SapperSix

Thank you Barry, I sure appreciate these. Its never too late as some guy might need them as well. Luckily, I already had them. My issue was the bulkhead, and having the right stuff in general. This plane serves a great lesson for me. By far the biggest project. But its part of the path as I move towards becoming more and more detailed in my future builds. -Frank

Thank you Gaz...you are very much correct, I would rather dream of such things. I just bought a visor with lighting and extra magnification. Now I am having a problem registering the location of the object, my hand and the brush. All in due time. My wife bought me some great single malt and some new drinking glasses. I am sure my vision and coordination is going to improve tonight.....

GT Resin seats Harv.

I hope everyone had a awesome Christmas. My wife bought me an Iwata HP-CS as my Passache's are getting pretty old but still reliable. I cant wait to give this baby a go. I am talking about the airbrush. I have been very focused on the MK7 Ejection Seats. Paging through the referenced and versions I finally settled on these: I have been spending the last week or so making extra bits out of copper wire, fishing line (10LB), extra photo etched sprues, and some parts from ReedOak. My eyes are blurry and I have literally been dreaming about Martin Baker ejection seat variants. I am still not done but am eager to show you my progress. The seat on the left is the "stock" seat prior to all my custom bits provided as a comparison. I do need a real camera as my phone camera is failing to catch the detail. I have been learning a I go. I have found that knowing what medium to use at a given time is commonsense only once a few mistakes are made. Copper and or lead wire doesn't take to curves as natural as monofilament does, but monfilament doesn't like tight curves an creates a great amount of tension when trying to make tight turns. Therefore compromise must be achieved as progress is made. The picture below is supposed to be the same wire that goes across the back of the seat. I used two different materials as I discovered fishing line more pliable. Off to eat some Prime Rib.....

Gaz, Thank you. Pictures of the finished product to come, tons of extra's. My eyes are blurry from all the bits. I have been dreaming Martin Baker seats... -Frank

Hey Harv!! They are Eduard. Now if I had it to do again, i might get a different set. They are painted only on one side. When I try to form fit them the painting tends to want to come off the metal. That really limits what I can do as far as how I want the belts to lay. Also the belts will ask one to super glue them as they are folded over. Make sure you form them first then glue. I learned that after the first couple belts on the first seat.... What I have now is going to look a little sterile compared to what I was aiming for. None the less it is coming together well. -Frank

I am sorry to hear about the catastrophic destruction of your plane. I am sure starting a new one will have you in good spirits quickly!

Well work has me going crazy with earthquake issues. Prior to all the fun the wife and I planned on replacing the whole of the flooring up stairs. Its been rough to find time. The hallway is the old flooring as the front room had been finished a day prior. My son is hard at work removing doors in the other rooms in preparation of the coming new floor and paint. Below is my incomplete MK7. Its the GT resin seat with eduard updates. I also have been making costume bits to fill in he parts missing from the real thing. Copper wire (yellow wiring) and other parts are being added and created to make as a complete MK7 as possible. Belt fittings and some belts are temporary placed to see how the over seat will look. Its been hard to find a matching reference. I will be leaving for a bit during Christmas but have a whole week planned right after. Looking forward to really making some progress. Have a great Christmas to all of you.

Had to spend some time doing a little earthquake recovery work around the house and of course work had me going pretty good. It was a relief to get home for some plastic therapy. I finally spent some time to plan and execute cutting the holes in the fuselage for the photo flash dispensers. It helped that my early Christmas present got to me. I ordered a new micro saw and made a flexible ruler to scribe and cut. I made a few mistakes as I got impatient after a few light cuts. Otherwise, it was a decent go. I will have to re-scribe proper panels in the area around the dispensers. I will have to also add the additional panel hiding the antenna in the vertical stabilizer. A lot of time was spent working on the cockpit minutia making minor advances over time. I worked on studying the seats while working on the cockpit area as I started making the seats come to life.

Another excellent build John. Its always a pleasure to watch you adeptly put together a fine kit...

You guys are a bunch of sick old bastards, I see now I am in the right place.

As I am finally getting in a bit of a build rhythm I am able to work on multiple build avenues as others dry. As such I have started working on the Martin Baker Mk H7 ejection seats. In so doing I have found three different color schemes to the seats. I have gone with what I call the faded olive drab seat over the brighter forest green seat. Forest Green color scheme (I dont think this color was used in a 1971 Phantom).... Olive Drab color scheme (Possibly more likely to be used in 1971 and more in line with found references)...... And lastly I have been using the below virtual cockpit as a reference color scheme... http://www.nmusafvirtualtour.com/cockpits/SEAW_tour/SEAW-10.html I have searched for standard or mixed color's to apply to the seat with no luck. I have come up with a flat olive head rest and a faded olive drab cushion set. I am wondering what others might have come up with?!?!? Any help or advice is much appreciated.

Harv, They are the same length. I didn't see anything in the tweak list about it being too short....bummer.

Phil, I appreciate your kind words. I am sure based on your posts that your J will be top notch. Without question, your appreciation and capability will overcome any possible shortcomings. I am looking in to a Wing Nut kit for Christmas, I have the same concern for that kit as you the J.....If nothing else it will be fun.

These came in today and they are absolutely top quality!! Thank you https://aerocraftmodels.bigcartel.com/

I have always loved the Phantom as it was one of my first builds as a child. I have done a few in 1/48. This is my first at this scale, with this much "extra". Thank you for the compliment.

And therein is why I am on this site. I have received help and offers of support in ways I would not have predicted. Such actions are highly appreciated and add to the fun of modeling. I am glad a Sparrow was provided for, the F-15 is probably my all time favorite jet aircraft and wouldn't want her to be lacking in an anything.

I have seen your work Peter, you are no slouch to say the least. I am getting a rhythm and the model is cooperating. I predict my best effort ever. Mainly due to all the help, information and guidance I have received by many here.

Thank you, I am really enjoying this build.

Thank you for the information Gaz. I will post some pictures of the gear as I build it. New LG just came in today so I will at least get it primed and base coated this weekend.

I don't know how I missed this as long as I did. This is fantastic!!! Maybe this build is so awesome it temporally blinded me. This is where I would like to be someday....

Well it was an adventure this weekend to say the least. I certainly hope anyone that was celebrating Thanksgiving had a grand time. All the parts that had been prepped are now primed with Mr Surfacer 1200. I live in Alaska and don't really have an indoor spray booth. That's not going to happen in the current residence as we are getting ready to install flooring and get the house on the market in preparation for a move early next year. I had to spray in my heated garage while providing adequate ventilation. It was a balance and as I was able to use the indoor heaters, fans and a lucky first time mix ratio to get a great primer coating on all the resin and some fuel tanks. You may notice that an exhaust jet to my J79 is missing in this picture......there was a mystery menace about the house.... A couple days past after the garage priming episode and I noticed when I checked on how things had dried that I was missing an exhaust jet. I knew it was in my possession after I had ran it in some warm water to get the dust from cutting and any oil off. I placed it on a drying board with many other parts. Turns out a day after I though it lost my daughter comes down stairs saying the dog had been chewing on something she didn't recognize. Here it is prior to any repair work. Luckly it will be buried deep in the plane and will not be a burden on the eye... I fixed the tail intake at the base of the vertical stabilizer as I had noticed in other builds this was corrected. I was able to confirm in subsequent research that it needed altering. So the original rendition was removed and I put in a extra piece of photo-etched. Unfortunately, this alteration was a little short and will have to be replaced. I started working on the rear cockpit and had to make some changes overall. This is part of the GT Resin cockpit with the instrumentation on either end removed and replaced with the Eduard instrumentation. Everything in between is "stock" and is still under construction. This is also part of the GT Resin Cockpit, rear upper instrumentation panel. There is no Eduard at all. The instrumentation is Airscale decals, placards custom made. The problem came when I realized that while I had many of the right instrumentation decals, they were not the right size. I tried making some on my computer but had many issues. Given some time, I will be able to work it out. I spent much time trying to make things fit, or trim down micro decals. I won a few and lost a few. My research and parts lined up to allowed me to do the instrumentation in the right order and placement for a RF-4C in this case. That will end here, as things will have to be adjusted as I move forward. It will be close, but not exact. Here are all the instrument panels that I worked on over the last two days. Placed to give an overall look at where it is all headed. By in large, I am pleased but also know I have lots of work to do. Lesson learned....I will have to dig deeper as I didn't perform enough research, purchase books and so on to get the full picture of the possibilities. That is, if my goal is exact replication....I have a vast learning curve in tools, techniques, capabilities and information sources.

Soooooooooo much prep work. I have never had the opportunity nor the wherewithal to apply this kind of attention to a model. I am really excited about the potential of this model. Since I have come to this site I have leaped in all aspects of modeling due to all the excellent builders here.. More fuselage adjustments to make room for resin aftermarket items. Resin exhaust prepped, test fitted and researched. I have a ton of Alclad and for the exhaust sections of this aircraft. I have been doing a ton research on the exhaust itself and the application of Alclad. I will do some test shots on my test airbrush plane. I will really have to focus on the hues, hell everything actually..... The ALQ-71 Short (after I put in the missing antenna's) and ALQ-101are ready for primer. I haven't heard back from the pilot of this aircraft to determine which nose he used on the short. So I will prep both. All the extra resin that hasn't already been prepped is now ready.

Thank you for he kind words!

Looking pretty good Gaz. I am liking the look you are going for! Zimmerit isn't as easy as it might seem, you are making it look easy and good....