GWH 1/48 F-15D Eagle

[JonMW]

Thought I would start on a new bit larger project after doing a bunch of smaller ones. So I looked through the stash and found this nice GWH F-15D. I've bought two Aires seats for it, the rest will be pretty much from the box except for some scratch building.



Started with building the seats and adding the belts. The kit seats looks really good, would just need drill out the handles and maybe add some lap belts. But the Aires ones have some crisper details. However the base of them are a lot shorter and they are missing the pitot tubes on the top of the seat.



So the pitot tubes where cut off the kit seats and added to the resin ones.



Also raised the seats by adding some styrene sheet under the seats.



For the cockpit tub I added a couple of electronics boxes made from styrene rod and lead wire. Also added a cover over the front cockpit storage box made from aluminium foil. I also added some Archer decal rivets to the sides of the cockpit.



The control stick where also extended using styrene rod.



Next I turned my focus to the canopy frame, the kit has some nice details, problem is that most of it is a ducting for the Environment Control System. The ECS was only fitted to the F-15E so it needs to be removed for this F-15D.



There are four ejector pin marks on the bottom of the frame, two small in the middle and two bigger in the back. To fill the two small ones I used a punch and die set to make two small discs.





The punch and die set was too small to use for the bigger epm, so to make the discs for these I used a circle cutter.





Done, added some more details from styrene rod, wire and more rivet decals.





The F-15D was fitted with a fuse panel on the right side of the rear cockpit that is missing from the kit. So this was made from some styrene sheet, rods and PE bolt heads.



The front cowling is missing the HUD camera so I added one from styrene sheet, rods, PE bolt heads and some lead wire.



The rear cowling also received some work, I removed the molded in handle and replaced it with two bits of PE and some wire.



Now it's time to start painting.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Love it all.....modification heaven
Those kit seats are very nicely done if one did not want to purchase resin ones

[JonMW]

Thanks!

Been doing a bit more work on this during the week. The cockpit has been painted and detailed. Except for the detail's added before it's just paint and a bit of oils for weathering.







When the cockpit was done I turned my attention to the avionics bays. They look a bit shallow out of the box so I removed the area between the electronic boxes. I then glued plasticard strips on the back and covered the back with a sheet to add some depth.









I then drilled some holes and added thin lead wires to make it a bit more busy.



Next up is start detailing the radar.

[demarcation]

Awesome detailing on the bays and that cockpit looks absolutely brilliant!! keep up the good work!!!

[JonMW]

Finally time for another update one this. Have been doing some work on the radar.


First up was to add some nose weight before the fuselage was glued together.


The big lip that locates the kit nose cone isn't supposed to be there.




So it was cut off and a sheet of plastic added instead.


This means that the kit supplied bulkhead doesn't fit anymore.


So the kit part was cut apart to supply a couple of details and then more plastic sheet and profiles where added to make a new bulkhead.


The kit radar sit just straight and looks a bit boring.


The kit mount.


So a bit of cutting.


Some more plastic sheet and rod.


And it looks a bit more interesting.


After taking the above photo I was moving the model to the bench behind me, and the radar wasn't attached and I dropped it on the floor. The mount was lying right there on the floor, but the dish is just gone. I have emptied the whole kitchen/man cave and nothing. So I went down to the LHS to see if I could find something useful. This F/A-18 PE radar was the closest and will have to do.


The F/A-18 radar is a bit smaller, so I cut a circle of 0.3 mm plastic.




And started gluing the Pe parts on.


To add a bit more detail I looked around the stash of left over PE and found this 1/72 F6F-3 sheet.


And using the bomb mounts to add a bit more detail.

[sheppsea]

Excellent work

[DrSprue]

Wow.. very cool detailing!

[Twokidsnosleep]

Some amazing detailing, love it all!!!

I am glad I am not the only one who drops stuff and cannot find it on a hardwood floor
I seem to have to christen every part with a holy dip onto the sacred maple wood.....if the floor keeps the sacrifice, all is well

[DrSprue]

Some amazing detailing, love it all!!!

I am glad I am not the only one who drops stuff and cannot find it on a hardwood floor
I seem to have to christen every part with a holy dip onto the sacred maple wood.....if the floor keeps the sacrifice, all is well

Yanno after a few years I really think my floor may have enuff parts to make an entire kit by itself!

[JonMW]

Thanks!

Time for another small update.


Added a couple of holes and cutouts that are missing and filled a recess that where missing.




The elevators has raised detail that is from the F-15E and shouldn't be on the D. So using the raised lines as a guide I scribed new panel lines.


The elevators are also a bit thick and needed some sanding to get the trailing edge to a better thickness.


The navigation lights are all molded in which I'm not a big fan of. So using a PE saw I cut off the light and glued on a piece of clear sprue.




And then sanded and polished it to shape.


As the avionics bays will be open I also wanted the locks on the doors to be open. So the molded in locks where drilled out and replaced with some 0.3mm thick strips.


All ready to start the painting.

[TommyKillander]

Fantastic work, Jon!

The avionics bay and radar looks amazing!


Tommy

[chief5437]

this is superb work, you must have the patience of a saint! keep it up buddy

[DrSprue]

Man, thats alot of crafting!

[JonMW]

Thanks!

Time for a final update on this one. I got a bit caught up in the painting and forgot to take pictures of most of the progress.

I started with a coat of Ultimate black primer and then started with Gunze GX2 gloss black for the metal areas followed by AK Xtreme metals dark aluminium and pale burnt metal. These areas where then masked and the FS36375 from MR Paints where then mottled over the whole plane until full coverage.



The instructions call out for FS36320 for the darker color. I didn't like how the MR Paints one looked, it was too close to the light grey and I couldn't tell the difference. So I added a drop or two of RLM 24 blue just to get it a bit darker and bluer.



I then went over with slightly lightened versions of both colors and added some bleaching to the panels. Next up where the decals, they went down pretty well but there where quite a bit of carrier film on some of the decals and they needed a bit of Micro Sol to lay down.



The radar bulkhead and avionics bays where painted in a custom mix of Mr Hobby blue, green and a drop of metallic blue and green. For the weathering (which I didn't take any pictures of) I first used Ultimate dark dirt wash for the panel lines, most of this was sanded off using the Ultimate buffer. I then added a oil filter/wash to make it a bit more grimy as well as adding some streaks.

The final bits to do was to add the lading gear, I also added a couple of Eduard remove before flight tags and scratch build a pair of FOD covers from plastic card.



More final pictures to follow