I.D. Models 1/32 A-7E

By Larry Hawkins

The A-7 is the ID vac kit which is very basic and comes with two A/C to build, the A-7E, A-7D, or the A-7K which is the two seat version used for training pilots. I choose the A-7E for the era where they were used in Nam. It's basic and it took awhile to get it squared away but when it was cut out and sanded it starting taking the shape of the Corsair II.

I got the fuselage halves ready to be glued together and opened up the mouth for the intake and opened up the tail for the exhaust. I built a cockpit tub which has been really working well for the jets as well as the prop vac kits that I have built in the past. These take a little longer but it cuts down the building time and there easy to reset when they're put into place. One thing I do is to make a bulkhead and put it in the rear of the cockpit and set the floor in place and go from there, but always making sure that the floor looks level and then proceed with the build up for the tub. When the tub is installed, the side consoles are in place and the instrument panel is in place, then it's all glued and again put into the cockpit cavity and is glued into place. The fuselage halves are glued together before the tub is inserted.

Now on to the scratchbuilding of the tail planes out of sheet plastic. The wings were completely scratchbuilt from the plans and looked better than the vac ones. The vac wings didn't come with this kit but I had plans on scratchbuilding them well before I knew about this. The hard points were scratched as well and glued into place after they were attached to the fuselage. The wheel wells were next and I boxed them in as I did with the RF-8C that I built and used the Revell gear legs for the main gear legs, they look OK and cut the time in half. I went to the nose section on the plans and cut out the nose gear bay out and also boxed this in as well and then sanded it all down to the contours so it would match the plans. The nose wheels and tires were off the Revell F-14 Tomcat and the rear ones were from the Revell F-16 kit, these all came out of the spares box as all my stuff does for the vacs.

Then I went to the front piece of the canopy and set it in place and glued it to the right angle as to the plans. I cut out the notches that were showing the hinges for the canopy itself and left it as is and went to the canopy and added framing from solid square rod, it looks better as in the real A/C and gives it strength as well.

One thing I did to the tail planes was to make them moveable, so I added tubing to the right location as to the plans and set the tail pieces into place and gave them the right angel as to the plans. The A-7 has the tail planes up at an angel as to the pictures and intel that I have and they look right for this A/C.

When all was sanded down, and resanded, I wiped it down with lighter fluid and started to mask off the windscreen and the cockpit opening and went over the entire plane for the final step before painting it with primer After this was done and it was ready for the gray and white scheme it was left to dry for one week and then masked off to shoot the gray upper portions.

A special note to all. Letting paint (be it flat or gloss paint) dry for a long period of time it gives the paint time to sink into the primer because if you rush it and use a masking tape that has a high glue content it tends to bleed into the paint, and when you pull the tape off it pulls the paint and that is not one wants when you have spent several hours and days working on your project.

When I finished the painting and removed the masking tape and all was OK, I then went to remove the tape from the windscreen after the flat coat was applied, and after the decals were put on, those also came from the scrap box. I added the tires and wheels for the next to the last step and now I added the ordinance to the hard points.Here I used the MERs and the MK-82s from the Revell F-16 kit. The TERs were from the parts box and these were from the Tamiya F-4D kit. These were given a light blackish wash to bring out the detail and they were glued into place and then added to the pylons. One thing I used is the rails for the Sidewinders from the MIG Killer kit and used the Sidewinders from the Hasegawa F-86 kit, these are molded solid and all one has to do is glue the fins into place and paint them white and set them on the rails. The tail markings were handmade and the other walkways were masked and painted flat black. All panel lines are penciled in, penciling panel lines is far better than scribing and the article from Fine Scale Modeler on doing this came in very handy. One thing one must remember and that is if you make a mistake you can erase it. If one uses a metal scriber and one does a boo/boo, then all work comes to a stop.

The final step was adding the ejection seat and it was from the True Details resin set for the F-4. I know that this is not the right one but it comes close to the real one and until one comes out then the other one will stay where it's at.

All in all it was a fun kit even if it is a vac. One must realize what his limitations are and one must use what he has at his disposal and that's his IMAGINATION.

I.D. Models 1/32 A-7E

By Larry Hawkins

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