HASEGAWA 1/48th SCALE F-14A VF-32 "GYPSY SWORDSMEN"

Coming along very nicely old boy

Thanks guys! I was on a roll all night after numerous glasses of Tomatin and made some headway on the rest of the fuselage. I got the top and bottom sections put together and everything went together well. I got the boat-tail installed and Hasegawa provides a spacer to ensure the fuselage aligns correctly with the tail piece. The intakes will have covers so I left out out the forward engine innards and intake trunks. However, I plan to sand, finish and paint the afterburner cans as no exhaust covers will be on them. I have done this once before on another F-14 so I glued the cans together using a lot of MEK to really make the plastic melt. Once that cures up I can still sand the interior seam down with a long sanding stick and make it smooth. The can is also corrugated on the inside too, which helps. The forward fuselage section, however, has no tabs to mate it to the fuselage joint. Since the nose is heavy from ballast and resin, I added some sheet stock tabs to give the plastic and CA something to grab on to. I have not decided on the load-out yet so I have not drilled the holes for the AIM-54 pallets. If I choose the '89 shoot-down load out the pallets will not be used since VF-32 carried AIM-7s in the wells for that engagement. But if I depict it in post-shootdown config it could have them......we will see. Anyway, stay tuned.

Best wishes!

Ian

Thanks, Paul! Yeah, everything mated together pretty well. The intake lips just needed some clamping because they are so thin and didn't want to lay down.

Best wishes,

Ian

Nice work!

Looking lovely

I made some more progress on the Tomcat this weekend. I prepped the rear fuselage to be joined to the nose section, to start off. If you ever build a Hasegawa Tomcat, this simple trick will save you a lot of fit problems. I placed a plastic rod in the back fuselage half, and shimmed it, to vertically stretch the section so it matches the nose section perfectly. If this is not done, you end up with a nasty stepped seam right across the AIM-7 wells which is a real bitch to sand sand down. The rod and shim worked and the two sections joined nicely as a result. I started sanding and filling on the fuselage next. There are two nasty sink marks right above the swing-wing bearings so I filled those with Tamiya putty. I also added some putty to the rear fuselage section where the top-and-bottom seam is located. This may change, but I think I may build it with the wings forward, slats and flaps dropped and in the shootdown load-out with AIM-7s, AIM-9s and drop tanks. 

Best wishes,

Ian












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Shaping up nicely now Ian  B)

Great tip on the bracing rod, I’ve used this before on larger kits to give some strength to the fuselage at the wing roots as not many kits provide wing spars. 

Coming together rather nicely Ian and a great tip as well

Great work so far my friend! Looks great!