Italeri 1/72 A-7D "Sluf", VMA-323, F4U livery

[Radish]

Looking really good

[srkirad]

Thanx Radish

More streched sprue was glued behind cockpit, because cockpit had some gaps beetween itself and inner fuselage walls





In front of front wheelbay I also put a piece of stretched sprue because a minor gap exist here, so it will be easier to fill it...



Fuselage done...



...but a lot of sanding will be required!  



Arrows indicate effect of streched sprue shown on first 2 photos in this post!

I will add some Mr.Surfacer here later, and repaint it with brush...



Details of instrument panel when installed



So, work that follows will be based on sanding/puttying...   

[PolluxDeltaSeven]

I'm building the same kit right now (Cold War West Germany for mine) and I had the same assembly problems with the cockpit.

Be careful with the wings assembly. A lot of putty/sanding to plan here to. But don't make the same mistake I did: it's easier to puty/sand on the upper fuselage/wing junction than under the wings! 

By the way, even if this kit give me a lot of work (I still ask myself why I chose to entirely rebuilt the air intake!!  ), I actually really like it. The A-7 has a lot of whiff potential!!

Good luck with yours!!

[Taiidantomcat]

Looking good! at that point where it is starting to look like a machine and not an odd collection of parts (like my builds)

[srkirad]

Thanx for support guys

I've been busy at work past week so I managed only now to reply to your posts

I'm building the same kit right now (Cold War West Germany for mine) and I had the same assembly problems with the cockpit.

it seems that ESCI for some reason made cockpit tub walls with "wavy" curve, while fuselage inner walls are linear "curve", so this is the reason for adding sprue from the back of the cockpit...

Be careful with the wings assembly. A lot of putty/sanding to plan here to. But don't make the same mistake I did: it's easier to puty/sand on the upper fuselage/wing junction than under the wings! 

thanx for the advice!
I assembled wings so far, and added few coats of Mr. Surfacer on lower part of them (joint of lower and upper wing "halves"), and tried dryfit of wings and fuselage - I think that really there is a bit bigger gap on lower part of junction than from the upper one - I will probably add stretched sprue as a "filler" for these gaps - sprue should also make more strengthened junction than simple puttying...

But, at the moment I am working on one real life model kit, so Corsair is on standby for few days...

Cheers,
Srdjan

[srkirad]

After few months of break here we are with new photos...

As front landing gear leg was a bit crude, I decided to improve it with scratchbuilt details - base of the leg was made from sprue, while landing lights were made from heated sprue pressed into the "half-spherical" mold, and then drilled... Later on, I will glue "glass" made from Kristal Klear here... Few more etched details are to be glued on the front part of this leg



I also made this "rear" part of gear leg from stretched sprue and then engraved it



Wings are glued to fuselage, everything that needed putty was sanded and polished...
Also, most of parts are glued on their position - Only few etched parts are left to be glued on fuselage...





I wasn't satisfied with intake cover provided by Italeri, so I made a new one from sheet of styrene....



Fuel supply hose intake cover was also made from styrene...



Root of vertical tail was sanded and smoothed as much as I could



I don't know what this pipe is for, but it is very striking detail on A-7, so I drilled it a bit more...



Gun muzzle is also drilled a bit...



this panel was redone totally - as Italeri supplied it, it would be parallel with fuselage, so I engraved fuselage at front part of base of this part, while I sanded front part at an angle... rear part is cut a bit....



as this will be what-if bird, I decided to play a bit with armament on this one  :whistle: these pylons are borrowed from Italeri F4U-4 and will carry HVAR rockets for the rest of ther payload you'll have to wait a bit more - let it be a surprise



well, that's it for now, more photos as soon as I glue more details, and we're not so far away from primer phase!

Thanx for reading, all comments and critiques are very welcome!

Cheers,
Srdjan

[Ian the Kiwi Herder]

Like where this is headed. Keep it coming.

Ian

[John Howling Mouse]

I admire your attention to detail.

[srkirad]

thanks Ian and John, hopefully I will have some more progress in following few days as the weather is awfully bad and cold with rain & wind here in Belgrade, so it's perfect for modelling 

[Radish]

Looking an excellent build. I've got one "on the go" too...but it's well onto the back burner as I try to finish other stuff first.

[Taiidantomcat]

This is great stuff 

[Ed S]

Looking good.  But then what's not to like about a SLUF.  Looking forward to seeing this in the retro markings.

Ed

[BlackOps]

Looking good.  But then what's not to like about a SLUF.  Looking forward to seeing this in the retro markings.

Ed

I agree with Ed! Your doing a great job with this one! Looking forward to seeing this one all finished up.   

[srkirad]

thanx for kind words guys - at the moment I'm "struck" with stomach flu, so for the last few days I had to stay in bed in a day or two I should be back to work again

oh, and maybe I should get on the "livery swap mate" as soon as I finish this A-7D - if you remember, this one will carry markings from F4U from Korean war, while F4U will get this A-7's Oklahoma National Guards markings and livery! 

[srkirad]

Today I felt better so I played a bit with etched parts - exhaust fan, and parts of front landing gear leg...



Exhaust ready for painting...





Front landing gear leg almost done - maybe just a few touch-ups to remove excess of superglue, and it will be ready for painting....







I glued this antena in front of front wheelbay...



and this one behind left rear wheelbay...



copper wire and toothpick are temporary "landing gear" while kit is in painting phase....