Hi-Tech F-4 Phantom - FINISHED

[kerick]

An upgraded Phantom is on my to do list, which is very long. Also an upgraded F-106.

[silverwindblade]

In the Paint Shop



With all the construction and masking complete, it's time for some paint.
I have a paint scheme in mind; and a grey underside is the first part of it.
I didn't have a light enough grey in my airbrush-ready paints, so I tried thinning some Vallejo model colour - not air - to spray through my airbrush. The result was a smooth coat once it was on, but it was very... spattery coming out of the airbrush. Luckily I didn't have to be too neat.

EDIT: also, I'm keenly aware of that massive gap on the underside where the front nose-section and the bottom of the fuselage/wings/intakes all meet. I could fill it in, but I'm also aware that it's going to be on the bottom, and I'm probably never going to see it... although, I will know it's there, and it will bug me. So... I still might, if I think I can do it without wrecking the rest of the model.



Blue was the next colour, and the first on the top. It's a bit more... bright than I may have planned, but it still looks all right - or, it will once the second colour is applied and it's received weathering and the like, I'm sure.

More to come soon - I need to get hold of another blue. Something darker, but not too dark, to counterpoint this one.
Sadly, most of my local model shops have closed down, but the remaining one I'll check out and see what paints they have in stock.
Otherwise, I'll have to order something and wait, which I'd rather not do while I'm making progress!

[Old Wombat]

The ol' Toom is looking very good!

[silverwindblade]

The ol' Toom is looking very good!

Glad you like it! I should have some more pics this evening, as I've moved on a lot with the painting too!

[PolluxDeltaSeven]

Wonderful !! Will it be in some kind of "JASDF F-2" camo ?

[silverwindblade]

Wonderful !! Will it be in some kind of "JASDF F-2" camo ?

Well, funny you should mention that...



I also shot some white onto the stores and the gear bays, though I'll need to do another coat of grey on the bottom now due to overspray.
The dark blue will also need neatening up again too, but that's okay; it's not in too many areas, and this is the first time I've used my airbrush extensively, and for more than a single colour, not to mention with a lot of masking. I expect mistakes, and I'm learning a lot of really useful things, as well as really enjoying it.



Getting there though!

[DogfighterZen]

 

[silverwindblade]

I don't know why all my pictures bar one seem to have disappeared - they're all still on my Discord server...

Anyway:

A Rhino of an Update

I've done a lot of work on this, but not had much time to post pictures and updates, or it kept slipping my mind, at least.
With the base colours on, I could remove the masking, and reveal the secret:



I acquired some pre-cut hexagon masks from Dspiae via OEShop here in the UK to create a cool-looking paint scheme. I have some ones in various sizes, as I intend to do some cool colour schemes on some Gundam models at a later date, but the idea of using them for aircraft camo was too good to pass up.



I also applied the same scheme to the wing tanks, after successfully stripping the paint off of them and repainting them in the current scheme. I'm using F-16 wing tanks, as they look more modern. The hexagons on the wing tanks are some of the smaller scale ones from one of the sets I originally purchased for Gundam use.



After that, there was a LOT of decalling. The Esci kit didn't come with any decals - it was a purchase from a third-hand seller at a model show - but a friend gave me a full sheet of decals from an Italeri kit, which included Japanese ones. So, using those and a few miscellaneous ones from my spares box (the tail art) I got to work.
I had some... issues at this stage, just after this picture. I realised the red line around the fuselage was too far forward. Despite my best attempts and perserverance, I couldn't remove the decal with rigorous application of Microset, and I hadn't even varnished the decals to seal them yet.
I ended up scraping off the decal, and then having to re-paint, and then re-mask the affected area. I then masked off a line in the right place and gave it a few coats of red.
It mostly went all right, though there was a lot of correcting for overspray. In the end, I was starting to lose my patience, so I called it 'good enough' and moved on. I'm not trying to win any competitions, and it looks better than knowing the line was wrong.
Some of the Hinomarus cracked and split a bit as I applied them, despite using copious amounts of Micro-set and Micro-sol. I did consider painting the cracked areas, but it didn't seem to do much good, and in fact, seemed to do more harm. It's not too bad, and it's mostly the ones on the bottom that were affected - and they're not going to be seen as much anyway, so I can live with it. I think it's just because they're such big decals, and the bottom ones are covering raised detail.



The underside has also been decalled, and then another coat of MRP varnish applied to seal all the decals in. I'm letting that cure for 'some' hours, and then it'll be panel-lining time. Then weathering, and final assembly of everything. The end is in sight...!

The MRP varnish is pretty good. It's my first time applying varnish through an airbrush. It's a lot quicker and simpler than using spray cans (although, I have some of those to use up, and probably will on the YF-19), but the MRP stuff runs out quick.
While I think I'm definitely a convert to using airbrush varnish, I need to find some that comes in larger bottles.



The stores - aside from some I'm reusing - gear bay doors, pylons and landing gears all also got some decals where appropriate, and then a coat of varnish too, and are now being left to cure along with the main body of the plane.

The Eduard pylons had an absurd amount of decals. Some of them were so tiny as well, that they were too fiddly to apply. In the end, I used some of them, and the effect is pretty good. I didn't use any for the outer pylons, and the resin ones didn't come with any.
The LITENING targeting pod and the ECM pod came from Hasegawa Weapons Set E, and I used the decals from that set. I think they definitely improved the look of the stores a lot, and some panel lining will really make both items stand out.

I'm eager to keep pressing on with this, and I'm really hoping the end result lives up to my mental picture of it.

[Old Wombat]

That's such a neat scheme! I like that!  

[Spino]

Very interesting.  I know the feeling about decals cracking, had that happen to me on an RA-5C a few years ago.  It was the wing roundels too 

[NARSES2]

I don't know why all my pictures bar one seem to have disappeared - they're all still on my Discord server...

I can see them 

That's such a neat scheme! I like that!  

It really is 

[kerick]

Excellent build! Good to see you're keeping the fun in it!

[silverwindblade]

I can see them 

I went back and re-added the links, even though they were still in the posts. It might just have been my browser/laptop.
Either way, they're showing up for me now too.

I'm glad people are enjoying this. More progress is being made, and it's entirely likely it'll be all-but finished by the end of the weekend. Couple of minor unexpected things to add and change, such as needing some rails for the sidewinders to fit on the pylons. But I'm going to scratch some from plasticard, rather than buying some. They won't be the most accurate ones, but they'll do the job, and it'll save me time and money.

[silverwindblade]

We Can See the Finish Line From Here

As I mentioned in my previous post; I needed some rails for the air-to-air missiles that go on the sides of the inner pylons. I didn't have enough spare ones lying around, but I did have some to use as templates for scratch-building my own.



A couple of hours work of drawing around the originals onto some plasticard of the right thickness, then a lot of scoring, snapping, and sanding, and we have these. Not the most detailed, but they'll be fine once painted.



And there they are, attached to the resin pylons. I pinned them in place using some thin wire and attached with gel superglue.

Some suitable ordnance was needed for the inner pylons. I was dithering between a few different things. Originally I was going to reuse some previously painted ordnance, but it looked shoddy compared to the rest of the model. Some replacements I had in my armaments dump lacked a bit in detail too. I'm a big fan of Harpoon and SLAM missiles, but didn't have any spares of those.
However, I had been gifted some lovely slide-molded GBU-16's from an AMK kit my friend had spare previously. I hadn't been sure what to use them on, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity, since they required minimal prep to paint.



A blast with some Vallejo olive drab primer, and that was most of the base colour down. Let it dry overnight, and then I painted the details, varnished, and decalled them up.

And then...







Final assembly is complete. I'm going to shoot some varnish over her, and then add some minimal weathering, just soot around the gun muzzles and exhausts, and a little bit of chipping in a couple of places where the paint has worn off during handling and building. As she's a prototype/test type aircraft, I figure she wouldn't have much weathering yet.

[DogfighterZen]