This is Italeri’s 1/48 F/A-18E. The particular aircraft I am representing is bureau no. 165791 bird number 212 of VFA-115 Screamin’ Eagles during Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln. This particular bird has some nose art respecting and remembering the lives lost onboard the American Airlines during the terrorist attacks on 9/11.
These are images of the aircraft.

First looking at the kit I saw that the kit cockpit was not very well represented, consisting of just decals, so I got the Black Box Cockpit set, which I feel is a must have for this kit. Also I have used Two Bob’s VFA-115 OIF decals.

As with most models I started in the office. The Black Box Cockpit set for the F/A-18E is superb and well detailed. I had some trouble with the fitting but after sanding and dry fitting, sanding and dry fitting it went in. I also removed the kits glare shield and replaced with the resin one that comes with the BB set. The parts were cleaned, primed and then ready for painting. I sprayed the tub Light Ghost Grey,(Humbrol 127) and the panels just with flat black. When dry it was sealed with Klear/Future and then went and dry brushed some of the raised details with various greys and a touch of white here and there. I also added some yellow in places looking at reference material I had. For the CRT’s I used some clear orange and green, and then sealed with another coat of Klear/Future. Added then some other bits of highlighting and sealed with a flat coat, and a dab of Klear on the CRT’s to give them a glass look. Same process for the bang seat and side panels

The fit of some of the main pieces were terrible, and the intakes were a nightmare to say the least. After getting the main parts glued and set, it was time to get rid of the seam lines using Squadron white putty and various grades of wet ‘n’ dry sand paper. There was a real poor fit when joining the top half of the rear fuselage to the bottom, and I had to fill a major gap using sheet styrene to which filled the majority of the space and the putty took care of the rest. I then sprayed primer over the seam and join lines to look for any inconsistencies along the seams, and then filled and sanded until I was happy that there were non showing.
Next I proceeded to make the alterations to the kit that was needed. First job was to get rid of the rear speed brake as it is not there on the real aircraft, so I filled the area with the speed brake that come with the kit, glued it in place and then filled the gaps with putty and sanded away until it was flush with the surrounding area. Again primed to see any flaws and corrected as necessary. Next was to fill the LEX and spoilers using the same process. I also cut the flaps off at this point so I could display them in the down position.

Next correction was to scratch build the IFF antenna box on the nose. I made this by gluing two sections of 20,000 sheet styrene together. I had plenty of reference material to guide me to the size and position of the box. To make the chamfered front and rear of the box I used Milliput Superfine White and with a wet finger made the chamfer. Again when dry I primed the area for flaws and made the corrections. The front wind shield was then added and blended with putty to the aircraft. The exhaust ports were next, as Italeri had them a polygonal shape, so I used Milliput so fill the gap and then wait about 1 hour until it was fairly hard but still pliable and cut out the rectangle shape for the ports. My last correction was to the wing pylons which needed to be toed out by 4 degrees outboard. For this I rotated the pylons from their front locating hole and moving the rear end of the pylon inboard. IIRC the correction was 1.6mm inboard. There are other corrections to this kit needed, for example panel lines not being right, but I decided to leave the corrections as they were as I am not very experienced in re-scribing panel lines yet and didn’t want try on this model.

It was now time to paint the model for which I used Humbrol enamels. Firstly I gave the model a good clean in soapy water to get rid of all the grease and build up of dirt from wet ‘n’ dry sandpaper, then let it dry. The landing gear bays had a coat of Gloss White (Humbrol 22). I then sprayed primer over the entire model, again kept checking for flaws and correcting as necessary. When the primer was dry I went over the model with one of Squadrons Superfine Sanding sticks and gave the model a blow down with the airbrush. Next I pre-shaded the model over panel lines, access panel etc, with flat black. I also pre-shaded the pylons at this point.

When this was dry I masked off the bottom of the fuselage and filled in the landing gear bays with Blue-Tak ready for a light coat of Light Ghost Grey (Humbrol 127). I started by filling in the centers of the panels along the length of the fuselage. After this I put on a mist coat of 127 slowly blending in the pre-shaded panel lines. While this was drying I put together the weapons and started work on the landing gear and afterburner nozzles. When this first coat had dried I lightened up the Light Ghost Grey with some white and proceeded to apply this on various panels. I then put down some lightened spots and patches along the fuselage and wings to try and replicate touch-ups from ground crews. This was then sprayed over with another mist coat of Light Ghost Grey to blend it all in and try and keep the weathering subtle. Unfortunately I did not have the camera at this point so I don’t have any images of this. The same processes were then applied to the cut flaps and top half the model using Dark Ghost Grey (Humbrol 128). The afterburner nozzles were painted Alclad II Jet exhaust and Humbrol Polished Stell (27003), and then given a wash with oils.

The weapons I have used for this build are the ones that come with kit. This is one part of the kit I really wanted to change but due to lack of stash and money for aftermarket weapons and stores I had to use the kits. I wanted to do this bird in a Wet 5 configuration, boring I know but that’s what I wanted to do. The weapons include 2 Harpoons and 2 HARM’s which were painted gloss white (22), 2 GBU-12’s painted in Matt Olive Drab (155). I created the weapons colour bands by masking with tape. Finally, the center line tank was painted the same way as the rest of the model using Light Ghost Grey (127).

The aircraft sports the markings of VFA-115 Screamin’ Eagles, Two Bobs (48-060), lo-vis scheme. The decals are top quality as can be expected from the guys at Two Bobs, and there are enough markings to do 2 birds. The decals come with the complement of colour references of each aircraft and even common loadout configurations during OIF on the reverse of the sheet. Well recommended.
I left the paint on the model to dry for 2 days and then applied coats of Klear/Future until I got a good flat shine on the model. I let this dry for 24 hours and proceeded to apply the decals. I used Micro Set/Sol to lay them down. When I completed the decals I left the model until the next day which is when I applied another couple of coats of Klear/Future and let that dry and cure.

Once the coats of Klear were dry I loaded the airbrush with some of the base coat extremely thinned down and sprayed a mist coat over the decals to give them a worn and used look. This was then sealed with another coat of Klear. Next came the wash for which I used oil paints thinned with turps and applied to the panel lines, landing bay etc, leave for a couple of hours and wiped over with a dry cloth in the direction of airflow over the aircraft. For some of the more obvious streaks and marks I used my airbrush to build up layers colour to produce the streaks on the upper fuselage and repeated on the lower. Some of the other streaks were created by using oil paint thinned to the consistency of warm butter, apply a small blob where you want the streak, hit it with the hairdryer for a few seconds, the wiped with a dry cloth from front to rear. It was then all finished and sealed with a flat coat over the entire model.

To finish up all the antennas, landing gear, gear doors etc were added.
 

Although the kit has fit issues more or less all over I really enjoyed this build. I have tried a lot of new techniques on this build and I am really pleased how it has came out and I hope you enjoy the pictures. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me.

All the best and happy modeling
Craig
 

Photos © 2006 by Craig McNiece

May 05, 2006

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