1/32 Tamiya F-14D Tomcat

Gallery Article by Phillip Roache on Apr 25 2011

ANZAC Day 2011

 

 I completed this nearly 1 year ago, and only now have I found the time to put it on ARC. I apologise for the bad photos. I had to rush to take the photos as the model is now elsewhere. This is only my 2nd submission to ARC, my first was a CH-53E back in December 2007.

This model started out as the "Black Knights" F-14A Tomcat. It ended up being a quite expensive and at times frustrating project as it was turned into an F-14D of the Bounty Hunters. This project was 3/4 complete when Trumpeter released their F-14D. If I had only waited.......

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 A lot of money was spent on this kit to change it to what it became, and it took nearly a year to complete. I don't need to go into the well known and infamous shortcomings of this big kit.

 I think I'll just list what was added;

  • A Cutting Edge resin F-14D airframe modification

  • A Cutting Edge cockpit super set

  • A Black Box resin cockpit set

  • An Eduard placard set

  • An Eduard interior set

  • An Eduard exterior set

  • Zotz VF-2 Bounty Hunter decals

  • Wolfpack resin late model wheel type set

  • Turned steel Alpha and AOA probes (I can't recall what brand they were.)

  • Eduard masks

  • Plenty of Gunze and Tamiya paint

 Firstly, I cut the fuselage up and replaced what needed to be replaced to make it a D model Tomcat.

 I used bits and pieces from both cockpit sets, and in my opinion, the Black Box resin parts were slightly better than the Cutting Edge ones.

 I didn't use all the placards, or all the parts from the interior and exterior sets.

 The decals settled well but were quite thick and I made a big mistake with the stripes on the forward fuselage. I only realised after I had sprayed clear over it all.

 Firstly, I cut the fuselage up and replaced what needed to be replaced to make it a D model Tomcat.

 I used bits and pieces from both cockpit sets, and in my opinion, the Black Box resin parts were slightly better than the Cutting Edge ones.

 I didn't use all the placards, or all the parts from the interior and exterior sets.

 The decals settled well but were quite thick and I made a big mistake with the stripes on the forward fuselage. I only realised after I had sprayed clear over it all. I also made a massive error with the intakes, I got lazy and didn't bother with puttying the edge of the plastic card I had placed in the intakes. For weathering I used several different shades of grey, and diluted watercolour artist paint.

Greetings from Australia. 

Phillip Roache

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Photos and text © by Phillip Roache