1:72 Monogram Grumman F7F-3 Tigercat

[Brandy]

"We" don't start kits to leave them half finished now, do we? Do the decent thing! 

 

Ian

[hacker]

GET YOUR BUTT CRACKING ON THIS MISTER! 

[DMC]

10 hours ago, Navy Bird said:

Hey mates, what do you think? Should I finish this Tigercat? The Buccaneer S.1 is in the RFI forum, so I've got some time on my hands!   

 

Cheers,

Bill

 

Yes, please do.  I noted several of them for sale at Telford and was sorely tempted.  However, I have the larger AMT kit to build and need to extract the digit and get on with the ones I've got started before taking on another one. 

 

The text in this link is in Japanese and I don't think it can be translated.  At least I don't know how.  The drawings look pretty good, though, and there are a couple of photos at the end.  thought they might be of middling interest to you.

 

http://www.geocities.jp/yoyuso/f7f/f7fdraw.html

 

cheers,

 

Dennis

 

Translated:

 

http://www.microsofttranslator.com/bv.aspx?from=ja&to=en&a=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.geocities.jp%2Fyoyuso%2Ff7f%2Ff7fdraw.html

 

 

 

 

[CedB]

I usually use Google Translate for this stuff as it sometimes helps and is often amusing... Copy the text, paste it into the translate window and adjust your languages if necessary. Here's its attempt at paragraph 1: 

 

To the last update date
■ Introduction

I've been drawing drawings for "modeling" for model making. It is a stance that the model is the main and the drawing is a bonus to the last. Nonetheless, drawing is quite interesting as it draws itself. It is a task to tickle intellectual inquiry minds by reading and understanding manuals and real machine photographs and elucidating shape dimensions. So, although the model production schedule is not in a while, I will make the drawing first, and it will be. Also, for a model without a decent kit or drawing, the drawing is the best tool to show "this is really such a thing!" So, we decided to create a new drawing page on Pegasus' wing.

So, if you continue with this F7F, Grumman Cat sisters F4F, F6F, F8F, you will have to do the next.

 

Give it a try and tickle your intellectual inquiry mind...

[DMC]

Thanks, Ced, I'll do that.  Doesn't exactly flow though, does it?

 

Dennis

[keefr22]

Yes from me too Bill, & as you said you didn't want to build another white machine so soon after the Bucc., then this is almost as far in the opposite colour direction that you can get!

 

keith

[Giorgio N]

Yes please, I'd love to see this completed !

[Navy Bird]

On 11/14/2016 at 03:10, DMC said:

The text in this link is in Japanese and I don't think it can be translated.  At least I don't know how.  The drawings look pretty good, though, and there are a couple of photos at the end.  thought they might be of middling interest to you.

 

http://www.geocities.jp/yoyuso/f7f/f7fdraw.html

 

Thanks for that - the drawings are great. It's amazing how good the old Monogram kit is, there's very little difference to these drawings. I've been to his site before, he's quite an amazing modeller. Usually when he goes to the trouble of making drawings like that, he's ready to build the kit. I perused the rest of his site and didn't find a finished build of the Tigercat - maybe it's still in progress.

 

Cheers,

Bill

[giemme]

Alright, when are we going to see some action, here?    

 

Ciao

[Navy Bird]

On 11/14/2016 at 16:11, giemme said:

Alright, when are we going to see some action, here?    

 

Ciao

 

A few pages back...      

 

Cheers,

Bill

 

PS. Seriously, finishing up the rescribing now. I hate rescribing. Even more than painting white. But why do we call it rescribing? This kit has raised panel lines, nothing was scribed in the first place. I'm not rescribing, I'm just scribing.

[Navy Bird]

OK, some stuff to look at. First, I completed the rescribing of the fuselage halves. Now, be forewarned, this is going to look ugly because when it comes to rescribing, I'm about as good at it - as ISIS is at protecting archaeological treasures.   

 

 

The spots of red putty are the "oops" moments when the scriber goes skating across the styrene. The one panel line that looks grey is because I had to fill it with some Mr. Surfacer due to a rather overzealous first pass. I'm not sure, but this may look better under a coat of primer. Certainly at that point I will know just how cocked up it really is! One thing I noticed is that this old Monogram plastic (I think this was the 1970ish release of the kit) doesn't like to be scribed. The plastic is just weird - it's like there's a grain to it and you have to scribe in one direction only - but then it changes right in the middle of a panel line. 

 

You'll notice that I removed the moulded-on drop tank. Pesky thing was always in the way. And why that aerial hasn't broken off yet is a big mystery.

 

The wheel wells have had a black wash, and the tanks have been painted. I believe the aluminum tank is for water/alcohol, and the yellow for glycol. Or the other way around. I forget. In any event neither tank is in the correct position, but I really couldn't do anything about that since the aluminum tank is moulded as part of the floor of the wheel well. I painted them according to their identification in the Starfighter instructions which seem different than some photos. But then the photos don't agree with each other either, so I'll just live with them the way they are. It looks so much better than the empty space provided by Monogram! More landing gear braces, struts, and actuators are coming.

 

 

 

You may recall that the Aires detail set would have you chop off a good portion of the front of these nacelle assemblies, and build up engine bearers from their resin parts. Due to the design of the Starfighter wheel wells you can't do that easily. What I thought I would try instead is to use the Aires engine mount, putting it on the front of the unaltered nacelle. Then add the engine and front cowl ring to see if the overall length of the nacelle will be right, I mocked this up with good old Tamiya tape holding things together, and compared against the original Monogram cowling:

 

 

By some incredible stroke of luck, it looks about right! (I still can't get over the spline on the prop shaft. Crazy.) Aires provide photoetch pieces for the framework that surrounds the engine, this goes from the nacelle to the cowl ring, as well as the cooling gills which attach to the engine mount. If all goes well, this should end up looking like an aircraft whose engine covers have been removed. Idiot that I am, I'm going to do this for both engines. Aye ca-rumba! 

 

I'll have to remove the moulded in exhaust stubs, since Aires have some really nice resin exhaust pipes to use instead. Aires also have a photoetch ignition ring to add a few more bits of detail.

 

I taped the entire airframe together, including the cockpit, but without the engines/props/cowls. In this configuration, about 32 g of weight is required between the cockpit and the nose to keep her from being a tailsitter. Yikes - no clue where all that weight is going to go. I may end up with the tail sitting on a barrel - which is OK as I've seen photos of the real thing doing this. My understanding is that she was prone to tail sit without a full load and/or in a strong wind.

 

Are we having fun yet?

 

Cheers,

Bill

[Robin-42]

If memory serves. I added weight behind the engines to help. Some dremeling of the rear fuselage might help as well. If you can't add weight up front, take it off the back!

[Thom216]

Looking nice! It's cool seeing some life being breathed into an old kit, and those engines look killer.

 

[Navy Bird]

On 11/14/2016 at 20:19, Robin-42 said:

If memory serves. I added weight behind the engines to help. Some dremeling of the rear fuselage might help as well. If you can't add weight up front, take it off the back!

 

Dremeling is a good idea but there is not a lot of plastic in the back end to begin with. I'll give it a try though. Unfortunately, the new resin engines and engine mount take up the space that is normally behind the kit's engines, plus the glycol tank takes up the space in front of the landing gear inside the nacelle. I'm planning on adding weight inside of the leading edges of the wings (which doesn't gain you much because it's so close to the main landing gear pivot point), as well as packing it in the nose, under the cockpit, and behind the cockpit. I have some nice lead shot (2 mm diameter) that is small enough to get into some really tiny spots. I weighed out 32 grams' worth, and it wasn't as many pieces as I thought. It might just work! 

 

On 11/14/2016 at 21:10, Thom216 said:

Looking nice! It's cool seeing some life being breathed into an old kit, and those engines look killer.

 

 

The engines will really make this kit I think. They're incredibly detailed for 1:72 scale, and there are more grubbins that are yet to be added. Is it grubbins or gubbins? Or greeblies? I can never remember.    

 

Cheers,

Bill

[CedB]

Very nice details there Bill on the 'gubbins' - I for one am certainly having fun already! If you need the barrel for support and you're doing a (mini) diorama how about leaving off one of the props to show off those nice splines?  

[giemme]

6 hours ago, Navy Bird said:

Are we having fun yet?

Oh yeah    

 

Ciao

[Navy Bird]

Just for giggles, I printed out the F7F drawings made by Temma, and referenced earlier in a link, scaled to 1:72. The outlines of the Monogram fuselage, wings, and tailplanes are almost a perfect match. If the drawings are accurate, this is quite a feat for such an old kit. But then, these old kits keep surprising all of us. They may have lacked in detail (pilot on a stick comes to mind) but they generally got the shapes right.

 

Cheers,

Bill

[TonyTiger66]

I'm really enjoying this Bill.

 

A bit of synchronicity: I started following this thread and thought "Very nice aircraft, wouldn't mind one of those   ".

 

I was surprised this evening to find a Starfighter nightfighter conversion set in my stash  ! Very hidden, in a zip loc bag with a Heinkel He-42 resin beaching trolley by Kora.

 

Too much detail  ! But:

 

The thing is I have no recollection of buying it, nor do I have a Tigercat kit  ? You didn't put it there did you  ?

 

It looks quite nice and includes two vac form canopies. Now I'm wondering if I should follow your lead, and get the Aires engine sets, and I guess a Monogram base kit would help  !

 

It certainly is an attractive bird, your engines just look wonderful, the cowls are going to look great.

 

Very inspiring modelling Bill, and highly likely to result in me sending a request to Santa  .

 

All best regards

TonyT

[DMC]

2 hours ago, Navy Bird said:

Just for giggles, I printed out the F7F drawings made by Temma, and referenced earlier in a link, scaled to 1:72. The outlines of the Monogram fuselage, wings, and tailplanes are almost a perfect match. If the drawings are accurate, this is quite a feat for such an old kit. But then, these old kits keep surprising all of us. They may have lacked in detail (pilot on a stick comes to mind) but they generally got the shapes right.

 

Cheers,

Bill

 

Well done so far.  Looking forward to the rest ot this build.  Drawings pretty accurate apparently.  Done from photos and with a measuring tape and the old reliable Mk-1 eyeball.  Think I'll print the drawings out in 1:48 and see how the old AMT F7F-2 measures up.

 

Cheers,

Dennis

 

[Navy Bird]

So, I just found this nice Sword 1:72 scale kit of the Grumman F8F Bearcat, complete with a very nice resin engine and two fuselages (one for the F8F-1 and the other for the F8F-2). Maybe I should build that at the same time - they're both Glossy Sea Blue.

 

But why stop there? I've got a Panther, Cougar, Tiger, Pirate, Cutlass, Fury, Banshee (in two flavours), Mauler, Fireball, Dark Shark, Skyshark, Stingeree, Crusader III - a veritable boat-load of USN types from the 40s and 50s.  

 

But no Phantom! Why are there no good kits of the FH-1? I had the original MPM kit once, but I think I sold it. That's was before I realised that you could use parts that didn't come in the box.  

 

Cheers,

Bill

[Navy Bird]

Now that's what I call service! I whinge about not having a modern 1:72 McDonnell FH-1 Phantom, and Special Hobby announce a new tooling! And to top it all off, they announced the new tooling last month!  

 

Cheers,

Bill

[TonyTiger66]

3 hours ago, Navy Bird said:

Now that's what I call service! I whinge about not having a modern 1:72 McDonnell FH-1 Phantom, and Special Hobby announce a new tooling! And to top it all off, they announced the new tooling last month!  

 

Cheers,

Bill

 

That looks very nice  .

 

Too much to hope for it by Christmas  ?

 

TonyT

[Navy Bird]

I have a choice between two resin nose gear bays, one from Aires and one from Starfighter. Both will do the job, and the Starfighter version is perhaps a bit more detailed. However, I'm going to use the part from Aires for a simple reason. First, a comparison:

 

 

The Aires part is on the left. I'll use it because I'll be able to put some additional weight in-between its sidewalls and the fuselage. There's not a lot of space there, but enough for some slivers of lead. This baby is going to need all the weight it can get up front, and even then I don't know if I can pack in enough.

 

And speaking of photoetch, I had some fun folding up these rudder pedals (they're the ones that don't say "Hong Kong"):

 

 

Somehow, they are supposed to attach to the bottom of the instrument panel. Hmmm...     

 

Next, I wanted to test fit the cockpit and nose gear well in the fuselage, and see how much sanding and other types of persuasion would be necessary to get the fuselage halves to close. Remember, this is an Aires resin cockpit set we're talking about, and they don't have the best reputation for drop-in fit. But guess what? It dropped in and fit, no sanding required!

 

 

My next task is to start gluing in the 2 mm lead shot and see if I can get 32 g packed into the nose and under the cockpit. Maybe - wish me luck!

 

Cheers,

Bill

[TheBaron]

Baffled as to how I could have missed the start of one of your builds Bill. Then clocked the date and realized I was three years late - I doubt I'll better this record! I'll just stand at the back quietly for a bit...

[Navy Bird]

Dilemma...

 

I have a crap ton of weight in this baby - I literally can't put any more forward of the main gear. It's almost exactly at the balance point, which means that with a little nudge it tips forward or backward depending on where you tap it. The Tigercat sets nose high naturally, so she'll be wanting to tip back. Ugh. 

 

But then I had a thought.   

 

If I glue some chocks to the main gear wheels, and the wheels are glued to the axle so they can't rotate, I should be able to stop it from tipping backward. Especially since it's right on the balance point. Anyone ever try that? And who makes nice USN WWII wheel chocks? Are they different than anyone else's chocks? A chock is a chock, right?    

 

Cheers,

Bill

 

PS. Mr. Baron, that's a wee bit of tardiness. Three years indeed. Punishment will be doled out accordingly. A little Spanish Inquisition perhaps?