I wasn’t much of an Air Force brat (my father was in the US Army) but we lived in a city that had 4 different Air Force bases, so hearing fighter jets and cargo planes was kind of a way of life. When I hung out with other military brats and geeks we’d just get together and riff on things like Predator (talking about what gun everyone carried) or Top Gun (commenting about how ‘that plane can’t carry that many missiles of that type!’ – actual argument).
So when it comes to modern warplanes I’m not the most versed military nerd around, but I know the flying machines I really like: the F-15, the Apache heli, F-14 and of course the Warthog: the A-10 Thunderbolt!
Basically it’s a flying gun. What’s not to like? The fact that it can take a beating and carry tons of bombs and anti-tank missiles is just a bonus.
I was really happy to get this model, and in such a size! It’s nearly a foot long and a foot across, it’s HUGE for a plane model. Very happy with this – and all the rivets in such high detail give me a nightmare when it comes to filling and sanding, but any mistakes will hopefully be covered up with the high detail in other areas.
So here’s the assembled model before I started painting:
Couple of problem areas…the main one is where the wings join the fuselage:
You can see there’s a sizeable and VERY noticeable gap between the wings and lower fuselage…very annoying! I didn’t notice this when I did the dry-fit so seeing it after I’d put glue on everything was kind of upsetting.
Oh well. No matter…UNTIL I saw someone building this EXACT SAME kit on International Scale Modelers and mentioned my problem, he said he didn’t notice the fitting problem so I gently ripped the wings off, re-glued (at my workbench instead of while watching TV on the couch) and fiddled with the fitting until I was happy (it took a while!) and now the gaps are much less noticeable but there will still need to be some filler used to make it look smooth.
Here’s the nose of the A-10, showing a couple of issues:
The gaps in the gun pieces aren’t a big deal, it’s the misalignment of the cooling vents that annoy me more – and the misalignment of the panel lines…not sure how to fix that now so I’m just going to go ahead with it.
Once again spraying the whole model with Vallejo grey primer and panel-lining with Vallejo black primer:
And that’s where I sit for now! I’m planning to build as many bombs and missiles as it will carry, but I’ll probably paint those on the sprue and touch-up as needed. The cockpit and landing gear will have to be painted white, so I’ll do those separately and try to glue them in place without destroying anything.
Paints & Equipment Used:
- Badger 105 Patriot airbrush
- Badger Renegade Krome airbrush
- Vallejo Grey Primer
- Vallejo Black Primer
Scale Model Maniac 