Here’s my take on
the A-7E. For some reason I like the more unfashionable aircraft, the SLUF
certainly isn’t pretty but it has a certain functional beauty. This is the
Revell boxing of the Hasegawa A-7E. I picked it up cheap at a swap meet; those
of you who have read about my other models will see a pattern forming here :-) .
Building this model meant several firsts for me, printing my own decals and
using Pastel Chalks for weathering.
I decided on the
Desert Storm aircraft in the kit, particularly as I had International Airpower
Review Vol 1 which has a good article on the A-7 in Desert Storm; it even
included a picture of the aircraft chosen by Revell.
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Desert Storm was the
A-7’s last war and it performed very well. It delivered HARM’s Walleyes and
plenty of dumb bombs. Originally I wanted to do an 8 X Mk 20 Rockeye loadout but
I didn’t have enough TER’s. As I’m saving my HARMS for Desert Storm F-4G I
decided on 4 MK 83’s. The mission marking for 302 show she delivered plenty of
MK 82/83's. The excellent photos in that article showed several interesting
details,
most A-7’s only flew with 4 of there 6 racks, and that certainly near the end
of the war A-7’s only flew with 1 AIM-9L
The kit is a typical Hasegawa
1/48, well made with fine recessed panel lines. The only problem with these fine
lines is that they are easy to fill up with paint, particularly when you are
heavy handed like me.
The Revell instructions were good but I’m sure they were wrong in certain
places, one of the main landing gear struts looked like it was shown opposite
from the photos of the real thing, so I went with the photos of the real thing.
Also it seemed to include decals for the main landing gear wells but the
instructions didn’t call for them, but again I had enough reference material
to make an informed guess. The Decal sheet also had 1 glaring error, for the Sqn
Name it had CLANSMAN, not VA-46 CLANSMAN. This meant I had to make this decal;
this was actually pretty easy once I found a font that resembled the actual USN
one. I ended up using the USAF one as it was available free on the net. I just
wasn’t prepared to pay $20 USD for 24 letters (there’s that pattern
again :-) )
The kit was built out of the box except for a true Details ejection seat, The
LOX bay was also rebuilt as the kit one looked particularly lame. I added the
Remove before flight tags and the bombs were from the Hasegawa weapons set but I
used putty to make the newer style fuses on the ends.
The kit went together fairly well
but I had some problem with the airbrake, it seemed narrower than the airframe
itself. Also I was unsure about the intake seam. So apart from a few coats of Mr
Finisher I left it basically as it was.
Again, I agonised over choosing
the paint. As my local toy shops only stock Tamiya and Humbrol so I generally
use those. I prefer the acrylics but don’t mind using enamels. My references
said the Desert store A-7’s were painted in FS 36320, this equated to Humbrol
128 but this looked way to dark. So I used about 2 mls of white to lighten it. I
think it turned out well.
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After the model was painted with
the lightened Hu 128 it was airbrushed with a couple of coats with Future (one
go) and then washed with a blue/grey mixture of enamels and turps. My references
indicated that was the colour of the anti corrosion compound used by the USN. A
flat coat was applied and then I used a mixture of grey pastel chalks to try and
get the looks USN aircraft get after a long time at sea. Again I’m pretty
happy with the result. As this decal shows an impressive mission tally the
mission 302 is prepared for would have to be one of the last of the war :->.
Another coat of Flat was applied,
once this was dry I added the RBF flags, the AIM-9L complete with SNURF and the
4 bombs. To the get the rippled effect of the ablative coating applied to
USN bombs I wet the bombs with cement and used a toothbrush. It turned out ok
but made painting the yellow rings difficult.
Once fully assembled there was
one more coat of Gunze Flat, the clear pieces were unmasked (or added) and
she’s finished.
Overall I’m pretty happy with
the model and I tried some new techniques which I will definitely use again. I
needed something for her to sit on so I painted a ceramic floor tile grey, not
very convincing as a carrier deck but it'll do for now.
Hope you enjoy the pictures and thanks for reading. See my other models at www.gibstuff.net/models
Calum
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