11bravo

Typical of the American philosophy of being eminently prepared to fight the last war, not the next.

If you are a fanatic on those early F-4's, I'd also highly recommend Fundekals Wolfpack decal set for early "Operation Bolo" Phantoms. An amazing amount of info on these jets is crammed into the instructions.

Got the landing gear finished and installed (sans the nosewheels that I bumped into and sheared off), also decided to load up the centerline MER and get the rack mounted. Love the look of those M117's!

Bombs are completed (aside from some cleanup needed around the safety wires on the nose). The Videoavaition bombs are outstanding.

A favorite subject of mine. I'm currently building this one in 32nd, How many different colors do you see here? Also note the grey "last three" on the tail.

Ummh... In USAF service, the A-1 was also replaced by the A-7D in the SAR escort role. The A-7 had the same attributes that made the A-1 ideal for that job. Massive amount of firepower carried and extremely long range / loiter time. It just took the AF a bit longer because they needed to develop the D model.

Wrapped up my underside weathering. Last step was to grunge up the external tanks a bit since most of my pictures show the undersides as less than immaculate looking. Note the intentional sloppy paintwork and mismatched sections. Unlike later in the war when the tanks arrive painted from the factory, these early tanks were overpainted green in the field when the switch was made to the SEA camo scheme and you see lots of strange looking tanks in service. Next up are the TER/MER (I'm building an asymmetric weapons load of external wing tank / 2 AIM-9 with ECM pod underneath / MER on centerline with 5 M117's / TER with a single M117 / external wing tank). I added close to 50 extra parts for each of these, as the kit parts are extremely basic. Note that the red numbers are intentionally mis-aligned, as it per my pics of the originals. I'm going to be touching up those bolts on the sway braces, looking at the pictures made me realize they are less than optimum. Press fit of an M117 on the TER. Still have much cleanup / paintwork to do on the bombs.

My subject is post-Bolo, see a picture of her below. My vague understanding is that a later version of the initial QRC-160 was developed that could be mounted on the inner wing pylon, as this one is (note the camouflage paint on the upper surfaces of the pod).

Hi Folks - I'm building an F-4C circa mid to late 67. Trying to figure out what I need to use for an ECM pod. The one picture of my subject aircraft shows a pod hanging under the inner starboard wing pylon, painted white with the upper surfaces green. I've got the GT Resins "ALQ-71 Short Tail" pod and the pod that comes in the Tamiya kit. I've yet to see a picture of an F-4C/D with the "short-tail" pod. Would I be better served going with the kit pod? I tried to read up on early war ECM pods but it's extremely confusing. Far as I can tell, the first pods (QRC-160) could only be mounted to the outboard wing pylons and were wind-powered by small blades on the nose. A bit later, the QRC-160 was upgraded to use power from the aircraft and could now be hung on the inner wing pylons, so the ram air turbine in the nose went away. This pod later morphed into the ALQ-71, which I think was pretty similar to the QRC pod. Bottom line - I don't think the short-tail pod is appropriate. If I go with the kit pod, do I need to make any changes to it? Any and all info is much appreciated.

I don't. Airbus has a pretty skeezy track record in this area. I'm sure that's resulted in more than a few sales for them.

Since it appears that all the passenger windows are on a long strip of clear plastic that affixes to the exterior of the fuselage, any idea how you are supposed to paint that section? Are you supposed to mask off a hundred or so windows?

And yet those helos keep selling. Crazy to think that professional navies might know more than the experts on the internet, right??

As my subject was an early F-4C in the "Navy" scheme, it had a full set of stencils on it's gloss white belly. Took me the better part of a week but I was finally able to then start the final weathering on the undersides. I used a mix of Flory Washes (love this stuff), some thinned black and brown enamel paint and a touch of pastels. Still have some touchups but I think I'm 90% done in this area. \ Thanks for checking in!

Bill - that is one of the best weathered F-4 underbellies I've seen. Great work! It's surprising how many fantastic looking F-4 models have pristine undersurfaces.

You are spot on. These aircraft got filthy. I've got more work to do once the hundred or so decals are in place. Here's the real thing:

Quick update, painted the radome (I'll be weathering it further down the road, for now it's just a semi-gloss black), did some touchups to the camo scheme and started decaling the undersides. These early F-4C's retained their Navy style gloss white undersides, along with about 200 servicing / warning stencils. The only thing the Airforce did was to overpaint the large national insignia and "USAF" on the lower wing surfaces. On more than a few jets, you could still make out these marking under a thin coat of white. I did my best to replicate that look. I've only started to add all the servicing decals. Thanks for checking in!

Paint corrections, touchups, etc. Getting very close to the final version of this very complex paint job. Note that the vertical stab is just resting in place.

More work to show. Wings are now attached and I've added some details to the main landing gear bays. More to do in this area. I'll fix the overspray in the AIM-7 well! That's it for now, thanks for looking!

I have nothing to back this up but I have to believe that there was zero interest in restoring these lines, given the circumstances at the time. On a related note, I have to shake my head when I see models of Luftwaffe aircraft with temporary snow camouflage and the builder then adds the missing stencils on top of the white.

You do realize that simply quoting manufacturer's performance numbers doesn't really even come close to the full story about how "capable" an aircraft is? How critical is max speed for a typical mission profile these helos will fly? Any idea? How well are the Russian helos networked (which in today's world is absolutely critical)? Do they have the ability to sync information from and control UAV's? How well do the sensors perform, especially in night/adverse weather? Again, do you have even a clue or do you just believe that the only way to determine which aircraft is "better and more capable" are top speed, range and rate of climb? Even just looking at your cherished performance numbers - Are those figures you quoted in an operational configuration or "clean"? How much fuel did they have onboard? The Tiger has better performance numbers so therefore it must be "better" than the -64? LOL, you may want to have a quick chat with the Aussies. They apparently came to a different conclusion than you did. I'm afraid all you have done so far is demonstrate your unfamiliarity with the subject.

The RAF loss was due to human error. Can't blame the aircraft for stupid humans. The book is still out on the recent USN loss at sea but there is a good chance that one may be pilot error. Keep in mind, at this stage there are a large number of F-35's flying. I wouldn't get too spun up about the mishap rates at this point.

Thanks for the great feedback! I'm now starting to work on the wheel wells. First up is nose gear bay. The Tamiya part is pretty basic. I added a bunch of hydraulic lines and the red avionics cooling air cover (along with 4 tiny little wingnuts). Once the nose gear is installed, I'll add more lines and it should look pretty "busy". Also have some touchup painting to do, to clean up a few smudges that happened during the weathering process. Thanks for checking in!

I currently work in the environmental remediation industry and trust me, I know all about the short and long term effects of exposure to lead and how to mitigate them. It's just that in 1945, occupational health and safety just wasn't a priority in Germany. No one cared if a panzer crewmember might get sick from exposure to lead 10 years after the war. And yes, cleaning up operable tanks that had taken crew casualties was (and still is) somewhat common. However, that had nothing to do with the reason why Elfenbein was re-introduced.

Unfortunately, you are mistaken on both counts. Lead is a inhalation / ingestion hazard that takes a very long time to cause damage. I promise you that there was no Nazi equivalent to the US's OSHA that shut down the painting of these tanks due to potential long-term health hazards with the tank crews. I think Germany had much more pressing concerns. Same for the inability to remove blood from the interior. By late in the war, if a Germany tank was hit and had crewmembers killed, it was more than likely simply abandoned. No one cared about how it was going to be cleaned out. The reason for the switching of interior colors is very straightforward - They eliminated the white color to save production time/money. However, this resulted in multiple complaints from the crew that they couldn't see well inside the vehicle when it was buttoned up (which was the original purpose in selecting this color). As this was impacting combat efficiency, the original interior paint was quickly re-introduced.

Just adding some additional details to the aft areas of both cockpits. Couldn't start this work until I had the cockpit installed into the upper fuselage. Still have much to do in this area, will also be adjusting some of the weathering on the canopy sills. Popped the WSO's seat in just to see how everything fits. Never realized how cramped the WSO's cockpit was and how low he sat. The canopy sill looks like it comes up above his shoulders. Also completed the inner wing pylons. Just added a few access openings and some missing rivets. Also added a bit of grime to them as these typically got pretty dirty. Much more to do in this area. That's it for now, thanks for checking in.