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Tamiya 1/48 F-14D Tomcat WIP


ZHOU Kun

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Really nice build, another Tomcat lover! Hope you get the decal issue sorted, often happens that something goes a bit awry, but thats modelling! I have built one Tamiya F14A and have the D ready to go.

 

Great to see the 2014 Red Arrow, lovely tail (I was very involved with it in real life).

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22 hours ago, Inshala said:

Really nice build, another Tomcat lover! Hope you get the decal issue sorted, often happens that something goes a bit awry, but thats modelling! I have built one Tamiya F14A and have the D ready to go.

 

Great to see the 2014 Red Arrow, lovely tail (I was very involved with it in real life).

Thank you! I managed to get autograph from the flight crew and ground crew when they came to Guangzhou before the 2014 Zhuhai Airshow. I am interested in what your position was at that time with the aerobatic team 🙂

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Update: Weathering...I originally planned a cleaner build but have to weather a bit heavier due to the decal issue. But not too heavy, the F-14D was well maintained during its service life.

 

I applied a thin layer of mixture of Mr. Color C46 clear coat and C181 semi gloss coat to protected the decals. Then, Winsor Newton Oil Colors thinned with Zippo Lighter Liquid was hand brushed to various areas on the airframe. 

 

The hand-brush was tied to the pivot of wing rotate axes to draw curves that depicts the rubbing between the upper and lower surface of wing and seal plates 

 

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Edited by ZHOU Kun
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Now I put everything I painted back on: slats and flaps, vertical fins, landing gears, drop tanks, TCS/IRST pods and the F110 engine nozzles:-D

 

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Edited by ZHOU Kun
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8 hours ago, ZHOU Kun said:

Thank you! I managed to get autograph from the flight crew and ground crew when they came to Guangzhou before the 2014 Zhuhai Airshow. I am interested in what your position was at that time with the aerobatic team 🙂

They went to China in 2016, I was the Team Leader in 2012-14 (Red 1). Monty was the Boss in '16.

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On 2/23/2021 at 07:03, Inshala said:

They went to China in 2016, I was the Team Leader in 2012-14 (Red 1). Monty was the Boss in '16.

WOW! Do you have an Instagram or FB account to follow? I would definitely be following! Your colleagues were flying really awesome 2016 in Zhuhai, I was working then beside the Zhuhai airport, I saw their rehearsals, really AWESOME!!!

20 hours ago, HOUSTON said:

ZHOU Kun,

PHENOMENAL  detailed build.

:worthy:

 

Your TOMCAT is simply AMAZING  to see.

Sublime workmanship. 

:wow:

 

thank  you! I will be updating soon!

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Really anxious to see what this plane would be like, that I took it to the balcony with my wife's sony digital camera. The oil paints on the airframe was just still smelling in the sun! Looks like the outcome is good!

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This one is really near the finish line. Here are some photos I took when I was working on smaller parts:

 

Gear bay doors: I paint gloss white (Mr.Color C107 Character White) inside by airbrush, then hand brushed the red edges(also Mr. Color, Character red). Gray (Mr. Color, C308, the underside fuselage color) was the last color to apply, by airbrush. This method needed the least repairing. If the red color goes to the back of the panel, gray color will cover it and make the edge neat.  The gear bay doors were easy to attach, Tamiya's engineering was great, you don't have to worry about how much angle should the doors be opened, everything just snapped in.

 

Also attached were the air data probes(pitot tubes, AOA probes, total air temperature probe) , arresting hook and its housing, UHF and TACAN antennas, port and starboard wing pylons(I would fit AIM-9Ms, AIM-7M, LANTIRN and some GBUs to this aircraft) 

 

 

 

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Edited by ZHOU Kun
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On 2/28/2021 at 16:29, shortCummins said:

that's a cracking aircraft you've built

 

she looks "just right" excellent paint and weathering, a very impressive build

 

rgds

John(shortCummins)

 

Thank you!!! I am updating now on the munitions.

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This was the start of painting bombs. I didn't bother to make the cook retardant coat using putties. Instead I depict it with pre-shading and some oil wash. the first step was to give it a preshading with a mixture of brown and black lacquer paint

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I was using the Galaxy Model masking tape for AMK F-14D kit. So I had to paint Olive Drab (Mr. Color C12?) first

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And then, apply the masking tapes to the shell of bombs

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Mask all Olive Drab area and prepare to airbrush Mr. Color C308 Gray

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The gray color was ready

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As for air-to-air missiles, I chose to paint the fins first. Mr. Color C28 

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All colors and decals are on

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Given them a little wash and weathering

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The decals for AMK F-14D kit were a bit larger for the GBU-31s, and they wrinked were the decals overlaped.

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Edited by ZHOU Kun
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And literally this model airplane is complete, I did not hesitate to take some quick shot befor leaving the workbench

 

The starboard slat just slide off its rail...opppps

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Put the slat back to rail:-D

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Edited by ZHOU Kun
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I had done a little adjustment to the bomb heat retarding coats by some washing, with oil paint. This time the coating look better

 

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For this model, most of the decals are spare AMK F-14D decals. I used Tamiya's own decals only on some places where there is no supplement (such as the AAQ-25 LANTIRN pod). The Tamiya ones are shiny and did not react to Mr. Mark Setter very well.

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For the nose section, the VF-2 Bounty Hunter bands also came from AMK's spare sheet. Due to the bulged shape of AMK's nose, the colored bands should be reduced in length in order not to go under the missle pallets. I cut 2 or 3 millimeters short

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The ResKit nozzles work well only if you reduce the length of its afterburner section. Also what should be cut short are the insertion sticks of ventral fins, they are too long and interfere with the burner cans.

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Bombs viewed from port side. The oil paints worked well to depict the heat protective coatings

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Shiny gun vents and nozzles were airbrushed with Mr. Color Super Stainless Steel SM204

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The biggest reason I could not mount a TARPS pod was that the hole was way too close to the starboard nacelle, so the display pole interferes with the pod

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I did not bother to fix the chaff/flare dispenser problem. I know they were 6 by 5 and Tamiya did it 5 by 5, I used up all my PEs on the dispenser boxes on my previous build (EF-18AM Spanish Hornet)

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The KASL resin wings does have a little problem when you fit the slats and flaps to the wing, I widen the slots on the wing and inserted some metal pins the help holding slats/flaps in place. Tried my best

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Overview with the completed work

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A little tooth brush hair was added to the front of windscreen, depicting the yaw string

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Edited by ZHOU Kun
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The weather in Guangzhou is not very good as rainstorms and high wind is hitting here. I put the Tamiya F-14D into the cabinet and am waiting for sunny days so as to take final reveal photos outside.

 

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Here are some comparison photos between Tamiya and AMK F-14D Tomcat builds

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8 hours ago, shortCummins said:

very impressive build and paint, the weathering is spot on and something to aspire to

 

I've really enjoyed your build log, thanks for posting

 

rgds

John(shortCummins)

thank you , looking forward to final reveals

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