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1/48 scale Monogram/Hasegawa H&MS-12 OA-4M


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Okay... it looks like I will have to jump into this Group Build as I have just started a commission job to build a 1/48 scale OA-4M for a friend. Our Executive Director at the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum, Col. Larry Wood (now retired), was the commanding officer of H&MS-12 at MCAS Iwakuni in the late 1980s, flying the OA-4M. While there, he had taken one of the squadron's OA-4Ms to an airshow in Japan, where it was heavily photographed by some photographers who were working for Hasegawa. As a result Larry's markings were on the kits that Hasegawa released in 1/72 and 1/32 scale. Much later, the same markings were issued in a Japanese-release of the 1/48 scale Revell Monogram kit.

Larry was a long time Scooter driver, having flown 295 missions in Vietnam with VMA-211 out of Chu Lai and H&MS-11 "The Playboys" as a fast-FAC at Da Nang. He also flew the A-4 with VMA-331, VMAT-102, VMA-324, VMA-331 and as Commander of the Marine Reserve Group at Willow Grove. He flew every variant of the A-4 except the A and the Super F. The H&MS-12 OA-4M with his name on it is still on display as a gate guard at MCAS Iwakuni.

So, in honor of our boss, Col. Larry "Nickel" Wood, I'm doing his airplane...

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As per usual, the work starts with the cockpit, although in this case, I'm not doing a lot of detail work. I am building the model for a co-worker who asked that I put in the pilots (which I normally don't install), so a lot of detail like seatbelts, etc. won't show. The interior was sprayed the standard Aircraft Gray, with semi-gloss black ESCAPAC seats and green cushions. (I'd already painted the bottoms of the seats when I found out that I was going to be installing pilots, so I had to do a little scraping...) The details on the sidewalls were done in black with highlights touched up with silver Prismacolor pencil. The instrument panels were similarly done with black paint, silver pencil, and a little light blue on the horizon indicators. The CRTs were done with gloss black with an overcoat of clear green, just for a hint of color.

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Continuing on, I had to do some work on the pilots, which again is something new for me as I haven't put pilots in my aircraft in probably 30 years... The first thing I discovered is that when Monogram added the back-seater they did a whole new figure that was about 20% larger than the pilot. While it was a good figure, it was simply too big! So, I grabbed a pilot out of another Monogram OA-4M and modified the pose by raising his right arm in a wave.

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I painted the flightsuits with Modelmaster Faded Olive Drab, with RML73 Grun for the oxygen mask and Marine Corps Green for the Nomex gloves. The helmets are gloss white with gloss black visors and the boots were flat black. I then coated them with Dullcoat lacquer and washed them with a Mig grey wash. I then did a little dry brushing with light grey to pick out the highlights on the figures. Lastly I added a red circle with a yellow inner circle on the right shoulder for a squadron patch. Pilots are good to go.

While waiting for the pilots to dry through their various coats of paint, I assembled the wing and landing gear sub-assemblies. I sprayed the wheel wells and gear Tamiya gloss white and then used the Mig wash again to help pop the details.

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Then I installed the nose gear well, the cockpits and pilot's instrument panel. Next bit of fun will be closing up the fuselage after I get the pilots in place in their seats.

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Gotta love 3-day weekends! One extra day to work on a model, woo hoo! Got the pilots in the cockpit, sealed the fuselage, sanded the seams and added the horizontal stabilizers. Still a little filler work to do on the underside of the nose and tail.

Wings and landing gear are dry-fitted at this point, but it's beginning to look like a Scooter....

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Just a few pictures of the subject aircraft and our boss, Larry Wood. The one shot shows the van that H&MS-12 had for the squadron's use, painted up with the CO's markings, with Larry doing the hand-over to his successor as squadron commander.

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In the bottom photo, you can see his name Lt. Col. Wood "Nickel" just under the canopy rail... same markings as the Hasegawa kits.

Edited by swbailey
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  • 2 weeks later...

Have not had a lot of time since the last entry, but did get a couple small things accomplished. I cut the solid plastic gunsight off and added one from clear sheet stock, and added a little strip stock behind the back seat to fill in a gap. Next I glued the wing into place and added the slats. Amazingly the fit of the wing to fuselage is pretty good and it will only take a little bit of Mr. Surfacer 500 to clean up the minor gaps.

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I'll be taking a break for the Oregon Historic Modelers Society contest at the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum this weekend, but looking forward to getting back to the project after the show.

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  • 2 months later...

After a long hiatus (far too long) I am back to work on the OA-4M, and hopefully will get it done before the end of the group build. I ran into a bit of trouble with the canopy, as the forward windscreen is too wide for the fuselage and it takes a bit of putty to fare it into the fuselage. Then, the fit of the main canopy is problematic as well. This wouldn't be an issue, except that the model is being built with the canopy closed. There is going to be a little bit of filling needed to take care of the gaps. Also installed the refueling probe, although this always worries me as I tend to be a "ham-fisted" modeler and am sure to break it off at least once before I'm done.

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Before closing things up, I made sure to add a red decal stripe to the pilot's helmet, after showing the build to Larry. He mentioned that his helmet had the red stripe across about a third of its width, so I just had too add it!

I also added some linkages in the flaps made from parts from the spares box, and finished up filling the seams on the fuel tanks and re-scribing the panel lines.

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Soon, it will be on to painting!

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Edited by swbailey
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Naw... it will stay Marine Corps. But I do have to do something Coast Guard related in the near future. Next year is the 100th Anniversary of Coast Guard Aviaiton! (Besides, having a step-son who is a former Marine, and our former boss, Larry Wood being a Marine has given me an appreciation for the Corps. :rolleyes:

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  • 2 months later...

Even though the Group Build has been over for a month and a half, I am still working on my OA-4M project and decided to post the latest pictures in case anyone wants to look. I've been tied up with work, and my garage building area gets extremely cold in the winter (even with a space heater) so building has been very slow. However, I have made a bit of progress this weekend.

The canopy was glued in place, which took a bit of work, since it was one of the worst fitting parts of the whole build. The kit really wasn't designed for the canopy to be closed, so the fit is not the greatest. If I had thought it out ahead, I would have cut the lip off the inside of the windscreen, which would have allowed the main canopy to fit better. As it was, there were a lot of gaps which I filled with Perfect Plastic Putty. It was the first time I tried this and it worked out well. It's water soluble, so I was able to smooth it with a damp q-tip and lightly sanded after it was dry.

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Once the canopy was on, filled and sanded, I masked it with my usual standard; Bare Metal foil, along with a little Tamiya tape.

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Then, the paint began to flow...

I airbrushed the canopy frame flat black, and as long as I was at it, I dialed down the pressure and started spraying the panel lines for pre-shading. I know it looks terrible, but I love the subtle effects of the darkened panel lines after the final coat of paint goes down.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Continuing on with the OA-4M and making a bit of progress... Today, I masked off the wheel wells and sprayed the underside of the aircraft.

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The underside is painted FS 36492 Light Gray. Working slowly, from the inside of the panels, out to the panel lines that were pre-shaded, I was able to do a fair job of delineating the panels.

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Next up, the Light Ghost Grey, after a bit of masking when the paint has had some time to dry.

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A productive day at the workbench!

I got the OA-4M masked, and shot the Light Ghost Gray on the fuselage sides and on the trailing edge areas of the wings and horizontal stabilizers. After it dried for a little while, I went and free-hand shot the Dark Ghost Gray on the upper areas of the fuselage and on the major portions of the wings and stabilizers. At first I couldn't tell where the Light Ghost Gray ended and the Dark Ghost Gray started, but as the paint dried, the effect became more visible. Still, it was nice and subtle, the way it should be. Just enough of the pre-shading shows through too, to give the effect I wanted. I'm not one for heavy weathering under most circumstances, so I like it to be understated.

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Next step, a gloss coat before decals.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Another weekend and more progress!

After getting all the paint on the bird, I applied several coats of Future acrylic clear coat; shooting it straight, with no thinning through the airbrush. After a day to dry, I headed into decaling it. The markings are from the Hasegawa/Revell release which was issued in Japan. I haven't used Hasegawa's kit decals very often, and I had a little bit of trepidation over using them, as I'd only have one shot at it. Luckily, the decals went down easily, although they took forever to release from the backing paper, even in very warm water. A little bit of Micro Sol worked well in getting them to snuggle down into the details.

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The very last decal onto the model was the one that meant the most... the one that says "Lt. Col. Wood: Nickel." With that it officially became Larry's bird.

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Next, another overcoat with clear, before I head into final detail painting and weathering. Should be done soon!

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  • 2 months later...

Well, we're getting closer to done. Hopefully this week! I've just started modeling again, after a month long hiatus as I moved from Oregon to Galveston, Texas to become the new curator at the Lone Star Flight Museum. Now that I have a place to settle and a solid table to work on, I have made progress with the OA-4M.

This weekend I was able to do some washes with MiG Products Cold Gray Wash, and weathering a Micron water soluable calligraphy pen. After that, I added the drop tanks and replaced a couple gear doors that had come loose during the trans-continental trip. Then, I sprayed it with Testors Dullcote to knock down the gloss and seal everything up.

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Once the Dullcote was dry, I removed the Bare Metal foil masking off the canopy. As always, it stuck down fast and I needed to scrape it off with soft wooden toothpicks and my fingernail. Once the BMF was off, I went back with Goo-Gone and cotton swabs to clean the adhesive off and get the canopy to sparkle again.

Next I glued on the landing gear and the AGM-45 Shrike missiles. I had added some striping from my decal spares box, as the kit doesn't supply any markings for the weapons.

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With all that done, I have just a few more small things to do, including: painting the pitot tube on the tail and the Angle of Attack indicator on the left side of the nose, painting and installing the gun barrels, painting the red beacon on the belly, and adding a blade antenna to the top of the electronics hump. I still want to do a little weathering to simulate oil and hydraulic stains that give the A-4 character! As several A-4 pilots have told me, if it isn't leaking, that means it's out of something, and that's bad.

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It's DONE! I finally finished up all the little details and the weathering on Larry Wood's H&MS-12 OA-4M Skyhawk. Only five months late for the group build; but better late than sitting on the shelf of eternal unfinishedness. Now, it will await it's return to Oregon, where it will be handed over to it's new owner. :rolleyes:

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Thanks all for the wonderful comments that everyone provided during the build! It was a pleasure to build and one of my best to date... I've got the decals to do a Brazilian AF-1A, and I've got another Monogram OA-4M on the shelf, and now I have "experience." But then again, I have a whole lot of other ones in the "in progress" pile.

Cheers!

Edited by swbailey
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