David Hingtgen

Speaking of which... Is that Miang from Xenogears? Yes it is. I switch avatars occasionally, but it's always her.

areaseven--you've probably been corrupted by all the bad anime series you've reviewed.

76.5%, far higher than I expected. Never mind the purple-haired anime chick avatar.

I thought Crane was only a common nickname, not official. Like Warthog or Viper.

Well, the E/F's are 100% new molds, whereas the A/B/C/D all share most parts. So I'll amend my statement to "All Hase Legacy Hornets include pilots". Legacy Hornet: New but quickly-gaining-acceptance term for "Not Super" Hornet. Anyways--I'm not going to use the pilot that came with my Blue Angels Hornet, since he's in flight gear, and not the uniform the Angels wear. I could snip that section of the sprue off and mail him to you. Don't know if he'd fit in a Super Hornet cockpit, but he is a 1/72 Hase Hornet pilot. He is molded in blue, BTW.

Yup, that's the parts I wanted to see. Same as in the F-14D kit. Hmmn, I'm thinking only the VF-1 kit comes with the version I want, I was hoping it'd be in all "F-14A" boxings. I was hoping I could buy just the Sundowners kit, and get both the decals and boattail I need--guess I need to buy a Wolfpack kit as well, just for the boattail. 16440 vs 36440. Well, it's nothing more than gloss vs flat. I've always felt 36440 painted very well, though 16440 is pretty good as gloss paints go even brush-painted 16440 enamel looked pretty good. (Though I haven't tried *acrylic* 16440 yet). Generally, F-14's in that scheme were 36440, whereas a white-belly one uses 16440. But that is the "renaissance" of high-vis, and a CAG (well, actually XO I think, being 201) so it may be 16440. PS--while you're buying paint, might want to get a bottle of 31136 if you don't have it. That's "flap/slat/brake/door-edging" red.

1. Canopy masks. Haven't tried yet, but plan to use the ones I bought. (They make ones for the Italeri and Academy F-14's even, but not the Fuji! You can argue Fuji vs Hase all day for "best F-14" but Italeri and Academy are a definite notch below) I need to email eduard etc about makin Fuji canopy masks. 2. Glue. Ever tried Micro Krystal Klear? Though I've never used it on such a long joint. It is almost exactly like white Elmer's school glue. Only thicker. But it dries CLEAR amnd GLOSSY, clearer than most canopies even. Fairly flexible when dry, as glues go. Also, very easy to remove when it's in the "gummy" stage, if you smear some on a canopy. 3. Seats--will have to get back to you on that, will look at my books. 5. Here's the stencil section from my CAM VF-154/VF-101 decals.

Whoops, I just mentally added "air" to "brushed". I haven't tried a Tamiya silver marker, I currently use a Sakura one for things like that, though I think I'll buy a Tamiya, it does look to leave an even brighter silver.

I see you went with blue for the nav lights. Anyways---how do you airbrush the silver marker paint? (or more specifically--how do you get it out of the marker, thin it, and what do you use to clean the airbrush afterwords?)

I found it very interesting that the F-5 ejects its shells, I'm betting the F-20 would have too. Ejects straight down, behind the nosegear door.

1. Aftermarket decals for the 2 most popular F-14 squadrons (Jolly Rogers and Sundowners) are rare and hard to come by in 1/72 because they figure that since half the kits come with them, there's no need for them. They don't seem to realize that even the best kit decals aren't that wonderful! The aftermarket Black Aces Super Hornet decals sold out in a week, even though the next Super Hornet kit has the exact same decals! Of course, they offer LOTS of that sort of stuff in 1/72, but not 1/48. (The #1 F-14 decal company offers all but ONE of their decals in both 1/72 and 1/48---they do not offer 1/72 Jolly Rogers) Anyways, Jolly Rogers Fuji kits come with high-vis Jolly Rogers decals, and lots of stencils. But there is a flaw, they print "NO STEP" as "NOSTEP". Though you probably have some extras somewhere. There were some Superscale 1/72 Jolly Rogers sets, but they've been out of print for a decade. 1B. Rant---1/48 F-14's have like 5x as many decals, you can get ANYTHING. But 1/72 has gaps for even the most famous and desired schemes. 2. If there's no names, it means nobody can find out what they were. Common problem--there'll be 50 pics of a neat scheme, but not a one is good enough to read the names. 3. Nobody stencils more than the Japanese. I'm sure a VF-0 or VF-1 has many times more stencils than even the most stenciled US plane. FYI, JASDF F-15's have some 4 or 5 times as many stencils than USAF F-15's. I don't have a set of Cartographs from a new-mold F-14, though I plan to buy kit 0366 soon. So I don't know if there's not enough, etc. Older the plane, the fewer the stencils. (That's been the trend. A 1975 F-14 will have maybe 2 dozen, as opposed to 100 like today) 4. If you want stencils, there's several companies that make F-14 data sheets. The #1 1/72 F-14 decal maker is CAM: http://www.camdecals.com/main.asp?action=72 Set 72-012. I could try to take a pic of my set if you want.

While Tamiya paint is nice, their color selection IMHO sucks. They do not make the 4 most common colors for all-time US jets. So pretty much no USAF/USN/USMC plane from 1950 to 2004 can be made "out of the bottle". Best match for 36440 is 36440, and Radome tan is Radome tan... I myself use mainly Testors MM acrylic since they make most every US jet color. 3:1 thinner/paint for airbrushing. (I think that's what it was) Anyways---I found a larger pic of the box art (thanks newca!) and that appears to actually be a much later variation of the scheme. Go here: http://www.almansur.com/jollyrogers/jollytomcats.htm They've got pics of every variation there is. You want about half-way down, when they were on the USS Theodore Roosevelt. And I do believe the exact pic used for the box art is there (you usually get nice *big* high-res pics when you click on pics at this site--be prepared to wait a bit) You've got a 1990 or so Tomcat, just prior to Desert Shield. The biggest difference between this and "classic" VF-84 high-vis is that you've got the AJ tailcode on the inside of the fin, where the older version has it on the outside of the fin, above and below the skull. And you'll probably want 36440, even the CAG birds were matte at this time. PS--I forgot to mention this while you were doing the VF-0--wing-sweep wear! There's almost always a darker patch visible when the wings are unswept. Sometimes hard to see, sometimes VERY obvious and dark. And it will be the exact shape where the wings are fully swept. PPS--I'd really like a pic of the boat-tail options (speed-brake area) in that kit, I'd like to know if the 364/366 kits come with the early style.

That kit is the exact one I've been taking photos of. That's the only one with EVERY part you need right out of the box. Any later A/A+/B has every part but the chinpod. I'm going to see if there's aftermarket chinpods available, would make it easier since you'd have a lot more kits that'd work. I'll probably make a new thread tonight showing exactly how to make Shin's out of a Fuji, it'll answer a lot of questions.

Hey, the Fuji A+ 's on ebay are mine! Anyways---I now have 2, and will (possibly) soon have 4 of the "Shin back ends" that I won't use, so anyone who wants to build Shin's is welcome to them. (They will fit ANY Fuji F-14) Could also fit any new-mold Hase without much trouble I bet. (I'll see how they fit tonight). "Shin back ends" would include the afterburner duct exterior, fairing, nozzle, and burner/flameholder.

Many people are confusing the bullets with their casings. Casings are never fired through the propeller. Also, firing bullets through the propeller is mainly a German/Japanese thing. US pilots simply do not like the idea, no matter how fancy of a synchronizer you have. You won't find many US planes that fire through the propeller. At least as far back as the 50's, most US fighters have collected their casings for off-loading later. I'll have to check for modern European planes. ::checks books:: Well, that's not an often-mentioned aircraft system, but Tornados collect them, Sea Harriers eject them, most Mirage's have gunpods/packs so it's hard to tell. Also found that F-5's eject them. Wil check on the Eurocanards later.

The Fuji has the kneeling nosegear too, as well as the catapult hold-back attached to the nosegear--the Hase omits that part, even though you need it if you want a "ready to launch" Tomcat diorama. A few more comments: Hase has more accurate navlight shape, as well as both early and later main-gear-spoke-hole patterns. But the Fuji wheels are much nicer and crisper, both the plastic and rubber-tired versions. And I'd love to see some pics of the Verlinden and True Details sets. I'm going to build at least one ultra-detailed VF-111 F-14A someday.

YF-23 soreness: yup. Turbojet acceleration: as a rule, they themselves take more time to accelerate. As in "how long to go from mil power to max power". Which can be quite a few seconds. 10 secs is a long time in a dogfight, which is the amount of time a turbojet can take to spin up. As for "aircraft acceleration rates in level flight at high altitudes/speeds for turbofans vs turbojets" I'd have to go see if I have info on that. (I'd have to vote turbojet as the winner there, since the faster you go, the more edge the turbojet has, even overweighing its high-alt advantage). Basic jet propulsion theory: increasing the momentum of the air passing through. Momentum=mass x velocity. To make thrust, you accelerate air's velocity. And more air being accelerated will create more thrust. The velocity of the plane is subtracted from the velocity of the jet's exhaust for calculating thrust. (Since it's the DIFFERENCE in velocity--if the jet is going 400mph, and thus the air entering the engine is going 400mph, and your jet exhaust is 400mph, you didn't change the air's velocity at all, thus no thrust) Thus, the faster you go, the less thrust you make, even if all other conditions are identical. (assuming constant exhaust velocity) Turbofans mainly move lots of air (mass) moderately fast (velocity). Thus at low alt (dense air, and large volumes of it) they reign supreme, but the higher they go the worse, since the air's thin. Also, the faster they go the worse they are, since they don't move the air all that fast to begin with. If you're only pumping out air at 900mph, and you're going 800mph, that's only a 100mph increase in the air's velocity--which is like an F-15 idling. Not much power. As opposed to turbojets, which move moderate amounts of air very quickly. At high altitude, the thin air doesn't hurt much, since they don't really rely much on air's mass, they rely on increasing its velocity. High speed--their exhaust is SO fast the speed of the plane doesn't reduce the thrust that much. But at low altitude, they are moving so little air (even though it's thick) that their increased velocity isn't nearly compensation enough to make as much thrust as a turbofan, since a turbofan at this point is moving such large quantities of thick air. Basically--the difference in air mass moved is greater than the difference in exhaust speed, for a turbofan and turbojet. A turbojet's exhaust may be twice as fast, but the mass of a turbofan can be five times or more as great. A turbofan is generally superior in all categories, since it is quieter, faster-accelerating, more fuel efficient, has fewer parts, less maintenance, and runs cooler---but a turbojet at high-speed high-alt flight will produce a lot more thrust which is a single but important advantage---which is important for a fighter jet---so it's always a compromise.

Not that I recall. I have very very few numbers for jets. A lot of the comparison just comes from speed/climb stats for "same plane, different engines". As well as some of the basics for turbofans---the higher the bypass ratio, the more power and acceleration at low altitude, but less power at high altitude. And a pure turbojet will beat any turbofan at high altitude, but suffer tremendously at low altitude. (Wanna go real fast real high? Get a turbojet. But expect to take forever to takeoff and climb there and slow acceleration once you're there). There's no perfect engine, except of course the F120 in a YF-23, which could switch between a turbofan and turbojet, and be the most powerful fighter engine ever under any condition.

Last pic unless someone requests something specific: Side view comparison. No comments on the positioning! (It's the only way it worked). Hase on top (in a non-innuendo way).

Underside comparison. Fuji on top, with no #2 engine or intake.

It's VERY hard to photograph surface scribing. Top 2 pics are Hase, bottom 2 Fuji.

Same area, Fuji kit. Not gapless, no F-14 kit is, but much easier to fill--don't need to re-carve the area aft of the canopy. Also note integral gunvents, and excellent fit of nosecone.

"The big gap" Source of 99% of all complaints about the Hase kit. The forward fuselage isn't as tall as the mid fuselage. That alone would be a problem. However, the angles also don't match. If you close the gap between the forward and mid fuse. on top, the plane's belly will be kinked, and the phoenix pallets won't fit. Thus you've got to make the belly flat, thus leaving a gap up top. (Much easier to fill a gap than un-kink the belly) PS--overall, the Hase fit together much better than I had been lead to believe. Still well below the Fuji though, IMHO. But the intakes (a very important part) did fit quite nicely, maybe even better than the Fuji's.

Big main comparison pic. Fuji is up top, with the green xacto knife supporting the underside. (Since as you just saw, a large portion of the underside is still on the sprue)

Tried some different backgrounds, but the main thing was "distance from the camera". 1 inch makes a lot of difference when you're this close to 1/72 bits. Before I start the main comparisons, quick shot here: This one of the Fuji's sprues, showing the main way it differs from all other F-14 kits. This is the entire starboard side of the lower half. Two large intake/engine halves, and a wing-glove (with integral upper intake and ramps).