F-16D Block 30 “Blue Bandit” (USAF 8th FW, Kunsan AB South Korea, 2007)

[fox1_BE]

Hello all,

 

Here is my "Korean Wolf": a USAF 8th FW F-16D Block 30 aircraft, operating from Kunsan AB (South Korea), seen in its October 2007 livery. This aircraft was scheduled to being transferred to the 18th FS aggressor unit early 2008 and carried the Blue Flanker scheme - in combination with the Kunsan WP tail code - in the few months prior to its actual transfer.

 

Being a Block 40 aircraft, the Kinetic kit comes with the correct bigmouth engine intake and exhaust for this particular type. Also the appropriate front nose panel without antennae is included in the kit.

 

As I had a Black Box cockpit in my stash (for a Block 40 aircraft though and designed for Hasegawa), I thought I'd try that here: … well, it does fit in, but only with quite some work ...

 

I backdated the kit into a Block 30 version, by some simple modifications:

• Removing the backseater's HUD and adding the top handle
• Sanding down the kit’s bulged MLG doors and replacing the MLG wheels with earlier (smaller) versions from Tamiya’s F-16C; I also scratched the landing lights to the MLG struts
• Removing some detail from the inside nose gear door (i.e. no landing light)
• Adding stiffening plates on the wings/fuselage joints (Astra Decals vinyl) and RAM panels on the nose (cut from Astra vinyl leftovers)

Nothing too complicated really - and making it sufficiently matching the aircraft I was building. 

 

The kit builds up reasonably well - serious fit problems though around the nose and intake areas, where several places needed some plastic strips between panels and quite some filler, sanding and rescribing work: the fit in these areas is really not good, but I think I got it looking right in the end.

 

Camo colours are Gunze (grey) and Vallejo for the two blue tones (both tweaked to better match pictures of Blue Flanker vipers), with Alclad for the exhaust area. The very nice "Blue Bandit" decals are from a TwoBobs decal sheet. Weathering with oils, taking this reference picture of airframe 87-0378 on f-16.net's database as inspiration: https://www.f-16.net/g3/f-16-photos/album38/album69/87-0378_001

 

As for the load-out: the AIM-9 is from the kit, the CATM is a modified AIM-9 from the spare box, the ACMI pod is from Hasegawa and the AN/ALQ-188 jamming pod is a Wolfpack resin item. Final touches are droptanks and pitot tube from the Tamiya kit as they appeared to be more refined than the Kinetic ones.

 

Comments always welcome ... and thanks for looking!

 

All the best,

Patrick

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[F-32]

That's really nice work, great paint and weathering

[Luka]

Tasty and well done camo scheme, love it!

[Baldy]

It looks absolutely superb Patrick! Lovely build and superb camouflage painting. I like the weathering too - just enough to look well used but not overdone. This is a much maligned kit with many citing shape issues around the nose but yours looks great and shows what can be don!

 

Cheers

 

Malcolm

[RMCS]

Brilliant work 

[Vultures1]

That's very nice work Patrick, well done!

[fox1_BE]

Thanks for the likes and comments, much appreciated 👍

[Gary Brantley]

That is some splendid scale modeling Patrick! 👍  I love the paintwork and the subtle touch with the weathering, just a great looking model man!  

[Bertie McBoatface]

That's outstanding. A very dramatic paint job. I like it a lot.

[exdraken]

Great result!!

That was a jet already painted in aggressor colors before actually being transfered to Ak, no?

[fox1_BE]

1 hour ago, exdraken said:

That was a jet already painted in aggressor colors before actually being transfered to Ak, no?

Yes, indeed Werner - f-16.net’s database shows a picture of this particular aircraft in aggressor markings with WP during summer 2007, a few months prior to transfer to AK (in 2008).

 

Thanks and regards,

Patrick