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Kenny J

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  1. I mean, the clue's in the name... Reminds me of John Nichol's book on the Lancaster where he describes Paisley as being ten miles east of Glasgow (it's about six miles west). Maybe navigation isn't his strong point. Anyway, love a Beaufighter (and a fine Speyside malt, for that matter), so I'll be watching with interest.
  2. I'm calling it done! Ready For Inspection thread here: Thanks for all your kind comments and encouragement. Kenny
  3. After about six months, I've finally completed my 1/48 scale Hasegawa F-4G Phantom "Wild Weasel". The kit itself was fine (other than the mysterious missing RWR), but I had primer related problems, or masking tape problems, or paint problems. Either way, I spent far more time scraping and reapplying paint than I'd have liked to. I wanted to do a Spangdahlem bird with shark-mouth, so decals came from Milspec (sheet 48-007), paints were Hataka (first time using them), a few bits came from my Eduard/Academy F-4, and I splashed out on a more correct AN/ALQ-131 from Eduard to replace the AN/ALQ-119 supplied in the kit. @Mark V provided some good information about colour schemes and likely load-outs - hence it's carrying a single dummy HARM missile (admittedly with fins), drop tanks, and an empty TER on the starboard inner pylon. Thanks also to @bar side, who was tackling the same aircraft at the same time and provided a lot of inspiration/information. Over-all, I'm mostly happy how it turned out. There are a few issues - the cockpit glazing's a bit wonky (could have done with the one-part canopy version), I messed up the starboard shark-mouth, and the tyres could be sanded/flattened so that both nose-wheels touch the ground. There are a few places where you can see I've had paint issues. However, the Hasegawa kit has held up well for its age and I'd happily build another one. Build Thread Here The photos are taken in my new light box, using a Sony A5100 with a 55mm prime lens. Still getting the hang of this serious-photography-with-an-actual-camera lark...
  4. Varnish on, masks off. And almost inevitably, I've knocked a tailplane off again, and the nosecone has peeled! It's a fun hobby, isn't it?
  5. It's been a while! Life, as usual, has a habit of getting the way of modelling sessions, especially with Christmas and all that. Anyway, after re-priming and painting, there were still a couple of areas where the paint lifted off with the tape, but I patched those up. After that, it was a layer of gloss varnish and on to the decals. They went on reasonably well, although the fin stripe and the shark-mouths cracked a bit. On reference to actual photos, the shark-mouths are are a bit too big and I've mucked up the positioning of one of them a bit. According to photos of the aircraft, they should end just ahead of the cheek A/C intakes, however I've got the port side one going above the intake, and the starboard one going below. I also dropped it, knocking off the tailplanes (and breaking the TINY locator pins which held them on), so those are now held on with superglue and prayers. Another coat of gloss and I've spent the week doing panel washes and sorting out the bits which aren't stuck on yet. Today will be matt-coating everything, and hopefully I'll be able to stick the bits which aren't stuck on yet on, and finally take the canopy mask off. Aiming to call it done by Monday. A couple of photos before my camera battery died:
  6. Looking good! I'm almost done painting mine - decals next!
  7. I'm a step ahead of you here - same decals, same paints! I've just posted in my build thread with some photos after spraying (and having had a bit of fun getting the mix right). I think the colours look OK, but possibly the grey could be a touch bluer/darker and the dark green is a bit light. More importantly, the camouflage pattern in the instructions doesn't really match the actual aircraft (unless it was resprayed between 1984 and 1985). https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235111303-hasegawa-148-f-4g-wild-weasel/&do=findComment&comment=4524789
  8. Got the paint on and the masking off, so some photos: The photos show the pre-shading to be a bit more pronounced than the naked eye does, but I'm mostly happy. Looks like I need to touch up a couple of areas - the demarcation between the greens on the rear port fuselage is a bit indistinct, and the starboard outer wing is showing the effects of some over-thinned paint. Shade-wise, I think the colours are OK, but looking at some photos of Euro-1 Phantoms, the grey could perhaps have a bit more blue to it, and the dark green a bit darker. https://i.redd.it/q81qbrgjz5v11.jpg And of course, in my search, I've found some photos of the actual aircraft portrayed by the decals, and the camouflage pattern bears no resemblance to what's portrayed in the instructions! Oh well - as I've said before, I do this for fun, not 100% accuracy. https://www.airhistory.net/photo/304903/69-0247/AF69-247 https://www.airfighters.com/photo/80487/M/USA-Air-Force/McDonnell-Douglas-F-4G-Phantom-II/69-0247/ Next steps: paint the tailplanes and metal exhaust bits. Oh, and the nosecone, although that might be the last thing I do because I don't want to break off the probe when I attach it (I've already done the one on the tail fin).
  9. Quick update on this without any photos (keep forgetting to take any): I took off as much of the paint as I could and and reverted to the Halfords spray primer, followed by some pre-shading, to get back to where I was. I then tracked down some White-Tack, which is SO MUCH NICER to work with than Blue-Tac for camouflage masking. I've found that 9:1 is about the best ratio of paint to water for the Hataka Red Line, and after a good clean of my airbrush, I'm very pleased with how it's going on - good coverage, nice sheen, just enough transparency for the pre-shade to work. Currently about halfway through the final green, then it's on to the tailplanes, the metal exhaust areas, undercarriage, stores and decals and weathering. Why am I doing the tailplanes separate, you ask? Well, on reading up on the history, construction and operational maintenance of the Phantom, especially at Spangdahlem, I found that there were several corroborating accounts claiming that the tailplanes were frequently the last thing to be painted, because the maintenance crews would leave them in the box and forget about them until after the bulk of the painting had been done. Yeah. Really. Honest. I'd show you my research, but my dog ate it.
  10. It was Halfords Universal Grey primer - I'm going to take it back to the plastic and try again. With the Hataka paint, the "mixed for airbrush" red line stuff I'm using seems a bit thick to be used unthinned, but it doesn't take much to over-thin it, so watch out for that.
  11. Since my last update, I've masked the canopy up with parafilm and have been mostly priming and painting. In the past, I've usually primed with Halfords spray cans, but the fumes are more of a problem in my new flat than the old place where I had an outdoor area I could nip down to and spray with cans. I decided to airbrush on the standard tinned version of Halfords primer, thinned with cellulose thinners. My extraction booth handled it much better than the full blast of a spray can, and I thought I'd done a pretty good job of it, and the pre-shading: As mentioned above, I'm also using Hataka paints for the first time - it's taken a bit of experimentation to figure out which thinner to use, and the right ratios - I've had the best results using a few drops of water - maybe a ratio of 1:8 water:paint. Spent quite a while spraying far too wet a mix, but in the end I managed to get it it laying down nicely and just showing a hint of the pre-shading. Then I took the masking tape off... It's lifted everything off - primer and all! Suspect I'm going to have to take it back to the bare plastic as best I can, give it a good wash, and re-prime, maybe going back to the spray can. Oh well, it's a FUN hobby, isn't it?
  12. Some progress: The scratch-build RWR pod - not 100% accurate, but good enough for me: It occurred to me that I didn't take a good photo of the sprayed intake effect - as I say, from a distance it gives a decent enough representation of depth: Full length shot, with bench not too messy (I moved last year and am still unpacking boxes. Slowly getting my workspace together and currently working on an old Ikea table until I figure out the alternative): Next step was the ejection seats. I had a couple of spares from my Eduard F-4N which were significantly better looking that the Hasegawa parts, except for the seat top and ejection handles. What to do? Combine the main Academy/Eduard seats with the Hasegawa tops: Painted and cushions (OK, parachute box, seat back and survival kit base) in place. I also added some straps made from strips of lead (or non-toxic equivalent) foil from a wine bottle. As part of my packing/unpacking process when moving, I threw out a TON of random bits and bobs that I "might need some day" but probably wouldn't. You know where this is going, right? The straps are a bit short because the only bit of lead foil which survived the onslaught was a tiny little piece. But you know what that means, right? I need to drink more wine! Anyway - the seats are good enough to go under the (closed) canopy:
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