It is a hot, somewhat smoky Sunday. The thermometer says it is 25C but it sure feels a lot warmer. Walking the dogs around noon had everyone sweating and panting by the time we got back home. Smoke has been very strong the previous 4 or 5 days, with air quality at 10+, but today isn't too bad. There are thunderstorms to the south, and I am hoping that we get the rain we desperately need.
It has been almost a month since the last update, but it doesn't seem like there is much family stuff to update.
Marie was in Calgary for the first couple of weeks of July to help her Mom with medical appointments. She then spent several days with a childhood friend who was visiting from out east. Things were pretty quiet around the house while she was gone.
I took the opportunity to paint while Marie was gone, with the sunroom now finished. It is time to move to the 2nd floor.
Nicholas wasn't feeling well at the start of this week. Out of an abundance of caution, he did a rapid test as he prepared to head back to work. To his surprise he tested positive, making it the third time he has had covid. He ended up missing three days of work but was able to return on Thursday while wearing a mask.
Luna has taught Ember to pick raspberries. Ember is not very selective, and is quite prepared to pull the entire raspberry cane out of the ground to get at the berries.
We are less than 2 weeks from the big family summer trip. Everyone is getting excited and looking forward to the holiday.
While it seems not much else has been going on, I have been making great progress on models but not so much on taking pictures of the finished product. I promise that I will get final pictures for the next update. On to the modelling update.
MiG-21
The MIG is finished! This was a really nice kit to build, and I enjoyed it immensely. It was more work than I expected, requiring more test fitting and careful parts clean up than I had expected, but it certainly paid back the effort with a nice model. I am not totally convinced I picked the best colour scheme but that is my problem rather than the kit's.
Now I just need to get it into some good lighting so I can take some decent pictures. Here are 4 teaser pictures until the final pictures are ready.
CF-5D
I got into a groove on the CF-5D, and things seemed to progress quite quickly.
The modular fuselage, needed to allow different versions to be built using a common mould, continued to be challenging. The joint between the front and rear fuselage wasn't very strong, breaking apart multiple times. Each break required the joint to be reglued, the joint puttied, then sanded smooth and finally restoraration of the panel lines and rivet details. I am sure I did this 5 times thru the course of the build.
The underside details were rather softly cast and required rescribing. The underside panel immediately ahead of the landing gear didn't fit well, and needed considerable putty and sanding work to smooth the joint. This was another area that was repaired and rescribed multiple times before getting an acceptable result.
Photo 1 - Fuselage together
Photo 2 - Rear fuselage installed
Photo 3 - Detail of work to fit the fuselage halves
Photo 4 - Bottom seams took multiple sessions to get satisfactory joints.
Photo 5 - 4th or 5th effort to smooth the upper fuselage
With joints sorted out, it was finally time to apply primer. I had been using black primer to check joints, anticipating it could be used as a base for the metallic silver paint, but found it didn't show problems as well as my normal grey. So the first primer layer was the traditional grey, and it found a number of areas that needed further attention. With repairs made, a black primer was applied, allowed to dry and then polished out.
CF-5's were painted in a silver lacquer as the bare metal was found to corrode quickly. Silver paint can be susceptible to masking damage so I painted the red wing panels first and then masked them off. A quick shot of primer covered up any red overspray and things were ready for the silver paint. I used Alcald High Speed Silver for the first time and was very impressed. The paint went on very smoothly, when applied in light coats, and covered well even without a primer. More importantly, it could be sanded and then reapplied cleanly without any special effort to mask or blend it into the existing paint. This was a very good thing as I ended up having to make further repairs three more times. Most of the repairs were around the troublesome fuselage intake area, or the underside area ahead of the main landing gear bay, but the silver paint also kept showing up moulding faults, nicks and scratches, and just areas of poor workmanship. Once happy, a gloss clear coat was applied to protect the silver paint and prepare for decal application.
Photo 1 - Primed and polished.
Photos 2&3 - Silver "paint" applied
Photo 4 - Third round of silver repairs complete and gloss coat applied.
On to decals. The markings selected represent a plane attached to AETE at Cold Lake, based on a photo from the silverhawkauthor website - https://www.silverhawkauthor.com/post/canadian-warplanes-6-jets-canadair-cf-116-freedom-fighter
The CASPIR website has this info on 116837 - https://caspir.warplane.com/bin/warplanero.exe?action=webprograms&subaction=airserialscanadian&aircraftno=200000381#116836
First flight on 8 April 1974. Initial delivery to CFB Cold Lake, Alberta on 9 July 1974. With No. 1 Flying Training School at Cold Lake in 1975. Used by Aerospace Engineering and Test Establishment in 1979, 1982, 1983, and 1987. With No. 419 Squadron at Cold Lake in 1989. Received full Avionic Update Program modifications in early 1990s. With No. 419 Squadron, CFB Cold Lake, in early 1995, one of the last operational CF-5s. Still in use in June 1995. Stored at CFB Trenton by September 1995. Seen in storage, outdoors at CFD Mountain View, Ontario in October 2005. Still stored outside there in September 2007. Still outside, wrapped in foil, by August 2008. Still there in November 2008. Reported as sold to Aero Vision in USA, but still at Mountain View in June 2010 and October 2010. Left Mountain View on 30 June 2011. Registered as N836LG in February 2012, to Logix Global Inc. of Lewis, Delaware. Sold to Tiger Aircraft of Tucson, Arizona in May 2012. Stored at New Castle Airport, Delaware, on 23 May 2012, reported marked N836MX, not confirmed. Registered as N475TA in July 2012, to Aerovisions Holdings of Newark, Deleware. To Global Aviation International of Jupiter, Florida in July 2103. Noted as new registration pending in July 2015. Reported stored at Tucson in November 2015, disassembled, but not confirmed. Registered as N836LG to Fast Jets LLC of Tucson, Arizona in April 2016.
1974-01-09 Taken on Strength
2011-06-30 Struck off Strength
I used a set of Leading Edge decals for silver CF-5's. I have had problems with older Leading Edge decals being brittle, but didn't have any problems this time. The decals were applied over a couple of sessions, and then sealed with a clear gloss coat. And that is when disaster struck. The large upper wing roundels wrinkled badly after the clear coat dried, and no amount of decal solvent would smooth them out. I can only think that the large roundels didn't bond well to the wing, and the clear coat caused them to "pucker" as it dried. Fortunately I had spare roundels so the bad decals were removed and replacements installed. That's when I noticed a large bubble in the nose anti-glare panel decal. I very carefully pricked the bubble in several spots, and applied decal solvent. The decal immediately wrinkled! I left it alone rather than try and smooth it, and called it quits for the day. Returning next day, the wrinkles were gone and the decal had bonded properly to the nose. Whew!
With decals on, it was time to add all the remaining bits and pieces, including the landing gear and gear doors. The kit nose pitot was very softly moulded so was replaced using a couple lengths of fine brass tube. I tried using a decal to represent the pilot's candy cane stripe but it refused to conform. An acceptable result was achieved by carefully masking the pitot and spraying red paint.
Pictures rarely show CF-5D's carrying any weapons, but it wasn't unusual for them to carry a centerline fuel tank and/or a pair of underwing fuel tanks. I really like the look of the CF-5, and wanted to preserve the clean lines, so no centerline or underwing tanks were added.
And suddenly the plane was essentially finished. There are still a couple of small pieces to add, and then it will be ready for pictures.
Photo 1 - The selected prototype, from the silverhawkauthor website
Photo 2 - Decals complete
Photo 3 - Roundel decals wrinkled after clear coat applied
Photo 4 - The nearly finished model.
Karmann Ghia
I haven't made much progress on the Ghia. After much debate I have decided to try Bare Metal Foil for the silver trim pieces. I have never used Bare Metal Foil and so am stalling until I work up enough courage to apply it. Or more correctly, the courage to take a sharp blade to it and trim away any excess.
Photo 1 - Gloss coat applied and polished
CF-104 Starfighter
I was 12 or 13 when I attended my first airshow. Our family were on summer holidays, and the first stop was at the Cold Lake cabin of our former neighbours in Camrose. It probably wasn't coincidence that the Cold Lake airshow took place the same weekend we visited. I remember it being very hot, with a cloudless sky. The announcer directed attention to the south, where three jets in close formation appeared, and made a high speed run along the length of the runway, before pulling into the vertical with full afterburners. The noise was incredible and everyone watched in awe as the three planes streaked up. Without warning, three more planes passed very low over the crowd from behind, lighting afterburners as they passed, and also going vertical. The surprise appearance made the noise even more impactful, and I was hooked! The show would have been in 1975 or 1976, so the fast jets in service would have been the Voodoo and the Starfighter. I suspect the first three jets would have been Voodoos, while the three that passed over the crowd would have been Starfighters. That would be the first of only two times I saw Starfighters in flight.
The CF-5, and especially the CF-5D, is a sleek, beautiful and graceful jet. They look like there are supposed to fly. The Starfighter looks fast, with the pinched coke bottle body and the impossibly small wings. It is speed personified. Fifty years later it continues to hold Canadian speed and altitude records.
The CASPIR website includes the following on the CF-104 Starfighter
One of the most revolutionary military aircraft ever produced, the F-104 Starfighter was designed by Kelly Johnson and his team in 1952, at Lockheed’s legendary "skunk works" in Burbank, California. The USAF ordered two prototypes in early 1953 and the XF-104 first flew in February 1954. Records established by the F-104 Starfighter are impressive: world altitude & speed records of 91,240 feet and 1,404 mph respectively in May 1958, world altitude record raised to 103,395 feet in December 1958 and unofficial world altitude record of 120,800 feet in December 1963.
The Canadair CF-104 Starfighter (CF-111, CL-90) is a modified version of the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter supersonic fighter aircraft built in Canada by Canadair under licence. It was primarily used as a ground attack aircraft, despite being designed as an interceptor. It served with the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) and later the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) until it was replaced by the McDonnell Douglas CF-18 Hornet.
Canadair's internal designation was CL-90 while the RCAF's version was initially designated CF-111, then changed to CF-104. Although basically similar to the F-104G, the CF-104 was optimized for the nuclear strike/reconnaissance role, fitted with R-24A NASARR equipment dedicated to the air-to-ground mode only as well as having provision for a ventral reconnaissance pod equipped with four Vinten cameras. Other differences included retaining the removable refuelling probe, initial deletion of the fuselage-mounted 20 mm (.79 in) M61A1 cannon (replaced by an additional fuel cell) and the main undercarriage members being fitted with longer-stroke liquid springs and larger tires.
The CF-104 entered Canadian service in March 1962. Originally designed as a supersonic interceptor aircraft, it was used primarily for low-level strike and reconnaissance by the RCAF. Eight CF-104 squadrons were originally stationed in Europe as part of Canada's NATO commitment.
This build will be using the Kinetic Gold CF-104 kit, which I have heard very good things about. I want to do it as an early service jet, in the natural metal finish. European service jets arrived in natural metal but were soon repainted in an attractive overall green camouflage. Canadian jets remained in natural metal through their entire service life, with red high visibility panels on the wing and the full surface of the horizontal stabilizer. Kit markings include two jets, 114799 in Canadian service and 114845 in early European service. The CASPIR website indicates that 799 was equipped for use of the Vinten reconnaissance pod, making it an attractive build option. The kit instructions show 799 with the red tail, but CASPIR shows it exclusively in European service with a white tail. I also have extensive pictures of 746, the plane at the Alberta Military Museum in Calgary, making this another option.
I also picked up a Quinta 3D decal set for the cockpit. I had previously used a Kits World 3D decal set and wasn't that impressed. Those decals seemed pixelated and slightly out of register, leaving a very visible white line around half the decal. I have heard good things about Quinta so am looking forward to using them.
The Quinta decals lived up to expectations and proved wonderful. They fit perfectly and look fantastic. The kit cockpit was beautifully cast, and it seemed a crime to have to remove all that detail, but the Quinta decals are really nice. The kit also included photo etch seat belts and a really nice ejection seat. After several days of work, here's where things are at.
Photos 1-3 - Cockpit assembled and installed
And that's it for another blog. See everyone after we get back from holidays. Stay safe!
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