Grand Phoenix 1/48 scale FJ-4 Fury

[Ronnie Murray]

Good stuff Lee, put that kit on the "Another one bites the dust" list.   I'm not a big fan of jets vs props but this Fury really looks cool!  I bet it'd look good in SEAC but that probably wouldn't be accurate.

[Lee_K]

Lee that build really came out very nice. Is the demarcation line between the white and gull gray a mask or free hand? It really looks good.

Thanks, Bill.  It was hard masked as my photos of operational Furies showed about a 50/50 mix when it came to hard versus soft masking of the demarcation line.  I think they came from the North American Aviation factory masked hard, and then when repainted by the Navy they showed a feathered edge.

Lee K

[Bill L2]

Lee that build really came out very nice. Is the demarcation line between the white and gull gray a mask or free hand? It really looks good.

[BenB]

That turned out great! Well done!

Ben

[Ronv]

Thanks Lee, I have wondered about the current modeling practice of outlining each and every panel line. Having worked in one way or another around aircraft for a number of years the practice of heavy outlining is not what you see on actual aircraft. Most a/c panels are very tight fitting having been fitted to the ribs/spars in a jig, the only ones you would really see would be the cowling sections or inspection panels which are intentionally loose fitting. I worked for almost ten years building a/c for Fleet in Canada and we would use a go/no go gauge of the order of 0.02 to fit the wing panels together on the jigs.
Thanks for the info!
RonV

[Ryan K]

If I were do to it again (which I won't), I wouldn't glue in the gear until the absolute final step in the build.

Are you sure....I have a deal for you.  

PS. I do like the build and the markings that were chosen.

[Bill L.]

Not too bad!  For all the labor, I'd say your investment payed off.  Maybe display it with a clear piece of plastic or polly-whatever supporting it under the belly to take any weight off the wheels.

Very nice!

Bill L.

[Lee_K]

Just a technique question .....I have noticed that on the last couple of builds that you are not really high-lighting all the panel lines. This FJ-4 has some panels faintly outlined and others that are not. On the last model almost none of the panel lines were outlined. Is this by preference?

Hi Ron,

Yes, this is intentional.  One of the latest fads in the world of modeling is a technique for extremely heavy panel line accentuation.  I try to make my models match period photographs and in the case of the Fury, the Navy ones were pretty clean and the Marine ones were not so clean.  But even on the dirty ones, every single panel line is not visibile, so I try to go for a somewhat random highlighting.  For this limited production run kit, the panel lines are very, very shallow and would not take a traditional wash.  So I used pre-shading with dark gray, followed with a pencil and then dark gray pastels.  It gives a lot of variation to the panel lines instead of the stark black lines you see on models finished in the "Spanish School" discipline.  I can't say my way is right -- it's just the way I try to represent what I see in photographs.

The wonderful thing about scale modeling is that there are many ways to skin a cat and all of them are valid.  It ultimately comes down to what makes the modeler the happiest.  We all work to please ourselves.

Lee K

[Lee_K]

I Like it, I like it, Lee! Was this a real labor of love or did you put about the amount of work into it that you had anticipated? 

Hi Mike.  It was more like a labor of stubborness.  My personal model building policy is to finish everything I start (Monogram F-80C and Revell 747-400 excepted), so through sheer determination I pushed through to the bitter end.  But I knew what I was getting into.  On-line reviews on HyperScale and Modeling Madness warned that it would be a difficult build.

The most frustrating part for me was the extremely fragile landing gear.  If I were do to it again (which I won't), I wouldn't glue in the gear until the absolute final step in the build.

Thanks for the kind words.

Lee K

[Ronv]

Hi Lee, Very Nice!

Just a technique question .....I have noticed that on the last couple of builds that you are not really high-lighting all the panel lines. This FJ-4 has some panels faintly outlined and others that are not. On the last model almost none of the panel lines were outlined. Is this by preference?

thanks
RonV

[mmittenzwei]

I Like it, I like it, Lee! Was this a real labor of love or did you put about the amount of work into it that you had anticipated? 

[Ryan K]

I thought the kit was unbuildable..... 

[Lee_K]

This is a limited production run kit put out by Grand Phoenix (a short-lived venture of AeroMaster and the Czech MPM group) which included plastic, resin, clear acetate instrument panel, and photoetch.  All the on-line reviews indicated this would be a very difficult build and they were exactly right.  I took some shortcuts to avoid some of the major trouble spots by scratchbuilding a FOD cover over the ill-fitting air intake and closing up the main wheel wells by gluing the doors shut (like most Furies were configured when parked) so as to avoid using the too-large resin pieces.  Still, the build was very difficult with huge gaps on the wing-to-fuselage joins on the underside.  I discovered while doing research that the kit markings are for an FJ-4 instead of a FJ-4B, so that meant adding two more ordnance pylons (found in the spares box), sanding off a large hump underneath the nose, and adding a scratch-built canopy decking (which the kit totally omits).

Markings are for a Marine FJ-4 of VMF-451 in 1957.  Model Master Acryl paints were used throughout.  Panel lines were preshaded and accented with pastels and a number 2-1/2 pencil.  Paint was faded with random oversprays of lighter shades of the base color.  The landing gear, consisting of resin and plastic parts, broke off three times during construction and required extensive pinning to restore it to its current very fragile state.  I don't expect it will survive for very long.

As always, comments are welcome, constructive and otherwise.











Lee K