FROG D.H. Vampire FB.5

On the heels of the FROG Gloster Meteor (see previous post) is this 1/72 scale DeHavilland Vampire 5. As I mentioned earlier, Al Letcher gave me one of these along with the Meteor kit, and they made a great pair. Back in the 70s, FROG's FB.5 was the only Vampire model kit available. Heller came out with another FB.5 in the 80s, but I have a hunch they got the molds from FROG when FROG went out of business. The FB.5 differed from Al's Mk. III Vampire in that the MK. III had rounded wing tips. At any rate, FROG's little kit was close enough to Al's Vampire and I liked having it in my collection, especially having seen it fly on several occasions at Mojave Airport.
I have faint memories of my original Vampire assembled. I can't remember if I painted it or not, or whether or not I built it wheels down or up. In rebuilding this kit, I chose to do it wheels up in memory of watching this great airplane in flight. The RAF camouflage scheme was hand painted, while the underside was spray painted with Testors silver metallic. I did not have a pre-mixed bottle of dark sea gray, so I tried mixing different colors to get the right shade. It was rather difficult, and after wasting too much paint, I settled with a shade I think is too blue. Nevertheless, a foot away or more it looks acceptable.

At some point in the future I may wish to model Al's Vampire using the 1/48 scale Hobbycraft Vampire Mk. III. It would go well with the Classic Airframes 1/48 scale Meteor N.F. 11. There is a less expensive option however to do both in 1/72 scale since Amodel from Russia has recently released a Vampire Mk. III, which would go well with the Matchbox Meteor N.F.

Hasegawa A-4E Skyhawk

The 1/72 scale Douglas A-4E/F Skyhawk was either my second or third Hasegawa model. Judging from Squadron Mail Order ads in old SCALE MODELER magazines, this kit appeared in the U.S. around 1973. The one I got originally like the one shown here is the second issue from 1974 (it's hard to tell though because Hasegawa and their U.S. subsidiary Minicraft never dated anything!) The quality of this kit is far superior to the F-104J and the Mig-21. The parts are cleanly molded in light gray, with hardly any flash at all. My original one from '76 looked pretty good; I left the upper body and wings in the natural gray plastic, and hand-painted the underside flat white. I built the Marine Corps "E" version with drop tanks and two Bull Pup missiles.
For this rebuild, I spray-painted the upper surfaces gloss light sea gray, with gloss white under-surfaces. In homage to my original, I did the same Marine Corps version but this time I left the tanks and missiles off. The Skyhawk is a pretty sleek-looking little hot rod; and although it would have been unlikely for a Marine A-4E to go into combat with nothing but the twin 20MM guns, it's not impossible to imagine a slick Skyhawk going up for a test or training flight. That's the look I wanted - a slick underside to accentuate the plane's hot rod-iness.
A test of one of the original decals revealed they were too brittle to use without Micro Decal Film, so I put some on and they went on fine. The gloss surface helped them adhere without much trouble or additional products.
This is a nice little kit to have on display again, and reminds me of my later days of modeling at the house on J-5. There are only several more kits to go before a major transition comes in the history of my boyhood model airplane building.

Crushed Fishbed! The first of several models that never made it to the shelf

At some point during my time at J-5 I bought a Hasegawa MiG-21 Fishbed like the one shown here. This was another kit I remember working on in my garage while my friend Phil worked on a kit of his own. Phil let me use his Humbrol paints to replicate the camouflage scheme shown on the box cover. The Humbrol colors had a strong odor and were slow to dry. I put the Fishbed on some paper towels to dry, and for some reason, laid it on the garage floor near the doorway into the house. Dumb! While Phil and I took a break inside, my Dad walked into the garage for something and stepped right on the MiG, crushing it. When Phil and I went back into the garage to resume construction, I saw my Fishbed laying there in pieces, tacky, stinky paint and all. I was bummed, but once again it was my fault. This was the second model destroyed by accidental crushing (see Aurora C-141A) and the first of several that never made it to my shelves. I'm covering these thwarted kits for completeness, but I'm choosing not to rebuild them.

FROG Gloster Meteor Mk.IV

There's a much bigger story around this FROG 1/72 scale Gloster Meteor Mk. IV than just having built it when I was eleven years old. The bigger story is, I got to spend time with a real Meteor at Mojave Airport. It was owned by Al Letcher, and was actually an Armstrong Whitworth N.F. 11, later converted to a TT-20 target tow vehicle. Al also owned a DeHavilland Vampire Mk. III, and at the time (1976) they were the oldest two jet aircraft flying in the United States. I came to know Al because my Mom got a job as his secretary at The Letcher Mint in Lancaster. Al minted tokens for Las Vegas and Reno casinos, and also commemorative coins for the collector's market. His desire back in those days was to own and operate a Royal Air Force museum there at Mojave. He got off to a pretty good start with the Vampire and Meteor, and later a Hawker Hunter! But by the mid 1980s his interest wandered to helicopters, and all three jets were eventually sold. The Meteor now sits in a museum at Edwards AFB. But for those few glorious years in the late seventies, Al's Meteor graced the skies over the Antelope Valley. It was even used in the WONDER WOMAN T.V. series episode, "The Feminine Mystique" guised as America's new secret weapon, the 'XPJ-1'.

As I mentioned in my post about the Grumman HU-16E Albatross, Mojave Airport was a magical place for a plane-crazy kid like me. Al's own aircraft made the place even more exciting. Al would let me sit in the cockpits of the Meteor and the Vampire, and that was a real privilege. He even let me scrub the underside of the Meteor with kerosene! How many 11-year old kids get to do that? I treasure the memories of Al and his wife Ada; they were like family to me. Al knew I liked to build model airplanes so he gave me a FROG Meteor MK. IV kit along with a FROG Vampire FB.5. I remember him telling me there weren't any models available of the exact variations of his Meteor and Vampire, and that the two FROG kits were about as close as one could get. I didn't care, they were model airplanes and I was thrilled to receive them and put them together. They were prized items in my collection, and I even refurbished the Meteor when I was in High School. I gave it a coat of silver with my airbrush, and put some new decals on it.

My rebuild pictured here was a bagged kit I found at a model swap meet in Missouri, but I later found an empty box for it on EBay. The kit was missing the display stand and the pitot tube, but that was okay. I knew I was going to build it wheels-down and the pitot tube would easily be replaceable with either plastic or brass wire. It was fun to build again, and easy to paint since the whole thing is silver. The original decals were thick, but went on fine. I love having this model back on the shelf. It meant a lot to me to as a kid, and still does today.
I should mention also that Matchbox eventually came out with an A.W. Meteor NF in 1/72 scale as well as Classic Airframes, who released a beautiful but dreadfully expensive Meteor NF in 1/48 scale. In 2006 I built a Matchbox Meteor to look like the XPJ-1 from WONDER WOMAN. I put it up for auction on EBay as a one-of-a-kind collector's item, but it didn't generate many bids. I might do another one later to match Al's white 'Mojave Meteor' from days gone past. Al painted the meteor gloss white, and put RAF roundels on it. He knew this wasn't historically accurate, but was more concerned about keeping the aircraft cool since it was kept outdoors in the hot desert sun.

Airfix 1/72 USAF F-86D Sabre "Dog"

Sometime in 1976 I sat down at my Dad's workbench in the garage, and with Paul McCartney & Wing's "Let 'em In" on the radio, I started work on my second Airfix model kit, the F-86D Sabre. I remember being impressed with the quality of this model; the parts seemed to fit better than most kits I had built up to that time. I hand-painted a few parts such as the radome and anti-glare panel, but left the rest in the natural silver-gray plastic.

When it came to rebuilding this kit 36 years later, I knew it had to be shinier than the dull plastic color. I wanted it to look like the one on the box art, so I sprayed it with Testors chrome; which in my opinion is the poor-man's version of Liqua-Plate or some such other esoteric hobby product intended to replicate bare aluminum. I think it looks good and somewhat vintage-like. After all, if one really wanted to stay within this kit's original context, that is, an English kid in 1975 would have brush painted it with Airfix or Humbrol silver, it would look a lot like my rebuild pictured below.

I really enjoyed building this model again, as I have with most of the others. Maybe it's because my memories of doing so the first time are still so vivid. One thing I did differently the second time was to build it 'gear up' like the one on the box top. One reason for this is the nose wheel piece is famous for its weak strut, which breaks very easily. I remember my original breaking several times right where the nose wheel forms with the compression cylinder. I say this is "famous" because it's mentioned in the review of this model in a 1976 issue of SCALE MODELER magazine. Another reason is I like the way the Sabre looks in flight mode with the wing tanks. So why not forget the gear this time? I know there are modelers out there who absolutely have to have a wheels-down model every time. But for me, it's nice not to have mess with the extra assembly and painting every now and then.

This is one of my favorite Airfix kits because it was still pretty new when I bought it the first time, and is an excellent quality kit. This rebuild may not be the last time I'll build one of these.  

Hasegawa's Classic 1/72 F-104J

The 1/72 scale Lockheed F-104J is the first model kit by Hasegawa I ever built. I bought it at Peterson's on a shopping trip with my friend Phil. I remember painting a few details on it such as the white wing tops and black anti-glare panel, but that was about it. It remained in my collection up until we moved from J-5.
Building this kit again was fun, but I was surprised at the low quality of the parts. The F-104J must have been one of Hasegawa's early airplane kits because the parts do not fit well, and the plastic is molded in a hard, brittle, silver-gray. There was a fair amount of flash on some parts. At some point in the early 70s Hasegawa must have had a quality improvement initiative, because other kits such as the A-4E Skyhawk (post forthcoming) are like night and day compared to this one.
For this rebuild I chose the Japan Air Self Defense Force version "666", same as my original. Instead of leaving the fuselage bare plastic though, I sprayed it with Testors primer gray, which seemed to match the Federal Standard shade of gray recommended on the instruction sheet. For the shiny aluminum part around the tail pipe, and the canopy framework I used metal foil with Micro Metal Foil Adhesive. I chose to omit the under wing fuel tanks and Sidewinder missiles in order to keep the Starfighter's sleek appearance. I don't think Hasegawa ever released an airplane model kit with a display stand, so wheels down is always the "option" unless one wishes to hang their kit from the ceiling.

This is an okay kit, not my favorite, but it was fun to revisit. I'm looking forward to rebuilding Hasegawa's better kits such as the A-4E, Mig-25, and Thunderbirds T-38.

Monogram Douglas TBD-1 Devastator

The Monogram 1/48 scale TBD-1 Devastator was the most advanced model kit I built during my early days on J-5. I remember buying it at Peterson's; my friend Phil was with me, and he pointed it out. Phil was a more experienced modeler than I was, and he liked large kits with lots of detail. I on the other hand had bought mostly reissues of older kits from the 50s and 60s. On the day I got the Devastator, Phil got a Hasegawa 1/32 Boeing P-26 Peashooter. We took our kits home and starting building immediately. Phil let me use some of his paints, and I put the TBD together fairly well. It was one of my pride & joy kits on the shelf.
Monogram released the TBD kit in 1974. It was a time of renewal for Monogram; they hit a low spot in quality in 1970, and came back in 1973 with their 1/72nd scale F-82 Twin Mustang. In '74 they released a 1/72 F-15A Eagle, and three 1/48 scale WWII airplanes: P-61 Black Widow, Do-335 Arrow, and TBD-1 Devastator - all fine kits. There were two versions of the TBD-1 released within a short period of each other. The original release in 1974 was packaged in a "tall box" and included a black & white pamphlet on building dioramas by Shep Paine. It shows a crashed TBD in the water during the battle of Midway. Later editions were packaged in a "short box" and did not include the diorama sheet. On the short box version, the nice color picture panels of the factory model on the box sides are cropped on the top and bottom, and part of the lithography on the box top is rearranged. I got the original 1974 version at Peterson's, and for my rebuild, I found a sealed one on EBay. There are however tons of later "short box" versions up for auction.
When I started on this rebuild, I took each step very slowly, and painted each piece as I went along. This was a more time-consuming method of construction, but it reduced some problems such as over-spray and touch up during final assembly and painting. I chose to make the pre-war version with silver fuselage and yellow wings & tail. I used Tamiya spray yellow, which is a fine product, but it's a little thinner than Testors, and did not cover the ribs on the wings very well. About seven coats were required to get it acceptable. Because the kit was still factory sealed, I expected the decals to be like new as well. Just the opposite was the case - they were dried-up and almost completely unusable. I was extremely disappointed; all the other vintage Monogram kits I had rebuilt up to this point had decals that gave me no trouble. I didn't want to have to buy another TBD kit in hopes of getting a good decal sheet, so I soldiered on with the originals using two thick coats of Micro Decal Film, Micro Set, and Micro Sol. A lot of TLC was needed to apply each decal, especially those on the wings which had to conform over the ribbing. After the decals dried, I coated them when Testors clear acrylic, and Micro Coat Gloss. It took almost as long to put the decals on this model as it did to assemble it- about a month all together.