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Boeing F/A-18F Super Hornet


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Evening all

Here's the next build lined up on the bench, Hasegawa's rather lovely little Super Bug. This is being built as part of the Modern Mil GB over on UKAR. She'll be finished in the rather fetching markings of VFA-102 'Diamondbacks', the scheme depcted on the box.

Here's the obligatory box and contents shots

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There's a whole load of plastic and a very nice looking decal sheet, so pretty good value for money at only a tenner :D

Detail looks very nice, with some finely engraved surface detail, and nice detail in the wheel wells and undercarriage. The cockpit is disappointingly sparse, so I may decide to add a bit of detail in there, just need to find some suitable reference material. Also, I'm very tempted to have a crack at drooping the control surfaces as these birds are rarely seen on the ground without the flaps extended. This would also mean I should do the slats as well, which look a little trickier, so I'm still undecided, especially as I've not done this sort of surgery on a kit before. One final point, the canopy has a nasty seam, and a little bit of a crack, so I'm gonna have to learn to polish these out, though I think I have the tools to do so.

Anyways, enough talk, hope to start cutting some plastic this evening

Cheers

Shaun :)

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OK then, some progress. When I said I would cut some plastic, I wasn't kidding :lol:

After having a play around with an old kit, I decided to jump straight in and reposition all the control surfaces. Firstly, the rudders have been deflected to starboard. Using a new blade in my scalpel, I've gently scored along the hinge lines, going all the way through the horizontal line at the top of the rudder, before gently moving them into their new position. I went too far accidentally on one of them, so it was glued in place. I then made a start on the port wing, using the same method. Few problems with the leading edge slats and ailerons, though I found it easier to remove them completely. The flaps were a bit more problematic, partly as the plastic was thicker, but mainly because the upper and lower hingle lines didn't line up vertically. So, I've accidentally cut through some plastic where i shouldn't have, though this shouldn't be too hard to fix with some putty. As I said, it's the first time I've tried anything like this, so I guess this is all part of the learning curve.

Here's a dryfit of the wing the, with all the control surfaces in their new positions. It's a bit rough around the edges, but should be acceptable after I clean them up a bit.

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Here it is dryfitted in place on the fueslage, along with the fins.

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Relatively happy so far, they certainly add a little more interst to the model I think :)

Just got the starboard wing to do now!

Comments welcomed as always

Cheers

Shaun :)

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I was given the Hase 1/72 F/A-18C single seater by a mate for Christmas, so I'll be watching this with interest for ideas and tips. Maybe I'll be brave enough to emulate the dropped control surfaces. No seam on my canopy but it's scratched all over, so polishing here too.

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Great idea on the rudders, saves a lot of work refitting them! Storing that one for my Hornet builds:D

I have the Wolfpack wings for this kit, your mods look effective (and a lot cheaper than the WolfPack set). Nice job so far Shaun

:cheers:

Edited by TrojanThunder
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Thanks peeps for the kind words ^_^

I was given the Hase 1/72 F/A-18C single seater by a mate for Christmas, so I'll be watching this with interest for ideas and tips. Maybe I'll be brave enough to emulate the dropped control surfaces. No seam on my canopy but it's scratched all over, so polishing here too.

I have no doubt that you'll learn plenty by watching my build, specifically what NOT to do ;)

Does anyone have the book of artwork by the guy who does the Hasegawa boxes?

Can't help you with the book, but I did think when I picked up this kit how good the artwork is

Right then, progress has been slower than I had hoped as I've come out in a stinking cold :sick: The boss told me not to come into work today, so I've been plugging away with this one, in between sneezing and coughing fits :D

The starboard wing has had the flaps and slats removed and both wings have now had them glued in place. The slats went on trouble free, probably as there is only a small deflection. For the flaps and flaperons, I needed to glue a thin strip of plasticard along the trailing edge of the main wing section, to provide a better surface on which to join the first section of the flap. This is alsp helped to fill a small gap between the wing and flaps. The first sections were then glued in place and held with tape to allow the glue to cure only a bit so that there would be a degree of give in them to position them properly. I then fixed the main flap sections to these, at a greater angle of deflection, and taped everything up to allow the glue to dry thoroughly. I couldn't resist another dryfit of everything, including the tailerons :D

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There's a still a bit of clean-up required, and there are a few gaps that are perhaps a bit too large and may need some attention, but overall I'm happy with the look of things.

When I'm feeling a bit better, I'll make a start on assembling and spraying up the cockpit. I was unhappy with the lack of detail in the office, so I've ordered up an Eduard pre-painted etch set. I feel like its a bit of a cheat buying the pre-painted stuff, but as I've never used etch before, I guess it's a nice way to introduce me to it :)

All comments welcomed as always

Cheers

Shaun :)

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Looking great! But dude, brush up on your control surface terminology man! It has leading edge flaps, not slats. It also has separate flaps, and ailerons on the trailing edge, no flaperons. Tailerons....eh, I'll give you a pass on that one, since they do help in roll authority. But otherwise, those are horizontal stabilizers, or just stabs ;)

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Thanks guys ^_^

But dude, brush up on your control surface terminology man! It has leading edge flaps, not slats. It also has separate flaps, and ailerons on the trailing edge, no flaperons. Tailerons....eh, I'll give you a pass on that one, since they do help in roll authority. But otherwise, those are horizontal stabilizers, or just stabs ;)

Looks like the four years I spent studying aero went to waste then! :suicide: Fair point with the leading edge flaps, but I would say though that given the ailerons droop with the flaps, that qualifies them as flaperons. Perhaps we'll have to agree to disagree ;)

Been slowly plugging away with this one over the last couple of days, assembling little things like the stores etc, though nothing really worth posting pics of. I'm still waiting on the etch for the cockpit to arrive; until it does, there's not a great deal I can really do :shrug:

Cheers

Shaun :)

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Thanks guys ^_^

but I would say though that given the ailerons droop with the flaps, that qualifies them as flaperons.

Royal Navy Phantoms used to have ailerons that drooped with the flaps, but they were never called Flaperons.

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Royal Navy Phantoms used to have ailerons that drooped with the flaps, but they were never called Flaperons.

That's very true, but, and I may be wrong about this, I think they only droop when powered down and as such are not used as flaps, just ailerons. This shot shows a Phantom on finals, with the flaps fully extended as you would expect- note the ailerons are in the neutral position, zero deflection. The ailerons have only a single function, to provide roll control, hence why they are simply called ailerons

Compare that to this shot of a Super Hornet touching down- you can clearly see the 'ailerons' deflected. They still, however, provide roll control (in addition to the tailplanes hence tailerons) and so, by their mulit-functional nature, can be qualified as flaperons.

HTH

Shaun :)

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That's very true, but, and I may be wrong about this, I think they only droop when powered down and as such are not used as flaps, just ailerons. This shot shows a Phantom on finals, with the flaps fully extended as you would expect- note the ailerons are in the neutral position, zero deflection. The ailerons have only a single function, to provide roll control, hence why they are simply called ailerons

Compare that to this shot of a Super Hornet touching down- you can clearly see the 'ailerons' deflected. They still, however, provide roll control (in addition to the tailplanes hence tailerons) and so, by their mulit-functional nature, can be qualified as flaperons.

HTH

Shaun :)

Hi

I suppose to avoid any vocabulary trouble Dassault have been creating tailless delta planes for many years :tease: .

But they've added "canards" :banghead:

Patrick

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Thanks very much Martin :thumbsup2:

Hi

I suppose to avoid any vocabulary trouble Dassault have been creating tailless delta planes for many years :tease: .

But they've added "canards" :banghead:

Patrick

Actually, they're called foreplanes :tease::bleh::tease:

Canard is the name of the configuration of foreplanes at the front and the mainplane at the rear.

Sorry to be pedantic :blush:

Cheers

Shaun :)

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Canard is in fact a French duck :lol: I think the foreplane thing is meant to distinguish between control surface type canards and lift producing canards maybe?

With you on the flaperons though Seamus, I've seen video of F-18's on finals and they are twitching away like good-uns, as well as being drooped like the flaps - definitely flaperons. Explain why the slats are being called leading edge flaps though, not sure on that one :shrug:

Jen.

P.S. Nice work on the model so far by the way ;)

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Ta Jen :)

I always thought any leading edge surfaces could be considered as slats, but thinking about it, I'd assume that a slat is a surface that has a slot to allow airflow between itself and the wing (to regenerate the boundary layer). Going back to the Phantom, the slats are pushed away from the leading edge to create this slot.

The Super Hornet doesn't have these slots, which I'm guessing is why they are referrred to as flaps :hmmm:

Oh, and I believe all foreplanes produce lift. The Tiffie's certainly do, in addition to providing roll and pitch control, so perhaps they should be called foreplanerons? :D

Cheers

Shaun :)

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I was thinking along those lines too, with the leading edge flaps.

I'm sure foreplanes do produce lift, but I was referring to the fixed type which are primarily there to act as a tailplane (but in the wrong place of course) like you see on the odd Rutan. The foreplanes on Typhoons and the like are there primarily to aid control rather than lift.

See what I'm getting at? :hmmm:

Sorry, thread hijack alert - woop woop woop - I can't help it if I find this stuff interesting :shrug:

Jen.

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derailing this thread slightly further lol, if you take a glance at the first minute of takeoff and the roll in this vid,

the tailerons seem to pitch differentially (like one would think to provide the roll), but in the opposite direction (I.e rolling clockwise the SH deflects the port taileron down and the starboard upwards, which I thought the exact opposite occurs!?) and with the flaps and slats still down providing only lift it looks like. But afterall the SH is an unstable fly by wire aircraft so I guess this unorthadox way to fly is determined by a very complex aerodynamic config/computer.

Anyways, good clean looking model going on there Shaun, would be cool to see it on a little diorama base :analintruder:

cheers

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