Todays Hobbies F-14A Tomcat build

[heywooood]

I have purchased their F-14 and have begun to build up the fuselage...this is going to be a tricky project to pull off.
I am going to model it with the gear down in the parked configuration ie: Gear compressed as if it were sitting on the deck.
The wings will (hopefully) swing but I am not married to that idea.
I think I'm going to finish it in the Bounty Hunter squadron colors (provided) but with a few enhancements (early high-visibility scheme)
There will be some cockpit detail as with the previous builds and naturally the landing gear will all have to be scratch built.
No pictures yet - soon though.
Hope everyone had a great holiday season!

[heywooood]

[heywooood]

as you can see - the fuselage is quite a monstrosity of angles and cutouts and contours...

I am hoping to have it completely infilled, puttied and sanded glassy smooth by the end of the month.
Then the hard work begins..lol

[backyardbalsapilot]

I like your choice of color scheme in the last picture.

[heywooood]

I had wanted to do the Sundowners red and white high-viz paint but could not find suitable markings.
This VF-2 version has the advantage of being the kit supplied markings - I will just augment them with a detail set of stencils and paint the non-skid wing walks on along with a few other
details not included on the decal sheet.

I hope I can do this model justice. It will be the largest and most complex one to date for me.

[sabu]

I would love to see additional photos as this build progresses. The Tomcat is one of the most beautiful aircraft ever built, period. I actually didn't know the front gear was compressed when it was parked - I thought that was only for cat launch. Regardless good luck and if you have the time to post more photos I would love to see them!

[heywooood]

I plan to do a proper build thread here - lots of real world interference just lately but soon
I should have more pictures and descriptions to post

[heywooood]

still sanding and shaping the fuselage...it's a big fuselage.
once this part of the build is completely smooth and as flawless as I can get it, I can begin to work on the cockpit, landing gear and other details related to the main assembly.
after that, the wings can be assembled, then shaped, sanded and sealed. then I can build the tail end.
painting this one will be as much of a challenge as every other aspect of the build. so many odd angles and notches to mask...
Anyway - here are a couple of images of the fuselage as it sits today.
sorry they're a little grainy - and the aerial is not part of the model..an old radio sits on the window sill behind my monitor..for baseball season lol

[heywooood]

ok - a couple of coats of sealer with some fun sanding in between..




still a few more coats to put down and then a light sanding with 220g then 320g then 400g
after that a coat of primer to see how it looks with some pigment on it

[heywooood]

while the sealer dries we fly...

[heywooood]

so...progress report
shaping the wing glove leading edges and making room for the swing wings -

building the wings -


and fitting them to the airplane-

[heywooood]

so...progress report

[heywooood]

Double post - if the moderator could remove the first one with the oversized images please? and thank you.

[heywooood]

Landing gear is under construction.
Today she 'stood up' for the first time..
[img][https://i.imgur.com/bejcaIM.jpg/img]

[heywooood]

so I have started fabricating the landing gear..mains and nose are about 50% complete

she 'stood up' for the first time today..


I trimmed the canopy free from its sheet and set it in place loosely - just for grins