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1/72 F3H-1N Demon Kitbash of Emhar F3H-2N Kit


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Hello again.

 

Time to stop resting on the ol' laurels (or is that the ol' glutes?), and get on with the next project.  This is one that I began way back when, shortly after Emhar introduced their F3H-2 series of models.  Unfortunately, that was also before Tommy Thomason wrote his excellent conversion article, over on Tailhook Topics, HERE.

 

The F3H-1N was actually the first PRODUCTION model of the F3H series, and it had some problems, most notably it's under-powered J40 engine, and it's one-piece blown windscreen.  The engine was known to blow out, and so was the windscreen!

The 58 models of the 1N produced were eventually shipped around the country as  maintenance mechanic trainers, most even being barged to final locations, as they were considered too unsafe to fly.   Your tax dollars at work....

 

Anyway, I started the model eons ago, and eventually gave up on it, as at the time, I didn't have much info about the aircraft, or as much modeling confidence as I've achieved since.   Here is the kit I used:

 

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I didn't get too far then, mostly modifying the wings and gluing up the kit cockpit and joining the fuselage halves:

 

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One of the sticking points that got to me the first time around was the auxiliary air intake doors, on each side of the fuselage, above the forward section of the wing.  After the 1N, these doors were sealed shut, but still existed on the later models.  That being said, I believe that I have found at least one picture of an early -2, where the doors opened, so not sure if they were sealed on the very first -2 or not.

 

For the wings, the only 1N version drawings I could find at the time were in Squadron's (sadly, now departed!) book on the Demon.  More on the wings later in the build.  Above right, the fuselage as it appeared when I started over, this time.

 

To satisfy my itch to do the auxiliary air doors (hereinafter refereed to as the "AAD"), I had no choice but to saw the fuselage apart.  If you were to do this build, the fuselage halves would not be joined and the job of sawing out the little doors could easily be accomplished by scribing the outlines many times, then drilling a small hole to accommodate the blade of a jeweler's saw, shown in the next picture.  The advantages of these saw is that they use very tiny blades, so they don't require a huge hole, and also, the blade is detachable at either end, so you can feed the saw blade into the hole, then reattach it to the saw:

 

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Sadly, for me it was too late, and I had to resort to the various tools and knife you see above, to get the doors scribed deep enough to fall  out.  They are not exactly the same, due to this extra work, but I'm banking on the idea that any irregularities will be distinguished by her dark blue paint job!

 

There will be more about the AAD later on, but for now, I'll begin with the other mods needed on the back end for the 1N conversion. In addition to the long boat tail  (already installed) the back end of the kit has a solid wall where the exhaust ring sets.  I'll drill out a hole using a very clever "stepped drill", after drilling a small hole first, to guide the larger drill:

 

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Above right, a razor saw is laid atop a fingernail file to approximate the needed height, and the kit exhaust is first scored all around with the saw.

 

My repeating the process all around, the exhaust is cut down to near final needed length, but will be sanded further as needed, later on:

 

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Above middle, I had previously found a piece of plastic "milkshake" straw, that fit both the exhaust ring, and the hole drilled into the rear end of the fuselage.  Above right, the straw inserted into the new, shorter exhaust end.  The inside of these pieces will be painted a dark exhaust color, while the outer part of the exhaust right will be painted a metallic color and given a black wash.

 

Next, the shortened exhaust can exposes a rather large hole in the rear fuselage that must be filled with plastic scrap.  The trick here is to cut a piece of plastic to a near fit, the glue the rearmost part only with a "hot" (fast-drying) liquid glue, in my case, Weld-ON #3.  When dry, the other edges are hit with the same glue, and the back end of an X-Acto knife is used to push the plastic addition into final place, while the glue welds everything together.  Mush simpler than puttying the entire hole.

 

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Above right, when dry and sanded, it's fairly smooth. I may add a little filler later on.

 

Next, some old-school sprue stretching:

 

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Above right, in a photo shamelessly cropped from Tommy's website pointed to above, the actuators for part of the exhaust "feathers"?  Perhaps our friend Tommy could jump in and give us a better (and more accurate explanation...

 

Anyway, the stretched sprue is cut in half at the chosen spot (it took a few tries to get the more-or-less right diameter of stretched sprue!), and glued to the model on both sides.  This is accomplished by using the hot liquid glue to the end of the sprue marked "A", while it is held at the opposite end, in as near a horizontal position as I could manage.  As the first end is drying, a knife blade is kind of squished down, to help blend the end of the sprue (cable housing?) to the fuselage.  When that had dried a minute or so, the other end of the sprue "B" was bent down a bit to try and mimic what is shown on the photo.  Note that the sprue extends back over part of the exhaust:

 

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When all is dry, some Vallejo putty filler is used to "fair in" the sprue to the fuselage.  I am trying the Vallejo putty as an alternative to my usual go-to for these types of filling, Perfect Plastic Putty.  While PPP works great, it has one major problem -- it dries out in the tube after being opened.  The Vallejo seems to work about the same, but has a much better  (and much finer) applicator tip.  Time will tell about the life in the tube aspects.

 

Well, we're off to a rousing start on a rarely, if ever, seen model.  I hope you'll all pull up a chair as we figure out how to build this one.  Comments, kibitzing and even personal insults are welcome.

 

Ed

 

 

Edited by TheRealMrEd
hit the wrong stupid button and posted before done!
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Now this is a cool project. Plus, it will be Glossy Sea Blue when you're finished! I had a look at my Emhar kit, and it looks like the windscreen is thick enough so you'll have enough material to sand off the frames, reshape the cross-section, and micro-mesh/polish it out again.

 

Cheers,

Bill

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The F3H-2 did have functional auxiliary air doors initially but they were permanently disabled early on.

 

The J40 afterburner nozzle description can be found here: http://tailhooktopics.blogspot.com/2021/02/westinghouse-j40-afterburner-nozzle.html

 

The F3H Demon variants are summarized here: https://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2010/11/f3h-demon.html

 

The differences between the -1N and the -2 are provided here: http://tailhooktopics.blogspot.com/2014/06/converting-f3h-2-to-f3h-1n.html

Edited by Tailspin Turtle
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Well, we're all going for a ride on this one, as I try and figure out each step.

 

One thing for certain, when Tailspin Turtle looks in, it always seems to be more work for me!  However, his comments always lead to a much more accurate model, so I have to be grateful.  Still.... (whine)

 

But, having been armed with better pics of the rear end, I'll try and make it a little better.  Not perfect, just better.

 

First off, I soaked the tailpipe/exhaust feathers joint with 99% rubbing alcohol, to take them apart.  Then the kit exhaust part was sanded even thinner, down to around 2.5mm or so in length.  Next, the opening was sanded even larger, so my straw could protrude out further.  And, I cut out a couple of openings, top and bottom, to represent the two clam-shell doors wide open:

 

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When the inside is again painted exhaust color, the "clam-shell" doors were painted Dark Aluminum and the exhaust painted Steel, it looks a little more presentable:

 

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This solution still leaves the "tail-feathers" on the original exhaust part, and the diameter of everything means the door actuators are even further away!  Since this whole assembly is still removable, I may take another shot at it later on.  Suggestions welcomed here...

 

I had always thought the clam-shell door were on the outside, so I hadn't worried about the diameter thing.  Oh well.

 

Late,

 

Ed

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Moving along.

 

The next thing needed on the rear end was to glue into place and then fill with medium CA , the air-brakes.  I didn't choose to model them open, and they were definitely not wanting to be closed.  But after sanding down the dried CA, which remained clear enough for me to see through to be able to re-scribe their outlines, they now look like so:

 

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 Moving along to the AAD's I took a piece of scrap plastic card and traced the outline of the doors onto the card (shown here dislodged from it's tracing position for clarity) with a pencil:

 

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Above right, when trimmed to shape, they were bent slightly around a drill bit to bend them to a curve matching the fuselage sides.

 

Next, a little bit of old-school tech.  Here is (the once ubiquitous) Bic ballpoint pen.  Back in the day, this was the go to for modelers needed small diameter tubing, and no access to needle syringes:

 

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Above right, once I crack and discard the outer plastic shell and the metal tip, we are left with just the old, ink-filled ink reservoir tube.  This one has been laying in the stash for the last 20-25 years, just in case, my preference in writing instruments having turned to GEL pins...  I shot a little lacquer thinner through to remove most of the old ink; the rest will dissipate when heated over a candle.

 

One stretched like sprue over an open flame, we are left with very tiny plastic tubing, a section of which is shown below, with an acupuncture needle stuck through it:

 

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Above right, some of the stretched tubing is shown, along with an original non-stretched piece.  Below those are the two freshly-cut AAD's, each with a tiny strip of card ("A") glued down the inside of the doors, to sort of shim the thinner door out even with the fuselage, when the doors are closed.  Then a long length of the newly-created plastic tubing is glued with CA atop that, and later reinforced with G-S watch cement, which will be smoothed a bit with alcohol, after it dries.

 

When eventually the tubing and plastic strips are trimmed to length, the AAD's look like this:

 

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Above right, the two AAD's are painted, Interior Green on the  interior (duh) and dark navy blue on the outside,  The inside and outside areas of the fuselage where the AAD's fit are painted inside and out, mostly to assure than the edges of the openings are painted.  Also, a piece of the same straw used for the exhaust pipe is cut in half, and the insides painted Interior Green.

 

Next the AAD's are taped into place to check the fit:

 

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Above right, the "X" 's shows where a small drop of thicker CA gel will be used to glue just the ends of the acupuncture needle wire to the fuselage only, assuring that the AAD's will swivel open and closed.

 

Below, the wire ends have been glued:

 

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Above right, the split straw parts are glued with white glue over the opening of the AAD's in the fuselage, giving a more-or-less impression of the inside of the intakes, when the AAD's are opened.  Hope that makes sense.  If not, questions are welcome!

 

Back next time,

 

Ed

 

 

 

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Finally, the nose is stuck back onto the rear of the fuselage,  Note the nicely-fitted AADs.  The arrow points to the kit cockpit rear "package deck" (for lack of a better term) detail, which actually does a fair job of representing this area on the F3H-1N, except that it is way too undersized, compared to photos of the real thing:

 

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The next problem is probably the worst fault of the kit, the fact that the air flow straighteners, or whatever they are called, are molded horizontally in the kit, where as they should be more radially oriented:

 

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They need to be reworked , as shown.  This would have been a far easier task, had I known about it when I first started building this kit, decades ago.  Before gluing the fuselage halves together, most of this work could have been cut in half!

 

Next, the detail in the rear tray, showing the original detail, and part of the fabricated detail below:

 

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Above center, the existing detail must be chiseled off -- again, much easier if it had not already been assembled!  Upper right, more detail, plus the little antenna made from stretched sprue, sanded to shape, that will be added:

 

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Coming along.  Now I have to figure some way to represent the gun sight, which is quite prominent.  Help!

 

Later,

 

Ed

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Another brief update.

 

I forgot to take a picture, before I added the canopy, but here is an after-the-fact shot -- some plastic bits, some PE scraps, and a dab of Micro Krystal Kleer make up a very rough approximation of the gun sight:

 

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Speaking of the canopy, back many moons ago, when I started this project, I had simply taken the kit canopy, filled the flat area on the windscreen with a glob of Squadron Green Putty, and the sanded it all down to the smooth  one-piece look of the F3H-1N canopy.  After sanding down with various grits of fine sandpaper, I gave the modified kit canopy a couple of coats of Future Floor Wax (now Pledge), and vacuformed a couple of copies on my trusty Mattel Vac-U-Former.  Sadly, the original canopy master has been misplaced over the years, but here is a shot of a copy of the canopy, molded atop what looks like a Mattel log cabin base (since I had lost the original vacuform base plate even before that!):

 

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Above right, the kit canopy and new vacuformed windscreen attached to the model, with the seam checked by a layer of Mr Surfacer 500.

 

Well, next time we'll get into the wings, and then we'll be headed for the paint booth soon after!

 

Back whenever,

 

Ed

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I have just been comparing the model against Tommy's drawing and it appears that the fuselage length and the fin size match the drawing of the prototype rather than the production version

John

 

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Hi John,  that might be true, I hadn't checked.

 

Anyway, another short update -- short at least, in apparent progress, but not in work!

 

First off, attaching the wings.  This is fairly straightforward, save only that the wing dihedral/anhedral must be watched carefully.  As is pointed out in a Tailhook Topics article HERE

the wing incidence is zero and the dihedral is measured from the center-line of the leading edge of the wing at the fuselage, out to the upper edge of the wing leading edge.  Thus, a couple of thin plastic card shims were needed at the underside wing root on both sides, with, in my case, the left wing requiring less shim than the right wing:

 

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Of course, the wingtip lights were added from appropriately colored plastic sprue blocks (old Lite-Brite pegs).  Above right, a tiny amount of putty at the upper wing/fuse join, and "F" denotes the fuel dumps on both wings, and "S" denotes the little wing air fences added to some aircraft in the early stages, later removed.  Also, the canopy is now masked.

 

Next, "B" denotes that the canopy area only is painted flat black, while "V" shows the added fuel dumps or vents (whichever they are) on the fuselage sides.  Note the peculiar shape of the wing fuel dumps, shaped as near as I can figure them out to be from the few photos I can find:

 

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Next, lots of silver, Navy blue and red parts!

 

The paint work continues...

 

Ed

 

 

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Hi John,  just checked the drawing HERE

 

and while the overall shape may possibly vary a bit, to me the giveaway is that on the prototype (dark grey on the drawing), the vertical stabilizer starts quite a bit further back on the fuselage, just about on line with the exhaust outlet station on the fuselage, whereas the production version (the plain line one the drawing) the vertical stab starts further ahead on the fuselage.  Also, the fact that the wing fence shown on this drawing is not quite the right shape, I'm inclined to believe the drawing is meant to be for general comparison, not detailed accuracy.  Comparing photos of the F3H-1N, the model looks close enough for my feeble efforts, at least...

 

Ed

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Sorry Ed. You are quite right. I must have been away with the fairies. I have an ambition to make the prototype and was concerned about the fuselage fatness and must have let that distract me and so I got confused about which version I was looking at. Age and Covid confinement have a lot to answer for!

John

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One recent discovery while preparing a response to a question from Ed is that the fence on the aileron was deleted on production F3H-1Ns early on.  Ed has included the fence on his model (see this post for the picture he’s using: http://tailhooktopics.blogspot.com/2014/06/converting-f3h-2-to-f3h-1n.html). His question was about surface details ahead of the aileron that I hadn’t paid any attention to before. I’ll try an post an update on that as well in the near future.

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Ed, I have looked again at the drawing and your post and the gray line is the production version ( short nose and fatter fuselage) and the plain line represents the prototype so I think that I was right first time.

John

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As far as the basic wing goes, all I could find was a drawing in the squadron book on the Demon.  I did exactly that, cut the wing off at the correct angle line, and sanded everything to thin it out.  Everything had to be totally re-scribed, and I believe a wing fence also had to be shaved off.  I had pictures of all this, way back when, as I had intended to do a magazine article.  I lost all the early stuff in a hard drive crash a long time ago, or I would have posted some pics.

 

Ed

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Back again, with some painted parts.  Over a coat of Alclad II Grey Primer, I decided to try the new True North Paints for this model, FS 15042  Gloss Sea Blue:

 

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Above right, a couple of areas get an off-white layer, achieved in this case by shooting the white atop the blue.

 

When that had dried, the model was masked to allow painting of the leading edges, as well as the metallic parts by the jet exhaust outlet, using both Tamiya tape and Parafilm "M".  The paint performed like a champ, needing only slight thinning to airbrush at 20 psi.  It went down smooth, although the sheen seemed to me more of a medium shine, more like about a 25045 or some such:

 

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Above right, when unmasked, the tape hadn't lifted any paint at all.  All good so far!  The metal leading edges are all done, except for those on the intakes.  At this point, I shot a coat of Alclad II Aqua Gloss over the entire model, to help provide a slicker surface for the decals to come.  I suspect the True North may have mis-labeled the paint as Gloss, instead of a medium sheen.  No problem!

 

The intakes I will do the same way as the F4H-1 Phantom prototype I did earlier, using silver decal -- mostly due to the extreme difficulty of masking the inner edge.  Below, the decal strip has been applied, using Micro Set, aligning it so that the center-line falls on the very edge, so that the decal can wrap around both the inside and outside surfaces of the nacelle:

 

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Above right, after the decal had dried for a minute or so, I ran some Walther's Solve-A-Set along the decal's leading edge, and after another minute or two it is already starting to curl around to the inside of the nacelle.

 

Next, the decal is pretty much settled into place.  One problem of the kit is that the demarcation line molded into the inlet where the bare metal is supposed to go, is slightly thinner on the right side than on the left.  I may touch up this side with a brush to match the line, or I may just let it go, depending.  Also, thin white decal strip is added around the main canopy to represent the sealer strip:

 

 

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Below, some of the major decals have been added from the spares box, because, of course, the kit scheme was a grey over white bird.  Once all the major decals are in place and dry, I'll shoot another layer of Alclad II Aqua Gloss over them, to protect them from the handling they will receive, while trying to add a myriad of tiny white decals all over the place:

 

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Not totally out of the woods yet, but rounding the far turn!

 

Later,

 

Ed

 

 

Edited by TheRealMrEd
Hit the wrong button before the post was finished!
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6 minutes ago, TheRealMrEd said:

... I decided to try the new True North Paints for this model.

<snip>

The paint performed like a champ, needing only slight thinning to airbrush at 20 psi.  It went down smooth, although the sheen seemed to me more of a medium shine...

 

 

I’ve been quite impressed with the True North paints. Glad to hear they worked well for you. 

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Thanks Bill, turn back in to read the REST of the dufus post.  I hit the wrong button before I was finished. 

 

Moderator, could we get the Submit Reply button moved further away from the "insert image from URL" button, just for us old, rapidly deteriorating old folks....???

 

Ed

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  • 2 weeks later...

About here. I noticed an error.  Years ago, when I began this model, pretty much my major reference was the Squadron book on the Demon, "F3H Demon In Action".  The sole side-view drawing of the F3H-1N showed the two small intake scoops on the upper rear fuselage as being present.  In reality, they are not!  So, now after the decals have been started, nothing for it but to shave them off.  Fortunately, the paint I used was the True North paint line of acrylic enamels, and these are hands down them best paints to allow brush touch-up atop the sprayed paint that I can recall.

 

Anyway, the pic below shows the arrow where the scoop remains on one side, and the "X" shows where I shaved the scoop off the other side with a sharp X-acto blade and some fine sanding:

 

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Above right, two other issues show up.  First off this particular (if not most) of the F3H-1N's) had a lower fuselage mounted pitot "A", which is not provided in the kit, so I made one up from plastic card and sprue.  Another problem with the kit, which I did not note before gluing the nose gear strut parts together, is that the fork, which is a separate piece from the gear leg, should have a small wedge placed between the two parts, to angle the fork part back at a slight angle, rather vertical to the gear leg as shown here.  Since this is a pretty small joint and I had pinned mine together with a small length of wire re-enforcement,  I decided to just let mine go as is.  This problem still exists if you are building the kit stock out of the box.

 

Below, with the rear scoops removed and the paint touched up, she looks pretty good:

 

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Up to this point, all the decals came from the spares box.  Of particular note are the very specific triangle-shaped ejection seat warning decals.  These were sourced from an old Microscale Demon sheet, as the kit came with the newer, smaller style warning decal.

 

The only thing I had to make up are the BuNo marking for this particular aircraft.  The artwork is provided below, should you wish to use them.  These ones below should print at the actual size needed for 1/72 scale, in which case the serial number is about exactly 1/4 inch wide overall, with the blue surround being a little larger:

 

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On the computer screen, the blue looked right on the money to match the model.  I real life, it printed a little bit too light, so after it dried, I touched up the white edges, and as much of the blue decal as I could, to help the decal  blend in properly.

 

Anyway, after adding all the fiddly bits, she's done, and as you can see in the teaser pic below, this generation of Navy jets is much bigger than the earlier generation!

 

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The other pictures will be posted in RFI HERE.

 

Hope you enjoyed the adventure!

 

Ed

Edited by TheRealMrEd
added RFI link
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Another beauty Ed, and as you say a lot larger than the earlier jets.  The Banshee was not exactly small itself so the Demon is really quite big.  How does it compare with a Phantom?

 

AW

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