This is
Hasegawa 1/72 F/A-18D Hornet. I build it strictly OOB except adding some
weapons from Hasegawa 1/72 US Missiles set and F4Dables TUDM’s Hornet
decals sheet. The kit was quite easy to build & I only encounter a few
gaps during building process (easily be solved with help of some putty,
acetone & Mr Surfacer treatment).
The stock ejection seat was very crude & unrealistic. Since I opted an
OOB way & SJU-17 in 1/72 was hard to find in LHS, I had to stick with
it & added a seatbelts made from masking tape to boost up its pity
look.
TUDM’s bug was covered with wrap-around gunship grey colour. Since my
old & cheap compressor give up on me last month, I have to use
industrial spray can to paint this bug. I use Nippon Paint Dark Grey for
this project. Surprisingly, the color was quite match with FS31118 Gunship
Grey.
Weathering was a must for TUDM’s bug since TUDM use it almost everyday
for training & patrolling sorties (think about reliability of US
jets!). For this project, I try to experiment with the eye shadows as a
weathering medium. The result was good & I’m completely satisfied
with the result.
After weathering session, I sprayed two coat of Gunze Gloss coat for decal
application. F4Dables’s decals adhered perfectly without any decal
solution. However, silvering do occurred on some spots. Perhaps it was my
own mistake not to evenly spray the gloss coat on the kit.
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images below to see larger images
While waiting
for the gloss coat dried, I prepare & brush painted all the small
items such as landing gears, landing gear doors,small antennas,pylon etc.
Then, all small items was attached to the kit & I sprayed the Gunze
Flat coat for the final coat.
Heard that during Ambalat border crisis last year, a pair of Hornets was
stationed at
Kuching
AB
for ?some kind of training purpose? . The Hornet was sighted armed with
live Harpoon! Live Harpoon for training purpose? Phewwww!!!
To add the excitement, on the same time, TNI-AU dispatched 4 F-16A to be
stationed at
Kalimantan
also for ?training purpose & normal patrolling?. Fortunately, nothing
major was happened (except our navy scratch their boat with TNI-AL?s boat)
& everyone live happily ever after.. :-}
So, I decided to
portray the Hornet during that Ambalat crisis, heavily weathered (they thundered
thru all kind of tropical weather from Butterworth to Kuching) & come with
complete live weaponry. I choose to add 1x AIM-7M, 2x AGM-84A, 2x AGM-65 &
2x AIM-9S Sidewinder to the bug. All items from 1980s Hasegawa 1/72 US Missiles
set.
I completely satisfied with this kit & definitely build more if I got the
chance. Adios!
Mohd
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images below to see larger images
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