The intake wouldn’t fit properly angainst the rear part.
Intake not aligned
Someone told me to remove those tabs in the upper front (against the body) parts to help get the intake in place easier, and I can see why, but perhaps the whole cover should have been assembled after the inner part of the intake was in place as it should. After some work and minor cursing, I got it to sit better, at least against the body.
Intake in place
I still had to use plastic sheet and putty to sort gaps.
The exhaust parts was painted on the inside with black metal and then assembled, and then got some steel paint on the outside along with the petals.
Exhaust parts painted
Then the petals parts got some black metal.
Petals painted
To get the exhaust pipe to sit right wasn’t easy and not as easy as it seemed when I test fitted it. The idea was to make it possibe to insert it after the body was painted. That didn’t work so well.
The rim is a bit too wide
The rim was too wide and wouldn’t fit. After some work, sanding off inside the edge I could push it in and later glue it in place.
Exhaust pipe glued in place
I just have to mask that later when painting.
The ejection seat was assembled.
Ejection seat
As well as fin, under wing tanks and pylons.
Some parts assembled
Still more to assemble and also some decisions to make, like if the canopy should be open or not.
This is a kit I got from my Swedish Secret Santa at IPMS Gothenburg. It looks like a nice kit, but it’s from Kinetic and they doesn’t always measure up. Anyway here’s the boxart!
Boxart
First I painted some black on the interior as a kind of pre shade.
Interior pre shade
Next up was the parts for the inner intake/rear wheel well. This isn’t very pretty!
Ejector pins
Not very hard to sort, a bit of grinding, filling and sanding takes care of it.
Filler applied
The cockpit was painted grey and then the panels black.
Cockpit painted
Intake fan painted.
Intake fan painted
Getting sprue ends on the details, creating more jobb than just some simple sanding to remove is not making me happy. But maybe I’m too picky! 🙂
Sprue gates on part
After some work I could assemble the rear intake/wheel well.
Rear wheel well
Then it got some white paint both inside and out.
Painted white
As I needed to paint white on one small detail for the well, I decided to sort a few more things to paint as well. Part of the upper interior was also painted black.
Landing gear parts and cockpit parts painted
Some more parts was added to the well and the cokpit got some dry brushing to pick out some detail.
Cockpit and well details
Some parts needed some additional white and the cockpit got a gloss clear cote.
More white paint
The intake/well was installed in the bottom fueslage, and things are getting ready for assembly.
Rear intake installed
The cockpit got a wash and a little bit of dirt/sand.
Wash and sand in the cockpit
The tires got some black paint.
Tires painted black
I decided to have open air brakes, something I usually don’t have or have to option to do. So I needed to do some cutting and assembly of the brakes in open position.
Airbrakes in open position
This kit as well as any other Kinetic kit have very nice details, and on this one it looks like they looked a lot on how Tamiyas kit was constructed. So far so good, but they don’t reach Tamiyas level of quality and precision. There is always a little more to do and check before assembly, and most often you need to check and testfit long ahead. Still this kit so far have had the best fit, and only small adjustments were needed.
Anyway I could now glue the fuselage halves, and by gluing them bit by bit, it went together fairly well.
Fuselage assembled
Next step was the front part of the intake which also holds the front gear bay. Some minor fit issues that was sorted by a little sanding. The part that created a bit of a problem was the thin strut inside the intake. I accidently broke it when trying to get it in place, and it didn’t look good after gluing it together. So I decided to use some thin plastic to create a replacement.
Replacment strut
The original strut can be seen laying beside the intake.
Part of the problem was that I haden’t cleaned up the holes properly. Whit that in place I cut off the ends and continued with the covers around the intake.
Intake with lip
Here I will need some putty as even though I tried to make it fit, I still ended up with visible seams.
Next will be sorting the seams and putting it in place, and then continue with the rest of the build. As with all F-16’s the landing gears and the stuff in the well creates a bit of a problem. I’ll see if I can solve it and hopefully not have to mask the plane with the gears mounted.
