1/48 Monogram F-5E Tiger II converted to RF-5E Tiger Eye

Gallery Article by Raja Jamil Ariffin on Aug 31 2012

Malaysia National Day

 

 

Background
The Tentera Udara Diraja Malaysia ( TUDM ) or Royal Malaysia Air Force ( RMAF ) was the first customer to purchase the RF-5E Tigereye reconnaissance aircraft, with examples being acquired in 1983. These operate with No 11 “Cobra” Squadron.  These aircraft operate at the former Australian Air Force Base at Butterworth, Malaysia. They carry the air force designation M-29.

Kit

This is a Monogram kit, as usual the panel lines are all raised. This kit is the F-5E version. 

 

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Construction 
The first task that I did for this kit was to remove all the raised panel lines by using a 400 grit water proof sandpaper. Then I rescribed the entire kit with scriber. The assembly of this kit is quite straight forward.  The first thing I did was the cockpit area. Then glue the fuselage together. The next step was to cut the front nose and glue square plastic strips from plastruk together to form a solid rectangular shaped. Then this part was cut to shape to replicate as RF’s version nose. The rest of the assembly followed as per the instruction sheet. Accept the landing gears I left unassembled, until the body paintwork was done. 

Painting and decaling
I used gunze paint for the entire fuselage 

Happy Merdeka Day 2012

Raja Jamil Ariffin

      

Photos and text © by Raja Jamil Ariffin