SoftScience Posted May 11, 2019 Share Posted May 11, 2019 Sto facendo, eh? The Hasegawa F-104S. I have no experience with Hasegawa F-104 kits, and im not sure what to expect. But it's a Lockheed design and it sure is pretty. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 11, 2019 Author Share Posted May 11, 2019 And the first bits are together. The kit fuselage is broken into four sections. Typically I would have glued thr front and rear halves together first, but I'm following the advice of Fabien Antonetti on the fanakit.fr site (Seriously, check out the jaw dropping 1/72 models on that page - stunning photos throughout). So in went the engine innards And then the two halves of the rear fuselage came together. I tried to line everything up, but the ventral midline needed some filler. The mouldings are pretty worn out. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevehnz Posted May 12, 2019 Share Posted May 12, 2019 I'll keep an eye on your build if I may, I've a couple of these in stock. I've long been under the impression they go together pretty well but its always good to get prior warning of any traps. Steve. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 13, 2019 Author Share Posted May 13, 2019 It's been pretty good so far, Steven. Typical Hasegawa; okay but not flawless fit. Today I worked on the cockpit. Im going to add some lead foil harneses, but need to find a good reference photo first. Oh, and have to add the bumblebee stripes to the ejection rings. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 14, 2019 Author Share Posted May 14, 2019 The finished ejection seat. It's not great, but good enough for a closed canopy. The front and back halves fit ok, but will need sanding. Which means rescribing. Dang! 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Lloyd Posted May 15, 2019 Share Posted May 15, 2019 Ah, Hasegawa's 'modular' period! Four- and six-part fuselages everywhere! 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 15, 2019 Author Share Posted May 15, 2019 Was that prior to their releasing the same modular kits but with new decals and new prices period? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 19, 2019 Author Share Posted May 19, 2019 Not much to report. I have been cleaning up and rescribing lines. I was almost done when my scriber madly slipped on the intake panel line and the attempts to fix it made things even worse. Fill sand and repeat. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 20, 2019 Author Share Posted May 20, 2019 Now it's beginning to take shape. And a question for the experts - what's the time.period when the italians flew these in green and gray camouflage? 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsairfoxfouruncle Posted May 20, 2019 Share Posted May 20, 2019 Not 100% for sure but i believe through the mid/late 70's if not later. I seem to remember the transition to grey's, maybe came about with the upgrades to the "S" standard ? But I'm sure someone will be along to verify that. Dennis 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted May 22, 2019 Share Posted May 22, 2019 Green and grey lasted from the mid '60s, after a brief initial phase in Natural Metal, until the mid '90s. To be accurate, the very first F-104 in overall grey was delivered in July 1995, Repainting in the grey scheme occurred during revisions, so it took a while for the whole fleet to wear this scheme. Now if you're building an S these entered service in the early '70s, so no need to worry about the schemes used earlier. Anyway there were actually two different grey/green schemes, or better one scheme that used two different sets of colours. The early scheme was quite similar to the then current RAF scheme, with semigloss paints. The later scheme used different paints, both matt. The S variant IIRC exclusively used the later scheme, where the green was browner and the grey less blue compared to the previous scheme. Both colours weathered quite a bit, particularly on machines based in Southern Italy, where the sun can be scorching. Undersurfaces were always in aluminum paint, glossier in the early scheme and dull in the later. Codes were white for most of the career of the type but in the '90s they started to be reduced in size and became light grey with a narrow black edge. Now what paints are best for the grey green scheme ? Lifecolor makes a very good green, code is UA106. Closest FS is 34086. I've never found a really perfect grey, I know that closest FS is 36132. What I generally do is spray FS 36231 and then add a light mist of 36118 on top, adding more along panel lines. The grey tended to weather more than the green, so this approach leads to a realistic finish. For the lower surfaces I mix silver with some light grey. Of course there may be other paints around that look good enough straight from the tin, a lot depends on how obsessioned each modeller is with these things. I've built a few Hasegawa Starfighters, and IMHO this is a nice kit. The main problem area is where the intakes meet the fuselage and you've sorted this nicely. One thing that must be corrected for an S is the ventral fin: this is slightly smaller on the S compared to the G and Hasegawa forgot to mention this. The correction is very, very simple: the leading edge of the fin on the S has a 45° angle, so all you need is to cut a small bitof the leading edge following that angle. Then there are several other details that differ between subvariants of the S and between the various update programs. Hasegawa correctly indicates to remove some antennas for some of the aircraft proposed, as these antennas arrived with the ASA update program. There are several other small differences, if you're interested I can go through these. 4 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shalako Posted May 22, 2019 Share Posted May 22, 2019 Ah, la bella Italiana ragazza!!! This kit is superb! Looking forward to see it complete!! Cheers Bill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terry1954 Posted May 24, 2019 Share Posted May 24, 2019 I'll sit in on this one as I just love F-104's, and those Italian schemes were some of my favourite. Excellent colour background there from @Giorgio N, very helpful indeed. I have several F-104's in the stash, unusually for me they are all 1/48. Terry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 27, 2019 Author Share Posted May 27, 2019 @Giorgio N thanks for the excellent info. Your comments are extremely helpful. And here we are, about to start the fun part. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 27, 2019 Author Share Posted May 27, 2019 Step one. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 28, 2019 Author Share Posted May 28, 2019 And step two. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shalako Posted May 28, 2019 Share Posted May 28, 2019 Which brand's metallic colour have you applied on your F-104, because the result is very realistic! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 28, 2019 Author Share Posted May 28, 2019 2 hours ago, Shalako said: Which brand's metallic colour have you applied on your F-104, because the result is very realistic! Thanks. That is Gunze H8 silver Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shalako Posted May 28, 2019 Share Posted May 28, 2019 2 hours ago, SoftScience said: Thanks. That is Gunze H8 silver No way!!! That's Gunze's H-8??? Honestly, the result is more than good!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 28, 2019 Author Share Posted May 28, 2019 3 hours ago, Shalako said: No way!!! That's Gunze's H-8??? Honestly, the result is more than good!!! yup. About 3 parts Mr Leveling thinner to two parts paint, over the base coat of gloss black. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nikolay Polyakov Posted May 28, 2019 Share Posted May 28, 2019 19 hours ago, SoftScience said: And step two. Yeah! Looks outstanding! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoftScience Posted May 29, 2019 Author Share Posted May 29, 2019 I dropped the kit while masking, and shattered the landing gear. I think I can fix it, but this was another blow to my already wavering modelling mojo. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
helios16v Posted May 29, 2019 Share Posted May 29, 2019 They were finicky landing in real life too. Keep at. Minor setback. You WILL persevere. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RidgeRunner Posted June 12, 2019 Share Posted June 12, 2019 (edited) On 5/11/2019 at 11:39 PM, SoftScience said: The mouldings are pretty worn out. definitely but a great kit! It also has the various parts for early machines as well as J-models, plus the different seats, etc. All round a great kit that can be bought very cheaply, even direct from Japan. Martin Edited June 12, 2019 by RidgeRunner Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RidgeRunner Posted June 12, 2019 Share Posted June 12, 2019 On 5/22/2019 at 12:38 PM, Shalako said: This kit is superb! Agreed! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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