Good F-111 kit in 1/48

[VF-x]

I'm thinking about building an F-111. However, I don't know which kits are good. As far as I understand, there are only two players in 1/48th scale: Academy and ZD. Are there any others? Which one is the better kit? <- I'm guessing Academy at this time.

TIA

VF-x

[MoFo]

Zhengdefu is a poor quality copy of the Academy kit. Best to ignore it.

Academy's Vark isn't bad. Detail's pretty sparse (Verlinden does a cockpit, Scaledown does... everything else), fit is generally okay, though the fore/aft fuselage join needs scraping, filling and sanding. There's also some accuracy niggles, particularly with the intake arrangement on some versions, and the exhaust/boat tail/fuel dump area. Even still, it's far and away the best choice in the scale.

If you're not stuck on 1/48, Hasegawa's 1/72 kits are very nice, and probably the best -111s in any scale.

[fulcrum]

Definitively Academy kit is the best option i have FB-111 and planning to build the F-111G in RAAF markings someday!

Greetings from Peru.

[habu2]

Well there are the old old old Aurora and Monogram molds, but they aren't worth looking for IMO.

Yes the Zhengdefu**up kits are extremely poor copies of the Academy kits.

[toadwbg]

This aircraft needs a new tool in 1/48th. It's been on my wishlist for years.

[HokieSNFO]

stay away from the Hobbycraft F-111s too

[Julien (UK)]

I would add that not all ZD Kits are very poor copies, they just need some work, after all even the Academey ones nedd a good deal to make them look good.

I have a ZD EF-111 and it is not to bad a copy at all, the actual surface of the kit is a bit rough but the pannel lines are deep enough to take a light sanding.

If like me you are intending to use a black box cockpit and aftermarket decals then £5 for a ZD kit is better than £20 for an Academey one.

I would highly recomend the scale down stuff as well, very high quality resin, especially the wheels and burner cans.

Julien

[VF-x]

I would like to build a F-111 with bombs loaded in its bay. I just visited a nearby hobby store. They had the Academy/Minicraft (btw... who the h*ll is Minicraft???) EF-111 on hand. It was pretty beaten up and looked pretty old. Does anyone have any opinions about this kit?

[MoFo]

Minicraft is Academy (and Hasegawa, and Tamiya)'s former importer.

The EF-111 is the same as the F-111 kit, with an added sprue for the new tail, canoe fairing and various antennae. Not a good choice for a bombed up Vark though - don't think the EF ever carried anything other than jammer pods.

[Murph]

I would like to build a F-111 with bombs loaded in its bay.

For conventional weapons, I believe that was rare. Nukes might have been another matter. I would suggest checking with mrvark here on ARC; he flew the real thing.

Regards,

Murph

[mrvark]

If you go to

http://www.clubhyper.com/referenc.htm

and scroll almost halfway down the list you'll find a series of articles I did on various F-111 topics. The short answer is that there is no good option for an accurate F-111 in 1/48th scale. The quickest way to get to a good F-111 model is to do one of the 1/72nd offerings from Monogram (EF-111A) or Hasegawa (any).

However, one major problem that exists in any kit that is not easily fixed is that when F-111s were parked, their weapons bays were always open (unless someone screwed up the checklist or they were at an airshow). Stephen Thrum of Scaledown

http://www.f-111.net/scaledown/index.htm

keeps promising a weapons bay for the Academy kit, but his day job is keeping him fully occupied at the moment (something about paying the rent or feeding the family). He already has many other bits available to fix other glaring errors with the Academy kit. Unfortunately, no fix for the intakes yet either...

As per your wish to load the weapon bay, the only weapons that were ever loaded there were AIM-9Bs during Combat Lancer (1 per jet adjacent to 20mm gun), the M61 20mm gun, and B61 and/or B43 "crowd pleasers" (with inboard B61s and outboard tanks). The FBs may have done something else, but not the Fs. No conventional weapons were ever qualified for use from the bay.

BTW, if you want to see the most brightly painted F-111G I've seen in a LONG while, go take a peak at

http://www.f-111.net/

Cheers,

[VF-x]

Thank you for all the information. I'm really glad there is a forum like this where we can discuss kits. I've decided to wait on the F-111 project. It doesn't sound like the kits available are really to my liking. I'd be all over the Academy kit if it had a bomb bay, or if someone made an aftermarket kit for it. However, since that doesn't look like its happening anytime soon, I'll pass on the F-111. I like the plane, just not the kits out on the market.

Cheers