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Stripy Panther


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My second build for this GB, this is the Hobby Boss F9F-2 Panther.

Constructionwise, I'll be building this pretty much OOB however, I'll probably bung a resin seat in.

As for the markings... I won't be doing an overall blue jet. It will be Light Gull Grey and white, with lots of red stripes. Yep... It'll be in the well known markings of ATU-206

Link to photo -->

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d9/F9F_Panthers_of_ATU-206_at_NAS_Pensacola_1956.jpg

Anyway, here's the box.

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And the parts. As you can see, this kit has been well fondled.

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Can't wait! :bounce:

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Here we go! Hold on tight, rider! :D

I know that Panthers had undercarriage bays in interior green at the start of their careers. However, this jet is at the end of its career and I think that they would all have had interior sections repainted white by that time - anyroads that's how I've depicted it! The cockpit is painted with Lifecolor Weathered Black, drybrushed with Lifecolor Worn Black and finally the kit instrument panel decal is applied.

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Okayyyyyy... remember that Baz Luhrmann song about sunscreen? One of the lines of advice is read the instructions, even if you don't follow them...

Well, I didn't follow the instructions - basically because I was too stupid to read them. :banghead:

I assembled the intakes and glued the wing uppersurfaces to the one piece lower surface. Then I offered the wing up to the fuselage only to find.... shock! horror! it doesn't fit! :yikes:

There's a simple explanation. The instructions show that you fit the wing lowersurfaces first, add the intake parts and then seal them in with the wing uppersurfaces. The wing roots wrap around the fuselage quite nicely. If the follow the instructions, the kit will fall together. Do what I did, and you'll have your work cut out... :wall:

Anyway, I managed to get the wing fitted with a bit of gentle persuasion. There are still some gaps on the wingroots, but they wouldn't even occur if I had followed the destructions...

Ah well... you live and learn. And then you learn again when you ignore what you've learned before. :shrug::lol:

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Not much movement on this one at the moment.

I've primed using Alclad2 grey primer.

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And then sprayed the undersurfaces with Alclad2 white primer.

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Edited by Enzo Matrix
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Nice, Enzo! You're making feel like I really need to get cracking on finishing my workbench housekeeping and get building!!

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All masked up ready to spray the uppersurfaces and guess wot? That's right... I have no Light Gull Grey paint!!! :wall:

It is always the same, when you want something it has already run out, or will do before you get to paint the whole model.

Nice progress so far.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Finally managed to get some Light Gull Grey paint. First of all I tried Lifecolor UA025, however that seemed to be a liiile too light. I resprayed with Xtracrylix XA1137 which has always given me good results. I think the Lifecolor paint will be suitable for painting faded panels on an aircraft which has seen a bit of use, so all is not lost.

After that, I masked the red stripes and sprayed them with Gunze Aqueous H327.

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As always, I need to do some touchups, but it's getting there. Having perused the original photo, I've noticed that the wing and tailplane leading edges are also in natural metal, which is nice. That will provide yet more interest to this scheme.

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As always, I need to do some touchups, but it's getting there. Having perused the original photo, I've noticed that the wing and tailplane leading edges are also in natural metal, which is nice. That will provide yet more interest to this scheme.

Actually an aluminized paint, part of a range of rain resistant coatings approved for use on leading edges. Not that it makes much difference to our models, as in any case we have to paint anyway... :lol:

Just bettere not use a paint that's too shiny

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Actually an aluminized paint, part of a range of rain resistant coatings approved for use on leading edges. Not that it makes much difference to our models, as in any case we have to paint anyway... :lol:

Just bettere not use a paint that's too shiny

Thanks, Giorgio. That's a very good point.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Stickers on! :fool:

The national insignia are from a 35 year old Microscale sheet. They worked perfectly!

The other markings are from various Fantasy Printshop general sheets. I still need to find some correctly sized ones to apply "ATU-206" under the "NAVY" logo. If I can't find them soon, I'll go for some substitute ones which aren't quite the right font.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Finished! :yahoo:

I have been very critical of TrumpBoss kits in recent months. They are always well engineered and a joy to build but many seem to have silly errors that are difficult to fix if you want to maintain the same level of surface detailing.

This is not one of those kits. It is a pure joy from start to finish. Just one work of warning... follow the instruction sheet exactly! Don't think that you know better. :lol: There is a certain assembly sequence for the wings and if you don't follow it, you'll have a few problems. Guess how I know... :wall: Follow the sequence exactly and the kit will fall together.

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Edited by Enzo Matrix
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