Douglas F4D-3 Skyray

[DogfighterZen]

i'm very happy with how this build is coming together... The Skyray has a new nose and nozzle! 

We are happy also seeing it!

That's looking VERY smart already. 

The Skyray is a sort of delta Hunter, in that it's intrinsically a good looking aeroplane, and our type of enhancements just add to that.

With that pinted nose it looks even MORE Anderson-esque to me! 

Looking good, already curiosu about the livery. 

Glad you like it, guys!
I agree, the original rounded nose and the intakes do remind me of the Hunter quite a bit and that's one good looking bird, indeed. I can imagine it with a pointed nose and that would also suit it pretty good...

I admit i'm not much of a fan of Gerry Anderson's designs, although they do seem very popular... there are a couple of them that i like bit most are a bit too rounded and fat for my taste. 
Regarding the livery, i'm still divided between a more real world scheme used on the Ford and something completely different... I do like the USN dark sea blue scheme...
That is still a big question mark for me because the kit's original decals are very old and yellowed, i won't be using them but i also didn't want to spend over 20€ on a decal sheet just for this...  Maybe i can come up with something usable from the stash or the spare decals bag.

Well, today i got the canopy fit problem resolved...









And then painted the pilot so i can close up the pit to proceed with the PSR...



More tomorrow...

[Tophe]

Well, today i got the canopy fit problem resolved...

Congratulations!
Well done!

[DogfighterZen]

Well, today i got the canopy fit problem resolved...

Congratulations!
Well done!

Thank you, my friend! 
There's still a lot of PSR to do for it to look good but i'll be working on that today. And i've also decided which will be the final scheme and decals to go with it.

[PR19_Kit]

A good bit of styrene engineering to get that canopy to fit. 

That's always quite fiddly, and your job worked very well.

[DogfighterZen]

A good bit of styrene engineering to get that canopy to fit. 

That's always quite fiddly, and your job worked very well.

Thank you, kit! 
I've masked and glued the canopy on so i can do some preliminary sanding before laying some putty over it to finish the job. I'll also have to sand the wing attachment stubs to get them to fit better and reduce the PSR on that area.



Really pleased with how this one is coming along. It's pretty close to what i imagined it would look like.

[jalles]

Really pleased with how this one is coming along.

I would be too, that looks fantastic. I'm not a big fan of the Skyray, but you're changing my mind 

[Old Wombat]

Looking nicely weird!


Not quite as weird as this:



But getting there!

[DogfighterZen]

Really pleased with how this one is coming along.

I would be too, that looks fantastic. I'm not a big fan of the Skyray, but you're changing my mind 

The original Skyray has always made me wish the designers had done it a bit less round in the edges of the wings and nose, something which always made me want to make some changes to it.
I may do something to the wings on the next one... 

Looking nicely weird!


Not quite as weird as this:



But getting there!

That looks great, Master Wombat, i hope mine can come out half as good as yours, that is one sweet build!
And looking at yours with that extended nose, it looks as if they are of the same variant, only difference is the all weather fighter version, kinda like the F9F-8 and the F9F-8P...

Last night i puttied the canopy area so today i'll be working on smoothing it out to see if it needs some more to make it look better.

[Scotaidh]

That's looking VERY smart already. 

The Skyray is a sort of delta Hunter, in that it's intrinsically a good looking aeroplane, and our type of enhancements just add to that.

Just give it the Hunter's gun pack, complete with Sabrinas, and you're all set! 

[zenrat]

I very nearly ordered a 1/48 Tamiya Skyray today.
No, I wasn't being tempted by the dark side, I was thinking of scaleoramaing it into a 1/72 twin engined two seater.
But I found some other things to buy with my unexpected windfall.

[PR19_Kit]

The original Skyray has always made me wish the designers had done it a bit less round in the edges of the wings and nose, something which always made me want to make some changes to it.

They went half way with the later Skylancer, but nowhere near far enough.

[DogfighterZen]

That's looking VERY smart already. 

The Skyray is a sort of delta Hunter, in that it's intrinsically a good looking aeroplane, and our type of enhancements just add to that.

Just give it the Hunter's gun pack, complete with Sabrinas, and you're all set! 

Well, there's a good idea... 

I very nearly ordered a 1/48 Tamiya Skyray today.
No, I wasn't being tempted by the dark side, I was thinking of scaleoramaing it into a 1/72 twin engined two seater.
But I found some other things to buy with my unexpected windfall.

Ohh, that's a good one... I bought a 1/144 B-1 with the idea of turning it into a single seat 1/72 fighter... 

The original Skyray has always made me wish the designers had done it a bit less round in the edges of the wings and nose, something which always made me want to make some changes to it.

They went half way with the later Skylancer, but nowhere near far enough.

Yup, I first wanted to do these changes on a Skylancer but, besides the expensive Anigrand resin kit and a vacformed kit (don't remember the name of the maker), there's no kit to be bought so, i went back to the F4D-2N mod into this one.

[loupgarou]

With your treatment, the Skyray looks ten years younger, at least one generation later.

[DogfighterZen]

With your treatment, the Skyray looks ten years younger, at least one generation later.

Thanks, mate! Ten years... right about the extra amount of service life i think they'd be getting with a mod like this.
They'd probably wouldn't be lasting longer than that due to the airframe's heavy maintenance issues. And being an interceptor only, it's role would be taken over by more recent designs, like it was in real life with the US Navy.

[jcf]

Nice. 

Seriously folks, why would you want to get rid of the lovely curves of the Skyray wing?
Just about every other deltoid/semi-deltoid* is boringly straight edged.

* BTW the Skyray doesn't have a delta-wing, it's classified as a low aspect-ratio
swept wing, it's based on R.T. Jones work at the NACA during WWII. Jones also did
work on swept-wings, and his first papers on the subject were published internally
at the NACA before any of the swept-wing material from Germany was known.
The NACA sat on his research and it wasn't shared with the US aeronautical industry
until after the German work was in hand, and it was shared reluctantly. It's one
of the oddest incidents in aeronautical engineering history.