F-14 Tomcat Group Build idea...

ah ! good to see you back mitch, you had us all worried for a while! welcome to the forums, its good to have new members around !

A question or two for you's all:

1. Reggie, you live in Singapore, you appear to be of caucasian/European descent. I don't mean to be rude here (read my post a couple of days ago...), but what is your ancestry? I know that Mittelsdorf sure does sound German. Also, you mentioned being involved in softball. Is that anything like softball here in the U.S.? Here, softball usually involves beer drinking, cussing, Camaros, and talking about softball in the off-season (which is in the winter, during bowling season).

2. Daniel, &$%*@&^ that spider gives me the creeps. Can you put a coin, or an X-acto knife blade next to it for some size reference? I love spiders, when they're outside where they belong. But when they get in the house, "Maw, git my gun."

OK, everyone, what I'm about to share with you has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with my "technical difficulty" (or my new identity). It has nothing to do with me being off my anti-depressants for two days now...ha ha. I came home from a second job interview this evening, and my wife informs me that an "accident" has happened downstairs. She leads me to my desk, which has remnants of a fluorescent light fixture lying in disarray on it. AAAACK!!





The "reflector" part of the light fixture was lying across my desk, but my wife moved it. Fortunately, 1) none of my children were playing near my desk when the light fell apart; and 2) my F-14 was unscathed, as evident in the photo below.



(No, that's not my wrist/hand/thumb, mine are not photogenic. Those belong to my neighbor, we'll call him "Harold", he is a part-time hand model.)(This photo cost me $20.)(Harold needs to trim his nails!)

For whatever reason, the danged light fixture just fell apart.

OK, for you detail-seekers, in the first photo, that is a "Simpsons" trivia game on the little shelf under my desk. Got it for Christmas in either '98 or '99, never opened it. Anyone want it? I accept PayPal, check, or money order. Shipping is $8.00 anywhere in the lower 48 states, for international shipping please inquire. I'll accept reasonable bids starting at $1.00. Oh, I thought I was on e-Bay for a moment there. Ha ha...

It sure is good to be back...I almost feel like a new member!

QUOTE: Originally posted by MA Cooke Hey fella's...I'm not gone. I just had a bit of...uh..."technical difficulty".

Technical difficulty? Let me guess. You tried to update your profile but instead cancelled your account?No matter. Welcome back!

Glad to see you Cat survived unscathed! Just imagine having to do all that work all over again.

okay fellas- I managed to cool off. I'm still not sure about what I am going to do but Daniel has offered up a solution. Many thanks, pingtang- I'm still trying to tell myself not load this thing with a firecracker.
Back Mitch!! This week's been a doozy. My Cat is hobbling...
The exact diameter of this nose cone by my caliper reading is... .422 of an inch. It also has bad mould marks all over it. I think it would best suit a 1/72 scale Tomcat!!! I'm thinking of using the the Revell kit and vaccuforming a replacement if my buddies machine is working. Hopefully it'll be about the right size. As far as the broken canopy sill- I'm still thinkin'.
I'm going to put this kit aside for a couple of days and attack a Tamiya 1/48 Bubbletop.
Sorry guys but the frustration means I gotta shelve it for a couple.
Meanwhile... How's everyone else's 'Cat going??? Mitch has some great progress and pics and his paint job is fantastic. bstrump has also hit a homer as well with his kits and for 1/72- I'm amazed. Same with Mitch- he's managed to tame the ever so beautiful but beastly Hasegawa 1/48 kit.
Sooooo- I'll be back in the game soon. Hopefully by Saturday.
You know, I'm sitting here looking at this nose cone- funny thing is every other part on this tree is moulded perfectly except for the nose cone and one of the main gear supports. The gear support I can fix- I just have to cut off the excess plastic. I'm perplexed how they'd let this one slip. I guess I should probably stop bitchin' and move on to a solution.

MA Cooke- Here you go. This is Harry sitting next to your average size pen.



Armorman- That's strange that those two parts are the only ones on the sprue that are badly molded. Don't know what to make of that one. Hope it all works out alright, but if it doesn't, my offer still stands.

dan - harry reminds me of toby, a spider we caught and kept in class for about a week until it escaped last friday

mitch - im half american half singaporean. my dad's ancestors were horse rustlers in the 17th century in germany or something and they were running from the german cops and decided that america would be a good place to lay low for a while, so to america they went and stayed. hence, mittelsdorf. my dad came to singapore bout 30 years ago cos he as too darn lazy to shovel snow in south jersey and he stuck in singapore where its always 80 degrees out and the humiditiy never falls below 70%

softball in singapore is a little different from softball in, say, Iowa or Cincinnati. its very organised and stuff in schools and we train alot cos we dont get the same exposure that american kids get. so no beer drinking, cussing and swearing only when that grounder hits a pebble and bounces right into your jaw. in short, they are pretty uptight bout softball around here. baseball is different though, since there are no national competions for baseball, everyone just screws around and cusses and swears when watching/playing baseball. the other way around are you a baseball fan ? shoot me an email and lets talk baseball !

no progress on any models, caught up with playing with my 155

erh welcome back micth(macooke that is u right )

i still hold onto my cat sighs

anyway guys i just want to ask something wat type of camera spec is good for taking pics of model in here a 3.2 megapixel suffcient enough ?

nice harry there pingtang . did u feed him yet ?

welcome erh audio. im new here too

Well, it's doooooone! I finally gave the Cat some claws and now it's ready for the flight deck. Here's my final pics of this project, my F-14A from VF-21 Freelancers, CVW-14, USS Independence, Desert Shield, 1990-91.



Construction of the F-14B continues apace and will be ready for the paint shop soon.
armorman, sorry to here 'bout all the problems you've been having with yours.That's gotta suck! Get back in there and show it who's boss!

Nice bstrump

wow ..... so u be doing in 48 ?

Yup, I was right..."First 'Cat Done" award goes to....(drum roll)...

bstrump ! (fanfare)

Great looking build there, bstrump.

Daniel, I'm glad it's 4:45 am when I saw that, that...that creature. If I had seen that next to a pen last night, just before going to bed, I would've probably had bad dreams, I'm getting a deep, deep spine-chill just thinking of that spider.

Reggie, that's so interesting about baseball and softball. I'll be sending you an e-mail...since my heritage traces back to the east Tennessee Appalachian mountains, I have a lot of "redneck" in my blood, I and I can't resist cracking redneck jokes about Camaros, beer, softball, bowling, hunting, guns, all the stuff that Jeff Foxworthy jokes about. I just remembered the strict social behaviour (look Daniel!) laws in Singapore...a few years back an American punk was busted for vandalism. His name is Michael Fay, he was from Dayton, OH (just 55 mi. up the road from Cincinnati), and he got several can lashes across his arse. He deserved it, as far as I'm concerned. Remind me never to spit or chew gum in Singapore!

Well, before I can resume work on my bird, I've got to clean up my desk, one of the fluorescent tubes broke, AND I've got to either repair that light fixture, or buy a new one. Those were high end bulbs, too...I sold light bulbs for about a month last summer. When I first started, I thought $18 was crazy for a 4-ft. fluorescent bulb. Then I "saw the light"...I put two in right above my workbench, and these things are brighter, whiter than any other light on the market. The company guarantees them for five years...they actually write in that the bulbs are designed to burn 24/7 for five straight years. Luckily I still have a few in my demo pack.

I don't know when I'll get more 'bench time. I'm also doing set construction for my daughter's musical, she's in the 7th grade and they're doing "Cinderella". I'm working from 10 to 4 every Saturday...man, that really eats into my model building time.

Have fun everyone!

Harry is no longer, he got chucked over the fence and now the Hepburns have to deal with him.

bstrump- That's a very impressive build. I really like the weathering and finish.

Hi Reg...check you e-mail.

Mitch

sentry:

You were asking about digital cameras, and you specifically asked if 3.2 megapixels would be sufficient. I don't know how "good" the current cameras are, how many megapixels, etc. If you look at my earlier posts, where I have posted photos, those were taken with a Fuji Finepix 3800, which has 3.2 megapixels. I have been using the highes resolution setting for model photos, and those are quite good, in my opinion. They take up a lot of space on the chip, but I shoot 20 or 30 photos and download them onto my computer hard drive, then delete them from the chip. I only have a 64Mb chip, it'll hold about 60 or 70 on the highest setting...it'll hold 400 on the lowest resolution setting.

Hope this helps.

Audiophile, VF-101 has a detachment there. I’m not sure if the aircraft are there all the time or they just fly down from Oceana when needed. Since VF-101 has been operating out of there since they flew the F-4, I guess any VF-101 scheme would do.

Chris Ishmael

ch47guy you rock! where did you find this information? thanks a million! ill have to get right to work researching vf-101 ... turns out they have a little bit of everything as far as the Cats go (they fly all four variants). i will continue looking for tomcat squadrons at either boca chica or key west air base, but thank you for your contribution!

pingtang - thats a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig spider.... i want one!!

Audio, I've been a F-14 fan from way back, & thats just something I memorized from one of the F-14 books in my own personal library.

VF-101's current scheme looks like this :.
Now that's one of their show birds. Their line jets have the same markings, only in grey :
.

VF-Decals produces decals for both of these aircraft in 1/48th, although they might be hard to find right now because of their popularity. CAM decals also produced decals for a specially marked VF-101 F-14B with a red canopy hood & all red tails. I think Superscale did a VF-101 sheet also.

Chris Ishmael

The VF-101 sheets are still available. Just go to www.vf-decals.com, and you can place an order there.

Hi
Macooke ; thanks for your infom , now im in the middle of getting a canon 3.2 megapixel or a nikon 4100 4.1 megapixels. Will work on it again. Thanks a lot bro. i just masked my wheel wells hope i do something again tonight maybe preshade it first. And get a camera first oh dear.

Hi Ch47guy

Since u something on the cats maybe i would like to ask :
u have any information of VX 9 ? do they still flying some of the birds . i have one black one but they also has the D version in grey . do they stull using the D version ? or they just disband it.

Now in the look out for vx 9 decals if there is ( the greys one) steve . any idea ?

Here is an image of the VF-101 sheet which I will use on the Revell F-14D that is in progress for this and the ARC GB.
next to HobbyDecal dry transfer sheet which is also excellent:


More images to follow. Now that my DSL is back up and running.

Chuck
Fly Navy

That VF-101 bird looks awesome. I always like a cat with black tails and canopies. Mine will be pretty much the same, but with more yellow.

As far as I know , VX-9 no longer operates the F-14 at all.

Chris Ishmael

Good news fellas! I've contacted Academy and they are sending me a whole new sprue. All I had to pay for was shipping. They even threw in a free catalog. Shouldn't have had to pay for anything in my opinion. I just want to get this baby built. I've got to try to make mine look as Mitch and bstrump.
After this week I am going to run for president and outlaw working. Your only job is to work on your hobby. Anyone wanna elect me?
Hey sentry, I have a canon 3.2 and after trying to get the Macro setting to work it still doesn't take good close up's. I think I am still missing a step.
Nice Photos ch47guy!
have a good weekend guys!

amour my man well happy to hear to get a replacement. did academey mentioned how much their F16 , 32 scale cost. really hope they start with a F14 32 scale.

i really tot of buying the 3.2 canon though o well may check with nikon again

thanks for the info amour my man

Guys-

Just a quick note to let everyone know that we're up to 11 entries at the ScaleAIR site. Stop by and have a look at

http://scaleair.com/Tomcatgb/gbmain.htm

when you get a chance.

Cheers,

Just took a quick peek at the ScaleAIR GB. Those are some nice looking builds, Steve!

I managed to make a little bit of progrees on the F-14B but I still have to do a wee bit more filling and sanding to get a paint-ready surface. I'm not sure how much more progress I'll make today (or this weekend for that matter!). Yesterday was my 36th birthday and after last night I'm really not in the best of shape for modelling.

Later guys!

I got to go to a hobby shop yesterday, and while I was looking for a PE set for a spitfire I found one for the Academy Tomcat. There's lots of extra details for the cockpit, and external details too. Might get me interested in building it again.

sentry- Have a good look at the Nikon 4100. Nikon make some great cameras. I use a Nikon 5400 and could not be happier with it. With a bit of practice, you could probably get great pics from either camera.

armorman - Here are a few tips that might get some better pics out of your camera. When using macro mode, don't use the zoom lense. I found that some cameras can't focus if you zoom while in macro mode. Also, try using a higher F-stop number (above F-7). This will give a better depth of field (instead of having the closest part of the model well focused, it will help get the whole picture in focus).

hope that helps you.

Hey thanks for the info on the Grim Reapers. I really like the VF-101 paint schemes and while the black tails looks good, I found some pics of an older scheme that I think I like better:

A prefab Grim Reaper display model -


I think I got this pic from the "Tomcat Alley" website (highly recommended for referrence info and pics and stuff) -


Just an example that I found for a VF-101 paint scheme -


Grim Reaper line bird -


Maybe it's just me but I like these older schemes better .....

hey guys along with my other 2 group builds going on. i have to stop building. i got a family emerngecy to go to. so those that have finshed your cats they look darn good.

Ga.modeler, if you're reading, our wishes and prayers are with you and your family. We do hope that your family is well, and that you can return to the forums soon.