Revell Tornado GR1 1:144 - update 15-11 the mighty FINished

[Neal]

Although I've not done anything, I did have a look at the kit today:

The cockpit to body gaps are a little larger than the panel lines, but they're even, so I'm not going to fill them as I'll cause more mess than I'll fix. 

I've never done pre shading before as my final brush coats were pretty thick, but I've been using some Newton and Windsor flow improver and I'm getting much thinner coats so I'm going to preshade around the main control surfaces and see how it looks. 

PS

John, thanks for the link

[Neal]

A bit of progress with the first coat of the grey, it's drying a bit dark and a bit blue, so I'll adjust the mix for the next coat. 

Made up the refuelling probe and added the pylons to the ECM pods. 

Edited June 2, 2012 by Neal

[Neal]

Think that's the grey fixed. 

Finished the sidewinders and ECM pods with their decals, they have been a right bind to get them to sit flat, I've given them a coat of klear so that'll hopefully pull them down. 

As you can see I've scratched some seeker covers for the sidewinders using some sprue and plasticard. 

[nirvanagr]

Nice job, Neal! Well done.

[Neal]

Nice job, Neal! Well done.

Thanks nirvangar

I'd fitted the sidewinder sensor covers at a bit of a jaunty angle as it looks to me like they're only push fit, but looking back at the pics I may have overdone it, what do the experts think?

[nimrod54]

Looking good Neal, the grey in the second photograph is much better and seems to be a good match. As for the sidewinder covers I think that whilst they are a push fit they are snug fit. Check this link and see what you think Tornado SIG - weapons pics. Keep up the good work buddy.

Edited June 5, 2012 by nimrod54

[AirfixAndy]

As you have probably seen in the photos....the covers are quite a snug fit to protect that delicate sensor in the nose.

Great looking build BTW

Andy

[Neal]

Andy, John,

Thanks for the help. 

The seeker covers have been straightened and corrected. I've also lightly drilled out the motors then attached them to the pylons. 

The decals still haven't laid fully flat on the ECM pods and there's some silvering, hopefully another coat of klear will fix it!

I'd completely forgotten about the LRMTS so masked, attached and painted the retrokits parts. 

Need to think about some RBF tags for the seeker heads, not sure whether to use tamiya tape or some thin plasticard. Any ideas has anybody made these before in 1:144?

[Neal]

Hopefully I can make some progress over the weekend. Planning to get some green paint on, looking at it where I've used it so far on the pylons it's a very dark and very green (hopefully that doesn't sound too odd) so I might add a tiny bit of light grey to make it a bit closer to the pics I've seen. 

I'm also trying to decide whether to mask the cammo or do it freehand. 

[nimrod54]

Those sidewinders look great Neal, neat job on drilling out the motors. Wow, a freehand camo-job in this scale would be interesting. I would have to mask it, my airbrush skills would not be up to it, I need a LOT more practice before giving that a go. Go for it, look forward to seeing your result, if it is anything like the rest of this build it will be brilliant.

Edited June 15, 2012 by nimrod54

[Neal]

Those sidewinders look great Neal, neat job on drilling out the motors. Wow, a freehand camo-job in this scale would be interesting. I would have to mask it, my airbrush skills would not be up to it, I need a LOT more practice before giving that a go. Go for it, look forward to seeing your result, if it is anything like the rest of this build it will be brilliant.

John,

Thanks for the comments.

I'm going to be brush painting, as I've not yet progressed onto airbrushing yet.

[nimrod54]

John,

Thanks for the comments.

I'm going to be brush painting, as I've not yet progressed onto airbrushing yet.

Doh . sorry Neal I naturally assumed that you had airbrushed the grey. That shows how good the finish in the previous photos is. It also proves that one should never assume, because it makes an bottom of u & me.

[Neal]

Only I bit of progress this evening, marked out the camo, couldn't get tamiya tape round the radii at this scale (good job I'm not airbrushing John). 

Painted the tyres, made a bit of a hash of one of the nosewheels so that needs fixing. 

Drilled out a HUD projector and painted it green (not that you can see it very well now) then added a HUD screen. 

Must take a brave pill and split the canopy.

Edited June 16, 2012 by Neal

[brianthemodeller]

Must take a brave pill and split the canopy.

Here we go, here we go, here we go....

Brian

ps Does look good though

[Neal]

Brian,

Thanks for the comments

Still not tackled the canopy.

Finally got the paint on. 

I did put a drop of light grey in the green. Putting on the green also seems to have made the grey look a bit better as well.

Edited June 17, 2012 by Neal

[nimrod54]

Great stuff Neal, shades look really good for this scale.

[Neal]

Cheers John.

Some how an hours work has only resulted in a bit of masking, opening up the UC bays again and making some bags for the wings from plasticard (ie those little V things on the mat)

[AirfixAndy]

Great paint job

Andy

[Neal]

Great paint job

Andy

Thanks Andy.

Got the wing bags on, don't think you can see in the picture but I've scribed the sections onto them, I recon the lines will come out when a wash is applied. 

Hardly worth opening the paint for but painted the lights on the intakes. 

Need to mask and paint the thrust reversers, I'll probably mix the paint for that but need to let it all dry to I can mask them. 

Drilled out the main UC door lights and put a drop of silver in, I'll put some pva on top later. 

Painted the radome and did a bit of silver on the UC & RF probe.

Painted an edge on the HUD screen. 

This is never my favourite part of the build, loads of jobs all small all fiddly, none of them seemingly getting you closer to the finish.…

Still thinking about RBF tags, any ideas?

[AirfixAndy]

RBF tags in 1/144 !!

You are braver than me Neal :lo:

Joking aside......how about strips of Tamiya tape painted red and very fine fuse wire ??

Andy

[nimrod54]

This is never my favourite part of the build, loads of jobs all small all fiddly, none of them seemingly getting you closer to the finish.…

Neal, I know what you mean, for me its adding the wing/fuse load outs. I always like to see models loaded up, but find this so boring to do.

Still thinking about RBF tags, any ideas?

What about using some thin plastic strip painted orange-red and add either mask them using some thin pieces of tape or use white decal stripes. I know this doesn't help with those that have 'Remove Before Flight' on them but I guess at this scale the lettering would barely be seen. You could also try doing the striped ones using something like Microsoft Power Point and print them out, you would need to the make them double the required length and fold in half. These would be more flexible so you could give them a bit more shape. I found these on the internet they are 1/48 so you would need to reduce them, I think that reducing by 67% gives you 1/72nd scale then you would have to reduce that by 50% for 1/144th RBF Tags right click on image and save image as ......jpg.

[Neal]

Neal, I know what you mean, for me its adding the wing/fuse load outs. I always like to see models loaded up, but find this so boring to do.

What about using some thin plastic strip painted orange-red and add either mask them using some thin pieces of tape or use white decal stripes. I know this doesn't help with those that have 'Remove Before Flight' on them but I guess at this scale the lettering would barely be seen. You could also try doing the striped ones using something like Microsoft Power Point and print them out, you would need to the make them double the required length and fold in half. These would be more flexible so you could give them a bit more shape. I found these on the internet they are 1/48 so you would need to reduce them, I think that reducing by 67% gives you 1/72nd scale then you would have to reduce that by 50% for 1/144th RBF Tags right click on image and save image as ......jpg.

Thanks for the link, I'm going to try a few things; I've some thin plasticard which is nice to cut and paint but probably doesn't have the right texture. I've had a quick go with tamiya tape which I think will sit right but I couldn't seem to get the masking right to make them in a strip so I think I'll make them individually in red then add the white stripes separately. I'll see if I can print something as well.

Looking at some reference pic on airliners.net there seems to be a few different design of tag and no standard fitment. I'm going for a fairly light fitment so I think one for each of the practice mk82 rounds, one each for the sidewinders covers and the drop tanks, then one for the intake covers. So eight all in.

A pic I forgot to add last night:

Edited June 27, 2012 by Neal

[Neal]

Just want to press on a get this finished, but still a big list of minor jobs still to do, unlike this great 1:144 A-10 Link which is positively racing along by comparison.

I've been looking for one of these for a while now and I finally found a reasonable one (in terms of cost and presentation)

The tomcat looks ok, not as nice as the latest revell F-14D though, however the deck and accessories look great. So I think this chap is swapping sides and is going to become Tornado ground crew kneeling on a ladder checking out the cockpit.

Any idea what colours to use for his uniform? I'm assuming olive drab coverall, day glow vest, green bump cap and black ear defenders.

[Neal]

No build this week, and probably no build next week either, which is a bit frustrating as a couple of hours work could see this ready for decaling.

Does anyone know where I could find a 1:144 scale NATO / UK taxiway Base that I could print for this, I've not been able to turn anything up yet.

Edited June 30, 2012 by Neal

[Neal]

Hopefully I might make some progress this weekend. 

In the meantime I've managed to find this which I'd exactly what I was looking for:

http://www.geocities.jp/kuugun_koushou/ab.html