To keep my mind off all the chopping and sanding required by my F-16D Barak build, I decided to start this project and keep it strictly out of the box (OOB). The only aftermarket portion is the markings, which comes from TwoBobs. So it's OOB with non-OOB markings and camouflage. It's going to be my sanity build. Heh.

Back when the US Navy ran the United States Navy Fighter Weapons School aka 'TOPGUN', it operated A-4 Skyhawks in the role of the adversarys, ie. the bad guys. This particular Skyhawk took that role to the extreme by having an actual silhouette of a MiG-17 painted on it.

This project is heavily reliant on the excellent article by David Aungst at Hyperscale, who did all the research required to do up an accurate Top Gun #56. In fact, the TwoBobs decals are also based on this same research. The kit itself is the excellent 1/48 Hasegawa A-4E/F kit.

As with all aircraft kits, I began with the cockpit and I must say this kit's cockpit is nicely detailed enough that I won't consider an aftermarket resin set at all. Even the seat is reasonable detailed with molded on buckles.

I tried something new for this kit. I did the normal aircraft grey for the tub, then black grey wash over all the crevices, then black grey for the control panels. For the highlights though, I used a silver grey color pencil to go over. I really liked how it turned out as the color pencil gives me more control over drbrushing with a paint brush. I think I'll use this method from now on. The main screen in the center of the control panel is given a wash of red color to simulate a turned off TV screen.

To make things even more challenging, the fingerprint appears over (or under) the 'rescue' decal. Meh. So anyhow, I haven't decided what I'm going to do with this. Most likely though, I will live with it.

The exhaust is made of 3 parts, the fan and 2 half-cylinders to make the trunking for the engine. The instructions called for the inside of the trunking to be painted in steel but I decided to leave as is because after putting the whole exhaust together, the inside can't be seen. Less work. Heh.

The fan in the intake however, is more prominent, so this was handbrushed the same way as the cockpit. Steel for the fan, given a black grey wash, then highlighted with silver grey color pencil. The scoop itself is handbrushed white.

The instructions called for 8 grams of weight for the nose but I decided to overdo this a bit since if I didn't weight it enough, I can't go back and add more weights. It's now suitably nose heavy.

With that done, all that remained was to cement both halves together. I slowly ran cement through the joints, inch by inch and worked around both halves of the fuselage, making sure the fit was good all round. With the cockpit sealed up, very little of the inside can actually be seen.

› Read the full project log

Nicely done kits I found on the Internet:

› ga1424's 1/72 Hasegawa F-16N Fighting Falcon
› vit's 1/48 Hasegawa F-16C Fighting Falcon
› RedFlag's 1/48 Monogram EA-6B Prowler
› blackout's 1/48 Kinetic F-16I Sufa
› rtvanzandt's 1/72 Hasegawa E-2C Hawkeye 2000
› Gambler's 1/48 Hasegawa F-16B Fighting Falcon

I know... many many F-16 kits. Hopefully other stuff soon!

Abit tired tonight so I decided to tackle the parts that broke off from the ejection seats. These are namely the triangular frame in front of the seat and the 2 protrusions. Armed with this picture from www.ejectionsite.com, I fashioned the new parts from 0.5mm plastic card. No specific calculations done for the shape and size, I used eyeball 1.0.

I wasn't too concerned with accuracy as once the seats are fitted onto the tub, the details can't really be seen. There's just an indication they are there, which is all I am trying to do.

Next up should be fitting of the Wolfpack parts to the kit...

› Read the full project log

One thing I've noticed about the Blackbox cockpit set, the resin is very brittle. But I've been told this is normal if thre resin is old. I've had this set for at least 5 years already. Anyhow, first up, replacing the coaming/glare shields.

The kit has these things molded on so I had to remove them. First I marked up the location of the rear glare shield then proceeded to carefully saw the part out. The resin replacement is thankfully a drop-in fit. The front glare shield needed a bit of elbow grease. The fit wasn't as good but with the help of rubber bands, the parts conformed in the end. Blackbox also has resin panels for the rear of the cockpit. These were easily glued in place.

The front cockpit is nice and busy. It's made up of 3 parts: the glareshield, the control panel (made up of 2 parts) and the HUD. I'll need to scratchbuild the glass panel for the HUD but I'll leave this to the end. Based on reference pics, I added plastic card to the center console to replicate the housing that Blackbox left out.

The rear cockpit is made up of 3 parts: the coaming, the control panel itself (itself made up of 2 parts) and the HUD repeater (in grey). The HUD repeater is a different color because it came from the Wolfpack Design conversion. The Blackbox set doesn't come with one.

The front sidewalls are then installed. A joystick is attached to the left sidewall. The right sidewall has a casted oxygen hose.

The rear sidewalls are next. F-16Ds have combat capable rear cockpits so this one is no different. On the left sidewall is a joystick. The ride sidewall was slightly trimmed at the bottom to fit the tub.

I then test-fitted the seats to the tub to make sure they sit OK. There are supposed to be pop-up vanes on the headrest but sources have indicated these things are usually only installed on Block 50 Vipers. I'll need to think about whether to add them to my seats.

Then a final fitting to make sure everything fits properly. This set is a whole kit by itself but man, does it improve the cockpit a whole lot.

Next up, fitting the Wolfpack conversion! The HUD repeater's resin seems much more robust than the Blackbox ones, let's hope the rest of the parts are the same.

› Read the full project log

Starting this year, I plan to have an annual aircraft project that is superdetailed ie. with as many aftermarket products and scratchbuilding as possible. This year, I will try to tackle The F-16D Blk 40 'Barak', which is flown by the Isreali Defence Forces/Air Force (IDF/AF). Base kit for this will be the Hasegawa F-16D. I plan to add the following things to it:

• Blackbox F-16D cockpit
• Wolfpack Designs F-16D 'Barak' conversion set
• Aires F-16 wheel bays
• Paragon Designs Python 4 air-to-air missiles
• Isradecal F-16C/D Barak decals

First up, the cockpit. I've had the Blackbox cockpit set for many years now and it's only seeing the light of day now. Scuttlebutt is that the newer Aires set's better but this is what I have so it'll have to do.

Besides, it's still a very nicely detailed set of resin.

First up, testfitting. Almost all resin cockpit sets need to be cut and trimmed to fit the kit and this one's no different. Blackbox molds the front and rear sections as separate tubs

For the front tub, I marked off what was needed to be sawed off and proceeded to slowly (and carefully) saw off. Took some elbow grease but I got it to fit into the kit perfectly.

Then came the rear tub which took a lot of cutting and scraping. So much so I ended up taking off the whole floorboard. I then superglued a 0.5mm piece of plastic card as a replacement floorboard. I also had to cut up some of the plastic in the kit's lower fuselage before the tub fit right.

Next came the seats which to my horror, had parts broken off. Actually I didn't notice it until I saw the illustration on the instructions. There are supposed to be 2 protrusions, 1 on each side of the seat cushion. These are pretty obvious so I may have to scratchbuild from plastic card.

The bottom of the seats needed to be trimmed quite a fair bit before they would fit under the canopy. While I'll be posing the kit with canopy open, I didn't want the seats to look like they were protruding out of the cockpit.

After I was done, I realized how much resin dust I had accumulated. This is dangerous stuff man. I have been told I should consider wetting the resin before cutting them. We'll see how that goes.

Next up, more work on the cockpit including sidewalls, which I am told will probably need to be ground thin with a grinder...

› Read the full project log

Kotobukiya is quickly becoming my favorite anime model kit manufacturers. The fitting for their kits can be dodgy at times but their interpretation of the designs and proportions are superb.

Coming in October is their latest HMM offering, the Gunsniper. Now this is one of my favorite Zoid designs, but the original toy itself, is really ugly. Bad proportions abound. Kotobukiya's interpretation though... WOOT! Priced at 3,675yen, I'd probably end up getting it and the inevitable reboxings with new weapons.

Hasegawa has recently started to pack 2 or more kits into one package, with the selling point being that the aircraft in the set are somehow related. This set includes 3 F/A-18Cs with 5 marking options (though with enough stencils for only 3 Hornets). The markings are all of the VFA-195 colorful CAG bird in its various special markings through the years.

› Read the full article