F-4J(UK)

[delbydoo]

Here is the next victim on the retro list; I will be mainly using the FMAI C model but a couple I will use the B as I have seen photo's of 74's J's with the wings folded, but it will be only 1 or 2 as it wasn't that common; I think I have the correct "blue/green" colour, as the RAF J was finished using an anomalous colour which the MoD complained bitterly about, although never fully rectified it until the late 80s, when three were repainted in the "correct" RAF colours. I still have stencilling to add but that won't take long...



Cheers

[Firebird]

Very nice.

On the model front I seem to remember that hawk_sh added something to his releases of F-4's so that the user could use either the F-4B or the F-4C model, so different fits. Alpha channels I believe.

It might be worth having a look at that to see if you could incorporate this into your pack.

[delbydoo]

Very nice.

On the model front I seem to remember that hawk_sh added something to his releases of F-4's so that the user could use either the F-4B or the F-4C model, so different fits. Alpha channels I believe.

It might be worth having a look at that to see if you could incorporate this into your pack.

All in hand

[delbydoo]

Okey dokey; a big thank you to Hartwig for letting me use some details from his F-4J paintkit (exhausts, DECM pods that were actually empty on the real aircraft), I have elected to use the F-4C model as a base for these paints, as the B model only had a centreline fuel tank, and not the two underwing tanks; the other downside of using the C is the fact there are no Sparrow/Skyflash missiles and it uses the older AIM-9J BUT I think that outweighs the fact that had I used the B model, all aircraft would be parked with their wings folded.......so compromise, compromise, compromise. They are parked up at Coningsby at the moment whilst Wattisham has it's runway rebuilt (literally - both the MAIW and UK2000 sceneries were made after the Army took over)



I have also included the three aircraft that were painted in the regular RAF air defence scheme.....



.....and used the alpha channel to try and make some different loadouts....



Cheers

[Firebird]

I know one 'Toom nut that will be downloading this .

That whole 'Flint Grey' thing was a bit of a debacle, I am sure that if they had asked we could have given them a couple of tins of 'Barley Grey'

[hawk_sh]

Looking good.

[Angry_Anderson]

Noice! My only wish is we had more F-4 models, including ones with the Spey engines.

[delbydoo]

Thanks guys. I shall be getting the 56 Squadron aircraft done next and then some flight plans. The 'funny grey' colour is discussed in detail on the britmodeller forum which was a great help. Jason, you are aware of the FMAI FGR2 that is available? Or did you mean different loadout models?

[garysted]

Gents,

74 Sqn on the Wattisham Northside HAS site - halcyon days! I spent many a day sitting on that fence watching them taxi past, so close that the jet wash blew over you as they turned the corner. People used to think that the end of Colt's runway was close to the action but I can't think of another airfield that had a 'beware of jetwash' displayed outside the base for aircraft on the taxiway!

A few shots, although scanned in from prints so they're rather poor nowadays.

Besides the last one delivered, they didn't arrive with black fins, they had standard tails for a while.



They didn't fold the wings very often - this was probably the only time I saw it outside staged events. Note that ZE350/T does not have the ECM pods on the intake, the only one not fitted I believe.



As already noted, a few were repainted.



The difference in the grey shades.



Great stuff back then, pity Wattisham is rotary now, still busy though. Chinook just landed as I was typing, late on a friday afternoon too!

Gary

[Angry_Anderson]

Thanks guys. I shall be getting the 56 Squadron aircraft done next and then some flight plans. The 'funny grey' colour is discussed in detail on the britmodeller forum which was a great help. Jason, you are aware of the FMAI FGR2 that is available? Or did you mean different loadout models?

No, I wasn't aware of that. I've only been using the Nick Black models. Yes, more loadouts would be great.

[delbydoo]

Unfortunately, the loadout question is fairly one-ended, as in you only get the one load with each of Fernando's models (the 'B has a centre tank with four Sparrows and two AIM9's, the C has the two wing tanks and two winders only and the FGR2 comes with two wing tanks, one AIM-9 acquisition round and two dummy skyflash) but thankfully, he marked his models up so that the alpha channel affected visibility, as opposed to reflection, which means that you can actually hide tanks, pylons and rails or any combination of those, to create "different" loadouts - that also meant that I (and Hartwig before me) could turn a F-4B into a F-4J.............

Nice pictures Gary, thanks for sharing those; and thanks for the heads-up on ZE350, shall get that sorted before release.

[garysted]

Nice pictures Gary, thanks for sharing those; and thanks for the heads-up on ZE350, shall get that sorted before release.

No problem, just wish I had taken more back then. Just a a couple of words about loadouts. I don't know if it's any help for AI purposes as I don't know what's possible and what isn't, but the standard daily training fit out of Wattisham was centreline tank, inboard winder rails and nothing fitted outboard, not even the pylons. This is different to the usual supersonic outboard tanks which was pretty much a standard fit for eveyybody else's F-4's. I know my pics show more with the outboard tanks than what I've just said above, but believe me, that was not that common.

Gary

[delbydoo]

Unfortunately, the centreline isn't an option on this model as I used the C version and not the B (because of the folding wing issue) and the pylon rails are double-mapped, so take one off, you take both off, so I've done some with rails and some without, and I'll cut down on the wing tank usage (but I need some for some "formation" pics that I'm working on this very moment but I wouldn't want to badger anyone about it).....like I said, it was an issue of compromise, and it's had to be fairly heavy-handed with this one, but I would like to think that people will be happy with the results

[Firebird]

Blimey, that standard training fit was different to my days at Wattisham.
On 56, same as every other FGR2 sqn I was on, had the standard C210 that Fernando modeled. He did that fit because I helped him on that. He didn't do more as he was worried about too many polys, i.e. he didn't want to do the C440, C444+ or D440.

I was kinda hoping that eventually Nick would get around to doing the K/M birds and we would have more choice. It seems that all I did was drive him frickin' mental over the various E/F/G and RF variants.