I have a passion for U.S. designed, Israeli flown aircraft.
With that said, I met an Israeli aircraft photographer at the Telford model show in 2014. Ofer Zidon presented me with
a photo of a F-16A he had taken. I have provided a photo of the photo below. These aircraft markings where available on a decal set of
the F-16 A/B from Isradecals that I possessed. Fate has now dictated this project.
I happened to have the Eduard boxing of the Kinetic F-16A. Seemed like a perfect set-up.
This kit has tons of extra features and an amazing amount of parts and
options. However it also has some very challenging build issues. I am not going to go into each
one, however a couple of notices I will provide.
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1. Why does it take 8 pieces to make a
Tail.
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2. Lots of options on the control surfaces, which made for various fit issues
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3. The nose section alone required a few days of fitting and filling and re-scribing
(see photo 4)
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4.
The Eduard resin exhaust ,while very detailed, did not come close to fitting
the plastic fuselage, lots of cutting and patching (see photo 5)
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5.
Somehow the nose was missing!!! Who knows. I tried Hasegawa nose -not close,
Italeri nose-not close, finally a Monogram F-16 real early kit. Had to add
strakes and used a Master pitot and AOA probes (I love their stuff). Small
(tiny pieces of steel wire was attached to the nose and blended. (see
photo 6)
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6.
The interior is beautiful and packed with tiny bits of details. I really
love the final result (see photo 7)
Click on
images below to see larger images
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photo
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photo
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photo
5
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photo
6
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You have
to really have a passion to get involved in the schemes. Rolled Blu-tack and
tape takes about a week of painting, drying, masking and repeat as necessary.
But I love the Israeli schemes way over the basic Greys and the results are
worth the extra effort in my opinion. (see photo 8 & 9)