Hasegawa 1/48 A-4E/H/L and TA-4J Skyhawks - Finished! 27/04/2020

[Col.]

Good work to get the decals conforming over such prominent surface details

[Jon Bryon]

1 hour ago, Col. said:

Good work to get the decals conforming over such prominent surface details

Here's what it looked like after more Daco Red:

 

 

However, all is not well. When poking and prodding the decal, I noted there was a 'spongy' section around one of the vortex generators. I decided to pick at it and, to my surprise, found that a section of blue backing paper had got under the decal - you can see it next to the decal on the wing. I have absolutely no idea how that piece got there. It's a shame it did, as this now needs fixing...

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Jon

 

[Col.]

Daco Red clearly is good gear. Had to remind myself just how much magnification there must be in your photos.

[Jon Bryon]

The A-4L is finished:

 

 

More photos in Ready for Inspection and even more photos and quite a lot of text at https://jonbryon.com/hasegawa-1-48-douglas-a-4l-skyhawk/.

 

Now to crack on with the TA-4J...

 

Thanks for looking.

 

Jon 

[Jon Bryon]

Some progress today on the TA-4J.

 

First, I made a new tail pitot from Albion Alloys brass tubing:

 

 

Then my primer coat of Mr Finishing Surfacer 1500 White needed sanding down to remove blemishes:

 

 

 

The final white finish was airbrushed using Mr Color 316. This was intentionally patchy to contrast the warmer C316 with the cooler white primer. You can't really see it in the photos, but it's there to the naked eye. Some of the Insignia Red has also been started (Hataka lacquer) but I've realised the intake lips are wrong and need the front respraying in white:

 

 

 

 

 

That's all for today. Back to work tomorrow, so progress may slow down a bit.

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Jon

 

 

 

Edited March 23, 2020 by Jon Bryon

[Col.]

Noticed this one on Facebook earlier Jon so came over for a look and not disappointed  The pitot tube is a quality upgrade and the paintwork will no doubt be up to the same high standards you've set with the previous two A-4s

[franky boy]

Great work Jon. 

 

Loving this thread. Makes me realise I really should get my A-4B out of the loft and get cracking. 

 

How  do you rate Hataka lacquers against Mr Hobby?

 

James

[Jon Bryon]

36 minutes ago, franky boy said:

Loving this thread. Makes me realise I really should get my A-4B out of the loft and get cracking. 

 

How  do you rate Hataka lacquers against Mr Hobby?

 

The A-4B is lovely (I built one in 2005) and IMO by far and away the best looking Skyhawk. I really wish Hasegawa had managed to release an A-4A.

 

I think the Hataka lacquers are comparable to Mr Color in my experience, but I'm not that discriminating. I certainly can get them to spray as fine as Mr Color and they are nice and durable.

 

Cheers

 

Jon

[Jon Bryon]

Off of work until Tuesday, so with not much else to do, some progress has been made on the TA-4J.

 

The red/orange areas have mostly been done. There's still a fuselage stripe to paint, and the leading edge slat bays need to be done in Insignia Red. 

 

The black areas have also mostly been completed, but there are quite a few black panels around the gun and refuelling probe that need to be masked and added.,

 

Once that's all done, the intakes still need to be blended in and the red and white repainted. I'll also use that opportunity to touch up the white in a few areas. 

 

Hopefully it will be ready for decals by next weekend.

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Jon

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Col.]

Tidy paintwork and an impressive result so far

[Jon Bryon]

The main paint scheme is now done. There's absolutely no room for error when masking red and white!

 

The main fuselage stripe, which is supplied as a decal, I decided to mask and paint. I used a scan and print out of the decal to get the spacing correct. The challenge will be getting the black edging to fit correctly; I'll use a decal for this.

 

 

 

This is what it looks like now, with the intakes finished and stripe painted. The intake markings are too wide, but I compromised here to make the masking easier. There is some overspray around the intake lips and along the refuelling pipe that needs to be sorted out. I intend to deal with the former by polishing the overspray off (this has worked quite well elsewhere) and using some black decal striping to tidy up the refuelling pipe.

 

 

 

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Jon

[Jon Bryon]

There's been a fair amount of progress recently fitted around work and family.

 

An oil pin wash mixed from Abteilung 502 Faded Grey and Zippo lighter fluid has been applied directly to the white areas. It's a bit more prominent than I would like, but there is always a dilemma with clean white airframes: either use no wash, which leaves the recessed detail looking very odd and out of place, or use a wash, in which case the recessed detail will be overemphasised. I plumped for the wash. Over the red areas I used Ammo's Neutral Brown Panel Line Wash, again applied directly to the paint.

 

Once the excess was cleaned up with foam buds (don't know what else to call them!) I prepared the surface for a utility gloss coat to protect the paint and provide the first layer of protection for polishing that will happen later on. For this I used Tamiya X-22 thinned about 50% with Mr Leveling Thinner and applied very wet.

 

Decalling then commenced, mainly using the kit decals. For their thickness these are surprisingly fragile and the white is translucent, sadly making the 'A' markings on the tail a bit pink. The national insignia are cut into sections for open airbrakes, which I did not want the fuss of aligning. I therefore used a generic Cartograf-printed sheet of stars and bars from Furball. My usual method of settling the decals on a puddle of Mr Mark Setter followed by Daco Red once the decal had dried worked fine, but with an unexpected effect on the national insignia over the vortex generators on the wing. I cannot fault the decal - conforming to such prominent surface detail is exceptional - but it's allowed the red to leach through. Once I've eliminated the air bubble you can see, I will have to engage in some very careful masking and spraying to restore the star to white.

 

 

 

Experience has taught me decals go down best on a horizontal surface. Gravity matters! It also prevents the setting solutions dribbling away. To this end I use a Lego jig to keep the fuselage sides horizontally flat while I apply the decals.

 

 

 

Here's what it looks like now:

 

 

 

 

Next I need to fix the damaged decals (especially the 'A' on the wing, which broke up) and get rid of the pink. This will be followed by some generous coats of Mr Color GX100 gloss clear so that the main sections can be sanded down with Infini 2500 sanding sponge and then polished with their 4000 buffer. This gives a nice in-scale smooth surface that is not too glossy. Hopefully the whole thing will be finished around the middle of next week, although I am anticipating issues when the canopy masking is removed.

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Jon

Edited April 4, 2020 by Jon Bryon

[Jon Bryon]

Decal update. I think this is one of the highest risk actions I've taken as a modeller.

Image 1 shows initial masking. The tape is Aizu 0.4mm and 0.7mm for scale:

 

 

Image 2 shows completed masking using some cut up Post-it notes and liquid frisket film.

 

 

 

Image 3 shows the finished article. It is not perfect. There is some overspray near one of the arms of the star (I'm not going to fix it) and the Mr Color 1 White is different to the white of the decal. The demarcation is also not perfect over the vortex generators. But it is better than it was before and if you didn't know any better, with the naked eye, I think I've got away with it.

 

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Jon

[exdraken]

great work! and safe!

[Jon Bryon]

Well, the TA-4J is now finished:

 

 

A lot more photos and a write-up at https://jonbryon.com/hasegawa-1-48-douglas-ta-4j-skyhawk/

 

Now to get on with the A-4H...

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Jon

[Jon Bryon]

Cracking on with the final Skyhawk, the A-4H. The aim is to have it (and therefore all four of them) done by the end of April. I've missed my Easter deadline as the colour schemes were a little more complex than I envisaged!

 

I've flip-flopped on this particular aircraft. Initially, I was happy to build it as supplied by Hasegawa: suitable for an early A-4H in around 1969 before the Israelis changed the guns to 30mm DEFA cannon. But then I decided I wanted the bigger guns to differentiate this Skyhawk a little more from the others, and went ahead and bought the Quickboost resin guns. But then I discovered you could not get decals for a DEFA-armed A-4 for love nor money, and so chucked the QB guns in the spares bin and built it as supplied by Hasegawa. But then, when I'd finished the other three, I discovered Armycast had reprinted their IDF A-4 sheet with DEFA-equipped A-4H markings! £38 later (! - admittedly including a decal sheet for the L-39, but still!) I've ordered them. They haven't arrived yet...I hope they do...because I've pressed ahead and filled the now-incorrect wing root inserts and installed the QB guns.

 

The barrels have been removed because they'd never survive painting and I'll replace them with Albion Alloys brass tubing nearer the end. It all looks a mess, but trust the process!

 

The canopy is sort of masked, and unfortunately is not as good a fit as the previous A-4s I've built. Must be user error.

 

Next up should be priming the whole thing in black...and hope the decals turn up!

 

Thanks for looking

 

Jon

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Shashman]

Great stuff!

[Jon Bryon]

Not posted much recently as work's been quite tiring, but there has been progress with the Israeli A-4H.

 

The underside blue is complete (bar touch-ups later on). This is Mr Color black-based using Artoolfx masks and the Uschi van der Rosten Trinity masks.

 

 

And close up...

 

 

I've also made headway with the main camouflage colours, again Mr Color:

 

 

 

 

Everything is freehand airbrushed here. Early Israeli A-4s have very soft and rather tatty camouflage demarcations, so rather than use my Custom Micro, this has been done with an H&S Evolution with a 0.2mm needle to give a softer edge.

 

Unfortunately, Hasegawa recommend the wrong shade of green - they suggest C312, which is for later IDF schemes. Mr Color don't make the correct shade so (at great expense!), I've had to order a bottle of MRP. Once it arrives, I can crack on with finishing the main camouflage. Then there will be a fair amount of touch-up, Insignia red for the intakes, flaps and slats, and then the intakes can be added and faired in if necessary.

 

Thanks for looking

 

Jon

[Ale85]

Wow, epic work on those Skyhawks! 

ciao

Ale

[Jon Bryon]

Two steps forward and one step back.

 

MRP green arrived today and has been applied: 

 

 

 

I had the intake lip stuck to some plastic for painting using an adhesive dot. When pulling it off to mask for the red, it shattered:

 

 

This was frustrating. I glued the part back together using some Mr Cement S from the rear, some CA on the front and applied some accelerator. I immediately then sanded it down:

 

 

After re-spraying the fracture is invisible. This all took about 10 minutes in total.

 

 

Having built 9 of these kits now, I have come across weaknesses in the plastic, and especially in these parts, which cause the plastic to crack very easily.

 

Next up will be the Insignia Red and black areas.

 

Thanks for looking 

 

Jon

 

[exdraken]

very strange behavior for plastic parts... are they especially old?

 

great progress by the way!

[Jon Bryon]

3 minutes ago, exdraken said:

very strange behavior for plastic parts... are they especially old?

 

Not especially. This kit is from 2004. The lower wing also cracked along a flaw near where it meets the nosewheel bay. My A-4E from 2001 also had a similar flaw in the intake lip which cracked.

 

Cheers

 

Jon

[Col.]

Fallen behind with your progress on these both here and on Facebook Jon so enjoyed seeing all your recent work. The TA-4J is lovely and the A-4H rapidly heading to the same high standard regardless of those extra minor dramas.

[Jon Bryon]

Apologies for the lack of updates. I've been busy at work and moving this forward, so now it's done:

 

 

Full write up and tons of photos at https://jonbryon.com/hasegawa-1-48-douglas-a-4h-skyhawk/

 

Many thanks for coming along for the ride. All four are now done and my stash is now Skyhawk-free! 

 

Till next time, and thanks for looking,

 

Jon

Edited June 20, 2020 by Jon Bryon

[Col.]

Well done Jon. All four look great