Marineflieger F-104G

[modelling minion]

Excellent work on the intake covers David they look superb.

I look forward to seeing some paint on these soon.

[eng]

Jeez, this is awesome, I remember seeing German F-104's at Leuchars many times during the 80's and was amazed wings so small would actually make the thing fly.

This build is going to be superb. Looking forward to your next update.

Eng

[mirageiv]

Thanks for the encouraging words guys!

Jessica- Have a few more to add to the family too!

Craig- Me too , though plenty more things to take care of yet, fortunately the 1/72 kit is a breeze. Hopefully in 2 or so weeks they should be ready and I'll probs do the final big update then before paint.

Eng- Jealous, I never got to see one! Hopefully that Norwegian TF makes some airshow appearance in the not too distant future, though maybe RIAT this year is a little close.

Cheers guys

DAvid

[F4u]

Its getting there David , I have been lucky enough to have seen a few 104's from various air arms of the world and still remember the whistle from the engine great aircraft ! anybody remember the vikings ??

Guy

[Spooky56]

And how about Check Whiskey and The Slivers?

[mirageiv]

Hi guys, some more progress from the past weeks. Some things I have been working on from early on but finally they are done too

Attention turned towards the gear bays and doors for both kits. First the 1/32 kit.

The kit comes with resin bulged MLG doors and wheels, both are pretty dodgy representations of the real thing. Below are the doors oob,

The real door: http://www.tantopergioco.it/wp-content/gallery/f-104-asam/F-104ASAM-55.jpg

First I tired to reshape the resin items however (like the wheels) one was much thinner than the other resulting in sanding though the door to get a better shape

I thought again about filling this but as they didn't fit very well anyways to the kit (also they were quite warped that I couldn't sort out) so I converted the oob flat gear doors with milliput/plasticard and shaped. Maybe in one of the prior posts you can see also the the MLG bays are completely devoid of any detail so I added wires etc...to resemble something like that area, the real thing is basically a birds nest so its only an approximation, tedious and not my idea of the fun side of modelling! Detail added to the MLG legs and rear doors too. Thankfully Hasegawa provides a metal spar inside the MLG leg for strength as this is quite a heavy model. So a wip pic;

The front doors are nearly closed when the jet is parked up so I didn't add anything in the font area of the bays, you just won't see it. The door locks at the front are ready for attaching later and the shape of the bulges are pretty much there, just need a rescribe now. They are much more subtle than Hasegawa suggests.

Still loads of rods, lights etc..missing but they will go on later on

Next thing to make was the centre pylon. It seemed a permanent fixture on the German F-104s so dimensions were scaled up from a Hase 1/48 pylon and refs.

These things were then replicated on the 1/72 version, albeit much simplified. At least the bulged doors and bay on the 1/72 kit are ok oob.

Front legs and a resin wheel from 1/32 kit. The wheel is too fat and had flaws all over it, so to save time I'm just gonna get the Brassin wheels made for the Italeri kit, hopefully they will fit ok to the Hase.

Then I turned back to the surface of the rescribed 1/32 kit. I use alclad white aluminium to show up all the flaws,any you see in the pic are fully sorted out now. Also I knocked the port wing tip so trying to repair it atm

Tails done.

The 1/72 kit is now complete and only the cockpit to sort out before paint I dropped the flaps for more interest

More surface detail was added to the 1/72 kit and the tip tanks

Hopefully after primer only a few little touch ups will be needed (already see a few in the photos )

Starting to home in on some RAL colours I'll use for the 1/32 jet. Finally I have deiced the build the 1/32 kit as one of the Viking demo jets where as the 1/72 kit will be in the traditional colour scheme with Kormorans etc.. The deciding factor was failing to make a decent Euro catamaran missile launcher in 1/32, that one beat me , where as the 1/72 kit thankfully has them oob.

Looking forward to painting now, should be a challenge on the display scheme trying to make it not look toy like, they did get a little weathered during the display season so thats something to go with. Thanks for looking in and any comments or advice

DAvid

Edited April 3, 2016 by mirageiv

[crobinsonh]

Stunning work

[exdraken]

great project very well executed!!

looking forward to the paintwork!

and yes, some subtle weathering and a clean but not too gloss paintwork should do the trick!

[mirageiv]

Thanks guys

exdraken- I will try to replicate the finish like this picture, it is noticeably dirty; https://www.flickr.com/photos/baettig/9443555137/

Not sure which would be the best way to achieve that, maybe not really any paint fading (or only a little as the scheme was only worn for a few months) and use weathering oils etc to dirty up the white and vary the tones Guess I'll test a few things out before I paint it

[RMP2]

You guys never cease to amaze me with your lack of fuselage seams, again with these youve nailed it, my hat is doffed.

Good work on the intakes fit too, its all looking very nice and the colour match for the display scheme looks spot on - good luck with it, as you say avoiding the toy like appearance will be tricky.

Got to love 104s!

[Pete in Lincs]

Just played catch up.

Lots of likes, there's a lot to like!

[exdraken]

Thanks guys

exdraken- I will try to replicate the finish like this picture, it is noticeably dirty; https://www.flickr.com/photos/baettig/9443555137/

Not sure which would be the best way to achieve that, maybe not really any paint fading (or only a little as the scheme was only worn for a few months) and use weathering oils etc to dirty up the white and vary the tones Guess I'll test a few things out before I paint it

AdriaN just showed this excellent Thunderbirds F-16:

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234993720-thunderbirds-f16c-block-52-148/

he replicated a very nice subtle weathering , maybe this is he way to go!

thanks for the nice hi-res photo in your link!

[Carius]

Excellent upgrade!

[RMP2]

AdriaN just showed this excellent Thunderbirds F-16:

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234993720-thunderbirds-f16c-block-52-148/

he replicated a very nice subtle weathering , maybe this is he way to go!

thanks for the nice hi-res photo in your link!

I may well be pushing my luck here, but Ill try it anyway - that wash looks a bit too black n white to my eyes, I would rather see a ligher wash used, a light or mid grey perhaps? Maybe mixed light grey and a light brown?

Its a personal thing I know when it comes to washes, I just hate it when it looks like someones taken a 1/48 Sharpie around the edge of spotless panels, thats all.

[Chris G 29]

Lovely job(s).

Really interesting seeing the two builds progressing in parallel.

Actually seeing the Viking pair was a real and unexpected thrill, given my penchant for post war British jets.

Great work

[mirageiv]

Thanks chaps

exdraken- The photo is hopefully how it will look in the end with the RBF tags, intake covers etc.. Yeah I'll do something like the F-16 with a very light thin oil wash to hint at the panel lines, should break the surface up enough. Will be a while yet anyways until I get to that point so plenty to mull over

RMP2-You guys never cease to amaze me with your lack of fuselage seams, again with these youve nailed it, my hat is doffed.

Good work on the intakes fit too, its all looking very nice and the colour match for the display scheme looks spot on - good luck with it, as you say avoiding the toy like appearance will be tricky.

Thanks, the best filler for gaps that never leaves a seam is super glue, and then you can rescribe over it so easily. I'll try out the colours on some scraped plane and see if the scheme can be done ok, if not I have that massive Airdoc sheet coming so plenty of other camo's to go with

Got to love 104s!

Absolutely!

David

Edited April 4, 2016 by mirageiv

[F4u]

Looks great looking forward to seeing the paint go on .

I use super glue with a bit of talc for seams if they are bad and just the glue for not so bad and maybe squadron putty.

Guy

[mirageiv]

Thanks Guy. I don't usually mix the super glue and baking soda as it tends to dry too quick for me so I fill the gap with superglue then sprinkle on the powder to speed up the drying, maybe if I use talk powder it will be better so I'll try that!

Ok guys I have been finishing some of the nitty gritty bits in prep for paint, bit of an enthusiastic update with all the pics but thought I'd show most of the little things I have done.

Being in the construction phase I decided to build up both the Aires seats. I've never used PE like this before and wow it was fiddly making up the belts on the 1/32 seat, new admiration for you guys who use a lot of the PE stuff! Still some bits pull handles missing etc.. but I'm happy with them and look forward to some paint. Because of these I decided to make the canopies open. I just copied a photo of an seat in use for the belt positions and added some things to get the correct lengths.

Some details added to the inner canopies, I didn't want to risk adding anything to the 1/72 front one in fear of getting glue all over it, its pretty tiny for me.

and painted

After some great help form BM member Spooky56 (thank you! ) I added some details to the front and rear cockpits. The box in the rear bulkhead of the Marine -G is definitely different to what was found in the Airforce version which I believe is the LEADS 200 system. Maybe it houses some similar system but it looks different. A rear folder (pic here-http://s540.photobucket.com/user/Dhollan/media/Dhollan4/d29fcb1f.jpg.html) wasadded and books/clipboards I have seen in photos going on the front coaming.

1/32

1/72

Then painted. I tried to weather the rear with a rather patchy sun bleached look.

1/72

Still quite a few details to add to the cockpit area but I'll add them after painting.

Finished the bulged gear doors on the 1/32 jet and also found out the locks actually had covers over them so made them too since I've done the rest of the FOD guards.

This Viking jet will be clean therefore I drilled the fuel tank holes on the tips, they need some lights (as does the airframe) but I'll make them later.

The control surfaces were fitted again. Flaps and LE slats set at 15 degrees takeoff position via a template. The rudder was deflected slightly and the tail pitched up as seen on some photos of these jets. Hopefully deflecting all these surfaces makes a clean airframe a bit more interesting later on.

I sprayed some Halfords white primer on directly from the can (bad idea, forgot how rubbish I am with aerosols!) and then spent a while polishing back up the surface for paint. This surface prep made it a little patchy in places but should be a solid enough white base, maybe it well help with the colour tones .

It is Long!

Back to the 1/72 version I made a basic error in that when the F-104G carries the twin Aim-9 launchers it cannot carry the central fuselage pylon I made, oops so I'll save that for maybe a nuke armed one. Anyways I added the two sway braces between the underside launchers

And built up the weapons. The Kormorans are from Eduard, I got a bit bored of making things so just bought them instead. The pack comes with 1 Kormoran 1 and 1 Kormoran 2, so you have to buy two packs for a pair of one type which is a little off from Eduard but no worries as I'll build a Marine Tornado later on with the spare two missiles. The Aim-9Bs are from Esci F-5s and were detailed up a bit with new fins, motors and the seeker head covers that I'll attach some RBF tags to. Only choice now is to decided to paint them white (live) or olive for a drill

I primed it with Tamiya fine grey just decanted into the AB, such a no fuss way I'll use it more in the future. Polished up a little too ready for the Weissaluminium undersides.

The pair. Still a few things to do such as attaching and filling the canopies, pitot probes etc..but I won't bore you with those so consider this the last update before you see them painted!

The Brassin wheels also arrived and they look very impressive, glad I went down that route

Thank you for any comments or advice (or any suggestions) and see you guys in a few weeks with a paint update. Cheers,

David.

[F4u]

Impressive stuff David really looking good.

Guy

[Alan P]

Post #43 is a belter. Every step a winner.

Great work making the 1/32 look so good. Your precision is a great inspiration!

Al

[mirageiv]

Thanks Guy and Al!

Al- After following your Phantom and Tornado with the extras you made it inspired me to have a semi crack at something similar on a 1/32 kit too, if it turns out 1/10th of your GR4 I'll be very happy

Cheers

David.

[modelling minion]

David your work on both these kits is simply superb. Your attention to detail and ability to make your own scratch built (and very accurate) parts is amazing, I love the folders and clipboards they're simply fantastic and really add a lot to the look of the cockpit area.

They really make me want to build an F-104, even though I won't be able to get it as good as yours.

I am really looking forward to seeing some paint on these.

Craig.

[Lieuwe]

I was told by some ex Marineflieger folks the box on the rear deck is to control the Chaff / flare dispensers the MFG 104's sometimes carried on the rear fuselage on both sides. Just curious, did you find any clear images on which you based yours? I looked and looked researching my illustrations but failed to turn up something worthwhile.

[Jessica]

Mother and chick appear to be doing very well

[Air-to-Air]

One of my favourite parts of your builds is when you reveal the incredibly neat and smooth fuselage ready for paint. These builds have not disappointed! The picture from the rear of the 1/32, revealing the light reflected along the fuselage is another classic. It must be very satisfying to hold these in your hands and inspect them in the light.