Hunting After Dark, 2011-2012 Night Fighter Group Build

Hoist is ready now

Tony thanks, appreciate you taking the time to comment with some kind words! Not much progress thats note worthy,been struggling with the trees and base. Figures are also killing me,painting them is not a strong point for me. Heres the basic base layout



Spent a long time painting and inking the palms to get rid of the 'plastic' look


Maybe after some dullkote they'll come around


the crew need some more detailing and cleaning up,especially the faces

Used a dual action sander with some 80 grit to give the base some depth variation,then just a quick rattle can to check my work


thanks for looking,cheers Trey

Thanks for the feedback guys. It always helps! I really enjoyed this kit, not quite as intricate or puzzle like as a Tammy in this scale but fun nonetheless and looks great OOB

Here's a shot next to my Phantom II F-D

Cheers

Great looking builds here guys. Those P-61s are a really impressive project Try, I know heaps of work has gone into achieving that outstanding result.

The F-117 is really nice too Casper, great build of a really interesting aircraft.

Cheers

Tony

Ship 2 completed,time to concentrate on the dio now.

thanks for looking,cheers Trey

Looks sharp Casper.

Ship 2 is nearing completion

Ship 2 is nearing completion

Ok, this bird is done!

Cheers

Here's the top view of the Nighthawk. I must say the inclusion of PE intake grills from Trumpeter is awesome. It's hard to convey in a photo but if you look at just the right angle, you can see the intake fan sitting back behind the grill. The other PE parts were not see through so it really gives the model a boost. I tried to photograph this but couldn't get it

Cheers

Well all of the hard work with masking sure paid off. I'm very pleased with the results. Here is the underneath.

Only 2 decals to go on the bottom then I'll attach all of the greeblies before decalling the top. I want to avoid resting this bird upside down so as not to upset the paint work on the top.

Cheers

Thanks NFN yes after I get done banging it around and knocking off the other antenae I'll scratch up a pair for both birds. Appreciate the reminder!

Very nice...  Are you going to add the two antennas on the bottom that look like capital "T"'s.  I think they are DME antenna's but I'm not sure at the moment.  They are used to measure distance to ground.  they are located on the central part of the fuselage.

NFN thanks its a big help for sure!

Casper like the looks of the black,that scale will sure gobble up some paint!

Ship 1 is complete

off on patrol

You guys want paint?? You got it!

almost 3 pots worth. I did the underneath with Tamiya XF-85 Tyre Black but wasn't that happy with the finish. I did the top with Mr.Colour H77 which is Rubber black and has a nicer sheen to it. Once this dries I'll apply gloss coat for the decals.

Cheers

Great job there Casper.  :)  Trey, the engines were shipped in crates and covered in Kosmoline, a preservative oil.  I also found a picture in a book I'm currently reading that has a mock up of the engine and mount for the P-61.  Oddly enough, its the diorama book from Fine Scale Modeler.  "How to Build Dioramas", pg. 76.  The crates for the engines were cubed with a band of wood around the top and a band of wood around the bottom.  There is also a diagonal bit of wood running from the top band to the bottom band on each side.  A photo and instructions on how to make the crate are on pg. 70.  Hope that helps.  :)

Ship 1 has been decaled and cleared

Aires R2800 kits in themselves!

Anyone have a picture of a shipping container or pallet they would have put these on by chance,thanks in advance

Coming together nicely Casper!

NFN thanks ,I'm just going to go with a clear disc. Sometimes less is more.

Masking complete. This took quite a longtime to do but because the F-117A utilises non-reflective radar technology, the panels and shapes are all straight and saw toothed with no curves. made it much easier to mask. Also decided there wasn't a tight enough seal between the canopy and office sill. I decided to paint the canopy separate and mask off the office.

Also the exhausts ports are painted matt black but the plane will be painted in tyre black. The subtle blue shade matches the real planes skin quite nicely.

Cheers

Well she's a big girl, got her sewn together. Nice to have the seam underneath and not cutting the fuselage in two!

Cheers

Well, this is everything. All parts have been cut off the sprues and have been glued, painted or drying from glue and painting. For such a large kit, there didn't seem to be a lot of parts, not like the Tammy 1/32 F-16 which had endless sprues to deal with.

Next job is to sew the bird up once the refuelling bay has been fitted just behind the cockpit.

Cheers

humm.. interesting... the more I look.. the more it looks......

Interesting.  :)  I think the yellow on the end would be present but very transparent.  The sticker for the center of the blade, not the middle of the disk, would be even lighter than you have represented in the middle pictures.  I seem to remember someone doing something similar but they cut out the area around were the expaned blade was and left the outside circle intact.  Do you understand what I mean?

Trying something new for the 'spiining prop' effect. I started with some sheet plastic and using a circle cutter and some masking added some rings

added some sprue to the spinners in place of the props and tapered the ends

masked the reverse side for the 'prop'

after the color on one side the mask was pulled back to allow for a blend area for the black

masked removed

then some rubbing compound on the color side,this leaves only a trace amount of color toning down the effect.

Finished results

What do you all think ? Is it passable or should I bin it and stick in the static props?

Getting the internal structures fitted into the Nighthawk.

Bomb bays and front wheel cabin and bottom camera;

Engines, cockpit and front camera. The instructions called for the painting of the whole engine. I decided only to paint the intake fans as they are the only thing you will see and I didn't want to waste the paint on unseen parts. Makes me wonder why the supplied such detailed engines at all.

I painted in intake fans in Alclad chrome, this will be just visible through the PE intake grates.

Cheers

After fixing some missed blems I started using the salt method for ship one

Then some Testors gloss black reduced 30%

After rinsing and scrubbing with an old tooth brush

Ship 2 progress engines and nacelles in place

Cockpit and front camera housing attached;

Front undercarriage and underneath camera housing attached;

Cheers

Something I used to do for gloss white,  (have not done much model related lately)  is to airbrush FLAT white as it covers much better than the gloss equivalent and then do staining.  After all is dry and I am satisfied with the base finish, I airbrush clear gloss or future over the flat paint to get the gloss effect.  I have found that gloss paints tend to draw back from details on the parts where the flat paints will tend to cover with a thinner and more consistent coat.

Casper office looks outstanding!Very nicely done Sir!

NFN Thanks! I loaded up the gunner area with weight as well. I'm using powdered pastels and washes on the wheels seems to work for me. I'm doing the salt method for the chipping on the black ship,probably do the same for the green one,appreciate the tips that will help a lot deciding how much and where.

I let the black paint sit in the sun for a few days and the filled areas did shrink a bit as I knew they would. I wet sanded those areas down and got rid of a few dust blems .

I then based it with some testors silver so I can salt chip the leading edges and canopy frames a bit. I'm hoping to be able to spot sand a few rivet and panel details as well showing some maintenance wear. Some blems around the canopy showed up after the silver base geuss I'm not done sanding.

Ship 2 booms on aligned and seams filled

Now the dreaded parts that need gloss white! Actually I used to really scared of air brushing light gloss colours but I've gotten a lot better at it now.

The landing gear and bomb bay are all meant to be gloss white. I've chosen an off-white because I just like the colour depth a little more. Also to achieve some more depth I primed all of these parts with black so when the white is applied there is subtle shading where the white hasn't quite gotten into. it also creates a nice depth through the white areas as well.

Cheers

Cockpit complete. I was a bit annoyed that Trumpeter neglected to include PE harnesses on such an expensive kit. I'd expect for the money I paid to get some more detail. Anyway I had some spare buckles left over from my Tammy F-16CJ build so I used lead foil to make the harnesses.

Cheers