1/48 Hasegawa Top Gun Tomcats #29 and 30

Gallery Article by Shawn "phantom" Weiler on Mar 22 2016

 

      

Everyone remembers the now 30 year old movie "Top Gun". The Tomcats, the great air to air footage, the great (for the time) music the oh so believable plot and secondary stories to sell it to the public.......

Fightertown decals has come to save the day. Everyone and their dog who make model airplanes has wanted the decals to make these planes. Recently we were blessed with the decals. Add a couple Hasegawa Tomcats, and you have a completed idea.

Now, everyone knows the movie. The photography is top notch, the music was great for the day, the plot and side stories are a joke. But the Tomcat, not Tom Cruise was the star.

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I wanted to make the scene just before "Goose" needed a serious chiropractic adjustment. As "Iceman's" plane veered left causing Mavericks plane to depart controlled flight and everyone then having a bad day at the office.

OK, forget the plot, and Tom Cruise. Top Gun was all about the F-14A Tomcats. Everyone and their dog who make models has wanted to do these planes for near 30 years now. Thanks to Fightertown decals we now can. The planes shot in the movie were in desperate need of paint touch ups as the just came off a cruise with VF-51 and VF-111. Part that the appeal. They LOOKED like banged up rugged Navy planes.

That was the hardest part of this build. Stopping the movie 20 -30 times to attempt to replicate the patchy paint. That and noticing during the "just before Goose buys it" scene they must have filmed 4 different planes. One second both planes have missiles and tanks, then they don't. Then as Mavericks plane goes into its death spin it switches tail markings from VF-1ish to VF-213. So I said screw it and went with what I thought looked best.

These two models were "parts kits".  On Maverick's plane I was able to find everything I needed, but it was not till I was almost finishing Iceman's plane that I noticed I did not have the interior engine parts. Well, instead of leaving a big pair of holes I shoved a couple chunks of cotton in there, painted them orange and called it "jet exhaust". So two chunks in 104 and just one chunk o' cotton in 114, as his engines started to flame out.  Actually it looks ok. Much better then big gapping holes.

Shawn "phantom" Weiler

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Photos and text © by Shawn "phantom" Weiler