Monogram 1/72 Republic F-105 Thunderchief

MONOGRAM 1:72 REPUBLIC F-105 THUNDERCHIEF

Reviewer: Paulo Ivo Teixeira (contact via SMAKR webmaster)
Kit Review submitted: 15 June 2009

Kit Details:

Monogram F-105D Thunderchief 1/72 scale, kit # 6808, from 1966. The (sturdy, top-opening, in perfect condition) box just says "F-105", you need to read the instruction sheet to learn this is a D. From e-Bay for 9.74 GB pounds incl. p&p in December 2007.

Aircraft History:

The Republic "F-105 Thunderchief" was conceived in the 1950s as a nuclear strike aircraft, but would achieve fame in the Vietnam War as the "Thud", a conventional strike and "defense suppression" aircraft.

It was designed by a team working under Alexander Kartveli at Republic Aircraft as a replacement for the F-84. The first YF-105A flew on 22 October 1955. The prototypes already featured the sleek body, small wings and stalky undercarriage of the production F-105, but the distinctive reverse-swept air intakes and coke-bottle-shaped fuselage were only introduced with the F-105B. The former helped reduce the likelihood of engine stall from high-speed shock waves propagating down the engine inlets. This was aided by a moveable "plug" in each inlet that could be shifted forward and back to improve high-speed airflow.

The first production version was the F-105B (75 built), followed by the two-seat F-105C (order cancelled, none built), and the definitive F-105D (610 built), with improved radar and avionics. These bore the brunt of the bombing campaigns in the first half of the Vietnam war, with more than half of those produced being destroyed through enemy action or in accidents. A later two-seat version, the F-105F (143 bulit), achieved distinction in the "Wild Weasel" role over Vietnam.

The F-105 featured a ventral bomb bay which could accommodate a nuclear bomb, however, as its role shifted more and more towards conventional bombing, the bomb bay was usually fitted with an auxiliary fuel tank with a capacity of 1,476 liters. In addition it could carry up to 5,450 kg of ordnance, including bombs, unguided rockets and napalm canisters, as well as Sidewinder and Bullpup missiles.

The aircraft was well-loved by pilots thanks to its speed, sturdiness and reliability, earning it nicknames such as "Lead Sled", "Super Hog", "Ultra Hog", "Iron Butterfly", and most of all "Thud". Amongst its drawback were very long take-off and landing runs and little agility.

Kit Parts:

39 injection-moulded parts including two-piece canopy. The 37 non-clear parts are moulded in light grey or dark green. Minor amounts of flash, some ejector pin marks that require care when filling/sanding, so as not to obliterate the surface detail. Larger parts were off sprues. Main fuselage split vertically and festooned with many thousands of rivets and overdone panel lines, as was the norm back in the 1960s and 1970s. Raised panel lines, engraved control surfaces.

Instructions:

One US letter-sized sheet folded in two, featuring: short history of aircraft with some technical specifications, in English only; general instructions on building, painting and decalling; 6 easy-to-follow construction steps, including text instructions as well as pictures; some detail painting instructions; painting and decalling guide showing 3-views of aircraft; colours are given as generic names only, no references to any paint range.

Colour Schemes:

One unidentified aircraft in the standard South East Asia colour scheme of two greens and a tan over light grey.

Decals:

Very small sheet with national insignias, aircraft numbers, some stencilling.

Cockpit/Wheel Well Detail:

Very spartan cockpit consisting of tub and pilot seat with pilot moulded on. Attachment rails for the tub serve as side consoles. No instrument panel. Wheel bays are shallow and devoid of detail, undercarriage legs are reasonably well detailed. A pilot access ladder and mechanic are also included.

Options:

Wheels up or down, canopy open or closed, and that's it really.

Construction:

Construction started with assembling the underwing stores. These consist of two underwing fuel tanks and two wingtip bombs (not sure what calibre the latter are, look like something in between 500 and 750 lb). Now this seemed too little - I like my planes armed to the teeth, and in any case the F-105 bore the brunt of the air-to-ground campaign in the early stages of US involvement in Vietnam, so I reckoned something else was needed that befitted the old warrior. Looking at photos I noticed that many F-105s carried a centreline MER with up to six 500 lb (Mk 82) or 750 lb (M117) bombs; I had six M117s in my spares box,so I proceeded to scratchbuild a suitable MER for them from two Airfix F-4 Phantom 3-bomb MERs. I used superglue to hold the pieces together, and after some alignment problems it came out convincing. A slot had to be cut in the bottom fuselage for it.

The bombs were painted old olive drab FS34087 (Hu 66), as this somehow seemed more plausible for a 1960s vintage aircraft. Vietnam was, after all, not so long after WWII, plus I'm not particularly keen on new olive drab FS34088(?). I also painted bright yellow (Hu 69) rings around the noses of all the bombs, and the M117s had their fuses done in silver (Hu 11).

The fuselage being moulded in dark green plastic, I knew I'd have trouble painting it any lighter colour. So I started by priming the inside of the cockpit with a very old and yellowed white (Hu 34). On top of that I painted dark gull grey FS36231 (Hu 140), which is the standard colour for US fighter aircraft cockpits. The inside of an air scoop located at the root of the fin was painted flat black. Now while I can live with a basic cockpit, a gaping whole into the fuselage behind the pilot is most unseemly. I therefore scratchbuilt a rear bulkhead from two sheets of old packaging styrene glued together, trimmed to fit, and filled any gaps around the edges with white glue. This was also painted dark gull grey, as was the cockpit tub. The edges of the tub and the attachment rails on the cockpit walls were painted flat black, to simulate side consoles. Tiny dots of satin white (Hu 130) were then applied with a very fine brush, to simulate dials.

The tub was then cemented in place. Weight, in the form of lead chippings embedded in plasticine, was placed inside the big nose and under the tub. I reckoned quite a lot would be needed, as the F-105 has a very "nose-up" attitude. Next, the two fuselage halves were cemented together: the fit is good, but there are some steps that need to be filed/sanded out.

There seems to be an awful lot of variation concerning the colours of the F-105's wheel bays and inside of wheel bay doors: interior green, natural metal/aluminium and white examples are all to be found. I decided to stick to the later scheme and painted them satin white (Hu 130). The undercarriage legs and the wheels where painted aluminium (Re 99), and the tyres flat black (Hu 33). The light (?) prominent on the nose wheel leg was painted gloss yellow (Hu 69).

Time to do some serious painting. I had briefly toying with the idea of doing a late F-105 in the Hill wraparound scheme of three browns (FS30219, FS30117 and FS30091), but, unable to find any colour in any locally available paint range that more or less matched FS30091, I opted for the standard SEA scheme of US dark green FS34079 (Hu 116), US medium green FS34102 (Hu 117) and US tan (FS30219) over light camouflage grey FS36622 (Hu 28). This was brush painted as usual for me. The camouflage on the actual aircraft has rather ragged edges, so I didn't use any masking. Hu 28 is a very thin paint and many coats were required to cover the dark green plastic. The underwing fuel tanks were also painted US dark green (top half) and light camouflage grey (bottom half), again with ragged edges. The exhaust can was painted gunmetal (Hu 53) outside and flat black (Hu 33) inside, prior to attachment to the rear fuselage; some white glue and sanding were needed to correct a minor gap/step. The radome, which is rather small, was also painted flat black (Hu 33), with a bright yellow (Hu 69) ring. The pitot tube was likewise done in flat black with a silver (Hu 11) tip.

The pilot is moulded integrally with his seat. Now I don't normally include pilots in my planes because they are a pain to paint (and I model mostly wheels down), so I briefly toyed with the idea of replacing the seat with one from spares. In the end, however, I decided to bite the bullet and go for it. The seat was painted dark gull grey FS36231 (Hu 140) with a scarlet headrest (Hu 60). The pilot's flying suit was old olive drab FS34087 (Hu 66), with black shoes and oxygen mask (Hu 33), a satin white helmet (Hu 130) and green goggles (coloured with a marker pen). The flesh colour for the face was custom-mixed using flat white (Hu 34) and a tiny amount of scarlet (Hu 60). The seat belts were done in khaki drill (Hu 72), which I think closely matches photos. Unusually for me, the painting of such a small item (with a Revell 00 brush) went very well and there were no mistakes.

The canopy framing was painted and the canopy was affixed. As usual, this left huge gaps, which had to be filled with white glue. I managed to smear a tiny amount of glue on the side of the windscreen part, creating a small, but painfully visible, blemish. Oh no... Determined to get it off, I started by scraping with a razor blade. This was followed by sanding with 1000-grit paper. Then rubbing with a kitchen towel, and finally with a piece of toilet paper. After some 3 hours of labour, most of the harm had been undone, and very little can be seen even with the help of a magnifying glass. Phew!

There was at least one decal to go under the wings, so I left adding the underwing stores till after decalling. I did, however, glue on the scartchbuit centreline MER (and was relieved that the bombs didn't trail the ground when I put the plane on its feet). There are only the tiniest locating pins/holes for the bombs, so superglue was used here. The undercarriage attaches very solidly, a welcome change from some previous builds.

To put it bluntly, the decals are awful. Good colour saturation and good register, but some of the worst, most visible carrier film I've ever come across, which to make matters even worse would peel off at the edges. This was particularly bad on the dark green areas. Reluctant as I am to use setting solutions, I first tried rubbing with a Q-tip dipped in vinegar solutions of varying concentration. To no avail. Almost in despair, I resorted to brushing some Humbrol matt cote onto the offending decals. And, as if by miracle, the silvering disappeared and the decal melted nicely into the background. Ok, you can still see a difference in brightness if you look at certain angles, but I can live with that, as I don't really want to matt cote a whole finished model - tried that once and wasn't particularly pleased with the result. I used some tail codes from spares - the lettering is ivory, rather than white, but oh well, no-one is perfect. :-)

Underwing stores and pitot tube were last to go on. The former required some sanding to fit without gaps

Accuracy:

Looks like a Thud, so that's fine with me. However this is very likely missing many antennas, scoops and other fiddly bits.

Conclusions:

hough primitive by today's standards, this kit is nice enough and very easy to build. Recommended for all skill levels.

References:

http://www.vectorsite.net/avf105.html
Paul Eden and Soph Moeng (eds.), The Encyclopedia of World Aircraft (Silverdale Books, Leicester, 2002).
Michael Sharpe, Attack and Interceptor Jets (Dempsey Parr, Bristol, 1999).

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