McDonnell Douglas F-4E Phantom II "HAF 40 Years of Phantoms" [Zoukei-Mura 1:48]

[Alex]

2 hours ago, chrish said:

Wow!

seriously, it looks like you’ve shrunk the real thing!!

Thanks!  This is the first time I’ve had the chance to build a model of a single specific aircraft for which there are multiple high resolution color photos from many different angles available.  It has been surprisingly helpful and a very different experience than my usual WW2 fare (esp Japanese subjects) where you have at best a couple grainy B&W shots to go by.

[Alex]

All masked up and ready to go.

 

Base coat of gloss black (Mr Color 02)

 

I then did an initial coat of 50:50 Alclad Aluminum : Duraluminum to give a "shiny metal" underlayer that can variably peek through all of the tinting/weathering that's to come.

 

I'm going to let that harden up overnight - my plans for this part involve a bunch of masking and I want to avoid damaging existing layers when I do that (I will also aggressively de-tack my tape, of course).

 

I sprayed a coat of Alclad Pale Burnt Metal on the exhaust cans, followed by a very light mist of Burnt Iron.

 

These things have a complex pattern of soot staining / heat discoloration on them in real examples, and I'm still pondering how to recreate that.  But this "smoked brass" kind of color is a decent crack at the underlying tone in the photos I have.

[aircommando130]

Wow that looks good! I like the oil/hydro fluid streaks underneath too.

 

Cheers,,,Ron

[Alex]

In doing the exhaust cans, I'm trying to approximate the pattern of brassy metal and (lots of) soot that you see in this photo:

 

I started by wrapping lots of bands of tape around them to get the segments that run down the exhaust "petals"

 

The thinnest ones are 1 mm tape sliced in half lengthwise...

 

I then sprayed them with a combo of MRP Exhaust Metal and Flat Black

 

This is what it looked like with the tape peeled off.  In retrospect I could have used even thinner tape strips and had slightly wider bands of soot between them.  I then added (as you can see) small masks I made that cover the central ~75% of each petal.

 

Back to the paintbooth, and you get

 

That's obviously way too bright, so oversprayed with the soot color, heavier towards the business end of the nozzle.  Here's one done

 

And both

 

I wish the edges of the painted areas were fuzzier, but at 1:48 this was hard enough to do with tape - Blu-Tack snakes would have been impossible.  They are not done - next I'll overlay masks that completely cover the petals so I can mist some light gray over the interstitial sections (which have a lighter, ashier tone in the photos I'm looking at).  The a final pass with pastels to blend and flatten a bit.

[Alex]

Spent a bunch of time this weekend on the aft end of the plane.  Had a few brief setbacks (like a spot of paint that just peeled back - all the way to bare plastic - and had to be repaired), but nothing too bad.  Here are some views of where I got to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are things about it that aren't quite right, but I'm leery of over-working things.  Plus I'm coming up on my self-imposed deadline to FINISH this and pack my modeling stuff away until post-move.  There are a few tiny touchups to do, but this week I should basically be able to do LG, ordnance, and then hopefully have *zero* trouble un-tacking that closed canopy and getting the proper, raised ones on there.  Fingers crossed.

[Uncarina]

Alex, this really is something special. I love the work you put into aft fuselage.

 

Cheers,  Tom

[Alex]

5 hours ago, Uncarina said:

Alex, this really is something special. I love the work you put into aft fuselage.

 

Cheers,  Tom

Thanks Tom.  It was a bit nerve wracking to do, as I had not really tried something like this before, but I’m pleased with how it came out.  I am actually looking forward to doing another Phantom soon that is less heavily weathered, so I can try to do this same part of the plane in a bit more subtle way.

[Alex]

Landing gear, drop tanks, ordnance installed.  I'm not sure that the HAF ever actually loaded one of these birds out for a full-on air-to-air engagement, so maybe this is a bit of a fantasy exercise.  Nevertheless it looks cool, and the kit has some obviously unrealistic gaps left in the underside of the fuselage if you don't at least mount the Sparrows...

 

 

I feel like I need to spray some more flat on some of this, like the drop tanks.  Or just hit it with a good layer of gray pastel on a wide, soft brush to kill the shine...

 

Standing on it's own (three) feet:

 

Hopefully I can squeeze in time between work meetings tomorrow to deal with the cockpit and canopies.

[LSP_Kevin]

So crisp!

 

Kev

[aircommando130]

awesomeness! Love it!

 

Cheers....Ron

[TankBuster]

Awesome work, well done. Cheers.

[Jeff T]

Just brilliant!!!

 

Jeff.

[Alex]

Sacrificial canopy removed and ejection seats installed.  In retrospect I should have spent the time to wire the back of the weapons officer's IP - you really can see it around the pilot's seat.  I will do this for sure when I build my Tamiya Phantom...

 

 

 

 

I hate close-up photos because they reveal all of the flaws in my lousy paintjob.  Model looks much better from two feet away with my failing mid-50s eyesight...

 

Anyway it's close now - add canopies, prop rod, and park it on the shelf.  Maybe should get the DSLR out and try to do some proper RFI shots first.

[Uncarina]

That’s a gorgeous cockpit!  The seats and panels look great. Thanks for the heads-up about the wiring. How did you like the Fine Molds seatbelts?

 

Cheers,  Tom

[Alex]

29 minutes ago, Uncarina said:

That’s a gorgeous cockpit!  The seats and panels look great. Thanks for the heads-up about the wiring. How did you like the Fine Molds seatbelts?

 

Cheers,  Tom

The fine molds seatbelts were pretty easy to use.  It is definitely different than PE (which I struggle with) or the paper/fabric solutions a la HGW.  They are very pliant plastic, so you can bend them and they stay bent (especially if you apply hot water), but they are not as flexible as paper ones.  Compared to the HGW paper type, they were much easier (no fiddly assembly of belts onto PE buckles).  And since they are polystyrene you can glue them on with solvent cement if you want to affix them before painting.  I did mine after painting stuff and used CA, however. 

 

I would use them again for sure, and may well do so for my Tamiya Phantom.