24 Rage 200 (Fightertown Decaks 48001)...