Hi to everybody. This is my first
time posting on ARC and this is the first time ever building a 1/32 scale model.
The subject is pretty well known, especially for the paint scheme. I chose the
excellent Tamiya kit of the F-4J Phantom II. I built it strictly out of the box
except for resin seats and decals. The choice for the first aftermarket
piece
was made by Paragon Design resin seats, the second for Yellowhammer decal set.
Seats are well done and come with a very good details such as seat belts and no
bubble on resin. Decals are good as well and the sheet gives you opportunity to
have enough to build two planes with different schemes, "Black Bunny"
and an experimental navy paint livery.
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images below to see larger images
I started building the cockpit adding only
scratch built minor details such as gear handle and mask/oxygen tube; the
rest of the plane building went down pretty much without any problems. The
air intakes are not extremely smooth and you can see the seem inside. I
discovered later aftermarket products for this part, even some pretty
intake covers. A good heads up for next time. At construction completed I
started with painting the wheel wells first, using Humbrol enamels. At
first matt white and then semigloss. I then painted the bottom part of the
tail and stabilizer with Humbrol metalizer (metalcote). I waited a day to
dry off completely and polish it with a cotton cloth. The result is not
bad. Masking these painted parts I gave to the whole plane a layer of
Tamiya grey primer. The day after I applied matt black to the whole plane.
I repeated this process for two times. Making sure that the paint was
completely dry I sprayed black gloss paint using the same technic as
before. I tried to obtained an effect close to the real one, at least
looking to some pics founded on the web. The original plane seems not to
have a complete and uniform shining black paint. Before applying decals I
gave to the plane Model Master clear gloss paint. Decal posing was fine
but sometimes some decal had the problem to break apart even using decal
solvent. I tried to fix it at my best. A clear gloss paint again to seal
the decals.
The base is made from wood and the
construction was pretty simple. I wanted to represent it on a piece of taxiway,
kind of open air museum. The concrete is made by pieces of Verlinden plasticard
glued with vinylic glue and painted with stone grey acrylic spray can. I
airbrushed with Tamiya smoke to give some weather effect. The grass is made by
railway model stuff and I added the squadron print of "Vandy One Black
Bunny" to complete it.
Hope you like it! Happy modeling
from Italy.
Fabio Bongiorno
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images below to see larger images
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