There's a FLY in the ointment! 1:48th Blunty to be exact.

[general]

But me happy now.


Yes. That is correct. I actually have two of them.
One is commission build, the other is in lieu of my commission price. The cost of sourcing a kit for me wasn't far off my standard fee anyhoos.
And I wanted one.

Goes together quite well. Not for the faint-of-heart, with no locating pins, the inexact placement of the IP and really thick trailing edges.
More pictures to follow. I'm planning a vid review as well.

Regards

[dewobz]

Cool!

[Ian Warren]

Looking forward to the follow up, seems they are returning more and more to NZ skies.

[general]

Okies. I said more to follow so I'd better keep to it!

A lack of IP decals forced my hand. I delved into one of my F-80 sets and punched out ones TLAR.
Applied them to scrap sheet.
I filed the kit IP to 0.5mm and popped out the dials. Big improvement.





Punched holes for the fasteners, shot lightened black then daubed on artist's acrylic white.
Once cleaned up they look okay.



Opened the intakes, added thin sheet to improve the internal profile.











That's it for now!

Regards

[general]

Slowly, slowly, catchy monkey.

Time and energy comes and goes. I must admit I've been happily distracted by my little Airfix F-4B/J.
It's a nostalgia build and nudged the Blunty aside for a little.

Meanwhile, I bit the bullet and put on the rest of the resin.
I'll leave off the towel rail antenna until painted. Added dowel struts to provide clearance and protect all the protuberances.

The last seam work is holding up paint shop.

Regards

[flyjoe180]

Good progress, looks like it needed a fair amount of filling though. Is your F-4 the ancient white moulded kit?

[general]

Yep, indeedy, Joe.
I've dragged the heels too long and decided to get her rolling. Whire plastic adds to the work.
A grey or black primer coat aids the scribing. When I sand off the primer and I'm back to white I scribble water-based felt-tip pen along the scribed lines, then wipe away the excess.
Simple and quick "datum" to check shape and depth.

In re: the Blunty.
It may look a lot but there's not that much filler req'd. It only looks serious because I've smeared it on without tape guides.
Those wee fairings inboard of the MLG doors are slightly narrow, and also have sink holes. Most of the fault lies with slightly off mounting slots.
The wing mounting tabs are a little thick. I had to file them down to fit, whilst keeping them centralised.
Stbd one still ended up a little low.

Otherwise, joint faces are actually very clean and precise.

Regards

[general]

Finally. Some progress.
Started shooting the light grey using the 0.25mm tip. Took the slowly-slowly approach to gradually build up opacity.
That left a subtle shadow from the pre-shade.

Added some plain white to some panels on the stbd, to accentuate. It's not obvious in the lighting. Left the tail unfinished for comparison.







And . . . those finnicky &^%$#-ing sway braces.



Stretched some sprue.
First bit: Held one end against a candle flame then quickly squashed it with tweezers. C-a-r-e-f-u-l-l-y drilled out the small disc, starting with my smallest drill bit then working up about 5-6 gauges.
Go too quick and it twists the round bit off the stalk.
Second bit: Held the end against the candle flame and let it mushroom. Once cool I held it in tweezers secure against the mushroom end and gently filed it flat against an emery board.

To install, I drilled holes in the pylon and CA'd the braces. Slipped the 'bolt' pieces, with extra length, thru the holes in the braces without glue.
Press-fit the tank, adjusted the 'bolts' to rest against the tank then CA'd secure. Removed the tank and trimmed the lengths.

Natch, the light grey on the tanks picked up seams and pits. Had some minor puttying to do. Also need to add D/G to the pylon leading edge and upper camo to the tanks.

Still, the undersides look purdy.

Regards

[general]

Painting, painting, painting . . .







Wrong green. (Don't ask.)





Right green.









And more of the greens.



A section at a time is whole new kick in the pants.
Especially doing a tricky SEA scheme.

Regards

[general]

Getting there, getting there.

Mostly done on the three-colour.
Rear demarcation is being difficult. Minor work still to do.

Now comes the fine AB and time to smooth out the patches.









Regards

[Dave Homewood]

Looking good!

[Calum]

Nice work

[flyjoe180]

Yep, nice work. Don't you just love masking the three colour schemes?

[general]

Gentlemen.

Once done trawling thru the morass of procrastination and indecision the last three-colour went on without a sniffle.
If you look at comaparison shots you'll notice the boo-boo on the port rear. I misread the paint T.O.s, had to reverse the Mid-Green and D/G on fin and tailend. There's a trap for young players.

You're not wrong, Flyjoe. Three-colour is getting to be something of a routine now. Spent donkey's ages working out masking regime so I could keep things tight and avoid major touch-ups.
These are the worst for hangar rash and a general deterioration of the pristine first coat.

Also getting into the groove with weathering and fading each shade as I go. A whole new skill set!
Who'd'a thunk it I cringed at the idea of an SEA scheme? Now they're kind of fun.



So, out with the auto gloss today. First sign of trouble was white specks on the wing. Oooops.
Simple deduction, from the symptoms, was not enough thinner. This stuff dries really quick and it was powder when hitting the surface half the time.
On previous kits it worked perfect, because I thinned well.





Never mind.
Fine-grit paper and TLC, should avoid major re-spray.

Thnx for looking.

Regards

Ross

[flyjoe180]

Looks good Ross.

[general]

Gentlemen.

We're on flightline. For interest's sake here are both:





Bunch of extras helped the overall look of the kit.






































Once I stop dreaming about SEA camo I might drag out the 2nd Blunty . . .

Enjoy.

Regards

Rossky

[flyjoe180]

Nice work Ross, the two look fabulous together. Nice to see this one finished, great build.