Pappy Posted January 1, 2022 Share Posted January 1, 2022 G'day, I have a couple of Q's for the F-14 'experten'. I am currently building the Hasegawa 1/48 F-14 as an F-14A+/B. I don't want to type that each time so I will just refer to it as an F-14B from now. I know that the glove vanes were de-activated on the F-14A+ and were deleted on the F-14D. Since the F-14B started out as an F-14A, I presume that the glove mechanism was still installed. I have had a look at the Walkarounds here and there are two F-14 entries; an F-14A and an F-14D, although the latter has a few F-14B pics included. The glove vanes are very apparent on the F-14A ( as expected) but on the F-14D I thought I could just make out out some faint panel lines from a fairing placed over the glove vane area so it appears that on the F-14D the vanes are not present at all but there is a fairing instead Question 1: Were these glove vanes faired over on the F-14B or did they look like the F-14A just not operational? The Hasegawa canopy has the correct 'Omega' cross section but it comes with a moulding seam that needs to be sanded off. It looks like there is thin grey strip in the top of the canopy on the real jet, perhaps some form of MDC strip? The strips do not extend the full length of the canopy, they seem to start at the back and extend forward enough to cover the area over the rear ejection seat then there looks to be a gap to the centre canopy bow and the strip starts again to cover the area over the seat and then another gap so it does not appear to be one continuous length. Question 2: Should the F-14B canopy have these strips present and does anybody have some clear pictures? cheers, Pappy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eng Posted January 1, 2022 Share Posted January 1, 2022 18 minutes ago, Pappy said: G'day, I have a couple of Q's for the F-14 'experten'. I am currently building the Hasegawa 1/48 F-14 as an F-14A+/B. I don't want to type that each time so I will just refer to it as an F-14B from now. I know that the glove vanes were de-activated on the F-14A+ and were deleted on the F-14D. Since the F-14B started out as an F-14A, I presume that the glove mechanism was still installed. I have had a look at the Walkarounds here and there are two F-14 entries; an F-14A and an F-14D, although the latter has a few F-14B pics included. The glove vanes are very apparent on the F-14A ( as expected) but on the F-14D I thought I could just make out out some faint panel lines from a fairing placed over the glove vane area so it appears that on the F-14D the vanes are not present at all but there is a fairing instead Question 1: Were these glove vanes faired over on the F-14B or did they look like the F-14A just not operational? The Hasegawa canopy has the correct 'Omega' cross section but it comes with a moulding seam that needs to be sanded off. It looks like there is thin grey strip in the top of the canopy on the real jet, perhaps some form of MDC strip? The strips do not extend the full length of the canopy, they seem to start at the back and extend forward enough to cover the area over the rear ejection seat then there looks to be a gap to the centre canopy bow and the strip starts again to cover the area over the seat and then another gap so it does not appear to be one continuous length. Question 2: Should the F-14B canopy have these strips present and does anybody have some clear pictures? cheers, Pappy Hi Pappy, There's loads of discussion threads and photo's across various websites if you google your queries but to answer your questions, see below:- Q.1 - The glove vanes were locked out on A's and B's when they were eventually disabled, so you could leave the outline of these and just paint over the area. I'm not 100% certain but believe the gaps around them were probably filled with aerodynamic sealant. Q.2 - The strips should be present on your F-14B canopy, all versions had these and I believe they were lightning conductor strips. Both the fwd and aft canopy sections have them fitted and they cover approx 2/3rds of each section from the aft edge forwards. Google search for canopy images, there's stacks of pic's available. Rgds, Eng 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alan P Posted January 1, 2022 Share Posted January 1, 2022 Eng is right on both counts! The locked out glove vanes were puttied over on the Bs. Canopy strips are lightning rods as @eng said This is a Red Rippers F-14B from 2003. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pappy Posted January 2, 2022 Author Share Posted January 2, 2022 8 hours ago, eng said: Hi Pappy, There's loads of discussion threads and photo's across various websites if you google your queries but to answer your questions, see below:- Q.1 - The glove vanes were locked out on A's and B's when they were eventually disabled, so you could leave the outline of these and just paint over the area. I'm not 100% certain but believe the gaps around them were probably filled with aerodynamic sealant. Q.2 - The strips should be present on your F-14B canopy, all versions had these and I believe they were lightning conductor strips. Both the fwd and aft canopy sections have them fitted and they cover approx 2/3rds of each section from the aft edge forwards. Google search for canopy images, there's stacks of pic's available. Rgds, Eng 7 hours ago, Alan P said: Eng is right on both counts! The locked out glove vanes were puttied over on the Bs. Canopy strips are lightning rods as @eng said This is a Red Rippers F-14B from 2003. Much obliged fellas, that was exactly what I needed, cheers, Pappy 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alt-92 Posted January 2, 2022 Share Posted January 2, 2022 11 hours ago, Alan P said: Looks like we don't have to bother with a seamless. smooth, refuelling probe door either 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silverkite Posted January 2, 2022 Share Posted January 2, 2022 Newly built frames had no glove vanes, converted frames had them sealed or still present with visible canards that were locked out. Luigi 3 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 3, 2022 Share Posted January 3, 2022 To add to what Luigi said, the new build aircraft had the following serial numbers Block 145: 162910 to 162927 Block 150: 163215 to 163229 Block 155: 163407 to 163411 Rebuilt aircraft have serial numbers scattered across the 120, 125 and 130 block (and 161287 in the 115 block) 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exdraken Posted January 3, 2022 Share Posted January 3, 2022 7 hours ago, Giorgio N said: To add to what Luigi said, the new build aircraft had the following serial numbers Block 145: 162910 to 162927 Block 150: 163215 to 163229 Block 155: 163407 to 163411 Rebuilt aircraft have serial numbers scattered across the 120, 125 and 130 block (and 161287 in the 115 block) Not too many new build aircraft... wonder why any at all were new build, many of the A models were retired around the same time anyways..., no,? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam Maas Posted January 3, 2022 Share Posted January 3, 2022 57 minutes ago, exdraken said: Not too many new build aircraft... wonder why any at all were new build, many of the A models were retired around the same time anyways..., no,? Airframe hours. Some of those A's were getting up there. Look at the block numbers for the rebuilds, they were all mid/late production A's, so relatively new, but not the newest Block 135 or 140's. The retirees were mostly old block 60-110 birds. The Navy kept the newest A's in service, rebuilt the ones with low enough hours and retired the older birds. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exdraken Posted January 3, 2022 Share Posted January 3, 2022 10 hours ago, Adam Maas said: Airframe hours. Some of those A's were getting up there. Look at the block numbers for the rebuilds, they were all mid/late production A's, so relatively new, but not the newest Block 135 or 140's. The retirees were mostly old block 60-110 birds. The Navy kept the newest A's in service, rebuilt the ones with low enough hours and retired the older birds. thanks! simply wonder why re-starting production for <50 airframes was viable... when there was a parallell re-building program... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam Maas Posted January 4, 2022 Share Posted January 4, 2022 (edited) 7 hours ago, exdraken said: thanks! simply wonder why re-startimgh production for <50 airframes was viable... when there was a parallell re-building program... Because the initial order wasn't supposed to be that low. the new-build B buy was mostly to keep the line running until the D was ready, but the D was supposed to be a fleet replacement buy, not 37 new build airframes and 18 rebuilds. The Navy wanted a minimum of 132 new-build D's and preferably a lot more, but Cheney was dead set on a non-Grumman air wing and killed any chance of keeping either the F-14 or the A-6 in the fleet Edited January 4, 2022 by Adam Maas 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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