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1/72 Heller F-16 A/B (old issue) First model fighter


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Hi all!

I just want to share with you the things I have been doing to a 1/72 Heller F-16 A/B old issue,

I got this kit to tinker with it and learn well... everything! I haven't done any aircraft modelling in a really long time and last time it was just a gluey mess with pieces of plastic attached to it. So I decided to go for a cheap kit and learn all the basic and try some advance stuff as well.

172-F-16AB-FIGHTINING-FALCON-HELLER-2014

This kit has raised panel lines which I decided to sand down and scribe them with a tamiya pea cutter I am also doing the riveting bit by bit using a small 0.3mm drill bit. I will get some pics when I have some more done.

I also got inspired by the fantastic work of Diego Quijano detailing a F-18 also on a 1/72 scale. The more I work on my F-16 the more respect I got for the level of complexity and the attention he put on his model! I have been working during the past week in detailing the landing gear bay and getting it to a more interesting level and the original kit had absolutely no detail whatsoever. Here are some pictures of it:

IMG_0828_zps402cdf49.jpg

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Still want to do some more cable work and also start working on the landing gear per se to detail it a bit more. I am also thinking in cutting some part of the fuselage to scratch build some of the internal bays.

Any comments/suggestions are more than welcome.

Thanks! and all the best

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Thanks for the comments falcon and woody37 also to the people dropping by to have a look!

Looking good so far mate. :thumbsup2:

That's a nice start with all that extra detail :)

Today I bring you some pics of the fuselage scribing and bolt drilling, some details of the cockpit and what I have been working during the weekend: the exhaust nozzle.

Regarding the fuselage, as I said before this kit had raised panel lines which I sanded down and scribed again using a tamiya scriber. Bolt holes were made using a 0.3mm drill bit, although I am thinking to start using Trumpeter´s riveter for the wings and just use the micro drill, which snaps quite easily, for detailed work. Here are some pictures of the fuselage, I have added a black wash so it's easy to see:

IMG_08392_zps269f4b6b.jpg

IMG_08402_zpsae2f03aa.jpg

You can see that there are some mistakes here and there which I will correct with filler and rescribe when I have a chance. Here a pic of the detail on one of the sides:

IMG_0841_zps78bdea96.jpg

Now, the cockpit! This kit is quite simplistic out of the box so I decided to add some details to the cockpit as well. You will see them at the back plates behind the seats and also at the side of the seats. Bottoms and knobs are made of stretched plastic sprues. The ejection lever? (not sure this is the proper term, the yellow thing) was made with some soldering wire.

IMG_0842_zps5d6ebfc5.jpg

IMG_0845_zps0657f76a.jpg

I have decided this is going to be a closed canopy model, so I will not go too crazy on detailing the cockpit. I will add some more details here and there but nothing major.

Regarding the exhaust nozzle. The end of the exhaust was just a flat surface, I shaped external bit of the turbine using plastic card, also the internal bit of the nozzle (internal feathers) was done using plastic card, this bit required cleaning the "internal feathers" of the original kit (just a flat layer of plastic), carved the shape of the outer feathers and make the plastic card feathers. Also there seems there are some small panels linking the main fuselage with the nozzle which were made of 1x1mm plastic card pieces.

IMG_08302_zps76436895.jpg

IMG_083322_zps5e88d676.jpg

IMG_0833242_zpsa1e336c2.jpg

As always comments/suggestions are more than welcomed!

Cheers,

Alex

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  • 3 weeks later...

Hi all,

It´'s being a while since the last time I posted anything on the F-16 but couldn't find the time with work to sit and do something with it.

I managed to get back on it for a couple of days and I have almost finished detailing the frontal wheel bay. Here are some pictures:

IMG_1606_zps6dddd19b.jpg

IMG_1600_zps71cffb91.jpg

I had to craft out of an old sprue the two hydraulic bars that control the opening/closing of the bay lid. The kit came with nothing of the sort. See at the bottom of the reference picture:

frontalwheelbay_zps0bb17321.jpg

One (the one already glued) I craft out a old sprue by profiling it with a knife and loads of patience.

IMG_1602_zps0af06102.jpg

The other one I stretched a sprue and then I used milliput to sculpt the rest of the structure. Here is a pic of the sculpted bar and a ref pic of where should be added:

IMG_1603_zps74a12fa5.jpg

That's about 0.5-1 mm thick in the main part.

IMG_1605_zps497f9e14.jpg

I think I will add some more cable work although the main work I think it's done already.

The golden cable you see comes from the net bit that comes in the lid of cava/champagne bottles. I found it quite useful for making thick cable/pipes. Just in case you were looking for cheap sources of cables ;)

As always comments/recommendations are always welcome! Hope you like it!

Cheers,

Alex

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Woah!!! You've really gone to town with such a basic kit! Fantastic!

Your detailing is superb, especially if this is not something you have done before. Congrats!

Re filling re-scribing errors, I find it best to use CA glue deposited with a tooth pick and sanded when it is +/- 20 mn old. Putty often crumbles when you run a scriber through and you end up with a messy area.

Just a suggestion.

And don't forget to remove the seam on the front wheel tyre.

That is going to be a great model.

JR

PS: where the hell is Menai Bridge?

Edited by jean
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Hi Jean,

Thanks a lot for the comments! I will definitely try the CA glue for the panels. Yeah I know about the issue of the front wheel I still have to sand it properly to give it an effect of weight as well, also gonna do some more detailing on the frontal landing gear with cables and add-ons.

After this I will try to do some side internal bays and finish off the bolts on the wings.

Menai Bridge is a little town in North Wales.

Cheers,

Alex

Woah!!! You've really gone to town with such a basic kit! Fantastic!

Your detailing is superb, especially if this is not something you have done before. Congrats!

Re filling re-scribing errors, I find it best to use CA glue deposited with a tooth pick and sanded when it is +/- 20 mn old. Putty often crumbles when you run a scriber through and you end up with a messy area.

Just a suggestion.

And don't forget to remove the seam on the front wheel tyre.

That is going to be a great model.

JR

PS: where the hell is Menai Bridge?

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TIny update. I have been working this morning in some of the side bays from the tail section. Carving the tail took most of the time! Here are some pictures:

IMG_1612_zpsba34e665.jpg

IMG_16162_zps50a64e46.jpg

All the best!

Edited by Gaia1984
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  • 4 weeks later...

Hi guys!

Been busy working on some panels! Still loads of work to be done, especially in the internal avionics. I have been working on the compartment housing which I intend to paint before adding the avionics, which also should be painted before putting them in place.

As I said I worked out that compartment in the tail section. Here is a pic:

IMG_2359_zpscdf0bc34.jpg

IMG_2367-2_zps8e41f525.jpg

Also the hydraulics of the frontal wheel bay has been added, you can also see in the following picture some of the avionic bays I have scratched out. One side finished other one I still have to work on it a bit more. I carved out the compartment from the original kit and extended it a bit using plastic card and flatted it out using some Squadron green. Borders of the bays are also made with plastic card.

IMG_2370-2_zpsd33f0d5b.jpg

Here are some lateral views of the avionic bays:

IMG_2366-2_zpsfcc1cb6c.jpg

IMG_2363-2_zpsb3589771.jpg

Thinking whether to do a cut out of the nose of the plane and make a scratch-built radar..... I definitely will be adding some more bays on sides of the plane, maybe not so much on the top. Also have to work on the wings.

Any way if you have any suggestions/comments please feel free to drop a message! Hope you enjoy it!

Cheers,

Alex

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Boy, Oh boy!

You are not leaving a single panel closed on this F-16!!!! But am I impressed with your work, especially considering it is basically your first real, serious model building.

Congrats!!!

JR

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  • 3 weeks later...

Thanks guys!

It's taking me some time to get back to it because work reasons. This week I had a chance of doing some little progress in the rear avionic bays and did the painting of the cutaways in the tail section.

Also noticed I made some mistakes:

1)the second bay below the cannon it doesn't really exists. So I had to refill the gap with green putty and rescribe the panel lines.

2)all the avionic bays are far too shallow compared with the real thing. I haven't found any way to solved this as it's pretty tight in the section because the cockpit it's right there. So at the end I have decided to do a compromise with fidelity and practicality. I'm going to leave the bays as they are and represent the components that are present in the bay in a flat way. I think it still does the job fairly well.

3) also one of the landing gear at the back snapped after an accident, I have managed to fix it but I'll have to redo some cable work.

Future work:

I want to do the very frontal bays. The ones with the radar electronics. I'm also pondering to scratchbuild the nose and make the radar antenna.

Regarding the painting I've been looking at f-16b patterns and really like the blue aggressor (I don't have the info with me but will post the squadron when I upload next update pics, they are coming!!! :);) )

All the best,

Alex

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Hi guys!

I bring some updates on the avionic bays.

First I realized I made a mistake in the interior bit of one of the bay door. Here it's a pic with the original I made on the left and the correct one on the right:

IMG_3408-2_zps05c2b846.jpg

Here is a pic of the bay doors with the on-top avionics. I still have to add the cable work to it but I am waiting for the Tamiya panel line accent to come to do a wash before adding the cables:

IMG_3417-2_zpsf68509d7.jpg

I decided to go for painted avionics. I know that Diego Quijano makes these with stretches sprues, I tried to do this but I still don't have the control to do them this way. I will also repaint a bit the screws in a more circular shape.

Untitled-1_zps239b9318.jpg

I also have been working a bit on the internal components of the bay. Still have to fill them but it is been proving tricky due to its size. The vertical side walls of the bays are about 1.5mm thin.

IMG_3425-22_zpsb1f4f0c9.jpg

IMG_3424-2_zpsc00e8c3b.jpg

Here it's the other side:

IMG_3423_zps7655b1f9.jpg

And here a more detailed picture of just the bays. You can also see the boo boo I made carving out that second bay on the right side of the plane. That bay actually does not exist, so I have to fill it up again. Still have to do some polishing of the surface. I will also work a bit more on the painting of the bay and will try to get a ref picture of the bay for comparison.

IMG_3413-2_zps0232d578.jpg

Last but not least I have done some painting on the tail cutaways:

IMG_3409-2_zps07349ed4.jpg

Hope you enjoy it!

As always comments are more than welcome!

All the best,

Alex

Edited by Gaia1984
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  • 3 months later...

Hi everybody!

It has been a while since the last time. I got a bit burnout with the project as progress was so painfully slow and also life caught up with me and had to leave it for a while.

Anyway, I made some progress during last week and hope I will be able to update the forum now and then on a regular basis.

I did some work on the avionics bays getting some of the detailing and painting done:

IMG_8531-2_resize_zps2fc5cf8a.jpg

I have to fix the frame of the bay in this one. Probably will be using CA as it has given me good results in other parts of the plane when correcting errors in the scribbled panels lines.

IMG_8545-2_resize_zps5cd2b3d4.jpg

Next thing I have been working on is the ALQ-199 ECM pod, aka this fella

0314F4pod_zps0e527116.jpg

That wasn't actually the model one! :P The one from the Heller kit was very plane with no detail at all besides general shape. I add a bit of detailing with plastic card:

IMG_8532-2_resize_zps731de9c4.jpg

IMG_8533-2_resize_zps647582f5.jpg

Also been working on the pylons from the triple missile launcher (for AGM-65 mavericks). Quite difficult to find any reference pic of this, I wanted to do some paneling as the original piece was completely flat:

IMG_8541-2_resize_zps2a58d745.jpg

IMG_8534-2_resize_zps5991d320.jpg

At the end I think I got the paneling wrong.... :( I think I did the paneling of the fuel pod pylons and not the one from the weapons pylon... :/ Another thing I am still planning to do it to sand off the tip of the AGM-65 Mavericks and make a clear lens out of CA.

By the way, quick question. What colour should I use to paint the Mavericks? I want the dark green version. Thanks in advance!

Last but not least I have been doing riveting! Got the Trumpeter riveter and I have been experimenting with it on the wings and tail.

IMG_8535-2_resize_zpsee8ee9db.jpg

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In this last pic you can see the marks of the old riveting I tried to made using a 0.3mm drill bit and trying to do it manually..... I don't recommend this to anybody!!!! I fix it by adding small quantities of CA with a toothpick and subsequent sanding. Also had to fix the sidewinder rail as you can see I had a mishap :/

That's all for today! Hope you enjoy it and as always comments are more than welcome!



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  • 2 weeks later...

Very impressive work and some very good results there ! More impressive considering the basic kit you've started with

Thanks Giorgio! It is a basic kit, maybe a bit too basic, some times I think it would have been better to start with a quicker build cos it is taken much longer than expected!

Massive job! Keep it up.

Ciao

Thanks Giemme!

Wow that is the most detailed F-16 model I have ever seen!

I've always been a huge fan of the Viper.

Keep up the amazing work mate!

Thanks Maverick!

I have seen some other really good detailed construction threads over there but thanks for the compliments! Looking forward for the painting phase!

So just another quick update! I made a bit of a mess! First I decided to cut the nose off and build myself a Westinghouse radar!

IMG_8550_zpsg01vbyey.jpg

I still haven't fixed the bulkhead on the aircraft side because I thought to open those lateral panels right next to the nose and do all the avionics in them. I will detail the rim of the bulkhead on the nose side and still have to add hinge of the whole thing

IMG_8553_zpsv3juqqqp.jpg

Here are the other two main pieces of the radar. The antenna on the left and the "studio-noise-isolation" thingy on the top of the aircraft side bulkhead. I am not very happy with this part so I may remake... we will see.

IMG_8554_zpsn1y8bzi8.jpg

IMG_8558_zpshczhss8j.jpg

Also did some painting on the underside avionic bays:

IMG_8574_zpsh1e3hey6.jpg

IMG_8573_zpswbh5u3ki.jpg

And also built the bay when the aircraft charger goes:

IMG_8570_zpszwuw7zfh.jpg

Anyway hope you enjoy this. All the best! And as always comments and suggestions are always welcomed!

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