Grumman Heritage Cat F-14B

[Tomcatter]

Hello all, excited to join the community! Last summer I put together a fun what-if kit based on the Navy's 2011 classic paint schemes that they applied to various tactical aircraft, celebrating 100 years of Naval Aviation. I decided to apply this logic to the wide "-cat" family of Grumman fighters, applying a 1943-44 three-color F6F Hellcat scheme to an F-14B. Perhaps Grumman would have applied this scheme as a "50 Years of Grumman Cats" event in the 1990s. Unbeknownst to me this has actually been done once before (https://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/Gal6/5301-5400/gal5303-F-14-Desautels/00.shtm) but I hadn't seen that going in, and mine has enough variations, and at an entirely different scale, that I like mine better.

First stop was to research and create a plan.


I started out by grabbing a Revell Top Gun F-14 kit, which is a new release of an old mold with some very odd features that I'll go into later. The main draw was the cheap price and the ease of finding tutorials at this scale and airframe, considering this is maybe only the fourth model kit I've ever started and only the second I've ever finished.
It is simultaneously a mostly-movie-correct F-14A kit, and an odd disaster amalgamation of parts except for featuring a 14D chin pod, and having both the TF30 exhausts, and petals for the GE F110. Anyway, we'll figure that mess out later, let's start the thing.


Halfway decent interior work, nothing special. I used Heatblur's great F-14 DCS module as easily viewable reference.




As a beginner, I wasn't gonna spend all the time poking all the little white and red button paints in there, so we rely on decals for a short period of difficulty rather than longer tedium that I would probably screw up anyway...
Build continued in replies.

[Tomcatter]

Apologies about the image sizing, I'm new here and can't quite figure out these full size imgur uploads. Anyway, build continues.


Revell only provides one pilot for some reason, so an F-15C pilot figure from that revell kit is forcibly lat-transferred to the Navy and joins the front seat.


They get tan flight suits, just like the WW2 pilots would have khaki jumpsuits, and by the 90's desert CWU-27's were in wider use.


Green nomex and colorful helmet schemes.


Cockpit installed as well as the two fuselage halves and the wings, which took some elbow grease to plunk it all together, but the gear-mechanism for the sweep wing is actually quite cool despite imperfect fit. Still works even when painted later!






Here, I applied putty to the big panel gaps (too much of it, oh well) to be sanded off.

Next, we get to the thing with the engines. I chucked out the TF30 exhausts and found the individual petals for the F110's and finally got em all in there.

[PR19_Kit]

I LOVE that 3-colour WWII scheme, so an F-14 done like that will be awesome, good choice. 

As for the pic sizes, there's a technique on here where you can add a prefix to the pic's script to re-size it from your originals. Sadly I can't remember how to do it as I set all mine to 800 pixels wide before they're uploaded, but someone on here will know it and show you how.

[Tomcatter]

I LOVE that 3-colour WWII scheme, so an F-14 done like that will be awesome, good choice. 

As for the pic sizes, there's a technique on here where you can add a prefix to the pic's script to re-size it from your originals. Sadly I can't remember how to do it as I set all mine to 800 pixels wide before they're uploaded, but someone on here will know it and show you how.

Thanks! I'm going to post the rest of the build as soon as I can figure out how to do that.

[scooter]

I LOVE that 3-colour WWII scheme, so an F-14 done like that will be awesome, good choice. 

As for the pic sizes, there's a technique on here where you can add a prefix to the pic's script to re-size it from your originals. Sadly I can't remember how to do it as I set all mine to 800 pixels wide before they're uploaded, but someone on here will know it and show you how.

Thanks! I'm going to post the rest of the build as soon as I can figure out how to do that.

Edit the IMG tag so it reads: (img width=xxx)Image URL(/img), replacing the parentheses with open and closed brackets, and xxx equals the width value.  I set mine for 1280 pixels, as it seems a good number for most monitors.

[Tomcatter]

I LOVE that 3-colour WWII scheme, so an F-14 done like that will be awesome, good choice. 

As for the pic sizes, there's a technique on here where you can add a prefix to the pic's script to re-size it from your originals. Sadly I can't remember how to do it as I set all mine to 800 pixels wide before they're uploaded, but someone on here will know it and show you how.

Thanks! I'm going to post the rest of the build as soon as I can figure out how to do that.

Edit the IMG tag so it reads: (img width=xxx)Image URL(/img), replacing the parentheses with open and closed brackets, and xxx equals the width value.  I set mine for 1280 pixels, as it seems a good number for most monitors.

Excellent, that should help.

[Tomcatter]

Continued with more normal image sizes. Here I rescribe the panel lines so that they'll show up better during painting.


Here we see the big visual difference up front between the A, B, and D model cats- the television camera system array. Since this kit only comes with the two-lobe D model setup, we'll have to buy an aftermarket single lens F-14B pod. This will come in handy later.


Duly scribed, marked, and masked, we first apply a mottled white undercoat on the panels.
With that completed, we then apply a black line to the panel lines.

[Tomcatter]

The white belly of the beast.

Next, the side and top coats in Tamiya spray colors.


Looking good so far.

[Tomcatter]

Later, an aftermarket pod by Quickboost arrived to get us from D to B.



With that on, lets get weap'd up. No fuel tanks, so probably inadvisable to carry a full loadout, and it saves some time. Two Fox 3, two Fox 2, two Fox 1.

[Tomcatter]

Now time for decals, thanks to buying some from the excellent Sprue Brothers.

[Tomcatter]

AND COMPLETED! Some beauty shots in the great outdoors...








The behind the scenes star, two spent bottles of Tamiya white!


Thank you all for bearing with me as I get accustomed here. Despite my status as a beginner I'm very proud of what I was able to achieve, turning my imagination into a table-top reality!

[Tomcatter]

BONUS:
Inspired by the great SPINNER, I hastily converted this into Strike Fighters 2 on the F-14 Super Pack mod. On a VF-32 instead of 31 cat, because the lo-vis was easier to modify.

[Wardukw]

Thats a different tomcat for sure and damn it looks good in that colour..nice one mate 
Oh welcome to this house of nutters bud ..you should fit right in 

[Rick Lowe]

Nice job on the Cat. 

[NARSES2]

I really like that, excellent