Saeqeh goes to Dreamland!

[Charlie_c67]

Just thought. Aren't the horizontal stabilisers too far back or something? Or am I confusing it with Hobbyboss' F-16B?

[DogfighterZen]

You didn't fail me.  You did very well given the time constraint.

It's the nature of the 1WGB to rush.  There's a few misaligned joints on my M16 Truck which I would have noticed if I hadn't been in such a hurry.

Bloody well done, a great effort 

Moved as per request.

  Thank you, gentlemen!  I didn't have so many fit issues on my first build of this kit but i do remember that there are certain details that needed more attention but i think i'll be buying a few more of these cheap kits for other ideas.

Ken

I've wondered how a guy could build one of these. I'm looking forward to see how you do it.

i'll post the rest of the pics i took now so you can see my approach but there are other ways, obviously.
There a video on youtube of a guy building one out of the Dream Model 1/72 kit and he uses epoxy putty after he attaches the tails.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIgm_uk4KS0

I thought of doing something similar but decided to take a different approach to reduce sanding in small and cramped spots and time waiting for putty to cure... looking back at it, i could've done it that way and it wouldn't be the reason why i missed the deadline...
As you can see in the pics, i used the styrene bits approach and cut the shapes out of thin 0,05mm Evergreen sheet and glue them in place.
Finetuning was just a few swipes of a narrow round file and then i had to use a bit of sprue goo at the front edges to blend it all in.
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This way was faster and not as much work but maybe the epoxy way could provide better results? Not sure so maybe i'll try that on a future project.

One thing this kit has is a nice interior with an acceptable ejection seat and very nice instrument panels. The decals for the latter could be better but i painted some details with pics of the real thing as a guide and i'm satisfied with the result for this build. I'm sure that with a bit more time and some scratchbuilding, i think one can do a very nice cockpit with what's provided.
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Also added a pilot but from an Hasegawa F-16 that i was supposed to use on the real world PoAF A-7P. The kit's figure is rather poor compared to these...
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It was after i got the tub into the top fuselage and applied glue that things went wrong...
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Just thought. Aren't the horizontal stabilisers too far back or something? Or am I confusing it with Hobbyboss' F-16B?

I've never built one of the HB Viper and don't really know if it's accurate or not but it wouldn't surprise me... and i'm not planning to find out cause there are much better kits available for just a bit more money.
Now that you mention it, i think that the H stabs actually are in the correct place on this kit but the rear fuselage's dimensions are a bit weird indeed. Something seems shorter cause when i was going through pics of the real thing, i saw that the leading edge root of the tails starts right above the auxiliary inlets, in line with the aft edges of these inlet doors, if you trace a vertical line from where the tails begin.
IMO; doesn't matter much for a kit of this price range but it does make it harder if you really want accuracy.

Anyway, i haven't done much today as my wife went back to work and i had the day alone with my daughter. She's been learning new skills and teeth are coming so, she's a bit restless and needed my full attention the whole day so, maybe now that her mother's home, i can relax and a bit an do some work on this build.

[DogfighterZen]

Ok, not as fast but steadily progressing, today i've managed to get the intakes sanded smooth and did some adjustments to the wings and fuselage to reduce gaps as much as possible.
There will still be some filling but it'll be just a thin strip of Evergreen pushed into the gap and glued in place before i take the modelling knife and cut off the excess.
Also got the wings' extended LERXs started but the sprue-goo i applied to blend it in still needs a few more hours so, i'll probably only get them finished tomorrow.

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After the wings are finished, there are some panel lines to rescribe and some sanding and polishing to eliminate some scratches on the fuselage.
Then i'll attach the wings and all the small antennas and sensors.
Now that there's more time, i'll have to select the loadout  cause i wasn't planning on having weapons on it if i'd been able to finish it inside the OWGB's duration.
BTW,
So, regarding the backstory...
In the scenario i have for this build, the jet had been found in non-flying condition, it was one of the Saeqeh-80 prototypes stored in poor state, in a small hangar on a forgotten corner of a secondary airfield somewhere in the desert. It had no engines, wings disassembled and kept on wood crates beside the dusty airframe, the nose cone was damaged but it still had most of the original F-5 systems installed.
Seeing that this was a US-built jet that had been modified by the Iranians, orders where given to take it back to the states and perform test flights to compare it to normal F-5s.
When the airframe gets to the US, it is taken to Northrop Grumman in Florida for a full refurbishment of all systems and structural components to make it airworthy again... but they'd do a bit more than that...
Then, the Saeqeh goes to Dreamland for some fun...

[Weaver]

You didn't fail me.  You did very well given the time constraint.

It's the nature of the 1WGB to rush.  There's a few misaligned joints on my M16 Truck which I would have noticed if I hadn't been in such a hurry.

And my Darter could certainly have stood another round of PSR or three, not to mention the cockpit and nose gear bay I didn't even attempt to scratchbuild.

[DogfighterZen]

I was willing to turn a blind eye to some seams and wasn't going to modify anything else beyond the twin tails because of the time i had but this kit seems to be more work than i remembered from my first build.
The front fuselage seams were too big to ignore, it wouldn't make sense to leave them visible just to finish in time...
Now that i think of it, guess i could've gone for a simpler whif like a PoAF F-5 and that would've been a much faster build but a much more complicated paint job... if i chose the obvious SEA camo, that is.
Being a whif, i guess i could just paint it with a simple scheme like the Swiss AF F-5s because, had the PoAF operated F-5s, these would've been primarily tasked with the country's air defense so, i imagine they could've had the fleet painted in a scheme more suited for that purpose...
Anyway, that's all good for a future build, not this one. The only way i can imagine the PoAF having Saeqeh or twin-tailed F-5 fighters would be if they had indeed bought them back in the 1980s and kept them going like the Brazilians and other users.
BTW, if you look at the 22 years they used the F-86F as a front line air defense fighter, i believe we could still have F-5s in PoAF service if they did the same as the Brazilians and teamed up with Elbit systems for the modernization program in the early 2000s... but still, i can't imagine how they'd end up with an Iranian mod done to their jets, it's a hard one to get around... and that's enough blabber from me on that matter.

I've been working on the wings and although they still need some panel lines to call them ready, the shapes are there.
I found a very good photo of a perfectly framed Swiss F-5E from above and that helped a lot in making these with the correct size and shape.

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So, now it's time to engrave those panel lines, rescribe a few that were sanded off on the fuselage and then i just have to fine tune some areas where there was heavier sanding work to erase scratches.
I'll attach the wings and the remaining bits after that is done.