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Marine F-4J Phantom - Decal time!


Durangokid

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I've got the wings attached which took a little work but overall a good fit.  Fitting the top of the wings took a bit of creative sanding but I was really trying to minimize the gap where they meet the fuselage.  There was still a tiny gap on one side which I took care of with Mr. Surfacer and a Q-tip soaked in thinner.

 

The biggest disappointment was the known problem with the undersized Aires exhaust.  It wasn't even close!  I didn't want to spend more money on other aftermarket exhausts which, other than Sierra Hotel, have the same problem.  I probably would have spent the extra bucks on the Sierra Hotel exhaust but I just spent a ton on weapons and ejector racks.  I saw someone had split the fuselage on a build thread so I figured I would give that a try.  I had never done something like this before so I cringed as I started cutting up my model.  I suck at doing the build threads and forgot to photo where I made the cuts but you can kind of see what I did here...

 

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I temporarily attached the sprue strips to hold everything together while the glue dried.  I tried to squeeze and hold it by hand but it just wouldn't stay together while the glue dried.  The strips worked perfectly and held everything together until the superglue dried solid.  I inserted some sprue strips to fill and strengthen the gaps.

 

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After a lot of sanding here is how it turned out...

 

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I'll take some more photos after primer so I can see where I may need some touch ups and additional scribing.  I forgot to mention that I attached and sanded down the upper part of the exhaust opening.  Otherwise it won't sit flush around the exhaust cans.

 

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Now I have a fairly tight seal around the burner cans which I will take photos of for the next post.

 

Thanks for stopping by fellas...

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The next bit thing I had to tackle was the outer wings.  I was going to just show them in the folded position but I don't usually do that with my builds.  In hind sight, I wish I would have done that but the fix came out okay, just okay.

 

I added a small strip of evergreen to the top part of the outer wing.  I would have attached it to the inner wing but that is where the hinge is and the last thing I wanted to do was rescribe that.

 

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I also had to put in these wedges to make the wing match up

 

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Here is how it came out

 

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Edited by Durangokid
accidentally hit submit
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This is kind of a boring update but here is a few other modifications:

 

I used iridescent film for my hud lens.  It's really easy to do and it looks neat especially looking at it from different angles.  The camera doesn't really pick that up though.  I just glued to pieces on the bottom and it's done.

 

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I'm one of those weirdos that likes doing the weapons and pylons.  I actually like it more than airbrushing which I always put off until the last moment, crazy I know.  I try to look at them as a kit unto themselves.  Which reminds me, I just spent a lot of money buying a bunch of weapons from Video Aviation and Eduard MER's and TER's.  I really like the Video Aviation stuff and for this build I bought the MK-82's and the MK-20's.  The kit MK-82's aren't all that great and it doesn't come with the MK-20's.  I just can't see going all out on a kit and half assing the weapons plus I got a little extra Christmas money :)

 

So here is the basic pylon.  They need some extra detail and need some modification.  The parts that attach to the MER  don't look right and they don't match up well.

 

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After some mods and adding rivet detail.  Sorry I don't know the name but I modified the parts that attach to the MER's.

 

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I'll just call these hooks that attach to the inboard pylons and this is the original

 

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I glued evergreen pieces to the bottom so I could reshape them:

 

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Then sanded them to this:

 

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I forgot to mention that I attached the tiny washers:

 

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I also added this:

 

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Here are the MER's and TER's.  I glued evergreen to the attachments to they would fit snug to the pylon, it worked surprisingly well:

 

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Here they are attached to the pylons:

 

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The Eduard MER/TER's are nice but if I had to do it all over again I would have just modified the kit ones.  Honestly, I expected them to have a bit more detail.  You might notice some of the photos are a little better, I finally got my good camera working.

 

More boring updates ahead!

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I decided to stick with the kit sparrow's since they seem fairly accurate.  I just made a few adjustments to improve the look.

 

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I used this neat little tool for the rivets:

 

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For the lights I superglued aluminum foil down before adding the lens, it helps bring it out a bit.

 

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Couldn't find a lot of pics for the tank but I noticed this was missing:

 

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Another mod was to sand down the fuel door, it was way too pronounced according the the photos I was looking at.

 

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If I'm reading Daco's book correctly, my aircraft was an early J model so it still had the old radar scope.  I cut it off the kit part and made some updates.  I wasn't happy with the fit of the lens so I made my own.

 

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The superglue shrinks so it takes a few applications.  I will sand it flush when it's all dry.

 

Thanks for the nice comments and if any experts see something I'm missing, please let me know.  Sorry I'm all over the place with the updates, I'm just trying to get caught up with what I have done so far.

 

Bryan

 

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Finished the IP and attached the HUD glass.  I think the superglue worked out a bit better than the clear part.  Unfortunately, the film behind the panel fell off and I had to re-glue it back on but I didn't get it lined up right.  I didn't notice this until after everything was glued together. :BANGHEAD2:

 

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