Tomcat's 1/72 Academy A-10A Thunderbolt II "Killer Chick"

[Tomcat64]

My entry into this GB will be Academy's 1/72 A-10A Thunderbolt II - "Operation Iraqi Freedom". I've only built one jet since returning to building and that was a couple of years back with mixed results so I decided it was time to fish another one off the stash and give it a go.


This kit was originally released in 1988 and has been re-boxed several times since, but the moulding still looks crisp with very little in the way of flash or seams on first inspection


The instructions are contained on one side of a single sheet and seem pretty straightforward


The flip side has the painting/decaling schemes


I'm expecting the decals to take longer than the build


I like to display my aircraft in flight for the most part so was disappointed to find that there was no driver included which means that I'll have to fit one in from this set


Here's the information about the A-10 from the kit instruction sheet:
With a nickname of “Warthog”, it’s quite clear that the Fairchild A-10 is not a pretty aircraft! However, beauty was not a part of the concept behind this formidable attack plane. Mounted in its nose is one of the deadliest weapons ever to cruise the skies. Called the GAU-8/A Avenger, it is a 30mm cannon capable of firing up to 70 rounds of heavy ammunition per second! With a muzzle velocity of ¾ mile per second, the shell is intended to penetrate even the strongest tank hull. The A-10, officially called the Thunderbolt II, was actually designed around the big cannon. The strange-looking shape of the A-10 was a result of trying to provide as much protection for the pilot as possible. For example, the twin turbofan engines are mounted between the wings and stabilizers to protect them from debris and to shield the infrared signature of the exhaust from heat-seeking missiles. The pilot rides in an armoured “bucket” and the plane is designed to return to base even though seriously damaged. Another means of survivability is the great manoeuvrability of the A-10. It can turn quickly and sharply, even evading radar directed guns. At 172mph the plane can turn within a tight 900ft circle. At 350mph it can turn within 1200ft. A-10s are intended to operate in pairs, their first targets being anti-aircraft weapons. For the planes carry AGM-65 Mavericks, a self guiding missile which seeks out its targets. Then the big cannon is used to destroy any unfortunate armour in the area. The A-10 carries up to 8 tons of weapons on eight wing and three fuselage pylons. Fully loaded the Thunderbolt II has a maximum speed of 423mph. It is a large plane, with a wingspan of 57ft 6in and is powered by a pair of General Electric TF34 engines producing 9,065lbs thrust each.

And a couple of photos from my own collection taken at RIAT in 2015


This is what happens when you misjudge inflight refuelling


And a couple I can't claim credit for






I'm going to be building this out of the box and having my first go with one of these grey on grey camo schemes.

Update: I've done some more research into the scheme I'm going to be using for this build and have found some interesting information about Captain Kim Campbell - call-sign "Killer Chick" and her mission in Iraq in 2003.

From Wiki:
Kim Nichole Reed-Campbell is an American officer and Senior Pilot in the U.S. Air Force who currently serves as a Military Assistant to the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy at the United States Department of Defense. She was decorated for piloting her A-10 Thunderbolt II back to base in southern Iraq after taking heavy anti-aircraft artillery (AAA) damage in aerial combat over Baghdad during Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. After her tour of duty in Iraq ended, Campbell gave lectures throughout the United States about her experience, including one at the National Air and Space Museum. Kim Campbell was promoted to the rank of Major in the autumn of 2006.

April 2003 incident

The damage occurred when she was flying a mission over Baghdad on April 7, 2003. "We did our job with the guys there on the ground, and as we were on our way out is when I felt the jet get hit. It was pretty obvious — it was loud... I lost all hydraulics instantaneously, and the jet rolled left and pointed toward the ground, which was an uncomfortable feeling over Baghdad. It didn't respond to any of my control inputs." She tried several procedures to get the aircraft under control, none of which worked; last, she put the plane into manual reversion, meaning she was flying the aircraft without hydraulics. The aircraft immediately responded. "The jet started climbing away from the ground, which was a good feeling because there was no way I wanted to eject over Baghdad." With some technical advice from her flight leader, Lieutenant Colonel Turner, she flew the injured plane for an hour back to the air base. "The jet was performing exceptionally well. I had no doubt in my mind I was going to land that airplane." Landing was tricky: "When you lose all the hydraulics, you don't have speed brakes, you don't have brakes, and you don't have steering."

For this action in aerial combat she was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.

On the ground it was discovered that her A-10 had sustained damage to one engine and to the redundant hydraulic systems, disabling the flight controls, landing gear and brakes, and horizontal stabilizer. A detailed inspection revealed hundreds of holes in the airframe and that large sections of the stabilizer and hydraulic controls were missing.

"She's one of the few pilots who ever landed the A-10 in the manual mode," said General Richard Myers, USAF, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Thanks for looking!

[Lysus]

Someday I'll do a Warthog, someday...in the mean time I'll watch yours and Mark's

[MarkVerploeg]

Nice to see another warthog
And in a completely different scheme aswell as i am going for the green on green and some more green version of the early 90's
Good luck with the build

[Stokesy44]

That is one dog-ugly aeroplane mate!

[Twokidsnosleep]

Good luck on your build, awesome choice

One of my favourite planes..tough, armed to the teeth and ugly as hell. So ugly it is beautiful
I am in the front row cheering you on

[ElCapitan]

Good to see two A-10's in this GB, looking forward to seeing two different approaches, as I really want to build one of these in the future!

[Tomcat64]

Nice to see another warthog
And in a completely different scheme aswell as i am going for the green on green and some more green version of the early 90's
Good luck with the build

Thanks Mark - I love that green on green on green camo that they used - looking forward to seeing it come together.

That is one dog-ugly aeroplane mate!

Good luck on your build, awesome choice

One of my favourite planes..tough, armed to the teeth and ugly as hell. So ugly it is beautiful
I am in the front row cheering you on

Good to see two A-10's in this GB, looking forward to seeing two different approaches, as I really want to build one of these in the future!

Thanks guys - I'm probably going to need some help & advice from the jet experts on this one so stay tuned As for being ugly well I guess it is, but I always think of it in the same way as the Apache in that if it's pointing at you then you are left in no doubt that you're in trouble!

[Avgas]

Nice choice. I don't think it's ugly, more 'functional'...

[PrivatePublic]

It's a plane strapped to a gun, I don't think elegance was given much consideration

[snowman819]

I've always loved the A10.Totally awesome plane which does its job well.
They just can't retire that plane.No matter how hard they try.

[Tomcat64]

Nice choice. I don't think it's ugly, more 'functional'...

It's a plane strapped to a gun, I don't think elegance was given much consideration

I've always loved the A10.Totally awesome plane which does its job well.
They just can't retire that plane.No matter how hard they try.

Yep I think you're all right and "functional" is definitely the best word for it! Thanks for looking in

So I grabbed a couple of hours at the bench yesterday and managed to get started. The first thing I realised was that this was my first 1/72 aircraft for a while having been playing with 1/48 aircraft and 1/35 armour for the most part recently, so the first thing to do was try and refocus my eyes down for the scale.

First up was the cockpit - the tub was a single casting, with three parts making up the seat and a single piece for the stick - nothing too dramatic here:


Then to see if the Hasegawa pilot would fit:


Decided to drop his left arm down onto the controls with a cut & glue; the join will be filled with a little CA. May also do a little more work to try and get his right hand fitted on the stick a little better as well as tidying up the visible seam lines


The tub fits on top of the nose wheel bay, so put that together next. There's a couple of nasty sink marks in here but since it'll be wheels up I won't bother sorting these out


The wheel bay section then fits onto the lower fuselage, but the join here is a little vague to say the least with a couple of mm of play so I think I'm going to position & fix this when I fit the two fuselage halves together and see where everything is supposed to line up


So for now just added the tub to the top of the gear bay - as much as anything else it'll act as something to hold while painting the cockpit


I then switched attention to the engines and started putting these together, again nothing too dramatic except for a couple of sink marks. The end of the jet pipes look a little irregular to me so I'm going to see if they need sanding down a little when I clean the joins up as I think they should probably be as close to circular as possible.


And then the wings - just three pieces here


Some cleaning up needed along the leading edges especially where the parts were attached to the sprue as there are a couple of bit marks to deal with. The bite marks in the leading edges is something I seem to come up on fairly regularly with aircraft kits so any advice on how to avoid it if possible would be welcome as it seems to happen whether I cut close or cut further away and then sand back when taking the wings off the sprue frame.


So that's all for this weekend - hopefully I'll grab a few hours in the evenings this week to keep this ticking along.

Thanks for looking

[Avgas]

Good start Neil. The bite marks might be able to be blended in if they are not too deep, other than that a touch of filler is all that's needed. As for preventing them, just be careful! Some kit manufacturers are better than others at getting the sprue gates right, some will be thick and go right into the part itself and others will have just a tiny smidgen to cut off.

[Tomcat64]

Good start Neil. The bite marks might be able to be blended in if they are not too deep, other than that a touch of filler is all that's needed. As for preventing them, just be careful! Some kit manufacturers are better than others at getting the sprue gates right, some will be thick and go right into the part itself and others will have just a tiny smidgen to cut off.

Thanks Dave. The bite marks were a little frustrating as I thought I'd clipped them cleanly so definitely an area I'll be paying more attention to in the future.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Make sure you paint a big grin on that pilot.....after all he gets to fire that cool gun

[Tomcat64]

Make sure you paint a big grin on that pilot.....after all he gets to fire that cool gun

That's what these decals are for, right??

[Twokidsnosleep]

indeed

[Tomcat64]

Ok - got this covered

[Tomcat64]

I've spent a few evenings this week pottering away in the cockpit as well as doing a little research on the pilot that flew the aircraft I'm going to be building (see the updated intro for more information)...

Here's the pilot "Killer Chick" in paint - brush painted using Vallejo model-colour with a dark clay wash to add some shading


and the office - again brush painted primarily using Vallejo model-air dark gull grey. There was no raised detail for the instrument panels so the decals have been laid down with microset and microsol, given a quick coat of Alclad Aqua gloss to seal them, and then AK Ultra Matte to dull them back down again


Here is the pilot installed


While that was settling down I switched to the engines - the fit is ok but not great, and as you can see here I missed some join lines which showed up after the first rough coat of metallic paint (obviously tired eyes when viewing after priming)


So I filled and tidied them up and recoated and then sealed up the top and bottom halves of the engine section. Again the joins weren't great and I've had to lose some small panel lines whilst sanding down which I'll try and rescribe a little later - this still needs some tidying up


Then it was on to installing the cockpit into the fuselage; as mentioned earlier the instructions indicated that the cockpit should be fitted to the lower fuselage panel first, but since the fit there was vague I installed that panel into the left half of the fuselage, and then installed the cockpit into that assembly to get everything lined up


And finally for this update I sealed up the two fuselage halves. I've also tidied up the edges of the wings, and in this shot the wings, elevator section and engines are all dry-fitted as much as anything to help hold the fuselage together in place. I've also checked to make sure the canopy has clearance over the pilots head - something I've run foul of on previous builds.


Next up is sorting out the join lines on the engines and fuselage, finishing off the cockpit and adding the undercarriage doors and weapons pylons, but at least it's looking the right shape!

Thanks for looking.

[Lysus]

Wonder what that feels like, sitting atop that blaster...

[Tomcat64]

Mainly a week of sanding, filling and sanding for this update...

As this kit was obviously only intended to be built wheels-down the gear bay doors don't fit particularly well when you try to close them up, so I added some scrap plastic into the nose bay to act as a support for the doors


And here's the end result - a little filling may be required here methinks...


The nose was added and again a little sanding will be required to get this lined up


After a round of sanding and filling I ran some Ultimate black primer down the joins to highlight where more work was needed prior to the next round. The wings, engines and tail section were all assembled and fitted to the fuselage - no major problems and alignment was pretty good with just some more minor sanding and filling required. Here's the underside shot with some work still required down the fuselage seam


And from the topside


I've test fitted the main gear doors and they're as misaligned as the nose doors were so there's a little work required to get them in place. Otherwise I think I'm fairly close to getting the seams finished and will then just need some rescribing before moving onto paint.

Thanks for looking!

[Tomcat64]

After we managed to get the washing and shopping done after being away for a couple of weeks I got a couple of hours back at the bench this afternoon to resume working on the A10 while Mrs Tomcat pottered about in the garden.

First up was some attention to the main gear bay doors; I used some i-form bar cut to size and trimmed to act as a guide for the doors


Here's the result for the starboard bay - not the tidiest bit of work I've ever done but should be rescued by some filling. The wheel is just dry fitted at the moment as that will be added following the main paint.


Learning the lessons from the starboard side the port side was tidier


I then worked my way across the wings adding the pylons and rails, as well as the ventral fins, gun barrel and other miscellany. This is now set aside to dry before starting in with (hopefully) the final round of filling and sanding back


The only part I've not yet added is C24 as the location for this is a little vague and I know it'll fall victim if I try to add it before the man-handling of filling, sanding and re-scribing so this will go on later just before final priming


While I was away I also decided that I'd add a small dio base under the in-flight A10 so to that end this has been added to the build


The instructions are a fairly detailed fold out booklet




And here are the parts


The kit includes the options and decals for an Iraqi vehicle and I plan to kit bash this to some degree to create a somewhat battered result along these lines


That's all for now - thanks for looking.

[Lysus]

I like where this is going.

I've often wondered why so many plane kits can't make accommodations for wheels up, like how hard is it?

[Tomcat64]

I've often wondered why so many plane kits can't make accommodations for wheels up, like how hard is it?

Yep me too - I guess it potentially means a second set of alternate parts, but most kits I remember from my early days gave the option for up or down as well as including pilot(s).

Anyway, here's today's update - first up the main gear doors filled and with initial sanding - still needs a little tidying up but getting there


Since I was working underneath I thought I'd take a look at the supplied ordnance (at least that's included ) some of the parts are single pieces and while they look ok from one side


The other side is a sink-hole special


So I filled those and put them aside to set before my next sanding session


Then back up top I tidied up the cockpit with some brush painting; also when I'd had the thing upside down on my desk I didn't realise it'd been resting on the pilot's helmet so that was repainted as well


I then added the canopy using Humbrol Clearfix


And here was my first pleasant surprise - given the fact that everything else about the kit was geared up for it being displayed wheels-down and canopy open I was expecting fit issues here as well, but no - the two parts lined up quite nicely with just a little filling and tidying up required


That's all for this time around, next up will definitely be the rescribing which I'll admit I've been putting off!

Thanks for looking

[MarkVerploeg]

Starting to look really nice Neil
Too bad about the epm's on the weapons
Now i want to get back to my A-10 but i still have some other GB builds that need to be finished first (1 in a couple of days)
But once the first one is done i will get back to it
Keep up the good work

[Tomcat64]

Starting to look really nice Neil
Too bad about the epm's on the weapons
Now i want to get back to my A-10 but i still have some other GB builds that need to be finished first (1 in a couple of days)
But once the first one is done i will get back to it
Keep up the good work

Thanks Mark - it's starting to get there. I know what you mean about multiple builds though, I'm seriously tempted to get stuck into the Sci-Fi GB but need to make sure I finish this first as I'm hopeless at trying to juggle more than one at the same time!

[Tomcat64]

Have managed to make some more progress through the evenings this week.

I finished working the panel lines and did some rescribing across the joins before masking the canopy. I was partway through this when it struck me that I should have masked this before attaching, and then a few seconds later the front section pinged off while I was working on a fiddly bit so that worked out ok The masking has been done with Tamiya tape for curves around the edges, normal Tamiya tape for the bulk, and a blob of white tac for the curved section at the top of the windscreen.


Around the back the jet pipes were stuffed up with wet tissue (that'll make the engines run a little rough!)


Then the canopy was given a quick coat of dark gull grey to match the interior cockpit colours. I then noticed that the back end of the canopy where it joined the fuselage had popped up proud again so gave that some attention and a little CA & filler to show it the error of its ways


And finally it was out with the Ultimate black primer - I love black aircraft... I need to sneak an SR-71 into the stash when my wife isn't looking


In between times I started working on the T-72 as well - nothing too dramatic here, the lower hull tub went together neatly


And no drama with the wheels either; I've left two sets unbuilt at the moment as I want to trim off the tyres to the rims to represent fire damage. There's plenty of spares in the box so will experiment with clippers, knives and sanders to work out the best approach


Then dry fitted the upper hull to make sure it all lined up properly


In a rare outbreak of planning I want to work out where to place the point of impact for the shell/missile hole that knocked this out so that I can damage it appropriately. Currently looking at putting the impact hole around the area marked in red where the fender joins the hull but I may move it back along the fender nearer to the turret


That's all for this update, I'm hoping to get a few hours at the bench this weekend so hopefully I'll get the first coat of gray down on the A-10 and start cutting up the T-72.

Thanks for looking.

[Stokesy44]

Looking tasty mate. Cant wait to see what you do with the tank wreck!

[Tomcat64]

Looking tasty mate. Cant wait to see what you do with the tank wreck!

Thanks mate!

Managed to get a few more hours in this week and spent most of it playing with the T-72.

The main parts of the turret went together well, I did think I'd have to remove the two locator lugs on the ring to allow the "dropped" gun barrel to move into place, but nope - one bit of surgery that wasn't required in the end


The gun barrel itself is three pieces, and is designed to fit in a single position, so I carried out some removals to the tab piece you can see to the right of this photo to allow the barrel to drop to the hull


I added some of the wheels and dry fitted it together


and then posed it at the base of the A10 on the Tamiya stand to give an idea of how I want to lay this out - it also looks to me like the stand is about the right height (6 inches)


Back to the surgery on the gun barrel and there's a little bit of filling required where I've chopped it back


I then waded in on the hull to make the impact point, used a razor saw, scalpel, clippers and needle nosed pliers in the attack


Then onto the two wheelsets that I wanted to trim back to the rims - as mentioned previously there are some unused wheels in the kit to experiment with. The ones on the left were attacked with clippers which were obviously too savage, and so I ended up using a coarse sander in two stages; the middle wheel is partway through and the one on the right is finished off


And again a loose fit to see how it's doing - I'm happy with how this is looking so far and will finish the upper & lower hull sections this weekend. This kit has link & length tracks so I need to have a think about how I'm going to adjust them on the damaged side of the tank.


That's all for now - hopefully there'll be another update after the weekend.

Thanks for looking.

[demarcation]

Nice work!! Looking forward to the dio!

[Tomcat64]

Nice work!! Looking forward to the dio!

Thanks Anders - appreciate the support

Got a few hours at the bench over the weekend and started off by brush painting the intake fans with Vallejo gun metal on Friday evening


Left these to dry overnight and masked them off with panzer putty on Saturday morning. I put a kneaded piece of PP into the intake and then carefully tamped into place using the "spoon" end of a Tamiya paint stirring stick.


Then laid down some Light Ghost Grey - I had a minor panic here as I couldn't find it in the Vallejo set... turns out their surface primer is also labelled Light Ghost Grey so panic over


While that was curing I switched attention to the T-72 and finished off the main assemblies. The only grumble I had with this is that the locating marks are a little vague for the turret fitments (I also managed to lose two of the smoke launchers to the carpet monster). I've left the rear fuel drums off for the moment as I want to crumple them up a little.


And here's how it looks now, I've modified the right hand side skirt to represent damage.


I'm kicking myself slightly as I want to leave the turret hatches open, but as there's no interior I want to blank off the turret floor in black at least and should have done that before fitting the turret together but I'll figure something out. Same thing needs to be done to blank off the hole in the hull but that'll be easier as I've not joined the two hull halves together yet.

Next step for the A10 itself is to start masking off for the other two shades of grey.

Thanks for looking.

[snowman819]

I'm looking forward to seeing this completed.
Love the A10s.

[Lysus]

via Imgflip Meme Generator

[DrSprue]

Its looking very cool Neil! Took a break from reading all these dozens of youtubes by ISM guys and other model peeps (as well as still looking for my update to my sig, which is coming soon) and decided to do some strolling over to these cool SIGS (there is a word for this but I dont remember) going on for WW that you guys are doing.

An A10!! Yup.. love that bird and your doing a fine job! (I actually read all 4 pages too) and the tank thing dio approach looks like a great Idea. Wow and that Hasaqawa set does not seem to be specific to gender, but who cares, Im sure she still kicks butt being she landed that bug in manual mode.. haha. Ill be following fellow siger... good luck dude!

We had them here for years here at Barnes in Westfield for the 104th Fighters, but the F15's came in a while ago, so we dont see them anymore, but yea... A-10s rule!. Good luck!

[Tomcat64]

Thanks for the support guys - it's always much appreciated.

After a couple of weeks of neglect I managed to spend a few hours with the A10 this afternoon.

Most of this time was taken up masking the light ghost grey off ready for the dark ghost grey to go over the top. Even when I've left the paint days (in this case weeks) to cure off I'm always nervous about masking and lifting it all off again - seen too many horror stories! Anyway - a combination of Tamiya tape for curves, standard masking tape and white tac was used and she ended up looking like this


Painted up with Vallejo modelair Dark Ghost Grey and a patch of Medium Gunship Grey and left to dry for an hour or so before removing the assorted masking materials


The variation in tones is accentuated in the photo, but it's also less subtle that I was expecting to the eye as well so hopefully I'll be able to tone that down a little when it comes to weathering. I've also got some tidying up to do along some of the lines...


And I'm really not happy with the ellipse of gunship grey under the fuselage so I'll be going back and giving that more attention. I think I was just so pleased to be back at the bench that I rushed this part in order to get the airbrush out.


I did have one casualty around the back end though - when I removed the tissue I'd used to mask the engines the starboard jet-pipe fell out so I need to figure out how to get that stuck back up there as well as doing some tidying up on the port side too


That's all for this evening, now I'm back at it I'm hoping to move this along again in the next few days

Thanks as always for looking.

[Tomcat64]

After doing a bit more research it turns out the demarcation between the light & dark shades of ghost grey is quite pronounced on the real thing so I'm less worried about how it looks on the kit now


So I tidied up the paintwork by brush


The ellipse underneath isn't perfect but if I keep "adjusting" it then I'll run the risk of screwing it up completely so I'm calling this bit done as well


Then picked out the black details with Vallejo German grey


And I managed to get the jet pipe back in place with some CA & tweezers


So next up for the A10 are the decals which will probably be done over a few sessions over the weekend.

In the meantime I've also been giving some attention to the T-72 - first up I added some wheel-weights into the lower hull; this will help to add some stability to the base given that the A10 will be up on a six inch rod


As the hatches are open and there's no interior I just put in some aquarium gravel mixed with white glue which will be painted black to give the impression of burnt out debris in case someone sticks their nose into the hatches with a torch


And took the same approach with the turret interior


Switching to the running gear I took a straight length of track and soaked it for a few minutes in boiling water before bending it around the wheels


And I think this will work for the broken track when CA'd in place - the drive sprocket is just dry fitted


The tank components and A10 wheels were all then undercoated in Ultimate black primer


Before being given a rough coat of a rather fetching shade of beige (Vallejo tan earth) as a base-coat - this will be worked on and lightened before heavily weathering for the burnt out look I'm after


That's all for now - plan for the weekend is to get the A10 decalled up and at least one sealing coat on, and for the T-72 to be painted and final assembly to start.

Thanks for looking.

[DrSprue]

Wow its all looking really nice Neil. The A10 is coming out really cool too.

[Tomcat64]

Wow its all looking really nice Neil. The A10 is coming out really cool too.

Thanks Tony - it feels like I'm getting there!

[Twokidsnosleep]

Looking really good now
I LOVE that photo of the real bird...god she is rough and tumble and armed to the teeth..... just beautiful
You are making me want to build one of these!!!

[Tomcat64]

Looking really good now
I LOVE that photo of the real bird...god she is rough and tumble and armed to the teeth..... just beautiful
You are making me want to build one of these!!!

Thanks Scott - yep she really does look like a flying tank with all that weathering doesn't she?

I've got a hankering to do a 1/48 version as well now but that would cause a breach of the strictly enforced "no more kits" embargo that I've so nearly almost adhered to... kinda...

[Twokidsnosleep]

Looking really good now
I LOVE that photo of the real bird...god she is rough and tumble and armed to the teeth..... just beautiful
You are making me want to build one of these!!!

Thanks Scott - yep she really does look like a flying tank with all that weathering doesn't she?

I've got a hankering to do a 1/48 version as well now but that would cause a breach of the strictly enforced "no more kits" embargo that I've so nearly almost adhered to... kinda...

Ha, no more kits...you are hilarious.
Everytime I impose that the devil pulls out his list of wonderful kits on sale, so I have just given in

[DrSprue]

Looking really good now
I LOVE that photo of the real bird...god she is rough and tumble and armed to the teeth..... just beautiful
You are making me want to build one of these!!!

Thanks Scott - yep she really does look like a flying tank with all that weathering doesn't she?

I've got a hankering to do a 1/48 version as well now but that would cause a breach of the strictly enforced "no more kits" embargo that I've so nearly almost adhered to... kinda...

Ha, no more kits...you are hilarious.
Everytime I impose that the devil pulls out his list of wonderful kits on sale, so I have just given in

[Lysus]

Looking really good now
I LOVE that photo of the real bird...god she is rough and tumble and armed to the teeth..... just beautiful
You are making me want to build one of these!!!

Thanks Scott - yep she really does look like a flying tank with all that weathering doesn't she?

I've got a hankering to do a 1/48 version as well now but that would cause a breach of the strictly enforced "no more kits" embargo that I've so nearly almost adhered to... kinda...

Ha, no more kits...you are hilarious.
Everytime I impose that the devil pulls out his list of wonderful kits on sale, so I have just given in

[Tomcat64]

Thanks Scott - yep she really does look like a flying tank with all that weathering doesn't she?

I've got a hankering to do a 1/48 version as well now but that would cause a breach of the strictly enforced "no more kits" embargo that I've so nearly almost adhered to... kinda...

Ha, no more kits...you are hilarious.
Everytime I impose that the devil pulls out his list of wonderful kits on sale, so I have just given in

I think we're now allowed to invoke the "Lysus made me do it" get out clause!

[Tomcat64]

So to temporarily return to the plot I had a really solid day at the bench today and actually got more done than I expected

I started in on the decals for the A-10 - wow... they're really, really thick and also activate almost as soon as you wave them near the water so really need to pay attention. On the plus side the thickness means that I've not had a single stencil roll up and die on me and every decal is on the aircraft; and the down side of course is that they just won't soften up and go around corners despite several drenchings in microset and sol. The main culprits are the two that form the mouth under the nose


I've done some surfing and found that this is not an unusual situation with Academy decals and many people just use AM decals if they're building an Academy kit. I've ordered up a jar of Daco Red (Strong) solution as apparently that's the only thing that might beat them into submission; in the meantime I'll keep applying the set/sol and see if they'll come on down.

Also I'll need to do some colour matching on the tail fins where the decals don't meet up


But otherwise everything is in place and it's starting to look the part


And the port side


As expected the decals were done in a few sittings rather than in one go, and in between times I gave some attention to her pet T-72.

Vallejo Model Colour Iraqi Sand was thinned down with Ultimate thinner and sprayed on in a couple of coats to lighten the colour and the tyres were picked out with Lifecolor Tyre Black


Then it was time to wade in on the link & length tracks. I've had a few run ins with these previously and not all of them overly clean but I think I've finally got the hang of things and I'll step through here how I approach them

Here's the instructions - as usual everything happens by magic in no particular order and works out fine right?


First up I work up the individual links that wrap around the drive sprocket and idlers basically placing the links on a white sheet so I don't lose them and then use TET once they're flush together


Then wrap them around the relevant wheels while the glue is still workable; at this point you need to make sure the track links are pointing in the right direction to match up on both sides. For my build one of the idlers will be untracked so just three wheels here (slightly out of focus - sorry!)


Working along the fully tracked side first, the sprocket & idler were dry fitted to allow some rotation to line everything up before fitting the long top length - again using TET on the rollers and where the tracks joined up


Then worked the second length down from the sprocket to the rear road wheel and adding the individual link required in here


Adding in the lower length


And then the length from the idler to the front road wheel - we're supposed to add a single link in here but the gaps too big and will need two


So here it is with the two final links pushed into place and TET added


Flipped back up the right way it looks like job done this side


So moving over to the damaged side I followed the same procedure starting with the sagged track section I created in the last update. I'm not too worried about the crack over the roller as this will be covered when the upper hull is in place


Here's the damaged side completed


Added the upper hull again for review and it looks good to me


Finally with the track cleaned up and the machine gun picked out in Tamiya Dark Iron.


I can't do much more with the A10 itself until the decal solution turns up, but I have got the main gear painted up ready for installation and plan to make a start on the ordnance. For the T-72 there's a couple of details to pick out and then I'll start in with the heavy weathering.

Thanks for looking!

[DrSprue]

Wow Neil it is all looking really nice. I dont even want to guess how hard those tracks are.

[Tomcat64]

Wow Neil it is all looking really nice. I dont even want to guess how hard those tracks are.

Thanks Tony - the tracks are a little fiddly, but my first encounter with them was on a Tiger which was really in at the deep end because of the sag.

[Tomcat64]

Got a few more hours in at the bench today to keep things moving along.

For the A-10 as mentioned in the previous update the wheels have been painted up using Tamiya Metallic Grey & Lifecolor Tyre Black


So these were dropped into the wheel bays


Then the ordnance - clipped it all off the sprue frames and cleaned up the seam lines and ejector pin sink-holes. These will need a little more attention before priming so more filler has been added where necessary. I'm amazed the thing could get off the ground carrying this lot, and that leaves two pylons empty - presumably for the kitchen sinks


Back to the T-72 - the tracks were dry-brushed with Tamiya metallic grey to pick out some of the detail


Then it was time to start making it look a little second-hand...I started off by dry-brushin & stippling three shades of Lifecolor rust across the thing where I wanted to represent fire damage - the tonal variations are a little washed out in the photo but most of it will be blackened out in any case


Next up was a liberal coating of black clay wash


Which was wiped off using damp cotton buds. I also stippled some areas rather than wiping to leave a "sooty" residue


Finally Vallejo black wash was airbrushed on in light coats to finish off the smoky/sooty effect. And this will do the T-72 for now - there'll be some more dirtying up done when I come to add to the dio base


That's all for this weekend so I posed them together to make sure things were still heading where I wanted them to be


Hopefully the strong decal solution will turn up early this week so I can try and get those decals bedded down and then start in with the sealing coats.

Thanks for looking!

[Tomcat64]

The Daco strong decal solution turned up from Hiroboy.com earlier this week - first time I'd used this supplier and the turn around was very quick so recommended if you've not used them before.


It still took three or four applications but the decals under the nose finally started to behave themselves


As you can see from the previous shots there are some creases to be dealt with that I'll apply a couple more coats of solution on but may have to finish with a scalpel and then touch up with paint


Talking of touching up the tailfins were finished off using Scale 75's Highlight 2 from their blue set


The ordnance was finished up with a couple of coats of ModelAir olive drab over a Ultimate grey primer - this will be added to the A10 after I've sealed & weathered it which should be done for the next update.


Thanks for looking.

[Lysus]

Look at dem teef! Your build is making me want a Warthog...

[DrSprue]

Look at dem teef! Your build is making me want a Warthog...

Yea, me too, I got an old Revell 1998 Thunderbolt II that just keeps calling me every-time I look at Neil's progress!