new book "Modelling the F-4 Phantom II"

I just purchased a copy of the new book "Modelling the F-4 Phantom II" by Geoff Coughlin and Neil Ashby. Having worked on F-4Cs and F-4Es for five years during the 1980s I believe I have a somewhat unique perspective on modeling this airplane.

The book is six chapters plus a foreward by an RAF Phantom pilot, an introduction that suggests different modelling tools and materials, a section on weathering, duplicating the bare metal areas, displaying the completed model and photographing the model, a biography and reference section, and a list some of the currently available Phantom kits with some comments about each. One possibly problem for American purchasers of the book is the liberal use of British brand-name paints, materials and chemicals, calling for the use of such materials as "Rotring air brush cleaner" and "Halford's screen wash." I would have no idea of what the US equivalents of these would be, but of course on this group we can get that info readily from our Brit friends I'm sure. The authors also describe using different gauges of "fuse wire" for cockpit details, but as an American, even being an electronics tech, I'm not sure what fuse wire is nor what an American equivalent would be. FWIW, I've found several gauges of lead wire at a fishing tackle shop (for tying flies) that work very well for detailing, perhaps this is the same stuff?

The book doesn't really give too many insights about the F-4 and it's unique characteristics; rather, it shows several models in three scales,

1/72, 1/48 and 1/32, discussing construction, detailing with resin and photoetch, painting, decaling and weathering with washes and pastels. If you are looking for a project as super-detailed as Pierre Greutert's superb 1/32 F-4S (those of you who are members of the Yahoo groups F4sForever and F-4Discussion know the model I'm referring to), you'll be disappointed. This book has each subject model built more-or-less out of the box, with the additions of detail parts in the cockpits and other areas but no major surgery or scratchbuilding.

The first project is an 81TFS (Spangdahlem AB, Germany) Hill Gray painted F-4G in 1/48 scale by Hasegawa with Eduard photo etch, Aires exhaust nozzles, and AirDOC decals. There are a couple of very minor errors in this chapter, referring to AGM-88 HARMs as AGM-45 Shrikes in a couple of places for one, as well as mentioning cutting and dropping the "Moulded-in flaps on the main wings... just inboard of the wing-fold", the "flaps" which of course are the ailerons. I would have hoped a book on the F-4 would have mentioned the unique-to-Phantoms (AFAIK) characteristic that when the stick is deflected one aileron goes down while the opposite side has a spoiler that comes up (with that side's aileron traveling upwards only a couple of degrees as the spoiler comes up). As the book says, when the hydraulics aren't pressurized, both ailerons tend to droop over time. The F-4G is shown with the left side aileron fully down, which was possible but rare to see. Generally the ailerons would droop to a maximum of only 30 degrees or so, and most often the ailerons on each side would be at noticeably different angles from each other. Interestingly, in this chapter the authors describe a mistake they made, planning to use the Aires resin exhaust nozzles but failing to make sure they fit before gluing the major assemblies of the aircraft together. Because of some plastic structure inside the rear fuselage of the Hasegawa kit that should have been cut away for the nozzles but wasn't, the author had to cut the nozzles much shorter so they would fit. I liked that they so readily admitted their mistakes and how they compensated; who among us has never done something similar? The authors also heavily tint the center windscreen green on this and most of the other models in this book, which is incorrect. The three-piece windscreen on a Phantom consists of the side panels which are Plexiglass plastic roughly 1/2 inch thick, and the center panel which is laminated glass, roughly an inch thick. Glass is less transparent than plastic (compare a large acrylic aquarium with a glass aquarium of similar capacity at a pet store if you want to see this for yourself), and really thick glass takes on a very faint green tint. I'd seen many models of Phantoms with tinted center windscreens before I joined the Air Force, so when I was working on them I took a good look to see if this was accurate. In most lighting conditions, the center windscreen looked clear, but perhaps VERY slightly darker than the side panels. However, in certain lighting conditions (hazy no-shadow days as I recall) the glass would appear a beautiful shade of green. The center windscreens on book's models are tinted far too dark. If you are going to tint the glass on your models, make it subtle!

The second chapter in this book illustrates the Revell RF-4E in 1/72 scale, using Eduard Photo etch, part of the Aires Cockpit and afterburner nozzles, and AirDOC decals to finish the model in AG51 marking in the two dark greens, dark gray Luftwaffe scheme of the 1980s. This is a short chapter, but does a nice job of showing the detail that can be incorporated in this small scale.

The third chapter details the 1/48 scale Hasegawa FGR.2 in 23 Squadron markings painted light grays, using the aires F-4E/F cockpit with modifications, Airwaves seats for British Phantoms, and AeroMaster decals. They show the difficulties involved in getting the Aires cockpit to fit, and have a few good detailing ideas. One minor quibble I have is that the author deflects the rudder and rudder pedals (correct) and the nose wheel is turned to match (maybe not so correct). On the Phantom (as with most other aircraft with hydraulic nose wheel steering) the nose wheel position is independent of the rudder pedals with the hydraulics depressurized. The rudder is mechanically as well as hydraulically connected to the rudder pedals, but the nose wheel steering is hydraulic only with a small hydraulic motor and gears. Whatever position the nose wheel is after engine shutdown or after the tow bar is disconnected is where it will stay. The rudder and rudder pedals will go to a neutral postion, unless a stiff breeze blows the rudder off to one side in which case the pedals will deflect accordingly. As an addendum, on the Phantom when the hydraulics are depressurized the control stick goes to the centered neutral position no matter what deflection the stabilator was set to during shutdown. The stab will retain whatever position it was when the hydraulics were depressurized even as the control stick goes to centered neutral. The ailerons were always at neutral and the spoilers closed when the jet was shut down in my experience. The spoilers could be pried up by the crew chief during his preflight inspections. Normally they'd close themselves after he let them go, but sometimes they'd stay up a little. Still, it was extremely rare to see them open even a little without the hydraulics pressurized and the stick deflected. Do note Phantom spoilers were used in conjunction with the ailerons only; the left and right wing spoilers couldn't be raised simultaneously like you might see on an airliner or cargo aircraft. Anyway, it is possible that the nosewheel, rudder pedals and rudder would all be in alignment off to one side on a parked Phantom, but it's much more likely that the nosewheel would be centered. If you want to throw contest judges for a loop, c*ck the nosewheel off to the opposite side from the rudder and pedals; you'd be just as correct but it'd sure look unnatural!

The next chapter features the 1/32 scale Tamiya F-4J in the RAF's 74 Squadron markings from Yellow Hammer, Eduard PE, Cutting Edge Sidewinders and Navy Wheels, a CAM SUU-23A gunpod on the centerline, and Reheat seats and intake covers. This model features a scratch-built Ram Air Turbine and landing gear downlocks made from thin plastic tubing. Most Phantom models I've seen don't have the downlocks in place, which clamped over the rod portion of the gear retraction actuators. Those downlocks were in place until just before the crew "stepped" to the jet when we maintenance folks would remove them, and reinstalled by us as the aircrew was still getting out of the jet after they shut it down. Accurate downlocks would be a nice thing to have Cutting Edge or someone else market. The authors did an excellent job depicting the worn paint on the canopy sills, worn from personnel getting in and out of the aircraft. The only problem I see with it is that they have the left and right sills equally worn. In reality the right sill was never badly worn, and we entered and exited the cockpit from the left side only. The righthand sills got only very minor wear from the crew chief standing on it as he polished the interiors of the open canopies. This model also has an open dragchute door with a chute packed inside. This is inaccurate, as the door would be pulled closed as soon as the chute was stuffed in the canister, or the door left open with no chute inside. You could display a model with the chute inside like this if you also position a maintenance stand under the rear of the jet and have a crewman on the stand about to close the door. This model uses the Cutting Edge wheels for Navy Phantoms which are bulged to represent aircraft weight. The True Details Company seems to have started this trend, but Phantoms' and many other high-performance fighters' tires don't bulge with weight. The tires have extremely strong sidewalls. As weight is added to the aircraft, the bottoms get flatter and flatter, but the sidewalls don't bulge at all. As a side note, forgetting to move the chocks away from the tires before we refueled and loaded up the jet would mean the jet would settle onto the chocks with all its additional weight. Once the aircraft was started and the pilot gave the signal to "pull chocks", we'd discover the error. We'd have to pound, kick, cuss and otherwise struggle to get the chocks out. I personally ruined a couple of pairs of boots from kicking out stuck chocks! If you could get one chock loose, you could use it to knock the others loose. Sometimes it was a real battle! We tried not to forget to move the chocks away from the tires before servicing the jet. The authors include a photo of a real Phantom in which the three access panels on the sides of the intake bulge out slightly. The caption points this out and says "Tamiya accurately represented these panels... contrary to some views". These are the panels that some modeller have mistakenly called "Battle Damage Repair patches". I have similar photos I took of other Phantoms in which these same panels were flush. I don't remember them bulging out like this on any of the Phantoms I worked on. Why are they bulged out on this particular aircraft (and the Tamiya model)? Darned if I know. Perhaps they had a thicker than normal layer of sealant on the lip that the panels mount to. Personally, when I finally get around to building a Tamiya Phantom I'm sanding those panels flush.

The last model featured is another 1/32 scale Tamiya model, this time the F-4E. The authors also used several Eduard photoetch sets, Reheat seats and intake covers, Cutting Edge resin leading edge slats and wheels, and decals from CAM, AirDOC, and Superscale. The model is finished in Greek Air Force markings; interesting to me on a personal note, 68-0408 is the tail number they picked. I worked on this very tail number at Ramstein AB, Germany in the 1980s when she belonged to the 526TFS. This model is painted in the Hill Gray scheme 408 was in when it was received from the USAF, and is depicted by this model very faded. Paint touch-ups are represented by darker gray, including the spot where the American "star and bar" was painted over by the Greeks when they received the jet. The authors show a number of "faded paint" and oily, greasy stain weathering techniques. This model is very well done. The paint and weathered finish is spectacular. There are a few extremely minor errors. One is that the author put on all the correct downlocks and REMOVE BEFORE FLIGHT flags, but they put the 370 gallon wing tank safety pin RBF flags on the outboard sides of both pylons. The pins should be on the left side of both pylons, so on the right wing the RBF flag ends up on the main landing gear side of the wingtank, not the outboard side. The second minor error involves the little antenna at the rear of the panel directly behind the rear canopy. This is the antenna for the SST-181X rendezvous beacon. The Tamiya Phantom was first released as an F-4C or D version. On the F-4D, the SST-181X antenna was mounted on the aircraft centerline as you see here. On the F-4E version, it was relocated to the righthand side of the same panel (Door 19). Tamiya didn't make this correction in their F-4E release, and the authors didn't catch it either. The last error I spotted is that 68-0408 had the modification done in approximately 1984 while it was at Ramstein in which the upper UHF comm antenna was relocated from inside the cap at the top of the vertical fin to the right side of the upper fuselage. The authors didn't add this antenna to the fuselage. There is another antenna on the top fuselage centerline between the SST-181X antenna and inflight refueling receptacle that I'm not familiar with; it wasn't on 408 when I worked on her. Navy Phantoms have an antenna located there, so I think it was more likely a mistake on this F-4E and should've been removed. For the cockpit, the authors used the new pre-painted Eduard photo-etch set, and the effect is outstanding. I was interested to see that they added the gunsite video tape recorder on the front cockpit right console, the first time I've ever seen this on a model. This was added to real F-4Es and Gs to replace the old film gunsite camera approximately 1985. It was great for smacking your right elbow against when you were reaching for switches on the right console. Again, scratch-built downlocks are put on the landing gear actuators, greatly enhancing the authenticity of this model. I would have liked a bit of a written description of how those were constructed, or perhaps a step-by-step series of photos.

The last chapters suggest ideas for displaying Phantom models, for weathering and painting, for photographing the models, and a bibligraphy of good references.

This book relies more on photography than text to show modeling techniques such as cockpit detailing and weathering. It appears geared toward an intermediate modeller, one who has basic construction and painting techniques down, but needs to learn weathering techniques. Scott Wilson

Reply to
Scott R. Wilson
Loading thread data ...

Scott,

As an outsider (being neither Britisch nor American) it's always interesting to see the subtle differences in the English language in Europe and the U.S. ;-)

'Rotring' is the brand of high quality pens for producing technical drawings ('Rot' is German for 'red', and AFIK the pens all wear a red ring ). Never heard of Rotring airbrush cleaner BTW.

'Fuse wire': simply the copper wires used for electrity at home. I use the separate strands for detailing cockpits, brake lines etc.

Thanks for your review, regards,

Bert

incorporated

Reply to
Bert H.

Brand names really don't "translate" as well as just describing what it is you are using. Just look at the trouble we have with Future on this group.

The fuse wire thing is frequently puzzling for us since we know what fuses are and we know what wire is, but we've never had reloadable fuses here in the states, so fuse wire is confusing. I understand it, but the concept of reloadable fuses is foriegn to most Americans. I can tell you this if they ever were available here they haven't been for quite some time as I can already see the vultures...oops, I mean lawyers, circling.

Is Halford's the only place that sells spray paint in the UK :-) Is it a hardware store or an auto parts store, or a paint store? I've never been quite clear on that.

John Benson ------------------------ IPMS El Paso Web Guy

formatting link

Reply to
John Benson

Scott,

Thanks for a stunning review! Now, from a Brit modeller a couple of words about your first paragraph.

Rotring Airbrush cleaner. I'm not sure what chemical this is made of, but Rotring is a German company usually associated with draughting (drafting) pens and drawing boards. I suspect that their airbrushes are designed to use inks, therefore the cleaner may well be alcohol-based and not a petroleum distillate, such as the Badger airbrush cleaner (an acetone, which would strip enamel from your teeth!).

Halfords windscreen cleaner. Sold in various sized containers here in the UK, it's an inexpensive alcohol-based windscreen cleaner (as it says!) and can be used to thin acrylic paints. I prefer to use Tamiya thinners and keep the windscreen cleaner for washing my brushes.

Fuse wire. Most new houses are fitted with "Residual Current Detector" circuit breakers. You get an electrical "short", it trips a switch. You reset the switch and change the light bulb or whatever. Before these, we had "fuse boxes" with heavy, removable plug-like circuit breakers. These carried a length of wire which burnt out if the circuit was overloaded. Different voltages used different thickness (gauges/gages) of wire. The wire was held in place by little brass screws and every household had a card with 3amp, 5amp and 13amp fuse wire wrapped around it. I've still got one in a box under the kitchen sink! I would suggest that most modellers can think of alternative sources for different gauges of wire, such as telephone cable, electrical flex, coaxial TV cable etc. It's just a question of stripping off the plastic insulation and hey presto!

HTH

Chris

Reply to
Chris Hughes

You might get that impression sometimes ;-)

It's an auto parts store. In my local stores they sell article too.

Reply to
Darren J Longhorn

"Article"? Meant Bicycles!

Reply to
Darren J Longhorn

Or "windshield cleaner", "windshield washer fluid" here in North America! The front windows on cars are known as "windshields" on this side of the pond.

Glad the word "bonnet" didn't come up! Or "tyres"!

BB in Canada Having to use "windshield washer antifreeze" this time of the year!

Reply to
Railfan

Fuse wire comes in differant gauges, so is uefil, but now i think about it i havent seen it for years. Not the sort of wall plug fuse, but house breaker i belive

Oil filters, brak pads, car radios, smelly car freshners etc, poor and over priced, also sell push bikes etc, now trying to get a youth boy racer market, but i only go for paints.

Reply to
JULIAN HALES

While we're at it, what is "white spirit"?

Curt

afterburner

accordingly.

s pressurized and the stick

Sidewinders

Reply to
C Knowles

white spirit=paint thinner cellulose thinner=lacquer thinner fuse wire =similar to fine soldering wire transfers=decals Halfords primer=Duplicolor primer PVA glue=white glue Klear=similar to Future £MSRP=$MSRP

Scott G. Welch

Reply to
OSWELCH

The reason we don't understand fuse wire is that we never had any such thing over here, at least not in anyone's recent memory. House fuses over here are self contained in glass with a socket much like a light bulb. These are refered to as enclosed fuses and have been around for at least 100 years. Circuit breakers have been available for homes since at least 1935 and most American homes have been built since that time. As a modeling tool it is easily replaced from other sources but it would be kinda nice to get everything you need in one package.

John Benson ------------------------ IPMS El Paso Web Guy

formatting link

Reply to
John Benson

I was always of the opinion that White Spirit was Shellite. Used to be used as a lamp/stove fuel, can also be used as a low grade paint thinner - I use it for Humbrol paints; works well.

RobG (the Aussie one)

Reply to
Rob Grinberg

NO! NO! NO! Very common misunderstanding.

Kerosene is a combustable liquid. It needs a wick or pre-heating to burn.

White gas is a filtered, very pure form of gasoline. It is a flamable liquid. Put a match to it and it burns. Camp stoves and lanterns use white gas under pressure for best results.

Specially produced lamps and stoves, mostly by Coleman, will burn kerosene, white gas or gasoline. What you see in most stores are white gas only products unless otherwise noted.

Put white gas in a kerosene lamp and watch the nifty explosion that results.

Tom Young Firefighter/EMT for fiteeen + years. A dozen calls to deal with the after effects of white gas in a kerosene lamp including one burned down home, five third degree burn victims and lots of misery.

Reply to
Maiesm72

...and I thought "white spirit" would be kerosene, which I've also heard refered to as "white gas"...er...petrol...

Reply to
Rufus

Thanks. I was just as confused...

Reply to
Rufus

All of which just goes to show... before there's any doubt, read the instructions!

RobG (the Aussie one)

15 years in the fuel industry
Reply to
Rob Grinberg

PolyTech Forum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.