1/48 Academy RAAF F-111C

Gallery Article by Irwin Brown on Jan 26 2010

Australia Day 2010

 

This is my take on the Academy F-111C.  I decided to tackle this as my first serious effort back into the hobby after 20 years, because (a) I've always liked the "pig", and (b) I'd read so many comments about what a lousy kit it was that I wanted to challenge myself.  In fact, having seen so many great kits on line, I really decided that I'd go overboard and drop the flaps & slats (this was before I realised that the F-111 has complicated Fowler flaps which are a terrible pain to build).

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Anyway, I used some resin/etch stuff (Verlinden cockpit & Pave Tack, Scaledown burner cans) and did a bunch of scratch building. The list of scratch-built stuff includes:

  • dropped flaps, slats & glove vanes 
  • fabric wing seals
  • front landing gear & landing lights
  • navigation lights on wing roots & tips
  • static dischargers
  • black triangular vents above intakes
  • intake trunks
  • pitot tube (pin)
  • fuel dump nozzle at rear (the original broke off & got lost
  • inside petals of afterburner nozzles
  • bumper bar & hydraulic actuator in tail (original looked nasty)
  • interior of front wheel well
  • antennas on top of fuselage
  • GPS antenna in front of cockpit
  • hydraulic actuators for canopy
  • nose cones on harpoon missiles (Hasegawa originals have clear noses)

The good news was that I learned a lot about scratchbuilding, rescribing, and so on; the bad news was that I missed my target date of Australia Day 2009 - in fact, I've barely made it for Australia Day 2010.  Anyway - hope you enjoy it!

Irwin Brown

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Photos and text © by Irwin Brown