Just curious, how will you "open" the avionics bay and please don't say "real carefully". I wouldn't know how to do it without screwing up the surrounding area. BTW, before reading your plans for this Phantom I thought my plane was going to be a challenge.......best of luck!

Bockscar

Ken:

Having a plan is a good way to go, very complex build you've undertaken, and that "shoe horning" is about educated guesses and lots of patience,

right about now I'm not sure if i have patience, or just lots of laziness....

Speaking of complex, how's this for a 28 cylinder radial engine (give or take 4 cylinders):

I'll bet that baby ran smooth.....

Dom

Is that out of a B-29?

Ken

Striker8241

Son Of Medicine Man

Hi Everyone,

Today I did a lot of research so not a lot of work on the F-4E.  Since Dom was kind enough to point out that I should install aftermarket wheel wells that has put me at a point of limbo.  The cockpit sits on top of the front wheel well so I will need it in hand to get a better idea of what to do next.  But I have been researching and found it is going to take a bit of "shoe horning" to make it all fit.  Another thing that I plan on installing that I have not mentioned yet is the Verlinden F-4E Phantom Super Detail Set which includes the open avionics panel.  This requires cutting into the fuselage area where the cockpit is located.  It is going to be a tight fit.

Another thing that I am planning to install is the aftermarket flaps and ailerons.  Since this cutting has to be precise, I am taking my time on planning this very thoroughly before I proceed.

Ken

Wow, Ken! Sounds like there won't be much of the original kit left when you finish adding all the aftermarket stuff .

Russ

I feel the same way!  There is not going to be much that is original.  But look at what you are doing!  You are doing a bunch of scratch building yourself on that B-52D!

Ken

Ken:

Having a plan is a good way to go, very complex build you've undertaken, and that "shoe horning" is about educated guesses and lots of patience,

right about now I'm not sure if i have patience, or just lots of laziness....

Speaking of complex, how's this for a 28 cylinder radial engine (give or take 4 cylinders):

I'll bet that baby ran smooth.....

Dom

Son Of Medicine Man

Hi Everyone,

Today I did a lot of research so not a lot of work on the F-4E.  Since Dom was kind enough to point out that I should install aftermarket wheel wells that has put me at a point of limbo.  The cockpit sits on top of the front wheel well so I will need it in hand to get a better idea of what to do next.  But I have been researching and found it is going to take a bit of "shoe horning" to make it all fit.  Another thing that I plan on installing that I have not mentioned yet is the Verlinden F-4E Phantom Super Detail Set which includes the open avionics panel.  This requires cutting into the fuselage area where the cockpit is located.  It is going to be a tight fit.

Another thing that I am planning to install is the aftermarket flaps and ailerons.  Since this cutting has to be precise, I am taking my time on planning this very thoroughly before I proceed.

Ken

Wow, Ken! Sounds like there won't be much of the original kit left when you finish adding all the aftermarket stuff .

Russ

Dom: now that's shiny!

Ken: great! I'll get the new thread started sometime before the first of the year.

And of course everyone is invited if you have a Japanese kit you want to build.

Bockscar

NMF stands for New Mint Finish?

Like this?

Exactly like that!

Ken

Gamera

Ken: I know what you mean about decompressing with an out of the box build. If you go with the Zero, um I'm starting Japanese GB Part ll next year (hint, hint).

Dom: I know what you mean, wish I could stop starting projects and not finishing them. I've been reading a lot about the Korean War and those Monogram kite sound pretty cool.

MikeM: welcome! Hope you have fun!

Hi Cliff,

I would be very happy to join your build!  It sound like the timing will be about right!

Ken

NMF stands for New Mint Finish?

Like this?

Hi Everyone,

Today I did a lot of research so not a lot of work on the F-4E.  Since Dom was kind enough to point out that I should install aftermarket wheel wells that has put me at a point of limbo.  The cockpit sits on top of the front wheel well so I will need it in hand to get a better idea of what to do next.  But I have been researching and found it is going to take a bit of "shoe horning" to make it all fit.  Another thing that I plan on installing that I have not mentioned yet is the Verlinden F-4E Phantom Super Detail Set which includes the open avionics panel.  This requires cutting into the fuselage area where the cockpit is located.  It is going to be a tight fit.

Another thing that I am planning to install is the aftermarket flaps and ailerons.  Since this cutting has to be precise, I am taking my time on planning this very thoroughly before I proceed.

Ken

Ken: I know what you mean about decompressing with an out of the box build. If you go with the Zero, um I'm starting Japanese GB Part ll next year (hint, hint).

Dom: I know what you mean, wish I could stop starting projects and not finishing them. I've been reading a lot about the Korean War and those Monogram kite sound pretty cool.

MikeM: welcome! Hope you have fun!

Bockscar

I'm probably going with an Monogram F-84F, F-86, or Mig-15.

Dom

Now those I would have to do like what Mike is doing and finish with NMF.  Nice and shiny!

Ken

I'm probably going with an Monogram F-84F, F-86, or Mig-15.

Dom

Bockscar

Son Of Medicine Man

Bockscar

Rich;

sorry to hear about the side-effects. I've never had a pneumonia shot, but given your susceptibility, that's a good idea.I loved ship kits, all the tons of little boats and guns and fiddly bits....now I hate that stuff. I built the Revell 1/400 enterprise, it's on my book shelf. I cleaned 8 years of dust off it the other day, coulda' built a new one for the time.

I almost have those duct floors cut out, I dug into the plastic when I realized the paper pattern was getting close. I reinforced the actual ducts. i must have dry fit those parts around 17-20 times last night alone. i can hardly wait to build an OOB again.

Get better Rich, winter is coming...

Dom

Hi Dom,

I hear you on the "I can hardly wait to build an OOB again"!  Although I already promised Don James that I was going to build his F-84E "Hoosier Hotshot" next.  But the one after that will definitely be strictly straight out of the box!  A nice easy Revell kit, like maybe a Zero!

Ken

Hey Ken;

i tell ya', the scratch stuff looks nice, and I appreciate being able to do it, but right about now, it feels way "too much like work" for me....lol.....

Dom

I hear you Dom.  After spending so much time on the cockpit with the added scratch building, along with the time taken off from recovering from Berny's passing, and now adding a super long list of added aftermarket add-ons, it will be nice to just glue and paint!

Ken

Son Of Medicine Man

Bockscar

Rich;

sorry to hear about the side-effects. I've never had a pneumonia shot, but given your susceptibility, that's a good idea.I loved ship kits, all the tons of little boats and guns and fiddly bits....now I hate that stuff. I built the Revell 1/400 enterprise, it's on my book shelf. I cleaned 8 years of dust off it the other day, coulda' built a new one for the time.

I almost have those duct floors cut out, I dug into the plastic when I realized the paper pattern was getting close. I reinforced the actual ducts. i must have dry fit those parts around 17-20 times last night alone. i can hardly wait to build an OOB again.

Get better Rich, winter is coming...

Dom

Hi Dom,

I hear you on the "I can hardly wait to build an OOB again"!  Although I already promised Don James that I was going to build his F-84E "Hoosier Hotshot" next.  But the one after that will definitely be strictly straight out of the box!  A nice easy Revell kit, like maybe a Zero!

Ken

i tell ya', the scratch stuff looks nice, and I appreciate being able to do it, but right about now, it feels way "too much like work" for me....lol.....

Dom

Mike;

Looking forward to seeing your work progress as well!

Dom

Striker8241

Bockscar

I almost have those duct floors cut out, I dug into the plastic when I realized the paper pattern was getting close. I reinforced the actual ducts. i must have dry fit those parts around 17-20 times last night alone. i can hardly wait to build an OOB again.

Dom

 

Hang in there, Dom .  Show us some pictures of your progress when you can.

 

Russ

There are seven parts involved, the engine bulkhead, the wing fuselage assembly, the original fuselage duct, the duct, the outer fuselage nacelle, the intake, and the splitters. Into that I'm trying to put in the 'duct floor' to hold the forward duct into its correct shape, hugging the inside of the outer fuselage nacelle and intake sections. Why it is complicated is that there are no obvious points of contact between the duct floor and any of those parts. The entire outline of the duct floor is an imaginary line that needs to be found in order to cut the outline of the floor, as nothing is glued into place, finding the outline has been a moving target....when I dry fit the assembly all those parts move around....have to do a lot of it by eye and pure guess.

Anyways, I'll try and get pics later this week.

Dom

mikeymize

   Hello and thanks for the kind words. I'm very happy to be a part of this GB and hope my addition will be worthy. As Ken mentioned it will be the MiG-17 that  will be attempting; NMF so it ought to be interesting as I've not had a whole lot of experience with that.

   One thing's for sure it will be fun and I welcome any comments, criticisms, etc. I never fail to learn something on every build and I'm sure this one will be no exception! I look forward to seeing everyone's  projects.

Hi Mike,

I forgot to ask, which kit and scale are you using?

Ken

mikeymize

   Hello and thanks for the kind words. I'm very happy to be a part of this GB and hope my addition will be worthy. As Ken mentioned it will be the MiG-17 that  will be attempting; NMF so it ought to be interesting as I've not had a whole lot of experience with that.

   One thing's for sure it will be fun and I welcome any comments, criticisms, etc. I never fail to learn something on every build and I'm sure this one will be no exception! I look forward to seeing everyone's  projects.

Hi Mike,

Welcome aboard!  If you have read through enough posts you will find that we are pretty laid back here and just about anything is an acceptable topic.  I will update page 1 now with your build.  Again, welcome!   

Ken

   Hello and thanks for the kind words. I'm very happy to be a part of this GB and hope my addition will be worthy. As Ken mentioned it will be the MiG-17 that  will be attempting; NMF so it ought to be interesting as I've not had a whole lot of experience with that.

   One thing's for sure it will be fun and I welcome any comments, criticisms, etc. I never fail to learn something on every build and I'm sure this one will be no exception! I look forward to seeing everyone's  projects.

Gamera

Dom: I did pick up a Trumpteter CV-10 Yorktown and the old Tamiya CV-6 Enterprise kit. Not sure if I'll build the second as the Big-E or as the first Yorktown CV-5. Funny it's getting hard to find kits in museum shops like you used to. I guess they don't sell as well.

i have the Saratoga, CV-3, man that was a beautiful ship, and the Lady Lex. Yeah, talk about wasting perfectly good ships, they trashed the Enterprise, and used the Sratoga along side the Nagato at Bikini Atoll for 'bomb practice' with kinda' big bombs. Lex went down fighting in the Battle of the Coral sea.

I use the hull and flight deck of the Trumpi Nimitz as a second layer on my shelf, to hold airplanes. i started it about 6 years ago but had to give it up when I started teaching....now it's status is "this kit has been started...." so I dunno....2023 or there abouts....lol

Dom

Bockscar

Rich;

sorry to hear about the side-effects. I've never had a pneumonia shot, but given your susceptibility, that's a good idea.I loved ship kits, all the tons of little boats and guns and fiddly bits....now I hate that stuff. I built the Revell 1/400 enterprise, it's on my book shelf. I cleaned 8 years of dust off it the other day, coulda' built a new one for the time.

I almost have those duct floors cut out, I dug into the plastic when I realized the paper pattern was getting close. I reinforced the actual ducts. i must have dry fit those parts around 17-20 times last night alone. i can hardly wait to build an OOB again.

Get better Rich, winter is coming...

Dom

Hi Dom,

I hear you on the "I can hardly wait to build an OOB again"!  Although I already promised Don James that I was going to build his F-84E "Hoosier Hotshot" next.  But the one after that will definitely be strictly straight out of the box!  A nice easy Revell kit, like maybe a Zero!

Ken

Bockscar

I almost have those duct floors cut out, I dug into the plastic when I realized the paper pattern was getting close. I reinforced the actual ducts. i must have dry fit those parts around 17-20 times last night alone. i can hardly wait to build an OOB again.

Dom

Hang in there, Dom .  Show us some pictures of your progress when you can.

Rich: hope you're feeling better soon. I had some sort of sinus krap last week. Could barely get any sleep because some stuff started draining down the back of my throat everytime I laid down. Heck of a way to start a vacation.

Dom: I did pick up a Trumpteter CV-10 Yorktown and the old Tamiya CV-6 Enterprise kit. Not sure if I'll build the second as the Big-E or as the first Yorktown CV-5. Funny it's getting hard to find kits in museum shops like you used to. I guess they don't sell as well.

Rich;

sorry to hear about the side-effects. I've never had a pneumonia shot, but given your susceptibility, that's a good idea.I loved ship kits, all the tons of little boats and guns and fiddly bits....now I hate that stuff. I built the Revell 1/400 enterprise, it's on my book shelf. I cleaned 8 years of dust off it the other day, coulda' built a new one for the time.

I almost have those duct floors cut out, I dug into the plastic when I realized the paper pattern was getting close. I reinforced the actual ducts. i must have dry fit those parts around 17-20 times last night alone. i can hardly wait to build an OOB again.

Get better Rich, winter is coming...

Dom

Gamera

Yeah the real thing must be wrong then lol!

I have to say I like the original WW2 look better. On the USS Wisconsin I wish there were funding to remove the Tomahawk missile launchers from her aft decks converting her back to her WW2 specs. Well I guess we're lucky to have anything - both the York and the Whisky could have ended up scrapped like the Enterprise.

One of the first ship kite I ever built was the first Yorktown. Painted her with the old square bottle Testors paints. Think I still have her around someplace.

Remember Bones walking onto the redesigned Enterprise "Damn engineers......"lol" the new tech stuff really messes with the classic lines, but as you said, we are lucky to have what we have. I wouldn't have minded turning the Enterprise into a Yacht club.

It would be great if you still had the original, mine was burned by a wicked sister. I replaced it about 4 years ago and its in the stacks, I think it was a revel about 1/700 or so scale.

Dom

Sparrowhyperion

Sorry I haven't been on too much in the last few days.  I had to get two vaccinations (Flu and Pneumonia), and now I am sick as a a dog again. 

Sorry to hear that, Rich. Hope you get to feeling better soon.

Russ

Sparrowhyperion

Sorry I haven't been on too much in the last few days.  I had to get two vaccinations (Flu and Pneumonia), and now I am sick as a a dog again.  I have only had a couple of carriers.  The John F. Kennedy, in I think somewhere around 1/600 -1/7020 scale, I can't remember which, and the huge honking U.S.S. Enterprise.  Both were a lot of fun.  I haven't seen the JFK around anywhere for a long time.  And the Big Enterprise is really rare from what I can tell.  I don't do a lot of ships anymore.  Most are way too small scale for me to do. 

Progress on the phantom is starting to shape up.  I'll send images as soon as I can stay vertical long enough to get a decent amount of work done on it.

Rich

Bockscar

I Hiryu,

I didn't follow the Yorktown's career after WWII. I didn't realize it had such a significant rebuild of the bow, and can't see the angled deck in those pics.

My Essex Class Yorktown doesn't have an angled deck either, that's because it's the WWII version, so no Grumman Panthers either, just Grumman Hellcats and Avengers.

i got my first aircraft carrier back in 1966, it was the original Yorktown Class Yorktown, no Panthers either.

Yeah, I got it along with a book on the Battle of Midway. That was a big read for an eight year old. The crew on the Yorktown extinguished the fire from the first attack so efficiently that the captain of the Nippon sub that targeted it thought it was a third carrier. That messed up their intelligence. Ironic.

I'll have to go and visit her, I love all those 60's era aircraft on her flight deck.

Dom

I am really sorry to hear you are under the weather Rich.    I hope you get to feeling better soon! 

Ken

Sorry I haven't been on too much in the last few days.  I had to get two vaccinations (Flu and Pneumonia), and now I am sick as a a dog again.  I have only had a couple of carriers.  The John F. Kennedy, in I think somewhere around 1/600 -1/7020 scale, I can't remember which, and the huge honking U.S.S. Enterprise.  Both were a lot of fun.  I haven't seen the JFK around anywhere for a long time.  And the Big Enterprise is really rare from what I can tell.  I don't do a lot of ships anymore.  Most are way too small scale for me to do. 

Progress on the phantom is starting to shape up.  I'll send images as soon as I can stay vertical long enough to get a decent amount of work done on it.

Rich

Bockscar

I Hiryu,

I didn't follow the Yorktown's career after WWII. I didn't realize it had such a significant rebuild of the bow, and can't see the angled deck in those pics.

My Essex Class Yorktown doesn't have an angled deck either, that's because it's the WWII version, so no Grumman Panthers either, just Grumman Hellcats and Avengers.

i got my first aircraft carrier back in 1966, it was the original Yorktown Class Yorktown, no Panthers either.

Yeah, I got it along with a book on the Battle of Midway. That was a big read for an eight year old. The crew on the Yorktown extinguished the fire from the first attack so efficiently that the captain of the Nippon sub that targeted it thought it was a third carrier. That messed up their intelligence. Ironic.

I'll have to go and visit her, I love all those 60's era aircraft on her flight deck.

Dom

Striker8241

Son Of Medicine Man

Hi Everyone,

I chopped some more on the fuselage!  The Aires cockpit that I have already completed includes the front instrument panel that is molded into the fuselage shown here:

Ken 

 

Dang. that's gonna look good, Ken!  Keep up the good work!

 

Russ

Thank you Russ for the compliment!  I really appreciate it!   

Ken