1/48 Tamiya F-14A Tomcat - "Rage 207" - COMPLETE 2/5/17

[deafpanzer]

Already one of best looking Tomcat build and it is not even done yet!!

[mrversatile]

Nice work, Doogs. I am wondering how the touch-ups on real planes are done? Are they hand painted, rolled, or sprayed? If you know.

[doogsatx/]

Dec 29, 2016 22:23:51 GMT -5 mrversatile said:

Nice work, Doogs. I am wondering how the touch-ups on real planes are done? Are they hand painted, rolled, or sprayed? If you know.

I think it's a mix. There's some kind of epoxy putty that often looks like it's put on with a palette knife (or a trowel). But there's also general touch-ups that from what I've been told were typically done with rattlecans. At least in this late Cold War era.

[doogsatx/]

Decals took longer than expected...but ultimately ended up being one of those fortuitous "just in time" situations, as the final decals I needed to complete my cobbled together scheme only showed up yesterday.

So...here's the deal.

Furball decals were used for the majority of the markings and stencils, including insignias, tail swooshes, NG lettering, all the various "No Steps" and so on. They were all simply excellent and reaffirm my stance that Furball's decals are the best I've ever used.

Tamiya's kit decals (grumble) were used for the slime lights (Furball's didn't fit the Tamiya kit) and some hoist point stencils that Furball bafflingly didn't include. These are a step up from Tamiya's usual decals - responded well to Mr Mark Softer and are thinner than what I've come to expect from them.

Fightertown decals were used for the 207 modex numbers on the nose and wings. The nose ones maddeningly degraded somewhat under Mr Mark Softer, so I kept it far away from the flap codes.

Custom printed decals were used for the Bu.No, tail codes and USS Kitty Hawk stenciling on the glove vanes (most VF-24 decal sheets are focused on the period after, when they were on the Nimitz). These had a knife edge between playing nice with setting solutions and having the ink run. Fortunately the only real smearing was on two numbers of the Bu.No, which is tucked away under a stabilator.

Next up - little details to attend to - painting antennas, installing metal AOA probe, getting gear struts painted, that sort of thing, and then moving into the joys of weathering.

[wbill76]

Markings on these Navy birds always do so much to bring them to life. Looking sharp, now the real fun begins.

[deafpanzer]

DAMN!!! All details really pops out especially the repainted places!

[doogsatx/]

So...after sealing the underside with Gunze Semi-Gloss, I had to admit that I HATED the custom decals - or at least some of them. The ones of the lower strakes were particularly bad.



My original plan was to build up a heavy gloss (Gunze GX100) and then sand back to level things out. I did this with some Tamiya prop stencils I used on my Dauntless and it worked like a charm. But then I remembered that I had VF-24s from the Fightertown sheet.

So I decided to do some stripping.



Also stripped off the Beware of Blast & Bu.No (BoBs are missing on ref pics, numbers had similar-but-not-as-bad problems as the strake decals) as well as the 07s on the tails.





Three main takeaways from the stripping business:

1 - ISO is great for cutting through a lacquer clear coat.

2 - Tamiya X-20A is great for removing decals.

3 - Testors decal paper is trash. I thought maybe the Badger Decal Film I used was the culprit, but the stripping action went in two parts - first the film and ink came up, and then second, a much thicker backing carrier from the decal paper itself. So I'm not going to swear off custom decals - but I do need to find a better paper.

[doogsatx/]

Part 2 - fixing the mess I made!

First thing - I needed to restore the swooshes to the lower strakes. First time out, I used Furball's decals, which were alright, but didn't extend all the way up the strakes. So before stripping them, I scanned them to capture the angle of the curve, then made my own masks.



I'm still mucking around with my vinyl cutter to dial in the settings, but what I've got is good enough for relatively simple shapes like this.



Painted with Gunze Euro I Gray mixed with some black to darken it.



And...decals re-added (didn't get a pic of the strake VF-24s yet, but they also came out nicely).

[doogsatx/]

More creeping progress. More "first pass" weathering - Ammo Blue Gray panel line wash being treated as a pseudo-sludge wash. Next up will be a sealing coat and then on to the more aggressive stuff.





Also solved the oleos on the gear struts - using Uschi's chrome powder over some Vallejo gloss black. It's a PITA to take photos of though...

[wing_nut]

All looking great. No kidding about the strake decals. Looked like the vinyl peel and stick for a Hot Wheels. The edges of homemade decals can be a problem.
As long as you made masks for the strakes, did you considered adding the "VF-24" to paint them on?

[doogsatx/]

Jan 19, 2017 9:26:09 GMT -5 wing_nut said:

All looking great. No kidding about the strake decals. Looked like the vinyl peel and stick for a Hot Wheels. The edges of homemade decals can be a problem.
As long as you made masks for the strakes, did you considered adding the "VF-24" to paint them on?

I'm still working on getting the vinyl cutter dialed in - but can't get reliable cuts for letters that small yet

[wing_nut]

Which cutter did you go with? I was looking at a Silhouette on Amazon for s120

[doogsatx/]

Camera's been out of action for a few days as we reorganize parts of the garage, but managed to get it up and running last night. Good timing, as I'm nearly done with the initial phase of weathering.

Here's a better shot of the chromed oleo:



The burner cans. I need to go back and darken these a bit and add more contrast in the individual petals.



The fixed lower strakes...



I still have to hit the area between the intakes/engines...



Some looks at the upper surfaces...







And the nose - where the slight melting thanks to Mark Softer can be seen on the 207. Fortunately it's pretty subtle.

[deafpanzer]

I can't get over the highlighted edges and details... looking forward to more updates!

[doogsatx/]

Semi-gloss, and on to my second-favorite part of modeling - WEATHERING!



First up, a bit of repainting and tinting of the exhaust petals...



Oils being used to fade out the intake walkways and sweep bladders...plus more subtle stuff going on that the phone isn't picking up.



Grunging up the area around the cockpit access points. Mix of 502 Sepia and W&N Payne's Gray.



A start on dirtying up the hinge-edges of the nose doors.



Moving to the underside tonight and can't wait - that's where the real action's going to be with all this weathering business.

[deafpanzer]

Really looking forward to see it weathered next

[adt70hk]

FANTASTIC!!!!

[M1Carbine]

Freaking stunning.

Bob

[Wes]

Wonderful stuff

[doogsatx/]

Home stretch is officially here.

After a coat of Gunze Flat to seal the oil work, I put down a coat of AK Ultra Matte. It's overkill for most jets, but a dirty TPS Tomcat is a different matter.



If you look closely at the nose, you can see where the Gunze Flat messed up some of the Dark Ghost Gray. The one thing I don't like about lacquer clears is that they can wreak havoc on thin paint.



Nose retouched freehand, and I finally got around to installing the yaw string. This is Uschi rigging line, laid flat with a tiny bit of thin Gator's Grip applied with an airbrush needle.



And last night, I finally got the gear struts installed. I'm still not a fan of the way the nose strut works (pin-and-post further up the strut would have worked better than their weird insistence on the half-pipe thing they did), but the main struts should be studied by kitmakers as a case study in how to do landing gear right. The parts just lock in, no wiggle or anything.



Up next...finishing the seats, finishing the tires, weathering and clearing the wings, dealing with all the various marker lights, dealing with the canopy internals and canopy sills, installing the glove pylons, blah blah...

[deafpanzer]

You are so close to the finish line... can't wait to see the Tom Cruise figure next!

[doogsatx/]

After a LONG time on the bench, it's time to call this one done. Overall, I'm happy enough with it, though there are plenty of little things that maybe only I see that definitely could have been tackled better.

[Rick]

Beautifully done Doogs. The end result justifies all the angst you went thru with the decals.
Rick

[Tobi]

Fabulous!

[Wes]

How flippen realistic is that first pic. Holy smokes she turned out beautifully Doogs.

[Leon]

Fantastic finish Doogs!

[DirkE.]

Thats a real beauty! Mission accomplished!!!!

[deafpanzer]

Definitely a build to be proud of... it was fun following your build especially that it is a new tooled kit for us to follow!

[mrversatile]

Nice effort, as usual, Doogs. I love your innovative finishes. Just curious, are burner cans on the F14 normally opposed or did you just decide to display them differently?

[wing_nut]

SCHA-WING