F-16E Block 60 - Mike builds a modern Jet

[janmplat]

Looks great Mike! I have had contact with the seller and he sends me the missing parts!

I have glued the 2 fuselage haves together, its notnas good as the Tamiya one, but with some elbow grease it will look nice!

Jan

[Mike]

Looks great Mike! I have had contact with the seller and he sends me the missing parts!

I have glued the 2 fuselage haves together, its notnas good as the Tamiya one, but with some elbow grease it will look nice!

Jan

Excellent and thanks for the kind words I love it when things go well

I'm currently spraying up the outsides of the exhaust, which looks like it'll need almost all of my various shades of Alclad. I've seen a few examples of the outer casing behind the exhaust petals that has blued with the heat, and am thinking of adding a little Hot Metal clear blue to give a bit of interest to the area. Lots of masking to go yet though

[Bandwagon 106]

Looks good Mike, looks just a bit different than the YF-16, and yet....

Those CFTs turn it into a bit of a beast don't they?

Keep it up

Joel

[Mike]

Cheers Joel - they do give it an extra purposeful look, don't they? Just finished spraying the exhaust petals now... pics in a minute

[Mike]

... quite a complex colorscheme on the F-16's exhaust, so plenty of colors and masking to be done First off was a coat of Finy Ally followed by a narrow strip around the little ledge between the petals and the shroud. Then the shroud was sprayed with a coat of Jet Exhaust with an overspray of a little Hot Metal Clear Blue to add a bit of extra depth to the color. I then masked the shroud and sprayed Stainless Steel on the petals.

I then masked each petal off leaving the darker inter-petal area bare, and shot Jet Exhaust into those gaps. I unmasked the petals and with a temporary mask on each petal in turn sprayed a little Transparent Smoke onto the opposite edge to dirty it up a little. Once it's nice and dry, a little Mig wash will be used to make the detail pop, although I've yet to decide what color to use

[Calum]

Nice work to date Mike. Watching this one with interest

[Gary C]

Excellent and thanks for the kind words I love it when things go well

I'm currently spraying up the outsides of the exhaust, which looks like it'll need almost all of my various shades of Alclad. I've seen a few examples of the outer casing behind the exhaust petals that has blued with the heat, and am thinking of adding a little Hot Metal clear blue to give a bit of interest to the area. Lots of masking to go yet though

Looking good so far...one small point. The donut panel forward of the nozzle is a burnt metallic blue on the P&W engined jets only. On GE engined aircraft like the block 60's it is actually satin black, some sort of carbon composite I believe.

http://data3.primeportal.net/hangar/sal_pr...ip_03_of_11.jpg

[janmplat]

Or take a look at this walk around.

F-16 E/F Walk around

Good luck

Jan

[NickParker]

That exhaust looks great, Mike out of interest do you spray alclad direct on to the plastic or use a primer first ? Reason being i really like the results people get with this, i've armed myself with a load of the metal and heat simulating finishes but have yet to use them in anger.

Nick

[Mike]

Looking good so far...one small point. The donut panel forward of the nozzle is a burnt metallic blue on the P&W engined jets only. On GE engined aircraft like the block 60's it is actually satin black, some sort of carbon composite I believe.

http://data3.primeportal.net/hangar/sal_pr...ip_03_of_11.jpg

It is quite black... not too tricky to re-mask off. Does it stay that way though?

That exhaust looks great, Mike out of interest do you spray alclad direct on to the plastic or use a primer first ? Reason being i really like the results people get with this, i've armed myself with a load of the metal and heat simulating finishes but have yet to use them in anger.

Nick

Cheers Nick I pretty much prime everything I paint out of the habit of using acrylics really. It's a good idea to prime anything being metalised anyway though, as the primer will show any imperfections, which would stick out like a sore thumb under metallic paint To get a REALLY shiny chrome though, they recommend a primer coat of gloss black - otherwise, any color (within reason) primer will do

[Gary C]

It is quite black... not too tricky to re-mask off. Does it stay that way though?

Yep, black, black or black I'm afraid. Never seen anything different. The F-14B/D uses the same GE F110 engine and also has the same black carbon composite style surround, it doesn't weather or change colour either.

http://www.cybermodeler.net/aircraft/f-14/...01cag_buno2.jpg

http://www.cybermodeler.net/aircraft/f-14/...sm_f-14d_03.jpg

[Mike]

After finishing my Pak44 the other day, I thought it was about time to pick up the cudgel again on this one.

There are quite a lot of landing gear parts, so I've installed most of them in layers to allow me to airbrush them in stages, so they all end up white. I've just got 2 more support struts to add to the MLG, and then I can pop the lid on the middle of the bay. A word of caution here - make sure you test fit the cover well before gluing, as mine didn't fit too well. I've shaved and trimmed it a little, and it now fits flush. The nose gear fits together quite easily, but for the fact that the main support strut isn't numbered in the instructions. I spotted it in the diagram however, and recognised it as part C7.

I can't upload pics at the moment, so I'll add them later

[Alan P]

Missed this before Mike, looks like a nice kit!

As for "it's my first attempt at a <modern jet>" - well if you have the skills, you can transfer them as long as you've got a good "modeller's eye", and you clearly have!

Al

[Mike]

Cheers Al I'm hoping to be able to upload some pictures of progress soon, but there's an issue at my exchange which is preventing me from uploading, so I'm a bit hamstrung for now.

Yesterday's work involved finishing off the landing gear, adding all the intakes, exhausts aerials & widgets that seem to festoon this jet - I'm surprised it manages to go forwards at all!!! Construction is all over bar the shouting, and I've moved on to constructing the weaponry that's going aboard.

Using some pics of a loadout used on an exercise, I'm going for Winders on the outer pylons, Mk.31s on the inner pylons, and the pod (and there's a LOT of differing designations on various websites out there) under the intake. I'm leaving the wingtip winder rails empty, as they often seem to fly that way. I could do with some reference pics of the bare rails though, as the kit parts are designed to be loaded with Winders, so have no attachment point detail.

If anyone can help on that, I'd be grateful

[AnonymousDFB1]

...I'm hoping to be able to upload some pictures of progress soon, but there's an issue at my exchange which is preventing me from uploading, ...

Call that an excuse

Looking forward to seeing them Mike. I'll have a look through my F-16 library in a bit an see what I can fin for you.

[AnonymousDFB1]

This any help?

Sorry got no close ups (unless I find any after some more digging)

[Scarlet]

Any good?

http://www.f-16.net/gallery_item45788.html

[Mike]

You're both wonderful! Looks like I have a bit of digging out of plastic to do

[Stephen]

http://www.arcair.com/AWA1/501-600/walk528_F-16_Toth/07.jpg

http://www.arcair.com/AWA1/501-600/walk528_F-16_Toth/16.jpg

Is this any help?

Stephen

Edited September 13, 2010 by Stephen

[Mike]

Yep - both great, thanks Stephen

[Mike]

Here are the pictures to go with post #37

Now I've got the CFTs etc. on, as per post #39, and what little modelling time I've had today has seen me mostly filling seams and polishing the bombs up nice & smooth. Still a bit more work to do on the winders. The canopy has been polished back to clear again, as I wasn't happy with the previous job, and I dipped it in Klear yesterday. There's a kit sill part that I need to attach, so I'll have to check if it needs painting first before I commit to gluing it.

I need to paint the turtle deck behind the pilot before I can attach the rear part of the canopy... more rooting round photos to find out what color that should be. I'd guess it'll be the same as the external scheme, but it's always worth checking

I suspect those static wicks are a bit overscale, so I'll check & chop them off if necessary.

[Jens]

I need to paint the turtle deck behind the pilot before I can attach the rear part of the canopy... more rooting round photos to find out what color that should be. I'd guess it'll be the same as the external scheme, but it's always worth checking

Nice progress Mike! The colour behind the canopy is all black.

HTH,

Jens

[Mike]

A bit of Panzer Grey it is then, thanks

[periklis_sale]

great work so far mate!

[TRUSKY1965]

Nice build! I think one of the most well made f-16 that i ever seen! The cockpit and the nozzle are awesome! I'll see forward for your progress!

Regards, TRUSKY1965.