SPA Modeler

Oh, and I sort of found out something about the Pitot Tube.

Master sells the same one for F-4E, F, G and EJ in the scales they make them in.

That either means Master or Spirits is wrong.

For What It Is Worth, I guess. I have no idea which one of them is right. (oh, and don't you just love it when books or aftermarket products don't agree with each other?)

Go figure...

Okay, question for all you Phantom Phreaks! I've had someone ask a question regarding the color of the center windscreen on the F-4G, I know that some of the later models of the -E and the -G, had the newer F-15 style windscreen that didnt have the frames. I also know that some of the Navy F-4's, particularly the -J had a bluish tinted center section. Can anyone shed some light on this?

I was just reading something on another site about that this morning. In the original framed windscreen, the center section is laminated glass, while the sides are some sort of plastic. According to what I read, by a guy who was a Phantom Phixer type, under certain lighting conditions, the glass area can take on a tinted appearance. Even though it is not. He further went on to say, that if you do opt to tint it in a build, do it ever so lightly. He did not mention the frameless windscreen from what I remember. But I do believe that is plastic, and not glass.

Ok so reading this thread has given me a headache (in a good way) - wow what a lot of variation (and Knowledge).

But I digress - Here's a question. What would I need to convert on a 1/72 (say Academy) F-4J in order to produce a F-4J (UK)? Is it just weapons fit? Or are there other subtle changes?

Cheers

Stuart

Making an F-4J(UK) is more about deleting parts off of an F-4J than anything.

You need the ALQ-126 fairings on the sides of the intake, found in F-4J and F-4S kits. Keep the radar fairing on the top rear of the fin cap. But, remove the small RHAW antenna found on the bottom rear of the radome. (make it look like the other two British versions there) Keep the UHF antenna on the nose gear door.

But, since they didn't actually have ALQ-126 installed, you need to take off the two tiny radars under the fuselage just about even with the wing leading edge if you have an F-4J kit, and the two farther back under the wings if you have F-4S parts molded on there. (for example, Hasegawa Phantoms have those four tiny radar fairings on the underside of all of them, removing those is a standard part of building many versions from their kits)

Then add the six Slime Lights on the fuselage and Tail,,,,,,in the same pattern as any F-4S decal diagram you might have in your decal instruction stash.

That's it, fuselage fairings, rear tail fairing, and Slime Lights on,,,,,,,and remove the 2 or 4 underside radar fairings, and the tiny radome antenna.

Paint Sparrows to look like Skyflash, and if you want it, these aircraft carried a USAF type gun pod on the centerline. (again, same pod as the other British Phantoms that carried it)

Oh, and one other small thing (if close enough colors is your thing), or big thing (if you want to get the color "just right")

For that cool "as delivered color", get a tin of XtraColour X-127, either paint your model with that, or use it to make a chip to find a colour in your collection that matches.

Two British authors wrote an Osprey book on "modeling the Phantom", in it, one of the authors put "as delivered" and "later correctly painted in the UK" paint chips from actual F-4J(UK)s next to each other. Then he put a tin of X-127 next to those, and gave us the defining match to that elusive color for once and for all.

Normally colors are modeled by each modeler's idea of what is okay,,,,,,,but, this is one of those rare cases where you'd want the exact match,,,,,,,,if you are doing one just after delivery to the UK. That "greenish" tint was caused by a very thin paint job of the UK color over the Zinc Chromate Yellow that Phantoms had for a primer coat,,,,,causing "your blue" to show as a "sickly greenish blue" color. You folks later fixed it by giving them another coat of the proper color, the second coat fixed that problem.

I'm doing both color schemes, since part of my Phantom collection is "every color scheme worn by Phantoms",,,,,,,I want those two to be displayed next to my other UK Phantom color schemes for the FG 1 and FGR 2.

(Warning,,,,,,both of these posts just "fell out of my head and landed on the keyboard", so if some detail is missing, I hope someone else will add to them.)

Thanks for the advice Rex - I can certainly work from those tips. It does however sound a viable project.

I've got some decals so I'll just need to source a kit - ebay here I come!

I really fancy having an FGR.2 in my RAF collection too - I just hope the new Airfix kit has that option.

Well, it shouldn't be too hard to build an FGR 2 from that kit. I saw the CAD and if they don't change anything, it will already come with the F-4M vertical tail (based on the RF-4C) instead of the F-4K tail (based on the F-4B)

So, that will be one hurdle out of the way, just change the tail tip to match the year and we're already more than halfway to the FGR 2. (of course, that would mean that we can't build an FG 1 OOB, no matter what the instructions and decals might say)

RexCag wrote:Making an F-4J(UK) is more about deleting parts off of an F-4J than anything.

You need the ALQ-126 fairings on the sides of the intake, found in F-4J and F-4S kits. Keep the radar fairing on the top rear of the fin cap. But, remove the small RHAW antenna found on the bottom rear of the radome. (make it look like the other two British versions there) Keep the UHF antenna on the nose gear door.

But, since they didn't actually have ALQ-126 installed, you need to take off the two tiny radars under the fuselage just about even with the wing leading edge if you have an F-4J kit, and the two farther back under the wings if you have F-4S parts molded on there. (for example, Hasegawa Phantoms have those four tiny radar fairings on the underside of all of them, removing those is a standard part of building many versions from their kits)

Then add the six Slime Lights on the fuselage and Tail,,,,,,in the same pattern as any F-4S decal diagram you might have in your decal instruction stash.

That's it, fuselage fairings, rear tail fairing, and Slime Lights on,,,,,,,and remove the 2 or 4 underside radar fairings, and the tiny radome antenna.

Paint Sparrows to look like Skyflash, and if you want it, these aircraft carried a USAF type gun pod on the centerline. (again, same pod as the other British Phantoms that carried it)

Yeah it's with an F-4S, but the changes can be seen between the two