Painting begins with black for the canopy frame. The nose is a deeper shade of gray so to help make it more visually distinct I used black as a marble coat instead of white.
I did both preshading of panel lines and marble coating to help with making a single solid color scheme look less ‘flat’. Note the masked off refueling door that I had already painted.
The underwing pylons were painted separately and attached at this time to get a strong fit.
As predicted, I eventually broke the fairing on the starboard tailfin. This was cemented into place and the join carefully sanded smooth. I was sure I’d break it again though…
It was then time to sling the main camouflage color which is commonly called ‘Gunship Gray’. In this case, it was AK Real Color Med Gunship Gray FS36118. I painted in thin layers so I can control the opacity of the paint.
The gun port was masked off and painted at this point.
For the nose I went with the gray from Real Color Aggressor Grey FS36251 which looks just different enough without looking too stark.
The stores took a while to prep due to all the masking of the bands. I also ended up handpainted some of the details like the GBU-12 seeker heads.
See? I broke the fairing again. And this time the broken part flew into the ether, never to be found until it pops up after I don’t need it anymore.
Luckily, Hasegawa includes a spare tailfin that has the thin fairing (some non-US Strike Eagles carry a matched pair of the thin fairings). I carefully cut it off with a scriber and PE saw.
It’s then cemented into place. No need for sanding smooth any join lines this time.
And voila! It looks as good as new after a coat of paint.
The decals were next. These are from TwoBobs’ 72-010 ‘F-15E – Strike Eagles Mountain Home Avengers’ for the F-15Es that carried various noseart and bomb markings during Operation Enduring Freedom. I chose 87169 because of the bright tiger on the nose that gave a nice pop.
This being an early TwoBobs product, they were thin but required stacking for all the multi-colored markings. It’s double the work and frankly, fairly tedious. The formation lights were also particularly fragile and some of them tore and required careful re-aligning. The orange tailfin bands also didn’t fit well without a lot of Mark Softer to help them conform around the RWR blisters.
The sheet came with stencils and I added about 80% of them to get the busy enough overall look. Some of the decals silvered and required some careful slicing with a hobby knife so some additional Mark Softer can go under them and do its work.
Once the decals have cured, I went back in and handpainted the details like the nosetip and probes.
The RWR blisters were also handpainted.
More handpainting were done on the wings for the lights and sensors. The yellow formation light are part decal and part handpainting because they didn’t want to comforn around the edge. I ended up cutting them in half, attaching on each side, then painting any gaps with a custom mix of Model Color acrylic paints.
Things are finally on the finishing stages.
While looking at reference photos, I found a mistake: the arrestor hook should be a mix of metal and the camouflage color. So I masked and repaited to correct it.
After a spray of satin coat, I did a quick panel wash with Abteilung Starship Filth. I also added some light staining on the bottom fuselage. The effects of the weathering is subtle due to how dark everything is but I’m liking the result. Once cured, I mist coated a flat coat to knock the shininess down a bit.
The canopy masking was then removed and urgh… the HUD was crooked.
But it was nothing that (a careful) popping off of the canopy couldn’t fix. A tad stressful thing to do though.
The exhausts are now attached and you can almost (in my mind anyway…) hear them roar.
The main wheels were attached and given an evening to cure upside down to make sure they are fit strong and straight first before bearing the weight of the kit. On a sidenote, I’ve always thought the landing gear were too small for the size of the Eagle.
Next is the slow process of attaching the stores starting with the centerline GBU-31 JDAM and working outwards. These were attached either with CA glue or sprue glue.
After the stores were given some time to cure, The fuel tanks went on.
And I’m finally done with this heavily armed bird. The Strike Eagle has always looked particularly brutal to me and even more so when it’s laden with munitions.
Build Log
Pt.1 – Construction | Pt.2 – Construction | Pt.3 – Painting & Finishing
