Venezuelan F-5A

[Natter]

Hi All,

Here's the latest kit off the workbench. I bought this off my old mate Troffa back in late 2009 or early 2010 and consigned it to the stash as soon as I had looked at it. It scared me. The fuselage is in eight separate pieces; upper left and right and a bottom section for the rear fuselage, left and right for the cockpit section, the nose section for the gun ports and then a two piece radome which can be exchanged for a two piece RF nose. I was going to do it for the lesser built airforces GB but I was still put off by the multi piece fuselage, then the F-5 GB which I didn't get time to do.

Well I finally plucked up the courage, and overall it went together really well. The cockpit section needed some care lining it up with the rear fuselage assembly. I made sure the sides lined up and were level at the top, which left a gap between the rear cockpit halves. This, and the underside join of these sections, were the only place I needed any filler at all.

Paints are a mix of Model Color, Lifecolor, and plain old grey primer for the interior of the cockpit. The photos I found of the Venezuelan F-5As showed them to be very clean so I haven't weathered the paintwork. The pitot and the gun barrels are made from Albion Alloys tube, so much better than the plastic bits in the kit, but otherwise it is out of the box. Decals are a mix of kit decals for some of the stencilling and Colorado decals for the national markings. Despite a nice glossy coat of Klear and loads of Micro Sol and Set I still got some silvering on the decals. Everything was sealed with W&N satin varnish. It looks like this:

The underside is really boring:

But the cockpit isn't too bad straight out of the box:

Thanks for stopping by to take a look.

[ForestFan]

Looks nice, always like seeing lesser done Air Force schemes

[Ozzy]

Nice build dave, like the paint scheme.

[Reini78]

a rare seen scheme nicely done!

[Head in the clouds.]

Very crisp and well built.

[WildeSau75]

nice one - like the sleek look of this plane - and you did it justice.

Cheers,

Michael

[albamac]

Hi Natter,
Lovely executed model of a very sleek airyplane. The F5 ticks all the boxes and nice to see another South American air force type. I'm becoming a fan of Latin American air forces and it's nice to see examples from that neck of the woods (or forests).Keep 'em coming. Best wishes.
albamac

[Troffa]

That's a little gem Dave, I love the neat wavy demarcations on the camouflage scheme! Nice to see her finished.

Cheers,

Troffa

[Luis Alfonso]

Hi Natter:

Wonderful build of a wonderful kit!!! It was renamed in FAV service in 1970 as VF 5 A/D after a series of mods and updates to keep them flying for many more years.

Cheers,

Luis Alfonso

[dolphin38]

Nice looking F5, nice work

[JMChladek]

That kit is a reissue of the Esci/Ertl F-5A and it can currently be found in boxings from Wolfpack (in ROKAF and F-5C Skoshi Tiger boxings). Revell of Germany has also repoped it from time to time. For a kit designed in the late 1980s, it is hands down still the BEST 1/72 F-5A out there and puts many of the available 1/72 F-5E kits to shame.

Very nicely done model Natter and excellent livery. I didn't know anyone even offered decals for Venezuelan jets. I especially like the look of the border of the underbelly camo as the wavy nature of it looks perfectly in scale. Did you mask it with poster putty?

Edited May 23, 2016 by JMChladek

[Natter]

Hi JMChladek, I used a piece of thin card stuck to the surface of the model with bluetack (poster putty) for the wavy demarkation. I tried putty 'sausages' but I couldnt get the waves in scale. I used a new scalpel blade and drew it along the card wiggling it back and forward to make the 'waves'. It took several attempts to get it about right but the effect was worth it. The rest of the camo was masked with the blutack.

[russ c]

Great looking Freedom Fighter there

[Bodmin]

Nice:)