Kinetic F-5

[Ian]

So this arrived all the way from ‘the old country’ this afternoon:

Even with the postage it’s still cheaper to have the thing delivered from the UK, than buy it across the counter here in NZ (even if you can find one !!).

As this is written I’ve only had a cursory glance at the contents of the (end opening) box, and surprisingly it isn’t the neatly packaged bits of plastic that made my jaw drop, it was the superbly presented, stapled, 32 page instruction manual. The 12 steps are individually drawn in large A4 LANDSCAPE format, one step per page and so explicit that even a serial styrene mangler like me has no excuse for scr*w*ng-up the construction.

Ahh but that only takes me to the centre-page. The following 16 pages are the paint/decal options !! – That’s 16, count them, 16 options, 3 USAF, 3 RCAF, 2 Klu, 2 RNoAF, 5 HAF and bringing-up the rear the sole VNAF machine….

So here’s a wee clue as to what I’m planning for mine:

I know that the Vietnamese machines had scabbed-on appliqué armour on the undersides protecting the engines and it shouldn’t be too difficult to fabricate these out of plastic sheet. There’s a good series of reference photos over on ARC (I think), which I’ll be using very soon. But other than this and a change in loadout, and maybe a replacement resin seat this will be almost straight from the box. Won’t be starting for a couple of weeks, after the RF-4, Harrier and StuG have cleared the bench, but I have to admit, the thought of starting this wee project does give me a very definite ‘buzz’

Updates ‘as-and-when’

AFN

Ian

[smuts]

Nice... got one of these in the stash watching this one..

Andy