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I have a question about this profile that I found online. It's a South Vietnamese F8F Bearcat, in a striking camo scheme. I thought it might be interesting as a variation to the glossy blue and all metal 'cats out there, but I wonder if there are any photo's to confirm this scheme, as all I have found was this profile (and variants thereof). Can anyone out there help me out?

Has anyone noticed, I wonder?... A brand new F8F Bearcat in the 1/72 scale! And highly detailed, it seems. Link: http://attacksquadron.pl/index.php/2013/12/a-kolejnym-modelem-attack-squadron-jest/?lang=en#more-868 Alex

Hi all, I previously posted a thread in ready for Inspection on Saturday - by mistake. So I will add a redirect to here. Hobbycrafts 1/48 F8F has been avaialbe for a while now ( 15years perhaps?) and is also available in the Academy boxing - which I am using. Though dimensionally pretty OK it suffers from 1 BIG problem and a couple of minor ones. I hope this build will be of use to anyone wanting to improve the only 1/48th model of Grumman's last, most pugnacious single engine "prop-cat" First up the BIG problem: the cowling. As moulded the model has a cowling lip shape which is far too blunt, and the diameter of the cowl opening is too small. This really does screw up the shape of the model when compared to the original. There have been resin replacements for the cowling, which do solve the problem. Looking at the kit part, I decided that I could improve the shape the old fashioned way: to whit - some serious sanding. The aim was to make the curve of the cowl lip extend back more and take on a smoother gentler curve. Using a very coard sanding pad, the shape was altered, and then refined with finer grades of pad until i was happy. I still need to rescribe some panel lines, but here you can see the new cowling, compared against the unaltered: Here's how the airframe looks with the unaltered cowl: And with the reshaped one: Whichever version of Bearcat you desire - the cowling front shape is the same, so this will need to be done. I've also removed the cooling flaps from aft of the cowl and added plastic card inserts to fair the fuselage underneath in. I'll cut new flaps form plastic card later. Now onto the first of the minor kit problems - the UC bay. As moulded Hobbycraft tried to show the prominent air ducting in each wheel well, and provided an insert for the fuselage to depict the bay into which these lead. However its very basic and doesn't do the complex nature of the real thing much justice. As the Bearcat airframe is very smooth and clean - I felt that this area really needed some extra detail added - to add interest and realism to the machine. First up I removed the existing moulded in ducting from the UC bays, then started to add new bulkheads, ducting and details from scratch. The air intakes also need a lot of work to fair in the ducting too. These shots are very much in progress, as there's LOTS more to add yet. So far everything added is made form plastic card, tape or bits form the spares box. Note the intakes still need refining and theres a small splitter plate to add inside the inner, wider part of the intakes too. The final bit to correct: The undercart. The Bearcat had a unique trunnioned UC leg which allowed for a long gear leg length without positioning the UC way way outboard. Hobbycraft's moulding of the leg is one peice and a bit anaemic to say the least. I thought that this unique feature of the aircraft could do with a bit of TLC - so here are the first steps. First the upper part of the leg ( the hinged trunnion) is removed. Next using thick plastic card and some very fiddly sanding, filing and drilling, new beefier trunnions were made. The link between leg and trunnion was drilled and brass tube used to make the hinge - which does work. Finally out came the mini drill with mini bur head and the recessed areas were made. The leg needs to be reshaped too - but that's mainly a cosmetic exercise using a file and some CA. The Oleo scissor links need to be redone and the braking calipers and hydraulic lines applied. But overall I'm pleased with the start. Well that's the state of play this evening. As more detail is added, I'll update with new pics. Hope you like it so far. Jonners

Hi all. Here's the Hobbycraft 1/48th Bearcat with a 'few' improvements added. See here for what I've done http://www.britmodel...showtopic=37214 Decals are from Berna and represent a GC1/9 Limousin "Beercat" based at Cat-Bi, French Indochina 1951. Camera batteries have just died, so I'll add a few more pics once they are recharged! As always, all comments welcome. Hope you like her. Salut Jonners [edit 6th Dec] Took some pics - hopefully you can get an idea of the finish with these.