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Academy F-4B Phantom II 1/48: smoke(r) on the water...


Sebastien

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Hi folks,

Here goes the WIP for my (I hope) Phabulous Phantom from Academy.

The cockpit is quite nice. I painted it FS36231 using Lifecolor (I strongly dislike this brand, can't get the thinning right, so I blame my incompetence on the paint...), Humbrol gloss black and clear red, and the details were highlited using a tubular pen with a 0.13 tip and white and red inks:

f-4b001.JPG

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img]http://su22m4.free.fr/f-4b/f-4b008.JPG[/img]

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The front wheel well is made of 5 parts that go under the cockpit floor:

f-4b005.JPG

The cockpit is then glued to the front part of the belly:

f-4b007.JPG

The bely is then assembled. I used standard glue, and strengthened the joint with CA glue:

f-4b010.JPG

f-4b011.JPG

I just put the fuselage on top of the assembly. The multiolored plastic reminds a wee bit of Matchbox:

f-4b012.JPG

Next: main wheel wells, intakes and nozzles.

Cheers,

S.

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Looking good so far, this is one on my hit-list for 2013 so I'll be keen to see how it turns out.

Interesting that Academy have chosen to have a drop in panel where the IFR point on other marks of Phantom is located... Hopefully this means a whole range of every mark of Phantom! 2013 could be a BAD year for my wallet!

Nik

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Looking good so far, this is one on my hit-list for 2013 so I'll be keen to see how it turns out.

Interesting that Academy have chosen to have a drop in panel where the IFR point on other marks of Phantom is located... Hopefully this means a whole range of every mark of Phantom! 2013 could be a BAD year for my wallet!

Nik

Great - a WIP for this one....! I'll start mine within the next days.

There's enough stuff in the box to indicate a whole Phantom Family - 4 different fin caps, 4 different Sidewinders, USAF IFR and nose wheel front door, long engine nozzles, slotted and non-slotted stabilators, 4 under-radome-bulges, etc. ...all in the box.

The "parts-not-used" list contains around 80 parts.

Edited by Ingo Degenhardt
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Great - a WIP for this one....! I'll start mine within the next days.

There's enough stuff in the box to indicate a whole Phantom Family - 4 different fin caps, 4 different Sidewinders, USAF IFR and nose wheel front door, long engine nozzles, slotted and non-slotted stabilators, 4 under-radome-bulges, etc. ...all in the box.

The "parts-not-used" list contains around 80 parts.

That's great news about all the spare bits and pieces! Sounds promising indeed for the whole Phantom Phamily coming out.

Of course this does now create the problem of what markings to choose - with an aircraft like the Phantom there is so much scope for special schemes and even some of the more interesting 'standard' schemes it could be a real headache!

Nik

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Looking good, and great to hear that there are more marks in the pipeline from the 'do not use' list. It does mean my Hase Phantoms may lose their value, but I am enjoying the resurgence of new kits in general.

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Small progress on the Phantom.

Here are the exhausts: three parts each, painted Tamiya NATO black and drybrushed with white. The nozzles will be painted stainless steel and weathered to give them, I hope, a burned metal aspect.

f-4b013.JPG

The intakes are off-white. A bit of puttying is needed inside the ducts, but not much:

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The intake duct from above.The compressor first stage is Tamiya TS30 with a black oil wash:

f-4b015.JPG

The intake ducts are installed:

f-4b016.JPG

A rough idea of the completed fuselage:

f-4b017.JPG

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Hi Sebastien,

Looks like a very promising build!!

How's the cockpit's side panels quality? I'm asking this since the rest of the kit (so far) seems to have a good level of details quality.

Keep up the good work.

Cheers

Sernak

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Hi Sebastien,

Looks like a very promising build!!

How's the cockpit's side panels quality? I'm asking this since the rest of the kit (so far) seems to have a good level of details quality.

Keep up the good work.

Cheers

Sernak

Thanks Sernak.

The cockpit walls are absent except for the rear starboard one..

Cheers,

S.

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Looks great so far, but, are you modeling the aircraft inverted with 45 degrees of bank? Only the artificial horizon on the instrument panel would suggest you are. A small detail I know but it does stand out because of your great painting.

Artificial horizon instruments often "tumble" when the aircraft isn't powered up, since there isn't anything to keep the gyro spinning. I did the same thing on a A-7 model I built years ago, a friend's father, who maintained Corsair IIs in the USAF noticed the detail and was impressed that I knew to do that.

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Ooooooo got to get one of these new Phantoms. And youve made a cracking start there, i'll be watching this one closly.

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Thanks!

Some progress: the upper surface of the wings have been glued.

First one in place:

f-4b018.JPG

Same thing, from the other side:

f-4b019.JPG

The fuselage simply put on top of the wing:

f-4b020.JPG

Now, the nozzles.

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Some more progress today.

First, the nozzles got a coat of Gunze super metallic Super Stainless, before a black wash. Then I sprayed heavily thinned Gunze blue and red, before spraying a black wash (well, I had some and no thinned black, so...):

f-4b021.JPG

The nozzles glued in place, with the heat shield (I guess it is the heat shield anyway) between them:

f-4b022.JPG

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Then, the fuselage is glued on top of all that. Some putty is needed on the right fuselage to wing joint, but nothing major:

f-4b024.JPG

f-4b025.JPG

f-4b026.JPG

To be continued (soon, I hope).

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I needed a little bit of 1mm thick plastic card to get the intakes to match the fuselage contour:

f-4b027.JPG

Then, with a little persuasion, everything went quite smoothly:

f-4b028.JPG

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I really like the job Academy engineers did designing this kit.

The wing tips just fall in place at the right angle and without any troublesome joint (joint I strongly dislike on Hasegawa kits, for instance).

Now with its wingtips and rear section:

f-4b031.JPG

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f-4b033.JPG

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Sebastian,

Marvelous stuff ..MY favorite jet...

Thank you for such a lovely build.cant wait for the result..

Woo hoo..

Thank you for your comment, but I'm afraid you'll have to wait a bit.

I've destroyed two quite bovious decals: the 200 that goes on the left of the nose, and the right hand "Danger Jet Intake" red chevron.

I'm trying to get spare...

This is the current status of the model:

f-4b044.JPG

f-4b045.JPG

Meanwhile, I'm working on something quite a bit more exotic.

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