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I need an F-4B to my collection


speedbird

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https://hlj.com/product/HSGE36 it's £14.24 plus shipping. All the Fujimi F-4Bs appear to be out of production so the only option for those is the second hand market (ebay). The Hasegawa kit is so superior to the Airfix Phantom it's worth the money even if somebody were to give you the Airfix kit for free. The ESCI 1/72 Phantoms were not too bad, but it does not appear that they did a B or an N, though they did a B in 1/48.

Edited by VMA131Marine
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10 minutes ago, speedbird said:

What would I need to do to the N if anything to have a plausible F-4B?

The kit I linked to has parts and markings for B and N Phantoms. According to Wikipedia, the F-4N was a modernized B-model with the main external differences being the "slatted tailplane, ailerons drooped 16.5° when landing gear and flaps were deployed to decrease the landing speed." The N retained the thin wing of the B.

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27 minutes ago, VMA131Marine said:

https://hlj.com/product/HSGE36 it's £14.24 plus shipping. All the Fujimi F-4Bs appear to be out of production so the only option for those is the second hand market (ebay). The Hasegawa kit is so superior to the Airfix Phantom it's worth the money even if somebody were to give you the Airfix kit for free. The ESCI 1/72 Phantoms were not too bad, but it does not appear that they did a B or an N, though they did a B in 1/48.

 

The Esci 1/48 kit was a B only in name, the plastic represented a J.

I totally agree on the superiority of the Hasegawa kit, not only on the airfix offering but also on all the others. The Fujimi kit wasn't bad (built a couple, one of them a B ) but really is not up to the quality of the Hasegawa kit. As your link shows, the Hase kit can be found for decent prices from Asia, I can add that the B also seems quite easy to find on the second hand market, again for good prices.

 

22 minutes ago, speedbird said:

What would I need to do to the N if anything to have a plausible F-4B?

 

Really depends on which aircraft you want to model.. as said above, the N is a modernised B, from a modelling point of view the main difference is in the presence of the N of fairings on the intakes for an RWR system (or was it ECM, can't remember). However these fairings were not present on all Ns from the beginning. At the same time the slotted tailplanes were also used on many F-4Bs and really an early N and a late B are externally identical.

Edited by Giorgio N
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14 minutes ago, 71chally said:

That is outstanding value for what is a chunky and very decent 48th kit.

I think £14.24 plus shipping  is for the 1/72 kit. I bought one a couple of months ago, cost was about £19.50 delivered and it arrived via surface mail in about 3 weeks. HLJ are good people to deal with - kits are always boxed and arrive undamaged.

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Sorry guys I was thinking of 72nd scale and should have made that clear... so reading between the lines all I'd need to do to  an N to get to a B is delete the fairings on the intakes and replace the the tail planes with a pair of slotted ones?  What about the burner cans, would they be that same for both B and N versions? By the way, I'm wanting to finish it in the sundowners markings with sharks teeth from an old decal sheet I have if that helps borrow down the modifications. As always I'm really grateful for the help and advice.

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17 minutes ago, speedbird said:

Sorry guys I was thinking of 72nd scale and should have made that clear... so reading between the lines all I'd need to do to  an N to get to a B is delete the fairings on the intakes and replace the the tail planes with a pair of slotted ones?  What about the burner cans, would they be that same for both B and N versions? By the way, I'm wanting to finish it in the sundowners markings with sharks teeth from an old decal sheet I have if that helps borrow down the modifications. As always I'm really grateful for the help and advice.

 

Yes to removing the fairings on the intakes, no to replacing the tail planes... the N has slotted tailplanes, the early B have unslotted, the later B have slotted. So depending on your aircraft, you either keep the N stabilators or add unslotted ones.

Burner cans remain the same as engines were not changed in the N. As Nigel said, the Hasegawa box includes parts for both variants, however IIRC there are no unslotted stabilators, only the slotted ones.

Speaking of VF-111 Phantoms, this unit used both the B (from 1971 to 1975) and the N (from 1976 to 1978). They were supposed to receive Js in 1975 but in the end went to the N. As they received the B quite late, I believe that their Bs had the slotted stabilators and the pictures I have of aircrafts from that unit show this features.

VF-111 also had some Ns without the fairings on the intakes, these are sometimes erroneusly captioned in pictures as being F-4Bs. The most famous was Bu.No. 151000, a CAG aircraft carrying the most spectacular "sundowners" marking. This is the subject for example of the Academy 1/48 F-4B kit... but it's not a B it's an N. Or better, it was an N when serving with VF-111. Of course at some point this aircraft was a B as all Ns were rebuilt Bs.

 

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2 hours ago, Giorgio N said:

 

Yes to removing the fairings on the intakes, no to replacing the tail planes... the N has slotted tailplanes, the early B have unslotted, the later B have slotted. So depending on your aircraft, you either keep the N stabilators or add unslotted ones.

Burner cans remain the same as engines were not changed in the N. As Nigel said, the Hasegawa box includes parts for both variants, however IIRC there are no unslotted stabilators, only the slotted ones.

Speaking of VF-111 Phantoms, this unit used both the B (from 1971 to 1975) and the N (from 1976 to 1978). They were supposed to receive Js in 1975 but in the end went to the N. As they received the B quite late, I believe that their Bs had the slotted stabilators and the pictures I have of aircrafts from that unit show this features.

VF-111 also had some Ns without the fairings on the intakes, these are sometimes erroneusly captioned in pictures as being F-4Bs. The most famous was Bu.No. 151000, a CAG aircraft carrying the most spectacular "sundowners" marking. This is the subject for example of the Academy 1/48 F-4B kit... but it's not a B it's an N. Or better, it was an N when serving with VF-111. Of course at some point this aircraft was a B as all Ns were rebuilt Bs.

 

Thanks for that info mate, very helpful. I know where I'm going now... thanks also to all you other chaps who chipped in with their advice..

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10 hours ago, Giorgio N said:

GLad to help ! If you can give us the Bureau Number proposed by the decal sheet you have, I can check if I have any info on that particular aircraft. I have a few references on the Sundowners, maybe there's a picture of your subject in these

It's the F-4B Phantom 151488 NL/211 VF-111 Sundowners shark mouth NAS Miramar 1971 on the 1.72 scale modeldecal sheet MD015
 
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Checked the various references but unfortunately I couldn't find a picture of that aircraft. Thinking about it there should be a picture in the decal sheet instructions, but not having these decals I can't check the various features.

I've checked several pictures of VF-111 F-4Bs and all seem to have slotted tailplanes. All also seem to have the antenna arrangement on the top of the fin with spikes looking both front and rear (can't remember the exact designation), the Hasegawa kit also include this part (and other types of fin cap)

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8 hours ago, Giorgio N said:

All also seem to have the antenna arrangement on the top of the fin with spikes looking both front and rear (can't remember the exact designation), the Hasegawa kit also include this part (and other types of fin cap)

 

Some good pointers on the various ECM fits: 

 

http://phantomphacts.blogspot.nl/p/shoehor.html

http://phantomphacts.blogspot.nl/p/sanders-analq-51-51a-100.html

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

 

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On 9/15/2017 at 9:53 PM, speedbird said:
It's the F-4B Phantom 151488 NL/211 VF-111 Sundowners shark mouth NAS Miramar 1971...

 

The Osprey "US Navy F-4 Phantom II MiG Killers 1965–70" book says on page 91 that F-4B BuNo 151488 was lost near Hanoi in November 1967 and never flew with VF-111.

Can it be that two different airframes would have been identified by the same Bureau Number?

 

 

Edited by niki
edited link to Google books frame
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4 hours ago, niki said:

 

The Osprey "US Navy F-4 Phantom II MiG Killers 1965–70" book says on page 91 that F-4B BuNo 151488 was lost near Hanoi in November 1967 and never flew with VF-111.

Can it be that two different airframes would have been identified by the same Bureau Number?

 

I'd say a typo would be a much more lkely explanation - BuNo's are not usually rehashed.  

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

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