Tamiya 1:48 Wildcat F4F-3 Conversion (Complete)

Been awhile since I looked in on the thread.  I'm doing Trumpy's -3 and -4 in 1/32, and won't even attempt what you did in 1/48.

Excellent work and a beauty, Butch would be proud of it.  If you feel something on the back of your shoulder, that's him giving you a pat on the back.

Dear Sir ;

 It has come to my attention that you shrunk a real F-4-F -3 and expect us to believe it's a model . That plane is to valuable to fly much less , starting the Engine and cease and desist this awesome fib ! ( Really , that is one Heckuva model . Very well done .)

Britt - 

Absolutely beautiful job sir....I don't know where to start. Every aspect of your build is immensely amazing. Superb WiP sir.....your commentary, explanation of the process and photos were perfect. Well done sir...Well done. 

Your weathering/finishing techniques are among the best I've seen on modeling sites. This is a gorgeous model of a Wildcat.

Wow.  This is an exceptional build.  All the detailing and scratch work, and the painting and weathering...   simply wonderful. 

Cheers, Mark

Geez Louise!  That...is....gorgeous!  Details like those in the canopy are increadible, and the painting is incredible.  After reading yet another two books about the Pacific campaign, this is becoming one of my favorite birds.  Now I have to build one.

Thanks for sharing the build and some useful tips.

D

Man Britt that weathering is NICE! Love the foil trick too. This is turning out to be a really stunning build!!

Beautiful build sir.  Such stunning work!

Toshi

Back with more. =D

Painted and Weathered!

I've had some time to get this flat coat on and spend a little time to put some wear and tear on O'Hare's wildcat. Navy planes generally tend to get pretty filthy, but I didn't want something that looked like hell. So I settled for something honest but lightly broken in. I browsed through a fair amount of pictures of wildcats from '41-'42 to observe what kinds of patterns of grease and oil and whatnot would smear here and there. Some times it was the absence of filth where a mat or tarp would cover something like a gun bay or insignia. Such was the case back in the early years of the war. Tarps would be drawn over identifying marks like insignia and painted rudders to keep their visibility down from the air whenever these planes were on the flight deck. The tarps would keep the filth from adding up a little less than the areas left exposed. Also, if you could find one that lasted long enough, the paint would obviously fade less as well. That's more or less what I decided to do with this cat. I based the fuselage weathering off of a famous picture of O'Hare and Thach flying together. The wings are made to represent the work and maintenance that would occur on a regular basis. I tried to keep it light but distinctive enough to keep this build from looking like just another blue over grey wildcat. There will be some addtional weathering to come to bring out this and that as I look back over her and tweak it, but this is pretty much how it'll end up.

I'll start with the canopy.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

I took a little extra time to look at what was really going on here and found some unique features that I think we all overlook especially when we think we know what a canopy is supposed to be. I found that the windows have a curved piece from the interior that rounds out how the pane appears from outside. The very back, bottom pane has a curved piece that extends quite a bit to round out the back of the canopy. I was actually surprised I never saw it earlier. In fact, there isn't a single 1:48 scale wildcat or even a decal AM company with pictures/drawings that represent this so it's no wonder nobody paints it. Naturally, now I have to figure out what I'm going to do about it. Luckily, my solution was the same lead foil that I'm now using to make up the interior framing of the windscreen/canopy. Very effective little trick here that I'm very happy with!! =] I cut thin strips of lead foil to white glue to the interior canopy (I'm using a Squadrion Canopy here) but before adhering it, I take a blunt needle tool and emboss the shiny metal side to produce a rivet mark on the black-colored side of the foil. The embossing breaks the colored side just enough around the mark to show the shiny foil giving the appearance of a "rivet."  Simple, easy, effective. Voila! Now there's no need to stress about painting the interior and having paint or primer leak under your masking or misregistering with the outside. Just strap these bad boys on there and match it up to your masking on top. It's a little difficult to see here. I'll have better pictures up later.  =P What is better though...you get to enjoy a bottle of wine while doing it. Just strip off the top foil and save for later. One matter to note here is that the interior for wildcats of this period was black. For a different color interior, I would recommend you measure and cut (perhaps leave a little bit extra to bend back as a place to grab with tweezers as you work with it) your strips first and bend them into shape or get them close enough before painting them. That way you don't have cracks or chips. But otherwise this is generally pretty sturdy stuff. I'll probably treat all my interiors this way from now on.

On to the rest

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Here's a detail of the canopy with the curved element in place.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

That's a wrap for now. There's still a bit to finish up with the canopy. I have the bullet proof glass in place. I just need to sure up the railing that will allow it to slide back and forth and match up to the windscreen. Next up will be putting on some exhaust staining and getting the exhaust manifold attached and finishing the engine detail. There's still a few cables that need to go on too. 

=]

Thanks Joe! Cheers to you as well. =] It's been hard for me to be on here as well lately. I'm just getting caught up to some of these other builds going on.

I've just tuned in Britt and all I can say is what an amazing and fantastic Wildcat you have going on here. You have done really really impressive detailing, painting and weathering. You have certainly peaked my attention to some of your techniques. I'm looking forward to keeping up on your build.  

Cheers, Joe

Thanks Andy. They're still difficult for me to cut out by hand. I'm very careful with them afterwards too as I try not to stretch out the tape the mask is made from while handling it. Always worries me. 

BK, I was able to lick this problem this afternoon. You'll see what I was after and I'll think you'll like it a whole lot more. If you're looking to really hammer your plane with weathering underneath, then yeah it still wouldn't have been too dark but I would have been more specific in how I was painting it on. Here, I did want a generally mottled look to it. =] I feel good about it. I'll save that picture for last. =P

I'll keep this post fairly short and to the point. I've got all the lose ends of painting out of the way and finally made to a stopping point where I can get a coat of clear on her. I painted the cowling for the engine in the same manner as shown on the previous page. Around the cowling ring I brought the light grey color up over the entire surface. These edges often get worn the most it seems and fade faster than any other part of the cowling surface. This is a little less noticeable here, but the eye sees it better. The rest is pretty straight forward.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

The numbers were hand painted as I just couldn't get a mask cut that small. Afterwards, I lightly sanded down a couple of highpoints I had and came back over it with the blue-grey color to show a slightly faded painted look.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

The anti-skid strips were painted on. I've never liked the look of decals for this part of the plane. Straight black is never seen on brand new aircraft either, so after some research I came up with the following. In both black and white and color photos, it's easy to see the lighter value of the skid strips next to the blue-grey paint on the wings. Since I wanted a real Navy Wildcat, I wanted those skid strips to be well worn. For the Wildcat the strips go down a little differently than you might first think. Here's the shape to look for...

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

It makes sense that it would follow the wing root, but the wing root curves out into the wing as it approaches the middle of it presenting with this shape.

NATO Black makes up the beginning color and it was lightened with Medium Grey as it's a warmer grey than most others.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

In this set of pics, you can also see the wing numbers. These were cut from Tamiya tape to make a mask based off the kit decals. I lightly painted these on and came back over them with the Blue-grey as well.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Here's an obligatory clear coat pic done with Alclad's Aqua Gloss Clear.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Since the contrast makes it easier to see, I wanted to take this moment to show what I did way back at the beginning of construction when thinning out the cowling area of the kit. With thinner sections it was easier to manipulate and bend to reveal a warped surface that occurs to some of these panels with the constant removal and replacement. A blunt needle tool was used for most of this. This will all become less apparent after the flat goes on, but I'm hoping it'll make enough of a difference. =]

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Lastly, I tackled that coffee weathering I botched earlier last week. I came in with a lighten Light Grey color to keep the contrast there after going back over it with the original Light Grey. Viola!

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

This is exactly what I was hoping to get. It made me nervous but was easily fixed. =D

Now with the clear coat on I can knock out what few decals I have to put down and move on to some extra weathering!!

The paint fading on this really looks spot on! Nice work with the insignia. Can be tough to cut those out by hand.

That coffee motteling is quite effective. I love how it looks. You say its overdone but to me in those photos its very convincing. I will have to give that a go. Well done.

BK

And I'm back with more paint. =]

A lot of this speaks for itself so I won't blab too much about what you're looking at.

A look at brushing in a grimier color along with the coffee staining.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Here is the blend coat for the underside of the Wildcat.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

I employed a new weathering technique that I've only tested one other time and like but it's not giving me quite the same results. I used coffee to add a stain to the light grey underside which worked remarkably well originally. It's possible I brewed a pot that was a little stronger or was a darker roast, but what I do know is that it stained a little too much and it isn't quite getting covered up with the thin coats of paint that I'm looking for. I'm hoping that the clear coat will dampen this to something more to my liking. It got away from me, but I'll have the last say. =]

Marble coat for the topside in USN non-specular Blue-grey. Honestly, Tamiya's XF-82 Ocean Gray is practically dead on for this color. I add just the tiniest dab of Flat Blue and threw that down on top of my Sea Blue undercoat. Skip all of Tamiya's suggestions. Here's my math:

The first is the typical Tamiya suggestion as well as what you'll see around the internet

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Second is XF-82 alone matched to a pixel from a uniform area of a color photo of a clean wildcat in 1942

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

The third is the FS number associated with this USN color mixed to Tamiya paints that I put together

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Not the exactly the precision science that took us to the moon, but it's easy to see how much closer the Ocean gray is than the old school mix...for anyone who's interested.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Blend coat for the topside.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Here you can see some of that staining that got a little heavy.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

These next two pics are a truer look at the color. The white balance on my iPhone is lightening these pictures up a little more than what the eye actually sees.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Naturally the masking set that came with the HB kit from Ebay was some ambiguous name brand that didn't match up with anything. The stripes were pretty close but as you see the mask itself didn't quite cut it. There was another set meant to be used for the red stripes so I used those instead to mask the white as that was my base color to help the red pop better.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

In the bottom right picture you can see the rod that makes up the axis for the rudder. I carved out a niche for it and placed an 0.6 mm aluminum tube after painting. =]

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

The masking for the insignia were completely unusable. I opted to tape over the kit decals that HB has for O'Hare's White F-15 and cut out my own mask with a new blade.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

I had a moment tonight to address the prop shaft that snapped off as well. I drilled a hole out with a pin vise--can't recall the size--into both the broken end of the shaft as well as what is still stuck in the engine and dropped a .51mm brass rod both with a drop of CA. Voila! The front end is a little dinged up, but maybe i'll come up with another trick for that later.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Moving on to the cowling and finishing the skid strips and numbers. =]

OH! I see you're still a night owl Joe. =D My wife has flipped my clock around somehow. By 9:00p I'm pretty much in bed these days. Doesn't leave much in the way of late night modeling anymore.... Some times on the weekends I'll push hard to 10:30p =P

Thanks guys! It's always very encouraging to hear. That perfect build still eludes me. This cat already has a couple of quirks on her. My dihedral on the right wing got away from me a little bit (isn't noticeable unless you're looking straight on)...I've just removed my masking on the engine to find the prop shaft snapped off...and one of my weathering techniques is getting away from me a little bit but hopefully I can get back on top of that one. I came back from the only IPMS show I've ever been to a couple of years ago a bit dissappointed but it has made a better modeler out of me and I hope that's shining through here. It definitely has tightened up my construction phase which is probably why these are taking so long now! Lol. Joe, it seems like you go through a kit in about a month. I don't know how you do it?!?

Tosh, you are very kind. These pictures fortunately don't show the headache that some times comes before them. I'd imagine pro modelers would have an easier time achieving what they're after. But I appreciate it still.

Jaime, I'm not quite clear on your mapping reference but I'm happy to learn if you care to elaborate. The computer side of things isn't really my forte. I have been following Wiltold Jarworksi's SBD Dauntless though. That guy is really doing it right. =]

I'll be back later tonight to put up a quick post. I managed to get the stripes on the rudder and insignia on the wings, then I'll be putting my attention to the skid strips and numbers before putting on a coat of clear. 

=]

This is pro modeling at its best, best quality work I've ever seen.  What a pro job.  Absolutely amazing technique and style!!!

Toshi

Ufff ... what amazing work!!! Specially i like this painting work ... i love this "mapping" effects in the low areas. 

I'll stay here for the next steps! 

Andy, glad to hear it! =] I've been on this forum for a few years now and I'm still pretty impressed with some of the guys and subjects I follow. I feel the same way about it. Even now that I feel I've got a pretty firm grip on how I'd like to to do things, I'm always finding that there is something new to learn around the corner.

7474, the app is called iModelKit. I know it's available for iPhone and it'll cost a couple of bucks but it's well worth the price. The money alone you'll save in paint by not having to waste it to mix certain colors will make it worth it! It does so much more than just matching color schemes and the developers put a lot of math into making everthing quite specific. I can't possibly use everything it does but I wholeheartedly recommend it.

Before getting to what's new with color, I did take my time with this build and worked hard not to rush certain steps concerning construction. I have a bad habit of moving on and having to correct something later down the road when it's not very agreeable. As it happens I caught a few spots that missed my attention when going through my checklist...I mean it's been a couple of months since I was able to jump on this cat. =P

One, I left off the actuator for the trim tab on the left aileron. The HB kit doesn't include it. Two, I needed to scribe in a panel near the wing root just below the cockpit on the side of the fuselage. Tamiya has the first near the front of the wing for the fuel tank but failed to put the one behind it. No problem. You can see those two in the top picture. I also had to replace those damn PE parts for the elevator. I new that was coming. Scratched new ones out of plastic strip. Sanded into shape and welded those bad boys on with Tamiya ETC. BAM!! They'll take a whole lot more abuse now.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Paint!! And about damn time too. I just noticed I'm about 7 months into this kit. I need to pick up the pace. =]

I've recently been paying more attention to what I can do with my surface weathering in the painting stage since that's really what I find I'm best at. With the last two builds I've been making use of Blackbasing to go about painting my aircraft. I've seen others here on the forum make use of it too, but I've really gotten to see a lot more about it through another modeler Doog who some times pops into Finescale every now and then. For those who don't know it involves beginning with a black base as a painting surface and building up the color through several layers that are put on thinly and in a "marbled" pattern as Doog puts it. Done properly, it does a great deal to show how paint weathers and fades in a non-uniform manner. On actual aircraft it's the subtle variations in the surface, the paint and it's thickness, dirt and debris, oils, etc that all play a part in giving us the weathered looking planes we've enjoyed modeling. If you can control your spray and keep it tight enough, it's quite possible to put several layers of paint down and build up a lot of character before putting down too much paint.

Here, instead of using a black I'm opting for a dark blue color. It's Tamiya's Sea Blue in fact. For the same reason you almost never use black in a real painting, I'm hoping for the dark blue color to help out in a similar way that black does but without having to be black. Since I'm using the Navy's Blue-Grey scheme, I'm hoping the blue works better. If we put the two side by side to make a comparison, I doubt it would be too noticeable but I think opinions would slant towards the blue. =]

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

The "marbling" at work. Here I've used Sky Grey and NATO Brown from Tamiya to make the Navy's non specular light grey. This was 7:1 respectively. I'm painting outdoors now which is complicating my airbrush a bit. Humidity sucks and I don't have a water trap. So I didn't quite have the control I normally have while doing this but it wasn't too bad.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

It's best to work a panel at a time and be as non-uniform as possible in your strokes.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

This last picture doesn't really capture what the eye sees. It's a bit washed out. The actual detail is a bit more subtle. I hope to get better pics when it's complete. The blues ought to do better. I won't be doing too much more since I got a little too heavy with the light grey. I'll marble in some dark grey with an actual brush along the wings nearer the engine and then follow up with the blend coat.

That's where it stands for the night. =]

That's some really nice scratch work Britt! Your work always inspires me to try a little more on my builds. Thanks for sharing this!

Back with the last set of corrections/touch ups before putting down a coat of primer.

I wanted to postion the elevators the way they're often seen - hanging down. These came all in one piece from Tamiya which I love but it did take a little bit of time and patience to release them from the horizontal stabilators. I also cut to open up the trim tabs on the elevators as well. I cut out the kit part where the elevators mate to the stablizers that is embossed with detail to put in place something more accurately representing this joint. I carefully cut out the sections with a razor saw and trimmed with a no. 11 blade and dropped in plastic rod to make up the bar that runs the length of the elevator. The PE that Eduards provides accurately describes the actuators but they're a royal PITA to put together. They don't fold together. They are separate parts. =[ What you see is about 2 hours and 45 minutes of work. Not very fun. I think next time I'll just fashion this out of plastic and bond it all together. But It's on there and it's an improvement....so I'm happy about it.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

One correction to the HB wings for the -3 is the addition of an approach light. This is commonly mistaken for a gun camera apparently. I cut out a notch before putting the wings together, and afterwards widened the notch to receive the clear sprue that the Tamiya kit provides. It took some trimming, but it went in without too much fuss. This got close enough into place and was sanded down nice and pretty and brought back to a polish with finer grit sanding sticks. I included the PE parts to dress all this up as well. =] 

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

On a side note...all these tiny pieces get lost at least once for about five minutes after they shoot out of my tweezers. Usually, I give up and decide to just make my own (or another one) and more times than not that is about the exact moment I find what I've lost. Imagine that. I'm sure that resonates with most of you out there. =P

I fixed the MG barrel I broke and finished dressing them up the rest of the way. For the broken barrel, I used the 1.0 mm aluminum slide tube from Albion to find the actual kit part inside the wing. I new where it was weak and where it had snapped once it did break so I just had to poke around and seat it over like a sleeve until snug. VERY carefully trimmed to the appropriate length and dropped in my 0.8 mm barrel to complete. Simple. Freak out fee! =] A shorter sleeve was cut for the right wing to conserve on material. Here's a few pics of that progression.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

It's not very discernable here but I've rescribed the correct lines back into the wing from the wing root and also put in some rivets that weren't there before. HB does a pretty decent job with the surface detail so I won't be changing much. This detail around the wing root will be better seen later after some paint.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

I trimmed and sanded down the signal lights. I'll be replacing the light with a clear sprue after painting.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Another view of the elevators and the new PE actuators.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Here is a view of the rudder being turned. This was accomplished by bending the top lug into place which was pretty forgiving, and cutting the bottom one and placing it at a 45º angle. Pretty simple stuff. Tamiya makes it easy. The rudder is a single piece as well.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Here is a view showing the signal light on top removed. It'll get replaced with clear sprue. Also, the nav lights have been cut to remove the front half of the kit molded piece. A little less noticeable here unless you zoom in. The ailerons will be painted separate and attached after. I've also removed the kit balance tab from the HB ailerons. It was okay for the most part but just had a few too many issues for my eyes, so I made a new one out of some plastic strip. Eduard had a PE part for just this issue apparently, but I don't trust something that thin attaching like that to something else equally as thin. I like welding that sucker to plastic. It ain't moving now! =D

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

And that's most of the ends and outs before priming. =]

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

I can't wait to get some paint on this. =]

Thanks guys! It's a lot of fun fashioning all the add ons. That's kinda why we're all here right? =] 

Yup, silentbob. The wings are on! Things get infinitely less cumbersome from here on out.

Wow, how have I missed this build?  Beautiful job, and I agree with you about this kit as being the best F4F kit you can find.

bvallot

This is meant for the Hobby Boss kit but in comparing both kit parts (firewall, IP, etc.) the match up is nearly perfect which is better than you'd normally hope for..

That's because the HobbyBoss kit is pretty much a copy of the Tamiya kit, in my opinion.

This is pretty darn impressive and you are doing a great job with it! Such great scratchbuilding!

Thanks Mike. Sorry it's been a while. Too many things in front of me right now. I'm afraid I might be slipping into that modeling coma where I wake up 20+ years later and my kids are finally out the house and I come back around to the world of modeling that left me behind. Time will tell I guess.

Did manage to tie up some some critical steps for Butch's Wildcat and I can say that I'm almost over the hump. Pretty soon it'll be going downhill! =]

I finally finished organizing most of the plumbing for the engine. There will be some later add ons once the landing gear goes on. I noticed one thing about the controls for the throttle in this set of pics. This group I took before attaching them to their location on the top side of the back of the engine where the carb would mount. You won't see them from underneath as you can see them hanging down here. These pics are from before that step and I mustn't have taken other pictures before closing this up. I can possibly get in there later to show an updated picture down the road some.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

The Pratt & Whitney with the wiring harness finally attached. Copper wire makes up the harness. They were painted with Tamiya's Titanium Silver (as I couldn't find my Flat Aluminum) and they received a wash from the Detailer's Rust to give the harness the appropriate color. Finally got to use that stuff! =D There's a clip that holds each set of cables together but I haven't found a solution to approximating that just yet...so I'm holding out for now. The two lines at the bottom of the prop reduction box make up the oil slump line for the oil manifold and oil discharge pipe. I still have the exhaust manifold to attach and I noticed I need to tweek the interior cowl. The cowling ring seam is a bit UN-seamly. ;) Sorry. Had to.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

I next addressed the wings. I first set the lower wing to maintain the proper dihedral and set my spar with some L brackets I cut up to reinforce this joint. Actually, let me back up one step...before that you can see I cut out the shape of the wing root to piece onto the fuselage and slid some shims in place where I didn't cut quite as neatly when sawing off the original Tamiya lower wing pieces. This was done to help better match up the new HB wings when mating them to the fuselage. This joint along with the L brackets were more effective than I believed them to be originally. I was planning to do a secondary spar that attached lower down on the wing root to sure up the other end, but none of that was necessary. This turned out to be very strong. Happy me!

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Test fit shows a little bit of work to be done to smooth up these lines from the wing root. So out came the Milliput. Love this stuff.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Before that the .50s were installed. I sanded down and nipped off the ends to receive 0.8 mm Albion aluminum tubes to better approximate the MGs. I did manage to break off the left inboard barrel after having closed up the wings. I'll deal with that shortly.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Wing roots milliputtied and sanded. I still may fool and tweek this some, but for now it's pretty much where I need it to be. We'll see what a coat of primer looks like.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Lastly, I took care of the ailerons as I'll be fixing them a little out of neutral. I wanted an extra step to get out of my comfort zone and make this Wildcat a bit more interesting and as I have a great book with great pictures of the Wildcat variants I figured I'd give it a try. Nothing fancy here. Just scratchbuilding what I see. The only step you don't see here is the rod attaching the aileron to the hinges. I'll craft that last.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Some of this will still get fiddled with along the way, but next up is fashioning the controls for the elevators, and addressing any issues with the rudder and elevators as well as fuselage touch ups. 

Thanks for stopping by. =] I hope you're itching to go grab a Wildcat.

It's really hard for me to believe what I'm seeing here. Some of these images look so real that I'm sure the engine can be started!

What a super detailing/over-all job of craftsmanship/modeling!!