1/72nd Zvezda AC-130J "GHOSTRIDER" 4th SOS

[A-10 LOADER]

"Is there a reason didn't you paint the camo for the aircrew ?"

At this scale I didn't think I could pull it off, it would be hard for me to do it in 1/48th let alone 72nd.

Steve

[HERC164]

Love the progress on the Ghostrider! Nice catch on the blister on the right side. No need to camo the aircrew as the desert and olive flight suits are still in use.

[aircommando130]

Great job on the AC-J! I've been in a couple of them here at Kirtland since the

gunship crews go through J model academics here. I think the flight deck has 

2 CSO's side by side with no bunk up against FS 245. The microwave is there

though! You can use prop blur for the turning props. Having both MC and HC 

crews in the 415th SOS here the MC crews pretty much fly in OCP's and the HC

crews wear flight suits. I was a MC-130P loadmaster at Kadena in the 17th SOS

and now it's a AC-J gunship squadron at Cannon. I need to build one to go with 

the 17th SOS AC-119 when it was a gunship squadron in Vietnam. That new gunship

is pretty lethal. Will watch your progress as it develops to own the night.

 

Cheers...Ron

[ST0RM]

6 hours ago, A-10 LOADER said:

At this scale I didn't think I could pull it off

Not with that attitude... LMAO
Looking great Steve. 

[A-10 LOADER]

1 hour ago, aircommando130 said:

Great job on the AC-J! I've been in a couple of them here at Kirtland since the

gunship crews go through J model academics here. I think the flight deck has 

2 CSO's side by side with no bunk up against FS 245. The microwave is there

though! You can use prop blur for the turning props. Having both MC and HC 

crews in the 415th SOS here the MC crews pretty much fly in OCP's and the HC

crews wear flight suits. I was a MC-130P loadmaster at Kadena in the 17th SOS

and now it's a AC-J gunship squadron at Cannon. I need to build one to go with 

the 17th SOS AC-119 when it was a gunship squadron in Vietnam. That new gunship

is pretty lethal. Will watch your progress as it develops to own the night.

 

Cheers...Ron

Thanks Ron, greatly appreciated. Yeah, the kit cockpit isn't 100% correct for the AC-J model. Actually since the fit of the kit is so good the props are made to be "moveable".  They give you a backing plate that the spinner fits on to that supposed to rotate, we'll see. Since I'm having such a hard time coming up with something that looks good for my EP-3's spinning props, I chose to just go with the kit parts and hopefully they'll spin with a fan blowing over them 🤞, for pictures.

Steve

[A-10 LOADER]

14 minutes ago, ST0RM said:

Not with that attitude... LMAO
Looking great Steve. 

😆 Thanks Jeff.

Steve

[UberDaveToo]

Looks like a good start. I have ancient Italeri A model, "Nam, baby!" It'll be a minute before I can get to work on it, due to current commitments.

 

'OPERATION "DELIBERATE GUARD", "SOUTHERN WATCH", "ENDURING FREEDOM" AND, "IRAQI FREEDOM" VETERAN.'

 

...I'm a Carter era vet, the only thing going on out there was "Operation Eagle Claw," I'm glad I missed that one. The only thing else going on back then was keeping close tabs on Ivan...

[A-10 LOADER]

This might not look like much but, this took me most of the day to finish. I had to walk away from time to time because I was getting very frustrated but, the pilot's side HUD is installed. Looking at the windshield it's very noticeable so, I had to add it. Sometimes I'm my own worst enemy. Close enough for government work but, more importantly, it shows thru the proper pain of glass. I still need to come up with something for the pilot and co-pilot's forward looking HUD's but, that will have to wait until my replacement windshield shows up.

Steve

 

 

 

 

 

 

Like my EP-3, the inside of the windows got some paint as per my reference pics. Getting closer to closing up the fuselage.

Edited February 4, 2024 by A-10 LOADER

[uncarina]

I’m learning a lot here! Nice work.

 

Cheers,  Tom

[A-10 LOADER]

Thank you Tom.

 

Today I worked on the "beaver tail" for the Gunship. The one in the kit is not appropriate for the AC-J. I had already added the sensors to the back of it and while I was dry-fitting it to the fuselage, I noticed according to my reference pics, it was too long. I decided to shorten the "beaver tail" by cutting a section out of the middle and grafting the remaining sections back together. The tape helped me with keeping my cuts straight but, they were not at 90 degrees, I REALLY struggle with this. This required me to add a .015" shim on the top edge which brought things back to level on top. I also had to add .015"plastic to the bottom because there was a step between the two pieces. Finally a small strip of .010" plastic to represent the attachment area where the end part attaches to the "beaver tail", as per my reference pics. Now that it's shorter it looks much better.

All of this would have been easier without those disks in the way. I figured I'd try doing all this with them in place. It still needs work but, the basic shape is there. After some primer we'll see how it looks, I still may have to redo those disks if the seams don't disappear.

Steve

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Lasinaatti]

Nice job with the tail.

 

A bit disappointed with Zvezda when it comes to details on the J model. The fit of the kit is great but there's a lot of stuff you have to scratch build/fix. At first I figured these were exclusive to the Gunship variant but the regular J has them as well, which is weird since they already released a regular J as well.

[A-10 LOADER]

Thanks very much. I stumbled upon your build on Britmodeler yesterday and your making nice progress on her so far. I thought your aircrew looked really good and I like what you built for the interior.

Steve

[A-10 LOADER]

Gunship update for today,

I glued in the main cabin floor/cockpit, the 105mm and, the plastic sleeve to the port side fuselage half. I used JB Weld 5 minute epoxy, where the sleeve attaches to the fuselage roof and cabin floor for a good, strong bond since the entire aircraft will be hanging on this point. The fuselage halves are not glued together as of yet and again, everything just fits so nicely.

Steve

 

 

 

 

[A-10 LOADER]

I know this is a long shot but, you don't know until you ask right ? So here goes, I'm in need of the spinner nose (part #E17) and the hub (part #E18) for my AC-130J build. I had a bit of a disaster and now they are unusable. I thinking maybe someone who built a 6 bladed J model used aftermarket engines and props ? I contacted Zvezda and asked them if I could purchase two new E sprues but, they said " Unfortunately, we can't help you with your request. We can only replace parts that have been broken/went missing during production, like your earlier request of C2."

I'm in the USA if anyone can help me, thanks all.

Steve

[HERC164]

Steve-

Great catch on the details, the firing HUD, the right side blister and the beaver tail. Looking really great so far! Looking forward to more.

 

[A-10 LOADER]

18 hours ago, HERC164 said:

Steve-

Great catch on the details, the firing HUD, the right side blister and the beaver tail. Looking really great so far! Looking forward to more.

 

Thanks HERC appreciate that.

 

I finally got the fuselage halves glued together last night. I chose to add some .030" plastic strips to help aid with the up/down alignment, now I just had to focus on holding the hales together as I glued. I took it slow and worked small areas at a time, like I usually do. The less sanding the better especially on this soft plastic. Once again, everything just fit perfectly. Once the seams are finalized I'll start adding all the antennas, I'll have to scratch-build a few the kit left out, and other items to the rest of the aircraft. Thanks to all who are following along.

Steve

 

 

 

 

[RichB63]

The fuselage looks great all buttoned up. Nice work Steve!

Rich

[Lasinaatti]

looking great with the fuselage together. Bummer about those props! Got any more info on what happened? Perhaps pictures? Are you planning on getting an AM set?

 

I'm also curious on hearing what colors you're planning on going with. I know the official colors for AFSOC stuff but models don't always work the same way when it comes to colors. Just got the orca scheme down on my build & I'm quite happy with AK's Gunship Gray & Light Gull Gray.

[A-10 LOADER]

On 9/9/2023 at 1:30 PM, RichB63 said:

The fuselage looks great all buttoned up. Nice work Steve!

Rich

Thanks very much Rich.

23 hours ago, Lasinaatti said:

looking great with the fuselage together. Bummer about those props! Got any more info on what happened? Perhaps pictures? Are you planning on getting an AM set?

 

I'm also curious on hearing what colors you're planning on going with. I know the official colors for AFSOC stuff but models don't always work the same way when it comes to colors. Just got the orca scheme down on my build & I'm quite happy with AK's Gunship Gray & Light Gull Gray.

I knocked over my small tub of lacquer thinner, that I use to clean the airbrush parts with and, it drenched the props which became deformed 😡. Needless to say that painting session was over.

I did a search and didn't see any AM 6 bladed props for this kit.

The colors will be Model Master enamel Gunship Gray FS36118 and, FS 36293 made by LVP Paints. These are the actual FS colors on the AC-J's.

Steve

[utley]

I used to build the wings for these aircraft in Marietta, cant wait to see this one finished!

[uncarina]

https://www.avm-scalemodels.com/producto/c-130-np2000-propeller-system-1-72/

 

Cheers,  Tom

[A-10 LOADER]

13 minutes ago, uncarina said:

https://www.avm-scalemodels.com/producto/c-130-np2000-propeller-system-1-72/

 

Cheers,  Tom

These are not the correct ones for the AC-J, the AC-J has the Allison turbo props with six blades.

Steve

44 minutes ago, utley said:

I used to build the wings for these aircraft in Marietta, cant wait to see this one finished!

Very cool, thanks.

Steve

[Lasinaatti]

Looks like you found some new props after all... and they've already shipped! 

 

Still missing the spinners though 😆

[jenshb]

For an in flight propeller aircraft I think it looks better with the spinner sanded smooth than seeing stationary blades.  The camera on a short shutter speed may freeze the blades, but what your eyes will see is just a slightly darker than ambient circle.

[A-10 LOADER]

With all the seams addressed I started on the fuselage modifications. I wasn't really sure if I was going to tackle this but, here we are. My reference pics show a lot of reinforced areas on the AC-J's. I used Evergreen .010" sheet plastic, which I sanded down slightly with some 400 grit, before applying the pieces. I'll sand them down a little more before the primer coat. There's still more to do but, I got a pretty good jump on the air-frame today. I'm hoping my replacement windshield shows up soon.

Steve

 

 

 

 

I added the anti collision light to the top of the tail so I could gauge the height of the tail antenna ??, I believe that's what it is. This was made using a section of 1/16" rod that I drilled and added a piece of .031" brass wire then drilled the tail and glued it in place.

Edited September 12, 2023 by A-10 LOADER