AMT 1/48 Grumman f7f-3 Tigercat

[Tim Marlow]

Looking good Tony. Engines are splendid. Personally I can’t stand rubber tyres and wonder why kit makers insist on including them? Properly moulded styrene ones would be much preferred in my opinion. Rubber tyres are just a toy like gimmick.

[rtfoe]

More progress on the tigercat and a few dilemmas thrown up ( Richard , , a heads up for you when you get to yours) .Ive been wiring the second engine , very fiddly but its now done ,just needing the gear housing attaching and a touch up and wash . As seen in the previous posts the wheel well interiors have been painted , theyve now had a wash and the nacelles have been glued together . The fit of these to the wing is not bad ,BUT they sit about a millimetre too far forward . The problem here is the rear section of the two part cowling ( the bit that has the exhausts on it ) wont go far enough back and leaves a gap of about 1 mm on the top . The mating faces of the nacelle fronts need shaving down and the stepped side parts need about 1 mm cut off the end. The raised circular part on the nacelle front also needs sanding down . After lots of fettling and dry fitting I managed to get the gap to close up ( see pics ).[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153085[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153086[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153087[/ATTACH]
Another headache is the fact that this model is going to need a lot of weight in the nose to avoid being a tail sitter . The kit even supplies an oil drum and packing case to use as a prop for the rear end. The dilemma is that if I decide to use weights to make it sit on its own the undercarriage is maybe not strong enough to cope . The undercarriage is commendably detailed and to scale but looks very fragile ( although a test fit of the main legs showed they were a lot more sturdy than they look)
So do I go for the weighted nose or a tail prop or similar ?
The next big problem lies with the supplied rubber tyres . These look great but when i took them out of the bag with the clear sprues ,disaster!
Something in the rubber has caused a weird reaction with the clear parts , melting them and turning them all rubbery .This has ruined the rear section of the canopy but thankfully the windscreen escaped unharmed. The rear section can be replaced by crash moulding another as its a simple shape ( plus I can make it a little bigger so it can be displayed open , something not possible with the kit one)
I didnt want the tyres to do the same to the plastic hub parts when assembled so a set of aftermarket resin wheels have been ordered.[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153088[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153089[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153090[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153091[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153092[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153093[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]n1153094[/ATTACH]

Thanks for the heads up on the fit issues Tony, haven't checked my kit for a long while and don't even remember if the tyres come in rubber. Wiring looks great on the engines.

Cheers,
Richard

[yak face]

The airframe is all together now and cleaned up . Once ive attached the windscreen and masked up the cockpit and wheel wells its ready for a blast of primer to see if anything needs tidying up . One area that I had to sort is the underneath of the nacelle fronts , this area being behind where some of the exhausts exit . Its not a good joint and impossible to fill and sand as its recessed ,so im going to cover it with a shaped piece of plastic card . Speaking of exhausts the part that contains the cowling flaps has the exhausts on the back edge ,which have been moulded with a hole in each stub. Commendable yes but they need opening out a bit to look better to scale so ive drilled them all larger . The overhead pic really shows the thin, knife like fuselage and broad wings .

[Neil Merryweather]

That's looking lovely Tony!

[rtfoe]

Nice.

Cheers,
Richard

[Jim R]

Hi Tony
Looking good. Each little issue the kit has you are sorting out :thumb2:
Jim

[papa 695]

Cracking work so far Tony, looking good.

[yak face]

The plastic card infills did the trick under the nacelle , base primer now on , UMP matt black . Next is a roughly applied misting of white , heavier in the centre of panels etc so that hopefully when the dark sea blue goes on it’ll not just look like a solid block of colour but varied and highlighted. Ive also given the inside of the engine cowlings a coat of ZC green .

[yak face]

Bit more progress yesterday . The black base has now had some white highlights added and will hopefully give the blue final coat a bit of variation .

[colin m]

Flying along Tony. Yes I've used that one before. It's a nice looking aircraft I'm not familiar with, but I see what you mean - it's all about the engines.

[papa 695]

Looking good

[yak face]

Got some colour on this now . I started by lightly going over the panel lines , avoiding the centre of the panels and gradually building up the colour density while trying to keep the shading visible . Its now all done and ready for a gloss coat tomorrow.

[outrunner]

Looking good.

Andy.

[rtfoe]

Looking damn good Tony.

Cheers,
Richard

[Vaughan]

Nice work Tony.