F-82G SH USAF Korean War -1/72eme

[PATRICK FROM THE SANDS]

Hello Fellow Modelers!

 

Here is a build I did some times ago, which gave me a lot of work as the kit is completely wrong from nose to tail: The F-82 G from Special Hobby.  This kit was supposed to be a better rendition of the old Monogram kit but it failed in almost all aspects: the biggest mistake is the shape and the height of the tail, which is not so easy to correct. What I did to have a more or less accurate model is too long to be listed here but, among them length of the radar pod (too short), the cockpit re-done entirely, the length of the inner trailing edge, propellers size, stabilizer size, radiator intakes etc... 

To add some fun I decided to open the gun bay and show the little radar scan. The final verdict is when the plane seats on its four wheels! 

Painting the model was also a challenge, I adopted various shade of very dark blue/black mix and tried to weather some parts of the wing/fusleage. 

I decided to go for a machine used during the Korean War (4th F(AW)S, 347th FG) to go away from the very well known ANG scheme full of stars on a light blue background. The SH decal sheet is crap as well, the red color of the markings is not correct, so I bough one from Print Scale (72-067) which was not better in term of accuracy and quality. So I did my own.

 

Here is the result:

 

The true F-82G:

 

Mine:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And, I usual, a little dio:

 

 

 

 

As a conclusion, if you look for a nice Twin Mustang (which is an odd aircraft!) at that scale, I will definitively not recommend the SH kit. 

 

Hope you will enjoy, critics welcomed! 

[Vultures1]

That's a fantastic result, especially given the less-than-promising material you were working with. I particularly like the details you added with the radar and gun bay...and the finish...oh, and the diorama is great too!  Well done 

[Mig88]

Beautifully finished and great work all arond, diorama included.

 

Miguel

[Pantherhawk27263]

For all the troubles you faced while building this kit, you achieved a fantastic result with the finished model. Great job!!

[Bertie McBoatface]

Excellent result for all of your hard work. 

[ForestFan]

Thats superb!

[Herb]

Patrick, while building this project, did you come across any drawings you felt were accurate? I've collected a lot, but they all seem different in major ways. Really would like to find some baseline 3-views that are correct so I could start a build like this.

 

And by the way, great result! Thanks for sharing the pics! Did you use any parts from the old Monogram kit to help?

[Bedders]

That looks very nice. A real improvement on the original and the tail looks much better after your hard work. Nice finish too.

 

One day I'm going to have to tackle the F-82, using either the Special Hobby or Monogram kits. What a choice.  But maybe I can hold off a bit longer in the hope that Modelsvit shrink their excellent-looking 1/48 scale kits...

 

Justin

[georgeusa]

Really great improvement over the base kit with what you have done.  This is a great looking presentation in build, finish and especially in the diorama scene.  The model really comes to life in the dio.  Thanks for sharing.

[PATRICK FROM THE SANDS]

16 hours ago, Herb said:

Patrick, while building this project, did you come across any drawings you felt were accurate? I've collected a lot, but they all seem different in major ways. Really would like to find some baseline 3-views that are correct so I could start a build like this.

 

And by the way, great result! Thanks for sharing the pics! Did you use any parts from the old Monogram kit to help?

Hello Herb! Thank you for your kind words! 

To answer your question, after many comparisons and calculations, I found that the drawing given in the D&S nbr 51 (P-51, page 52) is the best one among all I found in Internet and F-82-related books (e.g. Squadron Signal mini nbr 😎 even if I have a doubt about the upper curvature of the nose section. After comparing it with some pictures, the truth is between the SH kit and the D&S drawing but the kit modification is too difficult (for me) to do. Also, the SH fuselage seems too long by 2mm but this is also difficult to modify...

About the Monogram kit, I didn't take any pieces of it simply because I dont have it! So I decided to modify the SH pieces, which take me sometimes.

 

Here is a photo of what I did when constructing the beast:

 

 

To translate, (from tail to nose), I increased the width of the stabiliser by adding a 2mm extra material, put some details in the tailwheels wells. and the most challenging was to extend the width of the "middle wing between the two fuselage which is way too short. Also, the engines main air intakes are wrongly positioned and need to be moved 3mm forward. Finally, the radar pod was increased in height and length because too inaccurate:

 

and the tail correction:

 

 

 

I should admit that after making all these changes, I gave up for accuracy as I don't build kits for competition! If you have any questions, please don't hesitate!

 

 

[Herb]

Thanks Patrick! Again, superb job. Your modifications definitely produced a better result. You give me inspiration!

[F-32]

Wonderful work

[Hopesdaddy]

Well done with all of the work. What a disappointment to hear about the SH kit, I guess It was a good decision to pass on it and just build my old monogram kit.

[Bedders]

On 1/17/2023 at 12:00 PM, PATRICK FROM THE SANDS said:

Hello Herb! Thank you for your kind words! 

To answer your question, after many comparisons and calculations, I found that the drawing given in the D&S nbr 51 (P-51, page 52) is the best one among all I found in Internet and F-82-related books (e.g. Squadron Signal mini nbr 😎 even if I have a doubt about the upper curvature of the nose section. After comparing it with some pictures, the truth is between the SH kit and the D&S drawing but the kit modification is too difficult (for me) to do. Also, the SH fuselage seems too long by 2mm but this is also difficult to modify...

About the Monogram kit, I didn't take any pieces of it simply because I dont have it! So I decided to modify the SH pieces, which take me sometimes.

 

Here is a photo of what I did when constructing the beast:

 

 

To translate, (from tail to nose), I increased the width of the stabiliser by adding a 2mm extra material, put some details in the tailwheels wells. and the most challenging was to extend the width of the "middle wing between the two fuselage which is way too short. Also, the engines main air intakes are wrongly positioned and need to be moved 3mm forward. Finally, the radar pod was increased in height and length because too inaccurate:

 

and the tail correction:

 

 

 

I should admit that after making all these changes, I gave up for accuracy as I don't build kits for competition! If you have any questions, please don't hesitate!

 

 

Very useful photographs, and not completely dissimilar to work undertaken on my P-51H a while back. For the dimension I used the Modelsvit 1/48 scale kit as a guide. But then on the F-82 you have to do it twice of course, which is slightly sobering!

 

Edited February 2, 2023 by Bedders