News Feed

James C
Awesome and thanks for sharing 👍

Mr D
Nice Quality work, very impressive...😁👍👍

Rui S
Beautiful model, great level. Thx for sharing 👍

Christian Bruer
Klasse geworden 👍

Marc .
Stunning build!

Dieter Bihlmaier
Christian and Marc . I appreciate your comments. Thanks !

Rui S
That's a Beauty, indeed 👍

Hipsta
Lovely work, painting and weathering is excellent!!😊

gorby
Fantastic! You could easily mistake some of those B&W photos for period photos of the real thing.

Spanjaard
picture 3 is simply perfect

Dieter Bihlmaier
Thank you Hipsta gorby and Spanjaard !

Dave Pluth
The b&w photo is really killer. Makes it feel period!

Neuling
Excellent camouflage paintwork and good presentation!

Sebastian Meyner
Beautiful work, Dieter! 👍

Dieter Bihlmaier
Thank you very much, colleagues. With the black and white shots, I check whether the whole thing looks coherent.

Kees Borgers
Very well done, love the paint work.

Rui S
Great work & presentation 👍

Ignacio von Braun
Following!

Ben M
👀

Doubtingmango
Great idea!

Gary Curling
May be a bit of tamiya buff on the top of grass?still looks 👍

Dietmar Bogatzki
Nice diorama Marc 👍

Alexander Witte
The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence! 😉 I like the Panzer grey though, a nice faded touch, thank you.

Marc .
Thanks gary for your idea to use buff. I can see a difference but it's barely noticeable in the photos.
Maybe I should use more buff but I'll wait and see what the whole scene looks like with resin water and water lilies.

Thanks Dietmar.

Thanks Alexander.

Rui S
Looking good 👍

Mspi101
O panzer of the lake, what is your wisdom?

Robert Podkoński
Looks great already. I can't wait to see the final effect 🙂

Marc .
Thanks Rui.

Thank you Robert.

Dear Mspi101 finish the models that you have before buying new ones ...
- The Panzer of the lake has spoken😉

Shar Dipree
Looks fanstastic ao far.
The embankment just looks great.

Marc .
Thanks Shar Dipree.

Mr James
The embankment and roots are very well done 👏

gorby
Very impressive work so far!

Marc .
Thanks Mr James and Gorby.

J35J
Following with intrest!

David Taylor
Looks brill.

Rui S
Great, 👍 keep it coming

Ben M
Blub.

Rui S
Nice work 👍 photos looking a bit dark 🤔

Marc .
Stunning looking Tiger!

Neuling
Yes! 👍👍

Kees Borgers
Very well done, love the paint work.

Mark Sherwood
That's a 👍 from me.

Rui S
Woh mighty Tiger. I can fell the weight.. Simply Great as usual 👍

Cristian A
Beautiful work and presentation, congrats!

Łukasz Gliński
Very neat 👍

Rui S
An eye catcher 👍

James C
👀👍

Pepe
Looking

Christoph Kunz
This is waiting on my shelf of doom for a long time now.
So I'm watching yours to be finished.

Guy Rump
Following. 👍

Rui S
Beautiful work as always👍

Rando
Been cooking up this idea since I got the 1/72 RF-8. My original plan was to build the plane in the cover of the Osprey RF-8 book, flown by Lt Andre Coltrin over Vietnam. With a little help from a 1/72 version of the Furball MiG Master sheet, I will rearrange the nose and tail numbers to make BuNo 146871 as it flew in Vietnam during its 1966 cruise off the USS Oriskany.

I also found an Academy F-8E, which has decals for a VF-111 jet that flew on the same cruise, so decided I will build it as the RF-8's escort, which they often had during their photo runs. I also figured, why not build them together? They will be displayed in flight.

Oleg Bogolei
Nice idea and intersiting projeact. Also have two of them in a stash)

Freak
Great idea for a double build. Following!

Rando
Good to have you gents, looking to start this one soon! I like researching and adding reference photos, so I just added some in the meantime.

Urban Gardini
Now this seems like a build that I've to follow!

Rando
Welcome Urban, happy to have you! "It's only a model!"

Sergej I
Following 🙂 👍

Rando
Hi Sergej! I'm very very excited to get started on this one

Casey Beckett
Following - got 3 of those nice new Sword RF's in the stash.

Jos Jansen
Normally I don't follow 1:72 scale models...for this one I'll make an exception...😅😉, grab myself a seat here! Love those Crusaders...

Patrick Hagelstein
Got intrigued by Rando's comment on Jos' build, so I popped over here. Looks like a very interesting build as well!

Rando
Happy to have you gents here, I'll be getting to this one just as soon as my elaborate P-51 build is done...

Rando
Here we go, double Crusader build. Gonna be comparing the short-run Sword RF-8 with Academy's F-8, which has been the go-to in 1/72. I have extra Academy kits so I'm swapping out the RF-8 kit's nice resin seat, I'll use it for a future open canopy build. The pilots will be obscuring seat detail in a closed canopy anyway.

David Fuller
Following

Rando
Welcome David!

I assembled the PJ pilots and started nipping off parts to assemble the fuselage. Getting the pilots to fit in their seats is tricky so far. Fit on the Academy kit parts is pretty nice. Sword kit is not as easy since there's no locator pins but they align well

Rando
Pilots are fully painted now. The F-8E pilot is based on Dick Schaffert, who was a pilot on this 1966 cruise. While I don't know of any specific plane he flew, F-8 pilots often flew jets that were assigned to others, so he's flying 149180 on this escort mission. In order to accommodate them, I had to remove the rudder pedals and front of the cockpit tub on the F-8E. It won't really be visible when the cockpit is buttoned up anyway.

Rando
I didn't like how the Sundowner helmet turned out so I stripped the paint and airbrushed it this time with tiny wedges of tape, then shaped and touched up everything. Just need to add a black stripe for the visor groove.

J35J
Great attention to details Rando! Following👍🏻

Rando
Thanks and glad to have you J35J! Pilots, seats, ejection handles, and joysticks are all in place. Time soon to start putting the jets together.

Rando
All the interior parts are in, soon time to put the fuselages together 👍

Guy Rump
Looking good, following. 👍

Rando
Hello Guy, welcome 😊

Fuselages are together. Now getting all the panels and gear bay doors to sit flush.

Calvin Gifford
Very nice! How is the Sword kit so far??

Rando
Thanks Calvin! It's quite nice if you remember it's a short run kit and you prep and test fit parts a lot before gluing anything. Has been a far from perfect first effort by me but I like how it goes together. It's shape is pretty accurate too. The Academy kit is very plug-n-play in comparison

Calvin Gifford
👍

S M
Double build! Following!

Rando
Welcome S M! I have been painstakingly installing the gear doors closed. Stuffing blutack in the wheel wells helps with frustration. Both F-8s have tiny aft gear doors on the main bays that took a lot of time to line up. The RF-8's nose doors were also very tricky. Happy to say I'm done getting the gear doors on.

Casey Beckett
Backup RF-8 inbound Rando ! Shipped Friday!

Rando
You the man Casey! Did some scratchbuilding tonight

Casey Beckett
Me too - Bonanza gear struts. God bless Albion Alloys. Great stuff if you've not used any of their items.

Rando
I have not but am always looking to add new things in this hobby, I'll check them out! I actually have an old Minicraft 1/48 Bonanza that I might do something with one of these days.

Rando
Took a big long tour on the clear parts struggle bus this past week. Got glue smudges on a camera window, the windscreen, and canopy on the RF-8, which all had to be buffed out. Hopefully I get the canopies attached snug without issues tomorrow night. Finding that carefully lining the attachment point with Revell Contacta on a toothpick is less risky than TET.

Calvin Gifford
👍

S M
Clear parts look good 👍

Michael Kohl
Like the planes. Like to see them in flighr. Like the effort you put in.
Feel you when putting pilots properly in and closing wheel well doors.
Anxious for the paint job.

Rando
Thanks all, getting closer to painting. A ton of work has gone into smooth out and scribe the lines around the gear bays on both jets, not to mention persistent seams. Also turned my attention to sanding down and rescribing the fictitious bumps on the folding joints, which the RF-8 has as well. The RF-8 also has wedge-shaped plates on the droops, which were only present much later, so those were sanded down as well. There's still a few things I want to try to perfect before I begin painting. I also have to decide if I want to paint the wings separately, in all likelihood I'm going to glue them on first because I want the fuselage section to be flush.

Rando
Alright, wings are on. I feel like this will make masking more complicated, but better for making sure they conform to the fuselage. I am so ready to paint these jets

Calvin Gifford
Whoot!