Kinetic F-16 Shape Thread

[MoFo]

(if you're happy with the kit, or don't care about nitpicking accuracy issues, ignore this thread. You probably won't like it.)

Started so the rivet counters won't have to rain on the Just-A-Model-lers (JAMers?) parade. And vice versa. Hopefully BOTH sides can have their own fruitful discussions if we keep to our respective corners.

That being said, someone requested profile comparisons for the nose section. Well, here you go. Starting with BeeJee's profile shot of the Kinetic model, and Mad Viper's shot of an AM. Link and link, for reference purposes.

I will preface this by pointing out that the two shots aren't at *exactly* the same angle. Viper's shot is a good profile view, almost exactly side-on; BeeJee's model pic is from slightly above, and to the front. The different proportions will cause some issues, since it's not EXACTLY the same thing... but it's a good, rough starting point for the time being. You can't pin anything down to the last millimetre, but it does show generally where some issues lie, and suggests areas that deserve further investigation.

Also, methodology. The two pics are at different scales. I cropped out the background on the model pic and cropped the resulting image from the tip of the radome to the back of the nose electronics panel (panel line behind the RWR). I then cropped the AM picture, again from the tip of the radome to the same panel line. This was re-sized to the same width (# pixels) as the model pic, percentage reduction noted, then the entire image was resized by this percentage. There is a certain amount of slop involved but again, it should be 'close enough' for a start. The model pic was then dragged over the 'real' shot, opacity played with and a green layer added to help highlight the Kinetic kit - so I've got the 'real' photo as a layer, the Kinetic shot as a layer, and a green mask of the kinetic kit as a layer. It's also worth mentioning, the bottom of the intake was cropped just as a straight line, back from the lip; the depth of the *opening* is cropped to the model, but it just goes straight back from there (so the Kinetic kit isn't actually FLAT in this area, it's just the way I cropped the model shot)

Oh, and I'd suggest saving the pics and blowing them up to 200% (or more). Makes the discrepancies easier to see.

All *that* said, onto the pics.

First problem, how to align the images. Since the angles are different, and the shapes are different, it's tricky figuring out exactly how to try to match them up. The first shot is aligned with the nose AOA probes and the canopy base - the red lines being the 'real' canopy line. Done so because they're two of the more obvious alignment points - the most prominent (and complicated) panel line on the fuselage, and a fairly definate X/Y/Z point on the radome. The model shot had to be tilted down 1/2` to line up this way. Problem here being, the TOP of the canopy is *way* high, as is the spine area (particularly noticeable); bottom of the intake is too high; the bottom of the radome isn't bad... but the bottom of the fuselage is too high (basically, because of the 'droop' that led us to this thread in the first place); and the top of the radome is too low/flat. More minor niggles include the RWR blister, which is too low and just generally looks 'off', and the gun, which is slightly foreward of the 'real' location. Actually, it *looks* like the front of the gun plates are in the same location, but the Kinetic one is shorter, meaning the gun opening and gas vents are too far forward. And a little low.

I also did a version lining up the TOP of the canopy and the AOA probes, which is probably a more reasonable alignment:

Overall the profile lines up better here - the canopy is pretty close, the fuselage depth is good, intake depth is good. The spine aft of the canopy still looks too high, like it's flat instead of sloped down. The intake TOP looks like it's a little low to me - it seems like Kinetic's splitter is too tall, meaning the intake is spaced too far from the fuselage. Problems? Well, the canopy sills are way low now - you can see the dark line of the kit vs. the red line of the real plane. The angle of the back of the canopy is off, too. The gun and RWR blister sit too low as well - almost half the depth of the gun, actually. ...and then there's the nose. Too flat and angled too far down on the top, and with a large bulge from about the middle of the radome back to the aft end of the electronics panel underneath.

This is the 'off' or 'droopy' look that people had been complaining about. If you weren't sure where to look... there you go. If you were on the fence about whether it's serious enough to avoid the kit or not... hopefully this will help you decide one way or the other. And if anyone's got a better profile shot, I'd be happy to re-do the comparisons.

[volzj]

Mike,

Very useful and well done.

Thanks for the effort it took to put this together.

[otis252]

Excellent work. Way over my head.

Chuck

[Modeldat]

Excellent work Mofo! Hopefully, a reasonable discussion will be possble.

Out.

Edited November 24, 2008 by Modeldat

[otis252]

Again excellent work MoFo, thank you for taking the time to do it. Now my question would be this, wonder if the Hasagawa radome or perhaps the Royal Resin one, fit on the front of the Kinetic fuse? Then sand the bottom of the fuse to mate? Any thoughts?

Chuck

By the way, got the DJ ordered and will problem bye more, especially if the fix is one of the RR radomes and a sanding stick. Even with the purchase of a RR radome, the kit is of great value.

Edited November 24, 2008 by otis252

[dsmith]

Hi guys,

I thought I might make a comment about how my RR nose fits. I don't have a Kinetic kit in hand, but I had one person try it out, and waiting on another. From one modeler's test, it looks like my nose lines up pretty much dead on with the upper fuselage, but it will take some work (sanding stick) with the bottom of the fuselage. I will let you know when I have heard from all parties.

Cheers,

-Doug

[habu2]

...

Edited November 24, 2008 by habu2

[Jennings]

FWIW, it's physically impossible to take a photograph that will line up perfectly with loft drawings. The physics of optics make it impossible, not just difficult. You might get close, but there will *always* be some parallax error in any photograph you take, assuming you live in the 3D world that the rest of us do. If you could inhabit a 2D world, then you could do it...

J

[MoFo]

Again excellent work MoFo, thank you for taking the time to do it. Now my question would be this, wonder if the Hasagawa radome or perhaps the Royal Resin one, fit on the front of the Kinetic fuse? Then sand the bottom of the fuse to mate? Any thoughts?

Didn't really take much time at all. In fact, typing the post was longer than playing in Photoshop.

As for the radome... My gut feeling is, it probably falls into the 'too much hassle to fix' category.

If you look at the first picture, the radome shape isn't actually *too* bad, Kinetic vs. real thing - build up the front with a bit of putty and it would probably be okay. But that's only half the problem.

I suspect the SECOND picture is the more accurate alignment. Here the whole nose section is lower. The real F-16 nose starts drooping from the electronics bay panel line - right behind the RWR blisters. Kinetic's drops from the panel line further back - the one that runs through the rescue arrow. So the bulge is quite a bit deeper, and the whole nose seems to be angled down more than it should. At the radome break, you'd be sanding 1 - 2mm off the bottom of the fuselage (notice in the second pic, the Kinetic fuselage is about halfway down the 'real' antennae). First, that's a lot of material to be removing. You might have to backfill the lower fuselage to prevent sanding through. Secondly, there's a lot of subtle shapes in that area, and sanding a huge flat spot under the nose will mean a lot of work restoring the cross section. It's not just, file the bottom down and you're good. Even gluing on a replacement radome isn't enough. You'd have to re-contour the entire lower fuselage in that area, restore the curves, hopefully with enough plastic to do it. Scabbing on a replacement radome, you might end up sanding around the entire nose section to make them match up. That would require some hands-on time with the plastic, and some head-scratching.

Not to mention, if the profile is that out of whack, it could have wider ramifications to the shape in general. Could be the strakes are at the wrong level. Or... the F-16 at the radome break has a sort of rounded D shaped cross section. If the corners are too high (or too low), again, lots of work to blend. And looking at those RWR blisters, I suspect it may just have a different cross section.

Of course, it could be that it WOULD be simple to fix by sanding, just shave 'er down and round 'er out. I don't have the kit on hand, so I can't say.

Sooo... If the cross sections are reasonably close, it shouldn't be *too* bad to fix. And using a replacement radome would be a good idea, since it'll show you the shape you're aiming for. If the cross section is way off though, and you're looking at sanding here, puttying there, then trying to make it all blend together? I'd be inclinded to just live with it, and build the kit OOB.

MoFo, if you (or someone) will post up a good profile shot of the Kinetic kit I will overlay the GD loft lines on it.

As I said, I don't have the kit. But I noticed someone ask for a comparison, and figured I'd start a new thread rather than tempt the fates by carrying on in the other one - when rivet counters and non-counters collide, chaos seems to result, so hopefully by sticking to neutral corners we can avoid any flare-ups.

FWIW, it's physically impossible to take a photograph that will line up perfectly with loft drawings. The physics of optics make it impossible, not just difficult. You might get close, but there will *always* be some parallax error in any photograph you take, assuming you live in the 3D world that the rest of us do.

Yup, hence the various caveats and potential errors mentioned in the OP. But a rough comparison is probably more helpful than 'it looks right/wrong to my eye' to most people.

[habu2]

...

Edited November 24, 2008 by habu2

[pablo189]

Of course, it could be that it WOULD be simple to fix by sanding, just shave 'er down and round 'er out. I don't have the kit on hand, so I can't say.

I'm not particularly put out by the rest of the faults in the kit. Yes, I know they are there, but for me they fall into the catagory of not really being bad enough to be worthy of surgery... think of the wing crank in the Hasegawa Harrier...it's wrong, but it doesn't make a massive difference to the overall look of the kit. The nose on this though looked bad enough though that I wanted to have a crack at fixing it, especially so given the general quality of the kit and the added value of the contents, weps, tails etc. The problem to my eyes looks twofold, the nose is bent down too much and bulges out behind radome midway through the second aft panel. Soooo....

I razorsawed though the kit in the corners of the recesses, the Tamiya tape shows where...

This allowed me to bend the lower portion of the nose upwards just enough to smooth out the bulge a bit and then to bend the upper piece a little to accomodate it. Join the two together and you get this...

I trimmed back the step created by the bending and added the panels...

Another little step on the underside, trimmed and straightened that as well and added the radome...

So far, so good. At this point it might be good to have a look at the radome, Tamiya on the right, Kinetic on the left. The Tamiya profile is validated by the loft line pics in the D&S book ...

The oversquareishness in the lower quarters is not readily apparent in the dead on side view but shift up a few degrees and you see the impact it has on the shape....

So out with the heavy (240 grit) micromesh, smooth, spray some Mr Surfacer and this is what I got...

Personally, I think I've taken a fraction too much off the port side which I will build up again with some thick Mr Surfacer and the underside still needs some smoothing. A couple of panel lines will need rescribing to make them line up and some of the underside detail needs reinstating but, to me, it looks better. It's not anywhere near perfect but I can look at it now without wincing and that was the aim. The last shot shows it in comparison with a Tamiya kit ( I've got half built F-16's lying about all over the place :P )which looks pretty close to me and the two seem now to match to a degree that I find acceptable. Not a perfect science I know but...

...whaddya think?

Gary

[JP34]

Not to bad at all, i was thinking about the same today.Did you use the kit radome or the Tamiya one?? Is that also the kit canopy?

Gr Jan

Edited November 24, 2008 by JP34

[David Walker]

Very, very nice fix. That greatly improves the overall look.

[pablo189]

Not to bad at all, i was thinking about the same today.Did you use the kit radome or the Tamiya one?? Is that also the kit canopy?

Gr Jan

Kinetic radome and canopy, I'm hoping to work this so that no aftermarket is required. Just airbrushed some more Mr Surfacer to build up the underside of the radome tip a bit and smooth the rest out, I'll try and post a couple more pics tomorrow,

Gary

[volzj]

Nice work Gary.

It's always great to see a creative solution like this.

[otis252]

Very nice Gary. One question. Understand the bending upward on the lower fuse at the cut line, did you bend the upper one down? Man looking into the radomes, don't know what to do with that.

Chuck

[thegoodsgt]

Gary, very nice work. I always derive much more satisfaction from the hobby when I can put some "elbow grease" into a model!

And great discussion, too, guys.

[Stephen]

Nice work Gary, I'm in the process of trying to match the Royale Resin radome to the kit.

Cheers

Stephen

[pablo189]

Very nice Gary. One question. Understand the bending upward on the lower fuse at the cut line, did you bend the upper one down? Man looking into the radomes, don't know what to do with that.

Chuck

I bent the upper half nose upwards just a fraction to create a bit of space for the lower fuselage to move into, it helped to correct the slight droop as well as flattening out the bulge a bit. As far as the radome goes I used the kit one but took the squareness off the lower sides with the heavy duty wet and dry. The radome does appear a fraction to small overall but the general shape is at least in the ball park now.

[MoFo]

More comparisons.

After playing with these, I think I've got a grasp on the RWR issue. Basically, they're just really screwey. They're poorly defined, almost blending in to the nose surface, which is wrong. The shape is wrong - it's more like an elongated egg shape than it should be, as the real thing is more like a hemisphere that's faired in at the back. It's also too high, and too nose-high. Anyway, onto the pics:

Pablo's profile shots laid over the real profile pic. (same thing, just one's in green, one's the kit part)

This shows the RWR orientation issues pretty well. And his fix goes a long ways towards solving the droop problem. The Kinetic radome is *stilL* a little flat at the bottom front and on top, but that's a relatively minor niggle. A bigger issue that would be worth addressing is that, because of the fix, there's now a slight 'bump' under the nose, between the panel line behind the RWR and the line running through the rescue arrow - which makes sense, since Kinetic's droop starts at the aft line, and Pablo bent the kit at the front line. I drew a couple of green lines underneath the area in the green overlay shot, so you can see where I mean. Now, this will be pretty easy to fix - a bit of filing/sanding to level out the 'bump' and it should be good to go - and CERTAINLY an easier repair than sanding down the entire nose profile. But it's probably worth doing if you're going to correct the nose shape.

Basically, Pablo's method seems a really smart way to fix the problem, but you'll also have to smooth out a small bump as well.

In the Kinetic vs. Tamiya comparison...

(same deal, one's green, one's the model)

It was a lot tougher. The angles of the two kits to the camera are similar... but slightly different, making them tough to line up. But, with the exception of the lower front on the radome, they match pretty well. In the nose, at least. The strakes don't, but that may well be due to parallax/orientation in the frame, rather than inaccuracy.

And again, all the same caveats apply - the shots ARE all at different angles, parallax occurs, comparisons will only show rough generalities rather than specific and quantifiable faults, etc. etc. Basically, the goal here is just to give a more direct visual comparison between Pablo's correction suggestions and the Tamiya kit and real plane - rather than scrolling back and forth between images, this way you can do the same rough comparisons from one shot.

[Jonathan_Lotton]

Thats a pretty sweet way of fixing the nose issue! Thats close enough to call good in my book.

[Stephen]

Hi guys,

I thought I might make a comment about how my RR nose fits. I don't have a Kinetic kit in hand, but I had one person try it out, and waiting on another. From one modeler's test, it looks like my nose lines up pretty much dead on with the upper fuselage, but it will take some work (sanding stick) with the bottom of the fuselage. I will let you know when I have heard from all parties.

Cheers,

-Doug :D

Nice work Gary, I'm in the process of trying to match the Royale Resin radome to the kit.

Cheers

Stephen

From preliminary fitting and after performing Gary's surgery on my DG/DJ kit, I'd have to agree with Doug.The fit of the Royale resin radome is a lock with the upper fuselage but the lower fuselage will need sanding to match the RR radome.As I have the Royale Resin Hasegawa radome/antennae set I may sand off the Kinetic ECM bulges on the panels and replace them with the resin ones.

Stephen

[Gene K]

More comparisons.....

Nice exercises with the layering, MoFo!!! I really appreciate all the fine tuning required to come out with those overlays.

Gene K

[sv51macross]

I'm taking a good, long hard look at my AM here and the RWR blisters seem defined just fine. Mayeb the issue stems from the fact that they're mounted on plates above the skin (as opposed to Tamigawaleri having them glued directly on) makes the unpainted pieces looks as such.

[Gene K]

I thought I might make a comment about how my RR nose fits. I don't have a Kinetic kit in hand, but I had one person try it out, and waiting on another.

Doug,

A couple of questions:

1. What does your nose add/delete/fix on the Hasegawa and Tamiya noses?

2. Will you be adding a nose to correct the Kinetic kit to your lineup?

Thanks,

Gene K