Hello
again, fellow modelers and readers!
This
time I’ll tell you the not so strange story of a cat who’s lived three and a
half lives, my General Dynamics F-16B Fighting Falcon “J-
270”
from the 313 Tiger Squadron of the Royal Netherlands Air Force. I purchased
Italeri’s F-16C/D kit may be 14 years ago, it was perhaps one of the first
kits I bought from that brand. The kit was the basic Italeri F-16 A/B with an
additional sprue including parts for the C/D versions’ pods, although parts
and decals were included to build the kit as any of A/B/C or D versions. It had
recessed panel lines and a sufficient level of detail for its price at that time
(15 years ago Italeri produced cheap kits, now they sell their old-tooled kits
and their newly tooled ones at the same somewhat expensive price!) Italeri’s
F-16 kits today are miles behind the newly tooled Academy offerings, but are
close in price.
Well,
my F-16 was born as a USAF F-
16C
some 12 years ago. Construction began at the cockpit interior, which I
assembled following the kit’s instructions. By that time I didn’t mind so
much about accuracy and I hadn’t the same reference resources I can find
today, so I painted every cockpit part following Italeri’s instructions and
just added masking tape seat belts. I then inserted some nose weight and later I
closed the fuselage.
The
ill-fated story of this kit began when I decided to tint the cockpit canopy. I
bought Humbrol’s Clear Smoke with its recommended Cellulose thinner. When I
intended to airbrush this product over the clear parts, the airbrush only
spattered the paint, so I ruined the canopy of the one-seater version. Then I
added more thinner, mixed the paint again and tried to paint the canopy of the
two-seater version, with the same results! I later tried to remove the offending
paint from the canopies, but nothing worked. I learned the hard way that
Humbrol’s Clear Smoke can’t be airbrushed. As I couldn’t finish my kit
without a canopy, the unfinished model was put aside and so ended the first life
of my F-16.
Click on
images below to see larger images
Some
years later Italeri reissued the kit with a striking box art featuring a F-16B
with 1998 Tigermeet tail art and I fell in love with it. Although I knew that
Italeri’s F-16s aren’t by far the best F-16 kits of the market, as the box
indicated “F-16 A/B” I knew that with one of the two canopies of this new
kit I could finish my first kit and another F-16 as well, so I bought the kit
anyway. When I opened the kit I realized that Italeri added a sprue with two
AIM-120 AMRAAM missiles (although poorly done, they were a novelty by that
time.)
I
decided to build the two-seater F-16B first because I always wanted to have a
Tigermeet bird (by the way, the Tigermeet F-16A that was posted in July 2009 on ARC came some years later.) Therefore, the second
life of my kit began with a
little surgery to remove the one-seater rear cockpit part. I painted and
installed the rear seat and instruments console, and then I glued the rear
two-seater cockpit part to the fuselage. A lot of filing and sanding was needed
before and after gluing this part. I continued the build by adding the wings,
stabilizers, ventral fins and the radome. Putty was needed to smooth almost
every joint, in particular the joint between the jet intake halves (whose
interior were of course painted white prior to assembly) and between the whole
intake assembly and the fuselage.
I
finished this stage by gluing the big one piece canopy onto its place. It’s a
pity that Italeri didn’t include the choice of displaying the canopy open.
Worst yet, they also didn’t represent the panel lines that separate the canopy
from the fuselage. I also scratch-built and glued the intake navigation lights
because I didn’t like the kit’s ones, which I think are correct only for
some Israeli versions. I left the undercarriage parts, the afterburner, the fuel
tanks and the armament for the final assembly stage.
The
model was now ready for painting, so I airbrushed several coats of satin white
into the wheel wells. By that time I had the comprehensive “U.S. Military
aircraft colors 1955-
2001”
guide prepared by Paul Boyer of FSM magazine (later reissued into “How to
paint and weather scale models,”) so I used this reference for the exterior
colors, namely FS36375 Light ghost gray for the undersides, FS36270 Neutral gray
for the front fuselage, the tail fin, the outer side of the ventral fins and the
fuselage panels perpendicular to the wing roots, and FS36118 Gunship gray for
the fuselage behind the cockpit and the wing upper surfaces.
My
reference also states Neutral gray as the “standard color of F-16 radomes.”
However, the radome color of the F-16 seems not to follow a rule, as many
variations can be seen in different photographs. The more important thing is
that the radome always looked different than the fuselage behind it. As I
trusted my reference but I also wanted to show the difference between the
fuselage and the radome, I used a lighter shade of MM Neutral gray (mixed with
30 % white) for the fuselage and full neutral gray for the radome, with the
additional benefit that the lighter shade blended with the Light ghost gray of
the undersurfaces very well.
I
applied soft masks and hard masks to the model before airbrushing MM Gunship
gray (mixed with 40% white). By the way, the masks for the curves behind the
cockpit were drawn with a circles template. At this stage I also painted the
fuselage portion of the afterburner piece (the afterburner was later painted
with Humbrol Metal Cote Polished Steel,) the three fuel tanks and the weapons.
The AMRAAM radomes were painted white, then the AMRAAM fuselages and fins and
the Rockeye cluster bombs were painted FS36320 Dark ghost gray, as per kit’s
instructions. The Sidewinders were also painted with white fuselages, black
radome and gun metal canards according to the instructions.
The
model was then given two coats of gloss clear before decal application. By that
time I was still using Humbrol varnishes, although they remained tacky after
drying, because I haven’t yet thought about finding a replacement. I had no
problems with kit’s decals, but the decal placement instructions were
sometimes vague. The only complaints I have on the decals are that all the red
stencils should be orange instead, and that the refueling probe indicator seems
to be oversized. I could have replaced these with aftermarket decals I already
had, but I became aware of that too late.
After
all the decals were in place, the model received a coat of flat clear (except
the radome, which received a coat of satin clear) and it was ready for the final
assembly stage. The assembly of the undercarriage was somewhat difficult, in
particular of the main undercarriage doors. I lost the little front wheel, so I
used the one from the other kit. The end of the second life of my kit came with
an accident. While trying to attach the Rockeye bombs (which had no attachment
points) the model escaped from my hand and fell over my working table. The
result was one underwing pylon and one wingtip Sidewinder launcher broken. I
could repair the pylon, but not the launcher, even though I scratchbuilt the
piece. The model went again, this time almost finished, to hibernation for a
long time…
In
2006 I ordered a kit of a Hasegawa F-16CJ. Studying the kit’s instructions I
noticed that I should have to cut the wingtip Sidewinder launchers of this kit
to replace them with AMRAAM launchers. So the rebirth of my Tigermeet F-16B came
by serendipity. I cut the launchers from both sides and replaced them with the
ones I cut from the Hasegawa kit, which were better anyway. I glued the
remainder subassemblies and pieces, but before gluing the Sidewinders I wanted
to modify them as captive trainers, as seen in many photographs of Dutch F-16s
and in the kit’s box art. I therefore cut the Sidewinder tail fins and painted
the fuselage with blue and the radome and canards with gunmetal (actually MM
Metalizer Exhaust.) I made another improvement to the model by adding static
dischargers at the trailing edges of the wings, stabilizers and fin, made from
monofilament and painted with Revell Steel paint.
The
model was almost finished, but had no weathering because by that time I was
reluctant about accenting panel lines to modern jets, because these are hardly
visible even in photographs bigger than a 1/72 scale model of the airplane. In
the end I accented the kit’s panel lines with a fine drawing pencil, and added
gunsmoke streaks at the front of the cannon with graphite powder. I couldn’t
accent all the underwing panel lines because the armament was already attached.
This incarnation of the model was finished in August 2007.
The
above describes the third life of my kit, but I wrote about three and a half
lives at the beginning of this article. The “half life” is a “MLU” (Mid
life update) I made to the kit by November 2009. After finishing the third
version of the kit, I was concerned about the validity of having full ordnance,
and “live” armament as well, under a Tigermeet aircraft. After further
reading about Tigermeet engagements I learned that these are not merely the
exhibition of nicely painted aircraft, but complete exercises similar to the
famous Red Flag exercises. This fact dissipated my doubts about having full
armament, but not about having live armament.
Well,
in a cleaning session of my kits in early 2009 two of the Rockeyes fell from the
kit. There came the idea of repainting all the Rockeyes as training units. I
searched the Internet and I found photographs of these, with white bodies, a
blue band and a brownish red at its bulbous tip. I found photos of inert AMRAAMs,
and I also finally found a full photograph of “J-
270”
at the time it wore the 1998 Tigermeet tail art, unfortunately without
underwing stores. (I previously just had a photograph of the tail alone.) In
this new (for me) photograph I saw that the canopy frames were black and that
the radome was darker than I had already painted it, and that the aircraft were
not as clean as I supposed before.
The
“MLU” of the kit then consisted of the following:
-
The
Rockeyes were painted as inert units, as described.
-
The
AMRAAMs were painted as inert units. Painting the blue bands wasn’t
enough, as I realized that the bodies should be FS36375 instead of FS36320
as I painted before, that the radomes should be smaller than suggested by
the line engraved on the body, and that the fins and canards should be bare
metal. Therefore, the AMRAAMs were fully painted again. Even the blue
stripes were masked and airbrushed, together with the ones from the Rockeyes!
-
The
canopy frames were masked and painted MM Interior black.
-
The
radome was masked and painted with a mix of Humbrol 156 and white (4:1) to
represent a darker shade of neutral gray.
-
The
panel lines were accented a bit more, and some dirt was added to the wing
upper surfaces. I used a photograph of another Dutch F-
16 in
flight as reference.
-
The
metal ring before the afterburner received a subtle coat of Tamiya Clear
blue, while the afterburner itself received a coat of Gunze Smoke, in order
to achieve a more realistic look, but the Smoke didn’t worked as I
expected.
-
The
flat parts of the kit received a coat of Xtracrylic flat clear and the
radome received a coat of Polly S satin clear, to kill the tackiness of the
Humbrol varnishes I used previously.
-
During
the MLU the pitot tube broke beyond repair, so I replaced it with a piece of
hypodermic needle and a piece of copper wire inserted into one end.
-
I
added the static discharger that goes at the top of the fin, which I missed
before.
-
The
navigation lights were painted again, with Chrome silver, Tamiya clear red
and a mix of Tamiya clear blue and green.
Well,
after the MLU (better yet, three and a half lives) I’m really satisfied with
my F-16B of the Royal Netherlands Air Force, with its full inert weapons load
and its nice Tigermeet tail art, although it doesn’t have details such as the
thin ribs that run along the radome and the parachute end cap, among others.
It’s since then one of my favourite models.
I’d
like to add a commentary about the kit’s armament. When I was searching for
photographs of the cluster bombs, I found several articles describing how
harmful these weapons have been over the civil population of the countries were
they have been used, even years after the weapons were dropped. In fact, many
countries have signed an agreement proscribing their use from now on. I want to
make clear that I used the Rockeyes in my kit only for aesthetic purposes and
because they were already included within the kit. I think that the kit would
loss a lot of its artistic value if I’d remove its Rockeyes.
I
hope you’ve enjoyed the story and the photographs. By the way, I included just
two photographs of the model before the MLU, it had grey Rockeyes. The remainder
of the photographs portrait the model after the MLU, with its white Rockeyes.
I
dedicate this model to my wife Omaira, who likes real tigers very much, in our
25th wedding anniversary!
Thanks
for watching and reading. Greetings from
Caracas
, a city whose skies have seen many F-16s from the Venezuelan Air Force (FAV.)
By the way, my next F-16 build will be a F-16A from the FAV, with the surplus
canopy of the kit presented in this article.
Orlando Sucre
Rosales
Click on
images below to see larger images
|
|