I
was inspired to build these two Blackhawks after watching my copy of
Blackhawk down one night, yeah I know that neither are MH-60Ls but one is
a Night stalker bird, and both carry Special Ops soldiers into battle and
those who fly them are brave souls none the less. |
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I started out with the Academy MH-60K kit and the
Cobra Co detail set, but after I picked up the new Italeri MH-60G kit I decided to use this kit as my
base (better detail) and throw together the other kit
as a G (swapping parts) building both at the same
time. I started with the interiors which were almost
like a kit onto itself and I did a lot of scratch
building to detail it.
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The Cobra Co stuff is very good, but there are a few things missing from the set
that I wish had been there, like the rear crew chief seats (which I built from
plastic rod and Tamyia tape) and the seat frames for the pilot's seat (they are
meant to collapse in the event of a crash).
I built these frames up and they looked good, but in the end they were a bit too
big, and I did not realize this until after I glued them in, oh well. Also
I cut up and detailed the roof area, and added the internal ribbing to the crew
chief/gunners areas.
The resin cockpit was easy to paint (all black) and looked nice after some dry
brushing. This whole process for both took well over a month.
The
rest of the Cobra co stuff is to change the exterior of the helicopter, mostly
the nose and tail. The nose is easy to add but make sure you dry fit a
lot, including the windscreen.
I
was very frustrated with the Italeri windscreen, it looks like a good idea in
the box
(separate roof parts) but is a pain in the ass to build, and a very poor fit. I
much preferred the Minicraft windscreen. Although Chris Miller did great
research as usual, the K has gone through a few changes since the first Ks were
delivered during the 90s. One thing I noticed in current photos (which are hard to find) is that the
laser warning detectors have been moved from their original position on the
doors (which are left off in warm weather for better pilot visibility) to just
below the gunners and below the
engine exhaust (they were split).
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I cut them and moved them along with adding a mount for each. Another new
feature to the Ks and MH-60Ls is the chaff dispensers, that have a variable
angle rack, I scratch built these from plastic card.
The tail IR plume detectors took some sanding and blending but I re-scribed the
area afterwords.
I
found that the Italeri exhaust pieces were much more accurate to the real thing
than the mini-craft parts so I copied them in resin for use on the G
also.
The dog house area has two holes that need to be hollowed out (APU I think on
the real thing) and had to scratch build a new wire cutter for my G. I also
drilled out and added plastic tube to the exhaust port on the left hand side of
the birds for the APUs and such. I added some wires to the wheel struts for the
brake lines. I also had to scratch build the antenna array for the tail boom, I
at first used plastic rod only to break it off several times during painting, I
then rebuilt it using metal florist wire. It was then time for painting.
At first I was going to do an all black K after reading that they were being
re-painted during upgrades. I even made up new custom decals that were reverse
black to apply over green (David Agunst suggested that). But after seeing some
pics of a very well worn helo drab bird I decided that would be very cool and a
good chance to work on my subtle weathering in a different color than Grey. To
accomplish this I started with the black areas and masked them off and painted
everything with several coats of model master helo drab. I also painted the
areas above the exhaust shroud a slightly lighter green since I noticed this
area was faded from the heat.
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At first I thought I would airbrush on different shades of the green, I tried
this and it did not look right, too much contrast. I then came up with another
idea, I sealed the base coat with future (need that for decals anyways) to
protect it for my spot painting. After some experimenting I came upon a method
of thinning the base color and mixing it with black and white to darken and
lighten, and then applying this to the kit. I used Testors brush cleaner (worked
better than thinner) and mixed the paint in a small cup and then applied with a
brush, I used a brush so I could control the application and if I was not happy
with the result I could just wipe it off. I found that because it was thinned it
did not look clumpy like most brush work and I would wipe away a lot of it to
give that subtle staining affect. I studied the photos I had in International
Airpower Journal and tried to follow the same pattern of weathering, mostly on
the tail boom and the engine
area. This gave me the subtle molted look I was going for, simulating sun
fading, oil/dirt stains and rain stains very nicely. I am not sure if all of
this will show up in pictures but in person it looks great, I was very pleased
with the result.
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Decaling was done before the weathering process began and again using my photos
I realized the "UNITED STATES ARMY" on the tail boom was very faded
and missing in spots near the chaff dispensers. I applied the kit decals and
then after sealing them I lightly airbrushed over them in spots till they barely
showed through, it looks very close to my photos and looks cool. You have to
remember that because these special ops helos go places that we don't
acknowledge the national markings are probably allowed to fade so no one can
read them. The other decals were also over sprayed on the tail and I left off
the red danger decal since it is long gone from the real birds. I did try my
reverse decals on the intake no steps (they are OD) and they look OK but peeled
up in spots, oh well. I of course sealed with Testors Flat coat.
Putting
the lower foot level windows in was very disappointing, even though I test
fit them they had some gaps around them. Just like the windscreen/roof
pieces I think these parts do fit well. I wish I had fared them in before
I painted, everyone be fore warned! |
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I attached some final bits to the kit such as the antennas, wire cutters,
landing light and miniguns and called it done. Note that while I taking
the photos I broke off one of the probes above the gunner windows (air
data sensor?) so please excuse this in the pics, I have since fixed it.
Gotta hate those small breaky things. Even though it was very time
consuming I
learned a lot and in the end was very pleased with it. Maybe someday
I'll get around to the MH-60L, MH-6, and MH-47, all very bad ass machines,
but at least I have one of the 160th birds. Night Stalkers don't quit!
Everett |
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