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1/48 A-6A Intruder, VA-75 'Sunday Punchers.' Finished 13/11.


DaveJL

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Managed an hour at the bench after work. Wanted to do a little more on the fuselage modifications. Firstly though, the intakes were added and these were a good fit. A small bit of clean up top and bottom is all that will be needed. I also popped on the boarding ladder doors, I'm keeping these closed as I think that looks better (and it's less work :lol: )

 

So port fuselage first:

 

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You can see here the good fit of the intake and boarding ladder. Onto the modifications then:

 

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Not too much hassle here. A few rivets have been lost with the sanding of the 'slime' strip but the NAVY decal will cover this for the most part anyway. Onto the starboard fuselage:

 

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That's pretty much the height of it for the modifications on the sides, the rest are underneath. Firstly, early A-6As had a cover over the triangular part of the arrestor hook (seen in this  link - scroll to the second picture after the table). To replicate this, I firstly added some tape, like so:

 

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Then trimmed the edges and traced around the recessed parts with a pencil:

 

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I then removed the tape, stuck to a piece of styrene sheet and then cut it to a rough shape:

 

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The triangular part of the arrestor hook, part E1, was fitted then I popped on the cover.

 

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Not bad, just needs some blending in once it's inserted to the fuselage.

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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5 minutes ago, modelling minion said:

Thanks for sharing all your efforts in converting the A-6E aspects of the fuselage back to being an A-6A, really useful to those of us wanting to do the same.

Good job on the cover too, very nice work.

Thanks mate. I've taken some tips from that website linked above and a fellow member who has kindly helped me out.

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Managed another hour at the bench tonight. Firstly, I fitted the cockpit tub to the fuselage. Once set, I added the tail hook housing. A dry fit of the fuselage showed a relatively decent fit, just bit of fettling needed around the nose area. I tested the nose as a whole and found that there were steps on both sides so, and I would recommend doing this if you're not showing the radar assembly, I added each half of the nose to the appropriate fuselage. Another dry fit shows it works much better - no step and just a slight seam line to fix up.

 

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I also built up the inner wing parts including the exhausts. All fits well here, despite being a complicated set up:

 

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Having worked my way to this stage, I realise how much Hobbyboss can frustrate me. Some great fitting parts, some great detail but then again some parts that don't seem to align and then there was the debacle with the bomb locating points. I don't think I've built a HB kit, with the exception of their Su-27, that hasn't had similar issues. Perhaps just me. Saying that, I'm enjoying this kit so far.

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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With the nose halves and cockpit in place she is really beginning to take shape Dave.

The inner wing assembly does look quite complicated but you have done a good job of it.

Its not just you that finds HobbyBoss kits frustrating, they can have really good fit but dodgy details but on the whole they are usually problem free builds.

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13 hours ago, modelling minion said:

With the nose halves and cockpit in place she is really beginning to take shape Dave.

The inner wing assembly does look quite complicated but you have done a good job of it.

Its not just you that finds HobbyBoss kits frustrating, they can have really good fit but dodgy details but on the whole they are usually problem free builds.

Thanks mate. Attaching the nose halves will save you a lot of heartache when the fuselage is closed up.

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Fuselage closed up. Generally a good fit, other than around those intake areas. Heavy seam lines, which I think is typical of Hobbyboss to clean up and again, one of those things I always find about HB kits. 99% of parts align and fit perfectly, but there's always that one bit that doesn't. In this case it was the rear bulkhead of the front landing gear bay - it didn't close up to the fuselage halves, leaving a gap. I've had to insert a shim of styrene sheet to correct this. Anyway, it's starting to take that classic Intruder shape.

 

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I've test fitted the wings, engine covers and so on and the fit looks good. Some blending in work will be needed on my rough arrestor hook cover whenever I permanently attach it.

 

More soon.

 

Dave

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1 hour ago, modelling minion said:

Really taking shape now Dave, as you say she has the look of the Intruder about her now.

It looks like you have achieved a very good fit on the fuselage halves, good work mate. 👍

Cheers mate. Fuselage isn't too bad at all, but will require some tidy up!

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16 hours ago, coneheadff said:

Great progress Dave!

 

Have one of these in the stash and thought about converting it to an early E model.

But back to an A model is a great idea. 

Thanks Alex. It's hard not to like an Intruder in any variant!

15 hours ago, PeterB said:

Looking good.

 

I may have missed it but did you pit any weight in - assuming you are doing it wheels down of course?

 

Pete

Cheers Pete. Yes, there's plasticine in the nose, just didn't photograph it before closing up the fuselage.

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you're getting there, those mod works look great....a pity though that HB didn't get it right in the first place.....or gave you options.

 

I have a love hate affair with HB....mainly hate with regards to their aircraft....I reckon they're just Trumpeter under a different name!  :rant:

 

Anyway she is starting to look the part, am looking forward to what follows. :popcorn:

 

I may or may not have started looking at the 1/48th Kinetic one! :whistle: 

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On 9/28/2020 at 10:54 PM, trickyrich said:

you're getting there, those mod works look great....a pity though that HB didn't get it right in the first place.....or gave you options.

 

I have a love hate affair with HB....mainly hate with regards to their aircraft....I reckon they're just Trumpeter under a different name!  :rant:

 

Anyway she is starting to look the part, am looking forward to what follows. :popcorn:

 

I may or may not have started looking at the 1/48th Kinetic one! :whistle: 

Cheers Rich. There's a bit more work than I expected, hopefully it won't delay me too much or affect the other entries I have planned. My fingers are crossed that once I sort out the fuselage, the rest should be simple enough!

 

I know what you mean about HB mate, they're a bit like marmite. I've a couple of Trumpeter kits in the stash, a 1/48 Su-24 and 1/72 Tu-22. They look nice but I'm sure won't be easy builds!

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More done over the last few days and this kit has started to fight me. A lot of filling, sanding and cleaning up, with more to come. Firstly, the Doppler fairing on part D13, needs extended to the rear of the panel, covering the dual ALE-29 countermeasures dispensers which are not present on the A-6A. Simply turn parts H10 and 11 over and that sorts that bit out.

 

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Some work on the wings next. The 'slime' light on the wing tips needs removed:

 

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The fit of the flight controls on the outer parts of the wings is poor. The spoilers in particular need thinning to get them to close properly. Please pardon the messy appearance, but they need a final clean up:

 

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After that debacle I did something simple, the landing gear. Hobbyboss provide metal inserts here, which is a nice touch. They go together pretty well:

 

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Just remember to remove the cast part numbers from the struts as these are visible when complete. Onto the fuselage now. Lots of cleaning up here. The intakes were a pain in the backside. The wings went on relatively well I thought, but alas there was always going to be that one area that did not sit quite right, in this case it was the join between the rear of the wing and the top of the exhaust shroud. Filler and blending in required. I also had to run some Revell Contacta along the fuselage to wing join to close up small gaps.

 

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The scratch arrestor cover needed blending in and is probably more filler than my styrene template but turned out ok in the end. A few more modifications shown below:

 

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Some more work needed to clean everything up:

 

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Once that filler Is cleaned up, there's a few more odds and sods to add. I'm hoping some more wet and dry will clean most of the mess up and a nice coat of primer should sort it fully. Quite a bit of work on this one.

 

More soon.

 

Dave

 

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Well she might have started to put up a fight Dave but from where I'm sitting it looks like you are winning the battle.

I must thank you again for giving us such a comprehensive visual aid as to what to do to turn the HobbyBoss kit into a proper A, rather than the A/E hybrid that comes in the box. It will make life a lot easier for those of us that want to do the same thing later.

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7 minutes ago, modelling minion said:

Well she might have started to put up a fight Dave but from where I'm sitting it looks like you are winning the battle.

I must thank you again for giving us such a comprehensive visual aid as to what to do to turn the HobbyBoss kit into a proper A, rather than the A/E hybrid that comes in the box. It will make life a lot easier for those of us that want to do the same thing later.

Thanks mate. It's turning into a bit of a slog and looking at it I can't help but feel it looks a mess!

 

I can't take all the credit for the modifications as I'm using numerous web pages myself to assist.

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11 minutes ago, DaveJL said:

Thanks mate. It's turning into a bit of a slog and looking at it I can't help but feel it looks a mess!

 

I can't take all the credit for the modifications as I'm using numerous web pages myself to assist.

It might look a mess to you at the minute Dave but when you get some paint on you will see how good a job that you have done.

 

You might well be using numerous web pages to get your information but you are saving us the effort of doing it ourselves and putting all the info in one easy to access location.

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2 minutes ago, modelling minion said:

It might look a mess to you at the minute Dave but when you get some paint on you will see how good a job that you have done.

 

You might well be using numerous web pages to get your information but you are saving us the effort of doing it ourselves and putting all the info in one easy to access location.

Hopefully mate :lol:

 

Glad the thread will be of use to those on the site!

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I do like all your correction work, it's nicely done and as Craig mentioned great info for someone else attempting an early model Intruder from this model.

 

I know the pain involved in having to go through all the reference material/other builds to sort out what should and shouldn't be there........am going through my own private hell with my Kitty (should be Crappy) Hawk MH-60 build!  :wall:

 

Keep up the fantastic work! :thumbsup:

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20 hours ago, trickyrich said:

I do like all your correction work, it's nicely done and as Craig mentioned great info for someone else attempting an early model Intruder from this model.

 

I know the pain involved in having to go through all the reference material/other builds to sort out what should and shouldn't be there........am going through my own private hell with my Kitty (should be Crappy) Hawk MH-60 build!  :wall:

 

Keep up the fantastic work! :thumbsup:

Thanks Rich, glad you chaps are finding it useful!

 

Is there much work with the Kittyhawk H-60 kits? I was looking at the HH-60 in the near future.

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