Wow, that's a lot of work but looking good there in the last two photos. 

Thanks Guys!

Trust everyone had a good christmas, sitting down watching the Boxing Day Test Match on the telly, so far advantage Australia, but not in a big way. Heading down to the MCG for day 2 tomorrow, should be good.

But back to the Cobra

Filled out the other side of the nose with epoxy putty, ready to put the cockpit in and glue it up.

Then with it all glued up, coated the nose in tamiya grey putty and sanded it back

Gave it a spray with can primer, found so many flaws it wasn't funny, a bit more putty and sanding it again

Another go with filler and that's as much as it is getting for now.

SO next is to build the firespotting IR ball that hangs under the nose, then final assembly before painting

Interesting conversion there LA.

She's coming along great LA. Nice work!

Lostagain, I too, am enjoying watching you transform this whirly bird into a civilian version. This is gonna be a one of a kind.

BK

Lostagain that’s my favorite whirly bird. Can’t wait to see how it turns out. Looking good so far (oh wait, that’s an F-14 phrase lol)

Just a brief update on the Cobra

I have finished with the work on the exhaust shroud (pipe still needs to go inside the shroud) glued on the winglets and glued the tail boom and back half of the fuselage together. This means I can fill and sand and fill and sand without worrying about rubbish getting in the cockpit; that can drop in last thing when I close up the front half

Also started on the modifications for civilianising the Cobra up the front end; here you can see the fairing over the gun turret and my method for filling in the nose. There is a bit of weight added in before the epoxy putty is formed over the top, roughly getting the shape of the nose, that can be sanded down or filled up as required next time

Mongoose, that is completly brilliant. Stunning work on the paint job, the masking has really paid off. Thank you for shareing this.

I got going on my Dragon 1/72 He 162 last night. It's got a reputation as a fiddly kit, and it is. I'll try to take some photos tonight.

I'm going to finish it in French post war markings. THey ended up with one to play with, but I haven't researched the history yet.

Cheers

Tony

I thought that was a cool kit before I saw the base. Holycow, that is incredible. What an amazing build. You need to see if you can get that posted on the site. Super cool, Mongoose.

BK

Thats some really nice work Mongoose. Congrats on the improvement that you perceive, I thnk your models are great.

Cheers

Tony

WOW, she looks friggin' amazing Chris!!!

Love the F-35, love the base, love the concept, just fantastic all around!!!

Chris, where to start? That is a bloody ripper!

Superb work with the complex masking and gloss finish.

Great set up and a magnificent base to bring it all together

A build you should be extremely happy with!!

I can't believe it's done!! Well, pretty much as I should put some clear coat over the decals. I am so thrilled with how this turned out     Each one I do is getting better and better; I improve on something that looked horrible on the last one and ... I continue to struggle with canopies LOL Maybe somebody can do some airbrushing on my photos that get too close to the front of the cockpit  . So here's a bunch of shots. I'll put more detail shots here for those who are following along and then post a whole slew of them over in the Ready For Inspection thread. This is nearly all out of the box, a few scratch built parts to add some detail in the cockpit is all I added. 

I decided to do tribute to the outgoing F-16 and I found the perfect art on the USAF site. This poster was created by SSgt Jon DuMondof the USAF Thunderbirds and they had a 3mb file available for free download, perfect. The key for me was the 2 F-16's outbound in the visor reflection. I used watercolors to blend the photo into the base and wrap it up into the F-35A Thunderbird.

WOW !!! Excuse me while is pick my jaw up off the floor. That is one heck of an amount of work, but holy cow did that turn out incredible. I never thought about how this would look when I saw the red and knew it was a TB bird. Simply amazing. Pat yourself on the back on this one for sure, you deserver high praise.

BK

Love your work Mongoose, that's a great outcome on a difficult and tedious job.

Cheers

Tony

Just simply fantastic Mongoose! 

Don't think I'd said it before but I love the idea of a Thunderbirds F-35! 

Now that is impressive. Amazing masking job never mind anything else.

Mongoose, I am speechless that is a truly amazing piece of work 

Just WOW!!

And here’s the big reveal. Another 3-1/2 hours to mask everything beyond the pin striping and put down the blue. Finished up baout 130am. Going to be a 2 coffee morning 

One again- amazing masking job there Mongoose. She's gonna look incredible! 

Hey Gang, here’s tonights progress. I’m getting excited about this now, you can see the silhouette of the Thunderbird really well now!

I laid the exhaust nozzle in there for effect. Another day before i can spray the matt varnish on it.

Thanks guys! im feeling a little nuts for trying it at this point. I did not comprehend how hard the thunderbird on the lower half would be  thoght i had plenty of time with a month to go before the group build was dne, haha was i fooling myself. Not rushing though. Going to take my time and try to do this with clean, sharp lines. I used CAM decals on my Phantom. They look good and went down well, but it’s hard to avoid any ovelap of the many pieces and that darkens it in those areas plus you lose some level of detail...see that’s the crazy logic that started this fiasco of a masking event. Ok, enough rambling its time to lay more pinstriping!

Wow Mongoose that's an awesome scheme! 

Not sure if you're crazy or a total badass to try it!!! Maybe both?!? 

It's going to look amazing when done. 

Wow that is truly awesome work with that masking Mongoose, it is going to look a-bloody-mazing! I can well imagine that masking soaking up hours and hours of your time. Very few of us can claim that level of dedication!

(Now, if you painted it green instead of blue imagine how christmassy that would look? just a thought...)

Every build I’ve followed always talks about how much time is spent on masking. Now I really know what they went thru! I’ve got 6hrs invested in what you see here. Probably another 3hrs to go. Maybe I’ll have the blue on by Wednesday. That’s 3M fineline tape I’m using; 1 piece is for the color and the other 2 set the border so that the pin stripe starys a uniform width.

Looks awesome Mongoose! I assume she's an airshow plane since it seems funny to me to build a stealthy aircraft and then paint bright red markings on her!

And thanks, I used a pile of putty on this one. My first Kinetic kit, the detail was excellent but the fit was horrible. Thank God for Perfect Plastic Putty, I was able to put it on and then wipe away the excess with a damp cotton swab. If I'd tried to sand it I'd have lost a pile of detail.