1:72 Grumman/General Dynamics F-111B "Beta Tomcat" Part 2

[Navy Bird]

Finally, some Light Gull Gray! One of the two best colours ever for an aircraft - the other being Extra Dark Sea Grey of course.     

 

 

Once this dries I'll shoot white on the underside. I plan on having the wings forward, with the slats and flaps down, as Hasegawa moulded it (although I prefer the look of the F-111 with the wings swept back). Having the slats down creates a bit of a problem, as 151972 did not have the rotating glove slats which are common to the production F-111s. On those birds, the slats were longer towards the wing glove, and when the glove slats opened there was room for the wing slats to deploy. Without the glove slats, the wing slats have to be shortened and the recessed area in the wing needs to be modified. Perhaps this photo show the situation better than my description:

 

 

Notice how the inboard portion of the recess in the wing extends into the fuselage. This would only be the case when the aircraft had the glove slats, which open up like so:

 

 

So it looks like a little modification to the wings is in order, along with a razor saw session for the slats. Who knows, I may actually end up finishing this model after all!

 

Cheers,

Bill

[keefr22]

Looks to me that you're well onto the way to the finishing line Bill - she's looking very nice indeed!

 

Keith

[Navy Bird]

Sheet styrene is a wonderful thing. It maketh aerofoils in time of need.

 

 

 

That's the general idea anyway. It was pretty easy to roll the styrene around a cocktail stick to get the leading edge, and then progressively glue it on and cut to the proper length. Add a little bit of my magic red glazing putty and Bob's your uncle. Actually, he was my brother-in-law who just passed on July 4. We're almost done with his estate - should close on the sale of his house in the next week or so. I'm so glad that Mrs. Navy Bird won't have to be dealing with that big mess anymore. Whew! 

 

Cheers,

Bill

[Navy Bird]

Now she's starting to look the part.    

 

 

 

 

Much more detail painting to go - the white rudder, and I also have to add some small black patches that extend aft of the radome - hinges maybe? You can see one of them quite plainly in this shot, just below the sensor on the side of the nose and right above the IR pod under the nose (this black area is on both sides of the radome):

 

 

There are also some metal areas at the rear fuselage between the engine nozzles, but the photo I have that shows this cannot be posted on a public forum. The tyres are just about ready to go on as well. I think I'll finish off the fuselage (stickers, etc.) before I move on to finishing the wings, as I don't like to keep the tape on the canopy for a long time. An old habit from the days prior to Kabuki tape...

 

Cheers,

Bill

[Max Headroom]

That is a milestone in the build. It certainly looks handsome in a Navy scheme.

 

Trevor

[AdrianMF]

Looks a thing of beauty Bill. Not words I ever expected to say about an F-111...

 

Regards,

Adrian

[Hamden]

 

Looking good a real show stopper in the making!

 

   Roger

[Fritag]

Typically immaculate so far Bill 

[keefr22]

Lovely stuff Bill!

 

Keith

[Navy Bird]

Thanks, mates.   

 

After reviewing my last post, I decided to "tone down" the undulating demarcation line between the Light Gull Gray and White. Comparing to photos of the real aeroplane, it seems I got a little carried away with the curves. Much better now.

 

Next, some detail painting on the aft end. Here is a photo of 151972 showing what I needed to duplicate (my best guess is that these areas near the fuel dump are natural metal):

 

 

A little masking (OK, a lot of masking and a royal pain it was) and I have this:

 

 

Looks like I forgot to drill out the fuel dump - it's amazing how many things like this I would have missed if I wasn't taking all these photos. Here is another pain that's coming my way - note the area of the fuselage that has been exposed by the horizontal tailplanes moving off of neutral:

 

 

 

Someone has painted that area red - specifically "keep your fingers and other appendages out of here" red. No doubt the corresponding area on the tailplanes is also red. Rather than mask and paint this area on the fuselage, I'm going to try to cut an airfoil shape out of red decal striping and see if I can make that work. Maybe, maybe not...

 

Speaking of missing appendages, the USN tried to paint most, if not all, of the pinch hazards with high visibility red paint. The USAF did not do this to the same degree as the USN. I wonder if the USN had a significantly lower rate of missing appendages? In other words, did the red paint accomplish its objective? I don't think I've ever seen this addressed anywhere. Just curious...

 

Cheers,

Bill

[abat]

Looks really nice Bill. This is an aircraft i wasn't aware of before your build. Never imagined the Navy would fly these big birds. You mentioned toning down the demarcation. A pic would be good as it looked fine to me originally. I'm guessing you did it freehand?

[David H]

i sure like what i see so far...

 

-d-

[Ex-FAAWAFU]

5 hours ago, Navy Bird said:

Thanks, mates.   

 

After reviewing my last post, I decided to "tone down" the undulating demarcation line between the Light Gull Gray and White. Comparing to photos of the real aeroplane, it seems I got a little carried away with the curves. Much better now.

 

Next, some detail painting on the aft end. Here is a photo of 151972 showing what I needed to duplicate (my best guess is that these areas near the fuel dump are natural metal):

 

 

A little masking (OK, a lot of masking and a royal pain it was) and I have this:

 

 

Looks like I forgot to drill out the fuel dump - it's amazing how many things like this I would have missed if I wasn't taking all these photos. Here is another pain that's coming my way - note the area of the fuselage that has been exposed by the horizontal tailplanes moving off of neutral:

 

 

 

Someone has painted that area red - specifically "keep your fingers and other appendages out of here" red. No doubt the corresponding area on the tailplanes is also red. Rather than mask and paint this area on the fuselage, I'm going to try to cut an airfoil shape out of red decal striping and see if I can make that work. Maybe, maybe not...

 

Speaking of missing appendages, the USN tried to paint most, if not all, of the pinch hazards with high visibility red paint. The USAF did not do this to the same degree as the USN. I wonder if the USN had a significantly lower rate of missing appendages? In other words, did the red paint accomplish its objective? I don't think I've ever seen this addressed anywhere. Just curious...

 

Cheers,

Bill

She’s looking stunning, Bill.  I’ve always thought that the USN habit of putting red paint on things that open & shut was to make them visually obvious on a busy and deafening flight deck - thus helping the deck crew to check that flaps, slats, control surfaces etc are at the desired angle before they shoot the cab over the bow.  

On 25/09/2017 at 6:55 PM, Max Headroom said:

It certainly looks handsome in a Navy scheme.

Of course.  Everything looks handsome in a Navy scheme!

[keefr22]

Having always had a very big soft spot for the Tomcat, I've always dismissed the Navy 111 as being an ugly white elephant Bill - your cracking model is making me see it in a whole new light!

 

Keith

 

 

[Navy Bird]

19 hours ago, abat said:

Looks really nice Bill. This is an aircraft i wasn't aware of before your build. Never imagined the Navy would fly these big birds. You mentioned toning down the demarcation. A pic would be good as it looked fine to me originally. I'm guessing you did it freehand?

 

Yes sir, I always spray these demarcation lines free-hand. I'm too lazy to do that sausage role thing. Here is the original demarcation line:

 

 

And here is the actual aircraft:

 

 

And my revised demarcation line:

 

 

I'm happier with the revision. It wasn't until I posted the pictures previously that I noticed that I had overdone the waviness. You may also note that I've since added the smaller black areas at the bottom aft edge of the radome.

 

19 hours ago, David H said:

i sure like what i see so far...

 

-d-

 

Thank you, from one Navy geek to another!     

 

15 hours ago, Ex-FAAWAFU said:

She’s looking stunning, Bill.  I’ve always thought that the USN habit of putting red paint on things that open & shut was to make them visually obvious on a busy and deafening flight deck - thus helping the deck crew to check that flaps, slats, control surfaces etc are at the desired angle before they shoot the cab over the bow.  

Of course.  Everything looks handsome in a Navy scheme!

 

I never thought of that, I always assumed it was a pinch hazard thing. What you say certainly makes sense.

 

15 hours ago, keefr22 said:

Having always had a very big soft spot for the Tomcat, I've always dismissed the Navy 111 as being an ugly white elephant Bill - your cracking model is making me see it in a whole new light!

 

Keith

 

Thanks, Keith - I'm glad to hear that your heart is softening towards the 111B. I don't think it got a fair shake in the aviation press, and even within the USN where there seemed to be a bit of a political situation going on. And I think I've said this before (and no one ever agrees with me!) but I think the B model was the best looking 'Vark. There, I've said it again! Give me a moment to step aside before everyone starts throwing things!   

 

Cheers,

Bill

[keefr22]

Hmmm, I don't think I've got as far as thinking it's the best looking one yet, but it is growing on me!! 

 

Keith

[Navy Bird]

The next dilemma...     

 

I'm modelling 151972 in her Phoenix missile testing garb from her days at Hughes. The tail featured a nice round Phoenix testing logo. I have two decal sheets, one from Microscale and one from Pete's Hangar, that include these markings. However, the Microscale sheet is quite old and starting to yellow. I did a test with one of the decals on that sheet that won't be used on the model, and it disintegrated after a quick dip in water - old decals do that sometimes. Plus, I took a close look at the Phoenix logo (shown here with significant magnification) and more problems surfaced.

 

 

First, some significant registration issues, most noticeable with the white ring between the black and blue. Plus, the printing is not very sharp. So, I then took a close look at the same logo from the Pete's Hangar sheet.

 

 

Aye ca-rumba. I have a very high resolution photo of this logo that I unfortunately cannot post in a public forum. Comparing it to these decals I can say that Pete has it all wrong. The missile is pointing the wrong way, the fire (out of which the Phoenix bird arises) is missing, the USN anchor and glove designs have been replaced by black diamonds, and the outer ring is dark blue instead of the correct black. And to top it all off, it looks like it was printed with process inks instead of solid inks (hence the stripes). What to do?

 

Well, I guess I have a go at making my own decals. I'll paint a white circle on the tail so that the clear areas of the design will be white. I fired up my trusty CorelDraw X8, and created vector artwork using the high resolution photo as a template. I didn't do any kind of an automatic bitmap to vector conversion, I just drew right on top of the photo. I used the colours sampled from the photo as well. Once the artwork was finished, I created a JPG file so I could post it here - and here it is:

 

 

Trust me, this is very similar to the logo on the real plane, the only difference is that I couldn't match the font exactly, but this is real close. One worry I have is that parts of the artwork are too complex, and will get lost when printing this at 1:72 scale. But I'll give it a shot. What do you guys recommend as a sealer for homemade decals? I don't care so much for Microscale Liquid Decal Film, and I've heard that Future (Klear) can be used. I've never done this before, so I can use all the advice I can get!   

 

Cheers,

Bill

[Tailspin Turtle]

Your logo looks pretty good except for the font as you wrote (I know those can be hard to match) and the anchor would be more accurate without the rope. The color of the flames and the emblems might be more brown or gold than your orange.

 

Future has worked for me but so has Microscale decal film.

[abat]

22 hours ago, Navy Bird said:

Yes sir, I always spray these demarcation lines free-hand.

Do you do contract work? I’ve got a 1/72 tracker coming on line in that most lovely scheme. 😊 

 

And a great looking decal. I’m looking forward to see how this prints out. 

Edited September 28, 2017 by abat
Added a forgotten bit.

[Navy Bird]

3 hours ago, Tailspin Turtle said:

Your logo looks pretty good except for the font as you wrote (I know those can be hard to match) and the anchor would be more accurate without the rope. The color of the flames and the emblems might be more brown or gold than your orange.

 

Future has worked for me but so has Microscale decal film.

 

The rope is definitely part of the actual artwork (if you look close enough there is even a coiled rope on the globe as well) but it's very thin. What I did in my artwork is use a line that has a minimum thickness so that it shows up in 1:72 scale. When this design is printed out at .625" diameter the rope is just barely visible, which is similar to the real thing. It wouldn't make much difference if I left it off entirely. The orange colour is a placeholder while I experiment with getting that gold color to print so that it looks like the photo. With my luck, though, I'll get the colours where I want on test prints, but when I switch to decal film it will all look different! 

 

Which brings up a question - when printing on decal film, do I select transparency as the media choice in the printer setup (instead of paper)? 

 

3 hours ago, abat said:

Do you do contract work? I’ve got a 1/72 tracker coming on line in that most lovely scheme. 😊 

 

And a great looking decal. I’m looking forward to see how this prints out. 

 

I do anything for a buck. Almost.     

 

Cheers,

Bill

[Tailspin Turtle]

Wow - that rope is faint. No idea about printer setup.

[Fritag]

12 hours ago, Navy Bird said:

What do you guys recommend as a sealer for homemade decals? I don't care so much for Microscale Liquid Decal Film, and I've heard that Future (Klear) can be used. I've never done this before, so I can use all the advice I can get! 

Frankly I've used any old acrylic varnish that I've had to hand Bill - and they've all worked fine to prevent the ink running.  Not terribly scientific I know but perhaps reassuring?

 

I'm not sure if I've used Klear - but I would be happy to give it a go and I would have thought it would work well.  Anyways- You'll not waste much decal paper with a 1/72 logo in testing it 

 

That's a lovely looking piece of artwork - I hope that your printer can do it justice.

 

My issue with homemade decals has generally been that the the decal paper I've ben able to get is rather thicker than kit/commercial decals.  Have you been able to get some nice thin stuff Bill?

[Navy Bird]

8 hours ago, Fritag said:

Frankly I've used any old acrylic varnish that I've had to hand Bill - and they've all worked fine to prevent the ink running.  Not terribly scientific I know but perhaps reassuring?

 

I'm not sure if I've used Klear - but I would be happy to give it a go and I would have thought it would work well.  Anyways- You'll not waste much decal paper with a 1/72 logo in testing it 

 

That's a lovely looking piece of artwork - I hope that your printer can do it justice.

 

My issue with homemade decals has generally been that the the decal paper I've ben able to get is rather thicker than kit/commercial decals.  Have you been able to get some nice thin stuff Bill?

 

Thanks - all I have is the Bare Metal Foil "Expert's Choice" clear decal film for ink jet printers. I don't know how thick it is, but I guess I'm going to find out! They claim it uses a special coating that prevents the liquid inks from bleeding. I assume that means around the edges. 

 

Cheers,

Bill (yearning for the old days when I didn't fill seams or bother with painting the model - just slap some glue on and stick it together)

 

PS. Oh, here is the colour for the flames and USN logos that I came up with to try and match the photo. I think it's pretty close and it seems to print OK, at least on paper!

 

 

[Martian]

She is looking beautiful Bill and as always the workmanship is exemplary.

 

Martian

[woody37]

My god, I blink and now there's paint on it, looking fab now