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Hmmmm, Meng 1/48 F-4G?


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2 hours ago, ElectroSoldier said:

I know the Mavrick missile was common on Wild weasels but was it common for it to be carried on the triple rail LAU-88?

If so how was it loaded?

Not super common, but 2 Maverick's on a triple launcher was a valid load. middle and outer rail loaded.

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On 12/30/2022 at 11:25 PM, JeffreyK said:

...I had totally missed the fact that ZM didn't mould the slime lights onto the fuselage. Since they tooled an entirely new fuselage for the G kit that's inexplicable.

Otherwise, I still prefer the ZM kit overall. There are too my small issues here and ther on the Meng kit. There certainly are some on the ZM kit as well but on the balance sheet ZM wins for me. But others' mileage may vary.

J


ZM tooled a new wing for their G, not a new fuselage. The fuselage sprue is common with their early E kit

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5 hours ago, mawz said:


ZM tooled a new wing for their G, not a new fuselage. The fuselage sprue is common with their early E kit

No, the fuselage is not from the E kit. All G specific antenna mods are moulded on and they deleted the nose gun gas vents on the sides. The CAD is of course a common source but the tooling is new.

J

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5 hours ago, JeffreyK said:

No, the fuselage is not from the E kit. All G specific antenna mods are moulded on and they deleted the nose gun gas vents on the sides. The CAD is of course a common source but the tooling is new.

J


Check again, the lower gun housing is separate parts on both the E and G. They actually ask you to do a bit of filling on the fuselage to remove certain E-specific panels on the nose of the G.

I’m building the ZM G now, the fuselage sprue is the same sprue as the E part, and includes E specific tail antenna on the sprue. The most they seem to have done is had a G-specific sprue inserts used in the nose in 2 spots (the vent and the 3 nose antenna per side). The rest of the fuselage is the E and the sprue is clearly not G specific.

Sprue A, B,C, E, F, I, L, M , N, R & S are common between the Early E and G kits.
Sprues D & G are Early E only
Sprues H & J are unique to the G (for now, H is clearly also intended for a slatted early E, including some tooling to support a TISEO pod among other small items)

G & H are the wings. D & J are various specific parts. J is the lower nose pod, HARM’s, Tail antenna and some cockpit—specific bits, D is a smaller sprue with  aft cockpit bits and a few other specific bits.

Edited by mawz
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3 hours ago, mawz said:


Check again, the lower gun housing is separate parts on both the E and G. They actually ask you to do a bit of filling on the fuselage to remove certain E-specific panels on the nose of the G.

I’m building the ZM G now, the fuselage sprue is the same sprue as the E part, and includes E specific tail antenna on the sprue. The most they seem to have done is had a G-specific sprue inserts used in the nose in 2 spots (the vent and the 3 nose antenna per side). The rest of the fuselage is the E and the sprue is clearly not G specific.

Sprue A, B,C, E, F, I, L, M , N, R & S are common between the Early E and G kits.
Sprues D & G are Early E only
Sprues H & J are unique to the G (for now, H is clearly also intended for a slatted early E, including some tooling to support a TISEO pod among other small items)

G & H are the wings. D & J are various specific parts. J is the lower nose pod, HARM’s, Tail antenna and some cockpit—specific bits, D is a smaller sprue with  aft cockpit bits and a few other specific bits.

Will you post how the spine part fits into the fuselage and how the nose joins on please.
I would be interested to know your results.

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1 hour ago, ElectroSoldier said:

Will you post how the spine part fits into the fuselage and how the nose joins on please.
I would be interested to know your results.

 I have a small gap at the front of the spine, which I suspect is at least half due to order of assembly. I think if you put the aft canopy hinge coaming on after the spine, you have minimal issues and if you do the opposite you have real issues.

I had no issues with the radome, but the lower wing/nose section to nose section was challenging to get together right and has minor gaps.

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2 hours ago, mawz said:

 I have a small gap at the front of the spine, which I suspect is at least half due to order of assembly. I think if you put the aft canopy hinge coaming on after the spine, you have minimal issues and if you do the opposite you have real issues.

I had no issues with the radome, but the lower wing/nose section to nose section was challenging to get together right and has minor gaps.

Oh that is interesting.
I had a similar thing with the Revell Tornado when I built it, I never had the gaps or intake problems I did have some issues with the lower fuselage plate near the radome but that just needed to be blended in.

I think its starting to show there are problems to do with the parts but the order you put them together in can minimise those problems to the point of being nothing. Which is what I found on the Revell Tornado kit.

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14 hours ago, mawz said:


Check again, the lower gun housing is separate parts on both the E and G. They actually ask you to do a bit of filling on the fuselage to remove certain E-specific panels on the nose of the G.

I’m building the ZM G now, the fuselage sprue is the same sprue as the E part, and includes E specific tail antenna on the sprue. The most they seem to have done is had a G-specific sprue inserts used in the nose in 2 spots (the vent and the 3 nose antenna per side). The rest of the fuselage is the E and the sprue is clearly not G specific.

Sprue A, B,C, E, F, I, L, M , N, R & S are common between the Early E and G kits.
Sprues D & G are Early E only
Sprues H & J are unique to the G (for now, H is clearly also intended for a slatted early E, including some tooling to support a TISEO pod among other small items)

G & H are the wings. D & J are various specific parts. J is the lower nose pod, HARM’s, Tail antenna and some cockpit—specific bits, D is a smaller sprue with  aft cockpit bits and a few other specific bits.

I was talking about the louvred vent panels on the nose sides, which is why I said "sides". Not the large vents adjacent to the nose wheel well.

But I had another close look and indeed ZM utilised mould cavity insert pieces to facilitate the tooling of both the "E, early" and "G" kits from the same main tooling of the fuselage sprue. I had not noticed that before. But around the differing detail I had mentioned you can see a faint mould witness line giving away the interchangeable insert pieces. That makes me think that for their proposed "E late" release they probably won't provide moulded-on slime lights eather and rely on their rather thick plastic pieces.

Maybe I should market my vinly stock-on slime lights from my slat conversion set as a separate item...

J

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On 12/31/2022 at 3:13 AM, Ben Brown said:

I think one would have to do quite a bit of sanding to improve the keel and tail hook.

Z-M’s nose looks kind of wide compared to Meng’s.

 

A pet peeve about slime lights - why do manufacturers insist on having the lighted area sunk in below the edges of the frame? While the lights on the F-4 stood proud of the fuselage, the lit part was flush with the framed area.
 

Ben

Hhm, I have never seen a tailhook with such kind of potruding rivets. But as said, they could be sanded.

 

The nose diameter is an issue I'd love to be clarified. Who is right, ZM or Meng? That is an error which would refrain me from getting the kit which is grossly wrong. I don't point fingers at any of the two since I don't know which one is right or wrong at the moment.

 

Regarding slimelights, I guess it is the idea to allow easier filling with thick paint and still have crisp edges.

Btw, these are the measurements I took way back in time when I had daily access to the real Rhino:

Front: Outer dimensions 912mmx102mm , inner (the actual lime colored light strip) 864mm x 51mm

Fuselage: 990mm x 106mm / 940mm x 50

Tail: 1420mm x 100 / 1370mm x 50

 

B/r

Michael

Edited by SCOUT712
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7 hours ago, SCOUT712 said:

Hhm, I have never seen a tailhook with such kind of potruding rivets. But as said, they could be sanded.

 

The nose diameter is an issue I'd love to be clarified. Who is right, ZM or Meng? That is an error which would refrain me from getting the kit which is grossly wrong. I don't point fingers at any of the two since I don't know which one is right or wrong at the moment.

 

Regarding slimelights, I guess it is the idea to allow easier filling with thick paint and still have crisp edges.

Btw, these are the measurements I took way back in time when I had daily access to the real Rhino:

Front: Outer dimensions 912mmx102mm , inner (the actual lime colored light strip) 864mm x 51mm

Fuselage: 990mm x 106mm / 940mm x 50

Tail: 1420mm x 100 / 1370mm x 50

 

B/r

Michael

 

Michael, 

 

Thanks very much for posting those formation light dimensions…very helpful information! Interesting that all three strips had different outside widths.

 

Edited by RichB63
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  • 1 month later...

I was debating about what to do in Phantom world, and I've been more motivated since I've been working on my Zoukei-Mura F-4C.  If Tamiya had decided to do either a late F-4E (with slats) or F-4G on the heels of their F-4B (which I have, but have not yet built), I think I would've been happy to just get their E/G.  But since Tamiya hasn't said anything about any new F-4 variants, I placed an order for both the ZM AND the Meng F-4G planes (plus the Tamiya 1/48 F-35A). I've been mostly happy with the ZM F-4C (except for some issues with the fit of the air intake pieces), and I've been pleased with prior Meng kits I've done, so rather than agonize over which one of the F-4G planes to get, I'd just get both.  I'll be really interested to see how the intakes go together on the one piece Meng fuselage, and the updated ZM fuselage, compared to the ZM F-4C, though the Doog's videos seem to indicate a great fit.  And I'm REALLY looking forward to the slats on the wing for both.  Lastly, I can do both common F-4G paint schemes rather than have to pick one or the other.

Edited by Curt B
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So... in order to save some bandwidth on this forum, I'd rather ask you guys here than start another thread.

I'm thinking about building one of the QF-4S drones in VX-30. Wondering whether it's possible to convert the F-4J kit into an S?

I'm leaning towards using the Monogram 1/48 kit that is readily available in the stash instead of getting the Zokei-Miura kit.

Thanks in advance, and hope Dave doesn't mind my post, which I'll gladly delete if he does.

Cheers,

 

Gwen

 

 

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9 minutes ago, Gwen Phoenix said:

So... in order to save some bandwidth on this forum, I'd rather ask you guys here than start another thread.

I'm thinking about building one of the QF-4S drones in VX-30. Wondering whether it's possible to convert the F-4J kit into an S?

I'm leaning towards using the Monogram 1/48 kit that is readily available in the stash instead of getting the Zokei-Miura kit.

Thanks in advance, and hope Dave doesn't mind my post, which I'll gladly delete if he does.

Cheers,

 

Gwen

 

 


Getting an S from a J requires a fair bit of work, mostly to the wing. You can definitely get there from a J, since the originals are upgraded J's

Steel Beach used to do a conversion set, but it'll probably be easier and cheaper to just buy an S kit than to track down a conversion. 

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For a drone F-4S, you’ll need one with slats. The old Hasegawa kit is still a good option, even though it has Air Force style slats. This is easily fixed with a little styrene strip and Milliput. It won’t be up to the same level of detail as a Z-M kit without adding intakes, cockpit, and afterburners, and adding those will put you near the Z-M kit in cost. 
 

Italeri/ESCI had an F-4S, but I don’t know anything about it.
 

Edit: I just saw what Hasegawa F-4S kits are going for on eBay. Yikes! 
 

Ben

Edited by Ben Brown
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