Ben Brown

Hi Antti, What accuracy issues does the kit have? I know the cockpit needs work, the kit lacks intakes, the main gear struts need additional details, and the fuselage panel lines seem to be a mix of FG.1 and FGR.2. Also, Hypersonic makes accurate replacement stabilators for Hasegawa F-4s. He also sells a very nice resin and photo etched canopy detail set that I think is a must-have for any Hasegawa, Academy, or Z-M F-4 kit. Ben

Hi Dennis, The gear wells and the speed brake well on the F-100 were a darkish interior green, approximately FS 34092. Flat Euro 1 Dark Green from your favorite paint manufacturer will work. The insides of the gear doors and speed brake were natural metal or aluminum lacquer. Same with the gear struts. The Voodoo's gear wells were the same green as the F-100, but the door interiors were Insignia Red. The interior of the speed brakes and the wells were also red. HTH. Ben

The only model of an S2/S3 Turbo I've ever seen during years of searching was a sad-looking vacuformed slot car body. Maybe we should lobby that guy on Shapeways to do a Turbo transkit, since he's already partway there with the S3 parts. Ben

Here's one from Airliners.net: Link because no hotlinking And another from a site that doesn't allow hotlinking Just a guess, but I would think carrier-based Phantoms were a little cleaner than shore-based jets because they had to be washed often for corrosion control. Ben

I use cheap wooden plaques from the craft store and acrylic rod from Amazon. If the fuselage is hollow, I add a section of brass tube to accept the rod. Paint or stain the base, drill a hole in it for the rod, and cut the rod to whatever length you need to get the height you want. I use different lengths of rod so I can get several levels of “altitude” to squeeze more models into my limited display space. I use a couple of different diameters of rod, but I can’t recall what they are. I’ll check this afternoon and update my post. Ben

Flown: Some kind of glider, can't recall the type Hang gliders Quicksilver MX ultralight (still questioning that choice 40 years later) Lots of different single engine Cessna, Piper, and Beechcraft types NAVION Baron 55 and 58 Cessna 310, 402, 441 Beech 18 DC-3 Beech Starship All of the King Air versions from the C90 to the 300, except the F90 Mitsubishi Diamond Beechjet Dash-8 CRJ 737 Ridden in: B-17 A320 Fokker 28 & 100 707, 717, 727, 737, 747, 757 (best jump seat ride ever!), and 777 DC-8, DC-9, MD-80 Shorts 360 Metroliner III Jetstream ERJ-145 & 170 Ben

Just to add to the fun, Pacific Air Forces (PACAF) had a different numbering system than the rest of the Air Force. PACAF used the system as described by Finn, while the rest of the Air Force went with the last two of the year plus the last three of the serial. So, 64-0679 would be 66-679 if it were flying out of Lakenheath or Nellis. Ben

I've since learned that the "unknown antenna" under the nose is the datalink antenna for the Bullpup missile. Not used on the Weasels, but I guess the system was already installed on the aircraft when they modified them. Ben

Found it! First production F-106s with tape-style instrument panels were F-106A 57-2465 and F-106B 57-2523. Ben

According to Doug Barbier's World's Fastest Single-Engine Jet Aircraft, all F-106s with the vertical tape-style instrument panels were modified to use the guns. I made a quick glance through the rest of the book to see if I could find what serial number made the change from round to tape-style instruments, but haven't found it, yet. Given Doug's love for the aircraft, I'm sure the info is in there, somewhere. I'll keep looking. Ben

Very interesting about the Blackbird wings. For the amount of time work required to clean up those High Planes parts, you could build slats yourself! 🤣 Ben

That's looking great! Unless there is something wrong with the resin wings, I'd consider going with those. The Trumpeter wings (in all three scales) are too thin. This has the effect of causing the main gear wells to be too shallow and thus making the main gear struts appear too long. This and the too-large main gear tires cause the Trumpeter kits to sit almost level, instead of having the F-100's characteristic nose-up attitude. I faked it on my 1/32 kit by shortening the main gear struts and replacing the wheels with more correct ones. Ben

Wow! Ben

1/144!?!? Yikes! What are you going to rig it with, spider webs? This is going to be cool! Ben

Beautiful job! My favorite of the 911s. BTW, does anyone make a rear spoiler for this kit? Ben

Thanks for the suggestions! Ben

The Misty F-100Fs were borrowed from various squadrons based at Phu Cat, so they had a variety of tail codes. I haven't seen a photo of one without the RHAWS gear fitted, with the wider tail fairing and antenna fairing under the nose. Those bits will have to be added to the ESCI/AMT kit. The Mistys have a web site: LINK. There is also some good information on the NMUSAF site: LINK. Mistys carried the usual pair of 335-gal drop tanks (you'll need to add a scale 28" plug to the tank at the leading edge of the pylon) and a 7-shot rocket pod (can't recall the LAU-??) on each outboard pylon. I haven't seen any photos of Misty jets with the inboard pylons fitted. For the Wild Weasels, initially carried 19-shot rocket pods on the outboards and occasionally napalm on the inboards. They operated as a hunter for a quartet of F-105 killers. This made for a difficult combination, because the F-100 cruised at ~350 knots while the Thuds cruised at ~450. The Shrike came later and a single one was carried on an Type-1 pylon on the port inboard station. 335-gal drop tanks were always carried. The antenna fairing on the tail was slightly different than the widened one used on RHAWS-fitted jets. You might find THIS THREAD helpful. I need to go back and edit that thread. The rear instrument panel was modified to add the various Weasel gear, but none was mounted on top of the glare shield. Someone here on Britmodeller posted a scan of a report that showed the rear panel layout but I can’t find it now. Still looking…. EDIT 2: I found the photo of the rear instrument panel! Someone on this forum posted it, but I have lost his name and can't find the thread he posted it in. Sir, if you shared this scan, please let me know so I can give proper credit. Caracal CD72071 - USAF F-100 in Vietnam has decals for both a Misty jet and a Wild Wesel. HTH. Ben

Hi All, I bought a lighting set for my Martian War Machine for my first time at lighting a model, and I'm looking for a good way to evenly diffuse the light in the green nose and wingtip parts so I don't have hot spots. Will spraying the insides of the clear green parts with clear flat or thin flat white work, or am I better off hiding the LEDs behind tissue or thin plastic? Thanks! Ben

Beautiful build!!! It looks like a great kit. I wish I had the budget for one. We need more kits of current GT cars like this. Ben

@desert falcon, I just finished that kit last week! It was a fun, simple build with no "gotchas." The only problems I had were all self-induced. The most difficult part of the build was painting the black trim, which was mostly just tedious. Yesterday, I got a great deal on a Tamiya BMW 635CSI race car kit and a set of rare Studio 27 Jägermeister decals for it. Should be here Monday. What's funny is I bought the Porsche so I could add a Jägermeister car to my collection and had figured I'd never find the BMW at anything less than the astronomical prices they're going for these days. The decals are practically unobtanium. Ben

55-2955 was the first YF-104A. Here's a web page with its history: LINK I'm finding a lot of pics of drones in Day-Glo orange and various NASA and test jets with orange tails, but nothing of 955 painted as you describe. Who made the decal sheet? Any way you can post a scan of the instructions showing the subject at hand? Ben

Here's a larger version of the photo. It looks like "Services" and the last word on the bottom looks like "Choice." Trofeu Models made a 1/43 model of that car and it has the logo in question on it. Perhaps you could contact them through their Facebook page and ask if they can identify it for you? Facebook link I think this is their web site with an email link: Trofeu Models HTH. Ben

Wow, outstanding job! The M8 is a great kit. Ben

Great job on a difficult kit! You can’t go wrong with SK Decals. That livery is the best one put on that car, IMHO. The others seem to emphasize the car’s odd shapes from some angles. I hated to see Ben Keating lose his win over a technicality. Ben

@Robertone139, great pics of the leading edge flaps! The BLC was fitted to all "hard wing" F-4s, both USN and USAF. It was deleted on F-4s fitted with leading edge slats. The inboard section of the leading edge flaps was fixed on the F-4J and F-4N in an attempt to improve low speed pitch control, IIRC. According to Tommy Thomason's Tailhook Topics blog, it was brought back on the first few F-4Js that were modified to F-4S, but was soon deleted again. Ben