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1/72 Academy F-14A Tomcat |
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“VF-32
Swordsmen” |
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The
aircraft pictured above has quite an interesting story behind its construction.
This Academy F-14A Tomcat is my third entry on ARC, and I really enjoyed
building this one, not one time but twice.
Here’s the story, I’m sure some of you can relate to this.
I bought my F-14A kit at the Wings Over Pittsburgh Air Show during the
summer of 2002. I was impressed
with the model's outcome, and construction took a couple of weeks.
I used the kit decals with markings for Navy Fighter Squadron 51 (VF-51)
aboard the U.S.S. Carl Vinson, but
this would not last long. I was
displeased with the kit decals, they were very thin and would not stick well to
the Tomcat. I planned on
refinishing the jet with aftermarket decals, but I never really got around to
it, until the following July…
July
2003 started innocently enough. My
work bench was crammed full of projects I recently finished, so I decided on
moving my fresh aircraft and armor models to be displayed in another room.
After all of my new projects were properly displayed, I decided that one
plane needed to be moved a little to the left. I
picked up this aircraft, I think it was 1/48 F/A-18C, and all of a sudden, two
of the three shelves I was working on fell down.
Both shelves contained a mix of 1/72s, 1/48s and 1/35s.
You can imagine the scene. There
were armored vehicles, soldier figures, and aircraft scattered everywhere, in hundreds
of pieces. It was a total mess.
One of the worst of the planes was a 1/72 A-7E Corsair that looked
like it did after I opened the box for the first time, minus the part trees! As
a bonus, pictured here is an EA-6B Prowler that I have only started to
repair. I had to glue the fuselage
and wings together during a pain staking process.
Anyway, another aircraft that was utterly destroyed, is the F-14A of this article. Like I said, I planned on refinishing it sometime anyhow, now it needed to be done.
Reconstruction
went smoother than expected. As it
turned out, I had a sheet of Superscale decals I ordered from Squadron at a
discount price of $2.00! They
featured an attractive looking F-14A Tomcat from VF-32 “Swordsmen” on
“Indy”, the U.S.S. Independence. The
sheet also featured a low-visibility scheme from the same squadron.
I chose the high-viz scheme because the low-viz scheme to closely
resembled the Academy kit decals, I wanted something different.
The first thing I did was re-glue the stabilizers (vertical and horizontal) on the jet. The original paint scheme had black vertical tails, while the new one had an all gray theme. I lightly sanded out rough surfaces and areas were I added corrective putty. From there, I painted the aircraft overall Flat Gull Gray and used Testors products to refinish the cockpit, radome, and exhausts. I purchased True Details GRU-7 Ejection Seats to replace the ones damage in the “Great Shelve Accident of 2003”. I had to “borrow” the canopy from another Tomcat kit, one of my derelicts, an AMT/Ertl F-14A, since the Academy canopy was literally crushed in the accident. After several attempts at salvaging it, I knew when to quit, and went with my spare AMT/Ertl.
In
the end, this jet turned out great. I
weathered it using a paint thinner/pastel wash, and direct pastel as well.
I changed the ordnance, too: two
AIM-9 Sidewinders, one AIM-7 Sparrow and one big AIM-54 In
summary the markings on the new plane are from VF-32 Swordsmen, aircraft #212.
The pilot is CDR. Mark Errante and Radar Intercept Officer (RIO) LT. CDR. Mike
Rhine. The Swordsmen just
recently participated in Operation Iraqi Freedom using there new mount the,
F-14B Tomcat. I had the pleasure of
speaking to some of the aircrews at the United States Air and Trade Show at I
am defiantly happy with this jet, it turned out great especially after the
accident it had. I get that lovin’
feelin’ every time I look at this Tomcat (cheap Top Gun joke)! Enjoy! Joshua
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Photos and text © by Joshua Stockdale
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