jrlx Posted June 3, 2015 Posted June 3, 2015 EDIT: this is the second of three entries I made in the Phantom STGB. I wasn't able to finish any in time but I'll finish the builds as regular WIPs. So, the threads have been moved here very promptly by Mish, Shar2 and Greg B. Thanks for that -------------------- Hello dear Fellow Modellers, This is my second entry in this GB (my first entry is here). This time I'll be building Fujimi's RAF Phantom in the colours of the Alcock & Brown commemorative flight. The boxing and contents are the following: IMAG1741 IMAG1742 IMAG1743 IMAG1744 This kit is not exactly equal to the Royal Navy (RN) one I'm also building. It's a later version of the mouldings, with corrections to some inaccuracies of the early moulds, and some added detail (e.g.: positionable flaps and air-brakes). It also comes with a PE fret, rubber tires and white metal parts for the landing gear and ejection seats: IMAG1745 I'll use the PE fret but I'm not convinced by the rubber and metal parts. I'll stick to the plastic parts for these. Initially, I intended to use this kit to build a combat camouflaged aircraft, instead of the commemorative painting scheme. I even bought decals for that purpose. Unfortunately, I chose decals for recce squadrons and the kit doesn't come with recce pods or ground attack rockets, which I believe were used by one of those squadrons when deployed in Cyprus after the Turkish invasion (the 41st Sqn). The weapons available are for the air interception configuration (air-to-air missiles and external fuel tanks). Here are the original kit decals, on the left, and the additional decals I bought but won't be using in this build: IMAG1746 I'll build this kit OOB. As with the RN version, my objective is to improve my building efficiency. Since the two kits are very similar, I hope to be able to build them in parallel and keep a high rate of progress. This kit has the added objective of being my first application of PE parts. So, moving on to the building process. I started the kit last Sunday's night, one day later than the RN one. I started by cutting the main parts off the sprues, like shown here: IMAG1927 Then, I dry-fit the parts in order to identify areas of problematic fit: IMAG1928 IMAG1929 Everything fits very well and the fuselage halves are not warped like in the RN kit. Therefore, the problem found at the tail in the RN kit is not apparent here: IMAG1932 Anyway, its advisable to also insert a sprue rod spacer in the fuselage, in order to eliminate the wing root gaps: IMAG1930 IMAG1931 After this, I cut the small parts off the sprues and glued them to the tips of toothpicks to facilitate painting. Here are the instrument panels and other cockpit parts: IMAG1934 and here are all the small parts I've already prepared for painting: IMAG1938 I had to use putty to make some ejector and sink marks disappear. The putty was thinned with Gunze's enamel thinner and applied in thin layers with a small paintbrush, resulting in the following picture (inner surfaces of the air intakes and some parts from the cockpit's walls): IMAG1937 After 24 hours of drying time, I sanded the excess putty with 400-grit wet-and-dry: IMAG1940 The next step is applying grey primer to the small parts and checking that the marks are now invisible. As you can see, this and the RN kit threads are almost equal to each other. However, since the weapons loading, paint schemes and decals are completely different, I opted for two independent threads. Thanks for looking. Jaime 7
Dermo245 Posted June 3, 2015 Posted June 3, 2015 So this is where all those Fujimi Phantoms are! Just kidding - look forward to seeing this one. Dermot
jrlx Posted June 4, 2015 Author Posted June 4, 2015 So this is where all those Fujimi Phantoms are! Only have two yet... But I've order a third one two weeks ago on eBay. It's an RAF version with the proper weapons loadings for air-to-air, ground attack and recce squadrons. If it arrives soon enough, I'll try to make a third entry in the GB 1
jrlx Posted June 5, 2015 Author Posted June 5, 2015 Hello, here's a short update on the build. I'm afraid it is really very similar to the updates on my Royal Navy (RN) Phantom. That's to be expected, as the two kits are almost twins. The builds will only differ significantly when I get to the application of PE parts and main painting stages. Anyway, for the sake of completeness, here are the latest steps made on the build. I apologise to those reading my RN Phantom thread for the repetition... I applied grey primer to all small parts already off the sprues. As grey primer, I use Tamiya's XF-19 Sky Grey. It's an acrylic matt paint and works well as a primer. Here are the small parts primed: IMAG1949 The cockpit tube got primed as well: IMAG1952 I also primed the inner cockpit walls. The picture is a bit dull... Grey primer on grey plastic... Anyway, here it is for the sake of completeness: IMAG1948 The primed parts were left to dry for a day and then I checked the moulding marks that I tried to eliminate with putty. As should be expected, they were still visible, though not as bad as originally. Here are they on the inner walls of the air intakes: IMAG1951 and on the two small parts that will be glued to the inner cockpit walls (in foreground in the following photo): IMAG1950 In this kit the auxiliary air intake doors have no ejection marks. So, two parts less to take care of. Anyway, I had to apply another layer of putty, this time a bit thicker. Here are the air intakes: IMAG1956 and the cockpit wall parts: IMAG1957 The putty is now drying and later today I'll sand the excess off. Hopefully, the markings will be gone and I'll be able to apply a new coat of primer and go on to the painting of interior colours. Thanks for looking. I hope you're not too bored by these preparatory steps and, if you're also reading my RN Phantom thread, by the repetition. Cheers Jaime 2
jrlx Posted June 8, 2015 Author Posted June 8, 2015 Over the weekend I did some progress on the RAF Alcock & Brown Phantom. After being left to dry, I sanded the excess putty applied to the parts that had moulding marks. Unfortunately, after applying another coat of grey primer, the marks were still visible in the main air intakes and in the right rear cockpit panel. I applied putty again to these parts, left them to dry, sanded the excess off and applied grey primer to check. The right rear panel was ok but the marks in the main air intakes were still visible and the primer finish was uneven. So, I removed all the primer from the intakes with isopropyl alcohol and applied putty to a clean surface. I won't bother you with additional pictures which look just like some previously posted. When these parts are ok, I'll show them ready. Moving on, I rescribed the detail of the left cockpit panel part, lost to the putty / sanding process. I used a magnifying glass and an x-acto blade to rescribe the detail. Here's the result, which is better than the one for the Royal Navy (RN) kit I'm doing in parallel to this one: IMAG1971 This panel and the one for the opposite side were glued in place. I should mention that this was done with the cockpit tube dry-fitted in place, in order to ensure that, in the end, everything would fit. I found that I had to trim the right side panel part, as well as the rim of the rear seat cockpit on the same side. Since I did this previously in the RN Phantom, this time it was a quicker process. The following photos show these parts glued in place: IMAG1977 IMAG1978 Then, I painted the main colours of the small parts (seat parts, cockpit parts, ...) IMAG1994 Here are the seats. The instructions show two different colours: olive drab for the head rest and khaki green for the rest of the seat. The instructions for the RN kit indicate only one colour: olive drab for the whole seat. I searched the web for pictures of these seats and found all types of colour combinations, so I stuck with the instructions. IMAG1993 Here's the cockpit tube (detail colours still need to be applied to the side panels): IMAG1995 The inner grey (FS 36231) was also applied to the cockpit sides: IMAG1996 The next step is applying the detail colours to seats, instrument panels and side panels. Thanks for looking Jaime 2
jrlx Posted June 11, 2015 Author Posted June 11, 2015 Hello again, I'm running the risk of causing a lot of boredom by repeating every step of my RN Phantom build (this will only get worse when I start my Shark Teeth Phantom... ) but I'm afraid things will only be different when I get to the main painting stages... Anyway, this is a post regarding the work I did yesterday in parallel to both the RN and this Phantom. As said elsewhere, this will look to be a small update but, in fact, it represents several hours of work. As explained in the similar post for the RN Phantom, I decided to take the more difficult path and masked the cockpit tube to airbrush the matte black areas. Here's the cockpit tube already masked, waiting for being painted: IMAG2007 After painting and removing the masking, here's the result: IMAG2020 It turned out better than the RN one but also needs a few touch ups (with a brush...) I also painted the yellow handles on the ejection seat tops, which were used to initiate the ejection sequence. In this case I took pictures of one of the parts, after masking and after painting: IMAG2011 IMAG2010 After removing the masking, here they are, next to the other seat parts (sorry for the fuzzy focusing but my smartphone didn't manage to focus properly...): IMAG2022 I still need to paint the black stripes on the handles. That's all for now. Thanks for looking! Jaime 3
Air-to-Air Posted June 11, 2015 Posted June 11, 2015 I like the work you are doing on this one and your Navy bird. The airbrush finish on the consoles does look a lot smoother than the finish you might have got with a brush. 1
jimmydel Posted June 11, 2015 Posted June 11, 2015 Looking great so far. I just wrapped up this kit not to long ago...though in different livery...and really enjoyed it despite leaning toward large scale prefrences. I look forward to seeing you get this one finished. 1
jrlx Posted June 12, 2015 Author Posted June 12, 2015 Jimmy, Mark, thanks a lot for your interest. I'm now in the process of detail painting the ejection seats, instrument panels and side consoles on both birds. I have to use a magnifying glass and lots of patience but I must confess I'm really enjoying it I'll post the resultswhen the cockpits are finished. Jaime
jrlx Posted June 19, 2015 Author Posted June 19, 2015 Hello again, As said in my recent post on the RN Phantom, I've been quite busy working also in the Alcock & Brown Phantom in parallel since mid last week, with detailing work on the cockpit parts. This update represents several days of work. With the side consoles on the cockpit tube painted black, I finished painting the remaing black items on the cockpit side walls and the cockpit edges on the fuselage. First, I masked around these areas to be painted. On the inside: IMAG2027 and on the outside: IMAG2026 In the above picture you can see that I had already painted black the end of the air intakes and the area in front of the cockpit. I didn't mask at the time, so some overspray resulted. After painting the black areas, the results were the following. Inside: IMAG2059 and the edges: IMAG2053 For convenience, I repeat here the links to pictures of the instrument panels and side consoles of British Phantoms. As can be seen, they were mainly black on grey: http://www.projectoc...com/vox-07b.htm http://www.f4phantom...hp?plane_id=253 http://www.f4phantom...hp?plane_id=254 http://www.thunder-and-lightnings.co.uk/phantom/walkaround.php Taking these pictures into account, I moved on to detailing the lateral consoles of the cockpit tube. First, I applied a dry-brush of Tamiya's XF-19 Sky Grey: IMAG2029 Then, another dry-brush of flat white: IMAG2031 This made the buttons and dials really stand out. To finish with, I applied a final dry-brush with silver, in order to give a worn metal appearance. A coat of gloss varnish was applied in preparation for a wash: IMAG2073 Then, I detail painted the instrument panels, which were already painted in the base grey. First, using a detail brush, I painted the dials with flat black: IMAG2057 Next, I painted the other few colours (a mix of Tamiya's Desert Yellow and Gunze's Clear Orange for the radar scope in the front IP, and a few red spots). I also applied a light dry-brush with a lighter grey in order to make the dials' edges stand out: IMAG2062 This was followed by a flat white dry-brush to enhance the dials' edges further: IMAG2064 To finish the IPs, I dry-brushed with silver and applied a coat of gloss in preparation for the wash (the control column, on the right, was also dry-brushed with silver): IMAG2074 I also decided to detail the seats, since these are complex systems with lots of details and colours, as can be seen in the pictures in the walkaround here in BM http://www.britmodel...aker-mk7-seats/ I used a detail brush and about 7 colours to detail the sides, top of the seats and harnesses. Here is the result with the parts still on toothpicks: IMAG2048 The ejection handles were finished by painting the black stripes: IMAG2055 After all paints dried, I glued the parts together. Here are the two seats: IMAG2068 IMAG2069 IMAG2070 To finish these, I applied a light silver dry-brush to the metal areas of the seats (didn't manage to photograph these properly), followed by a gloss coat in preparation for a wash. That's it for now. The next step is the application of a wash to the cockpit parts. Thanks for looking. Jaime 4
jrlx Posted June 24, 2015 Author Posted June 24, 2015 Hello again, While I was finishing my Spitfire Mk XIV (RFI here, sorry for the self-publicity...), I applied a dark wash to the cockpit parts of the British Phantoms and left them drying. With the Spit finished, I came back to the Phantoms and cut the canopy parts off the sprues. Here is the sprue of the RAF's Alcock & Brown Phantom: IMAG2155 After removing and washing (water + dishwasher liquid) the transparent parts: IMAG2156 After drying, the canopy parts were dipped in Aqua Gloss, to improve transparency and brilliance. This was done simultaneously for the canopies of the three British Phantoms I'm building. Here's the set-up: IMAG2164 The parts were left to dry in the box on the right, which was covered to protect the parts from dust. Just like with the RN Phantom, I also forgot to fill in the hole on the rear cockpit's floor, since this RAF Phantom didn't have a rear control column. I filled in the hole with a piece of plastic, carved off a piece of sprue, melted in place with Tamiya's extra liquid glue. This was covered with Squadron's white putty, diluted in enamel thinner, applied with a paint brush: IMAG2171 This is now drying. The next steps are: - sanding the excess putty and polishing the area - re-prime the area - re-paint the area - re-apply silver dry-brush - re-apply dark wash Only after this, can I install the cockpit tube in the fuselage and close the fuselage. Thanks for looking. Cheers Jaime 5
Cookenbacher Posted June 24, 2015 Posted June 24, 2015 It's all looking excellent Jaime. ps - the Spit is beautiful! 1
Jabba Posted June 24, 2015 Posted June 24, 2015 A lot of good work gone on there especially in the cockpit. Well done. 1
jrlx Posted June 29, 2015 Author Posted June 29, 2015 Hello, Last week I also managed to finish repairing the floor of the back cockpit of this Phantom. As I said in my equivalent post for the RN Phantom, first I made a small "tool" for sanding the excess putty, using a sprue rod with a piece of sanding paper CA-glued to one of its ends. The following picture shows the tool next to the cockpit base, right after sanding the putty: IMAG2178 In this case the damage to the previous paint job was worse because, before sanding, I tried to remove part of the putty using a cotton bud with too much nail cleaner... Then, I masked the back cockpit and repainted the floor. I also didn't use primer first, though the affected area was larger in this case. This is how it looked after painting: IMAG2182 After one hour of drying time, I dry-brushed the back floor with silver paint IMAG2193 The back floor was coated with gloss varnish and left to dry overnight. Then, I applied a dark brown wash and finished by applying a coat of matte varnish. The final result is shown in the following picture: IMAG2196 Again, also in this case, the repair is not perfect but I'll leave it as it is... Thanks for looking Jaime 4
jrlx Posted July 5, 2015 Author Posted July 5, 2015 Hello again, Here's an update with last week's work. This Phantom was also ready to have its fuselage closed. So, I started by glueing together the cockpit parts, resulting in this: IMAG2222 The cockpit was glued to the starboard fuselage half: IMAG2228 IMAG2229 Then, I glued together the two fuselage halves. I used the same procedure as for the RN Phantom. The halves were held together with masking tape and I applied Tamiya's super thin glue from the inside, a small section at a time. This allowed me to make sure the halves were kept properly aligned as the glueing procedure progressed. I started with the aircraft's spine, then the tail fin and the area aft of the exhausts. At this point I inserted spacers, like in the RN Phantom, to ensure a proper alignment of the fuselage and wings near the exhausts and to eliminate gaps on the wing roots: IMAG2230 I finished by glueing the nose and left the glue to cure for a day, like this: IMAG2231 I moved on to the wings. First I had to open the holes for the pylons. In this case, I also had to open the centre line holes, since the commemorative flight was done with the three drop tanks in place. Since the centre line ports are open in this kit, I also decided to build "walls" around them, so that the hollow inside of the fuselage could not be seen. This was done with pieces of 0.5 mm thick plastic sheet, which can be seen already cut in the following picture: IMAG2232 The holes were opened with a pin-vice: IMAG2233 After opening the holes and glueing the walls around the centre line ports: IMAG2234 Since the centre line drop tank will be installed, I had to remove the raised detail in the centre of the lower wing part: IMAG2235 Now I had to paint the centre line ports. The insides and edges are red. Before painting, I masked the area around them: IMAG2253 The aft fuselage auxiliary air intake are also red. So, I masked the area around them as well: IMAG2256 Since the insides of the air brakes are also red, I took these parts off the sprues and glued them to toothpicks with CA, ready for painting. IMAG2241 They were primed before applying the red paint, of course. After painting the centre line ports, this was the result: IMAG2254 Later, I brush painted the inner sides of the walls around the ports with flat black. There was some overspray on the outer surfaces of the port doors, which was later cleaned with isopropyl alcohol. IMAG2273 The fuselage aux intakes after painting: IMAG2257 There is detail on them in this kit: IMAG2258 The air brakes and aux intake doors after painting: IMAG2266 I moved on to glueing the fuselage and wings together. When test fitting the wings again, I found that, after all, there were gaps on the wing roots. Perhaps the spacer inside the fuselage was displaced while I was applying the clothes pegs to held the fuselage halves together? Anyway, I removed the spacer and installed a new one. I didn't manage to completely eliminate the gaps but they were reduced to manageable widths. The wings and the nose gear well part were glued in place. The following pictures show the result: IMAG2276 IMAG2277 The joints near the exhausts are ok. The melted plastic coming out of the joints was done on purpose since it acts as a self-sealing material for the joints and reduces or eliminates the need for putty. Of course, it must be filed, sanded and polished: IMAG2278 IMAG2279 The wing roots are also not too bad. The small gaps were filled with CA. IMAG2281 IMAG2282 To finish with, I glued the front instrument panel cover in place. This time I used super thin glue, instead of CA (which I used in the RN Phantom). This is more tolerant of positioning errors, gives enough time to correct them, and the paint job must be repaired anyway, so there's no point in using CA here: IMAG2283 I also glued in place the two parts for the nose air intakes, which are quite poor and must be filed to shape later. In this picture there's a noticeable step on the aft joint of the nose gear well part. This will be a bit tricky to eliminate. IMAG2284 The next step is filing, sanding and polishing all the joints and applying putty in any remaining gaps. Thanks for looking. Cheers Jaime 5
jrlx Posted July 11, 2015 Author Posted July 11, 2015 Hello, Last week's work update. After closing the fuselage and wings, I moved on to masking the canopies. These are made up of four transparent pieces, since I'll assemble the canopies in the open position. I used the masking approach described in my post in the RN Phantom thread (here). Here are the external surfaces completely masked: IMAG2303 Since the canopies will be assembled in the open position and are relatively big pieces, I decided to mask their internal surfaces as well: IMAG2304 These parts were then bathed in Aqua Gloss, to seal the maskings. After completely dry, I mounted them on blu-tack blobs and put them on toothpicks, ready for painting: IMAG2317 I also cut the remaining clear part from the sprue: the gun-sight. It can be seen on the top right corner of the sprue, in the following picture: IMAG2314 To avoid damaging the part, I used a saw, followed by x-acto blades to remove the excess plastic (the same technique used for removing the canopy parts, as per a previous post in this thread). The gun-sight got an Aqua Gloss bath to improve its transparency and brilliance. The Aqua Gloss also protects the part from liquid glue vapours. I masked the cockpit area again, in order to repair some damages inflicted on the black paint while glueing the fuselage and cockpit parts together: IMAG2321 After this, I painted the canopy parts with the interior black colour: IMAG2328 and repaired the paint job around the cockpit: IMAG2329 Having done this, I moved on to the main air intakes. These were painted gloss white (Tamiya X-2) but the camouflage colour (Light Aircraft Grey) extended inside up to a point where, in the kit's parts, there is a step (as seen in the following pitcure). I started by painting the white colour: IMAG2330 This was left to dry for a day. Then I masked the intakes for painting the Light Aircraft Grey area. Here are the intake parts, ready for painting: IMAG2345 After painting the Light Aircraft Grey areas and removing the masking, I got this: IMAG2348 Like in the RN Phantom, the gloss white area was marred by the masking tape. The same considerations done in the RN thread (link above) apply here. Thanks for looking. Jaime 5
Jabba Posted July 11, 2015 Posted July 11, 2015 Like the masking of the intakes and that the demarcation line is different from the RN FG1. 1
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