Moments of Zen

[TheChronicOne]

I meant the fitment.  I have no idea if they look right.
How's the fit  between the wings and fuselage halves on the underneath DFZ?  That's usually another place that stuff doesn't fit.  It is however hidden out of sight whereas those intakes are right there in your face teasing and giving you the finger.

Gotcha..... my mistake. Truth be told, while a favored subject, me neither. I know bits and pieces about the 1/72 differences when it comes to the T-38 and the F-5B and the various attempts at passing one off as the other but that's where my usefulness ends. 1/48 is beyond my scope although interestingly, of the 3% of 1/48 kits I didn't get rid of, two happen to be T-38's. Go figure!

[DogfighterZen]

You're both right, fellas, the fitment of the intakes is far from perfect although the right side one isn't as bad as the left...



But the bottom is bad on both sides...



That was the best i could get them to fit... i think i can handle it but it's a good thing it's a bigger model, right?  I just hope the 1/48 AFV kits i've bought recently of the f-5 family don't have this type of problem...

One thing i've noticed from pics on the web of the real bird i'm building is that the US insignia has a much lighter blue than the blue on the kit's decals... well, it wouldn't be an issue if the decals were to be used on a whiff build... Guess that means i'll have to buy a set of good decals for this build... Two Bobs make a great sheet that has this very same plane...

[zenrat]

Makes you doubt your skills doesn't it.  When that sort of thing happens I wonder if it was me misaligning something or if they just made the mould for the bad side on a Friday.

[NARSES2]

I built a lot of 1/72 F5's back in the day when I was still into jets (Airfix and Hasegawa) and from memory those separate intakes were always a pain.

[PR19_Kit]

Even Hasegawa's 1/72 T-38/F-5 intakes didn't fit either. It seems to be generic! 

[NARSES2]

Or genetic ? 

[DogfighterZen]

Makes you doubt your skills doesn't it.  When that sort of thing happens I wonder if it was me misaligning something or if they just made the mould for the bad side on a Friday.

Sure does... i did think of sanding on the mating surfaces of the intake bits to get them to fit better but i glued them on and thought i'd better deal with it with some PSR... but now i've gone back to that plan again and just removed the intakes by reactivating the TET with a few more drops and yanked them out so i can sand them a bit more to see if i can improve the fitment.

I built a lot of 1/72 F5's back in the day when I was still into jets (Airfix and Hasegawa) and from memory those separate intakes were always a pain.

Even Hasegawa's 1/72 T-38/F-5 intakes didn't fit either. It seems to be generic! 

Or genetic ? 

But not on the Hobbyboss F-5E kit i've built a few years ago.


I've bought two more cause it's a nice little kit, and also have the Italeri F-5E with the shark nose, i hope it fits as good as the HB kit does.

Gonna take care of these intakes now and then glue them back on so i can begin the PSR...

[TheChronicOne]

Re: the blue decals. Do the roundels go over the lighter patches of camo? If so, they may turn out alright. I've seen before that sometimes kit makers will make blue darker because once you apply the decals to light colored paint they change a few shades brighter.  I have some American Airlines blue stripes that are dang near BLACK but once they go on top of shiny NMF.......

[DogfighterZen]

Re: the blue decals. Do the roundels go over the lighter patches of camo? If so, they may turn out alright. I've seen before that sometimes kit makers will make blue darker because once you apply the decals to light colored paint they change a few shades brighter.  I have some American Airlines blue stripes that are dang near BLACK but once they go on top of shiny NMF.......

They do go on the lightest grey of the camo scheme:



Have no clue if Syhart designed the Revel kit's sheet to work like that but even if they did it, i won't know unless i apply them... I think i'll end up buying a set of these decals even if it's for use on one of the other 1/48 F-5 kits i have in the stash.

Meanwhile, i've been able to reduce the gaps and misalignment of the intakes after some more sanding but, i'll still have to fill some gaps anyway so they're glued back in place.







Looks bit better but still a lot to do as can be seen... 

[DogfighterZen]

Well, i used Deluxe's Perfect Plastic Putty for the first time last night and i like it for some uses, but it's easy to see that it won't work on every gap. Still, it works very good for some stuff, IMO, a very good modelling tool.
Here's how it worked on the Monogram 1/48 Spitfire's wing roots...





It can't have too much water like Fred had mentioned before when we spoke about this putty in the new in stash thread but i like it, it works just like i expected it to, no sanding at all so i'll be using it much more.!

[TheChronicOne]

Re: the blue decals. Do the roundels go over the lighter patches of camo? If so, they may turn out alright. I've seen before that sometimes kit makers will make blue darker because once you apply the decals to light colored paint they change a few shades brighter.  I have some American Airlines blue stripes that are dang near BLACK but once they go on top of shiny NMF.......

They do go on the lightest grey of the camo scheme:

Maybe that'll help, hopefully!  I see what you mean about them with that faded blue. Looks neat! It's like they wanted the roundel to be sort of low-vis. You know, that's not the fist time I've seen the USN monkey with the roundel colors. I have a Micro Scale sheet of a special scheme for a Viking I think??  Some sort of anniversary scheme or something and the roundels have that same/similar "washed" blue color to them. In fact, the entire roundel is that color; no red.

That putty looks like some handy shiz!!! 

[DogfighterZen]

Thinking about it again, i don't believe the Revell/Syhart decals are made to work like that cause if that's the case then it would mean that all the colors are to be a bit translucent, right? Syhart are known to make good quality decals so i don't get it, why would they make this mistake with so many pics of the real bird available? Maybe my eyes are playing tricks on me...
I know this is a minor detail but being a RW subject, i'd like to have it looking like the real thing but... I guess i'll have to buy the Two Bobs sheet to see the diference. The closest will be used on this build and the other one will be put in the "whif markings" stock list...

Took a day off work to sort some stuff out and will have time to work on the F-5F's seams but i think i'll need to use more that just the PPP on this one...

[NARSES2]

It can't have too much water like Fred had mentioned before when we spoke about this putty in the new in stash thread but i like it, it works just like i expected it to, no sanding at all so i'll be using it much more.!

Yes it's excellent for long, narrow gaps in particular and is a very useful tool to our armory for that 

[TheChronicOne]

Thinking about it again, i don't believe the Revell/Syhart decals are made to work like that cause if that's the case then it would mean that all the colors are to be a bit translucent, right? Syhart are known to make good quality decals so i don't get it, why would they make this mistake with so many pics of the real bird available? Maybe my eyes are playing tricks on me...
I know this is a minor detail but being a RW subject, i'd like to have it looking like the real thing but... I guess i'll have to buy the Two Bobs sheet to see the diference. The closest will be used on this build and the other one will be put in the "whif markings" stock list...

Took a day off work to sort some stuff out and will have time to work on the F-5F's seams but i think i'll need to use more that just the PPP on this one...

Agreed, better safe than sorry! That's a pretty important detail as far as I'm concerned and needs to be done right. That's a focal point of the build!

[DogfighterZen]

I think it's important too, but at the moment, my budget does not allow me to buy that decal sheet so i'll just keep it in my watch list. The Monogram F-5F has fit issues on almost every seam so it'll require more filling and sanding. The PPP worked on some of the seams but others where the plastic has to be sanded besides filling the remaining gaps... that more PSR after dinner...