Alright it's been sitting there staring at me so its time to build it

Man thats sexy


After doing the review found Here
I will be building this mostly OOB just adding a Aires Aces II ejection seat,for the paint I'm going to try Hawkeye Hobbies Raptor Sheen found Here

Great review and interesting subject. I was never a fan of the F-22 but will follow this...who know's I may have a change of heart.

Happy Modeling,
Joe

I'm gonna quit my job and just sit here eating popcorn and watching you and Joe build jets. It'll be interesting to see how the new paint turns out.

Hermon

Then how are you going to feed your habit I mean hobby,kids,wife and squirrel

Will follow with great interest

man I can't wait to see how the new paint works out! Hawkeye has a monopoly on that colour right now and I want to see if it's as good as all the other SnJ paints
gonna be keeping a close eye on this one

I finished assembling and painting the cockpit.The Tub it self is spot on.The ejection seat is a good representation if you wanted to go completely OOB I on the other hand went with a Aires F-22 ejection seat because I feel that this is the focal point of the cockpit so I wanted a little extra in this area.The decals on the seat are from the kit.

Looks really good...

Just a little jealous - you seem to be cranking out a model in the time it takes me to just clean up the sprues and cut some of the parts of it for assembly.

Cheers,

Harm

Oh yes, much more accurately laid out than the Academy kit.
Nice work.

Mike V

Thanks Guys

I don't think your the soul-guy, I think your SantaClaus and all the little elves are helping you. There's no other explanation how you can build them so fast.

Yes and all my elves are evil

That does indeed look better than my Academy cockpit.........and very nicely painted up too.


Hermon

So I'm doing assembly right now of the lower fuselage and fighting the urge to stuff it full of detail.it's alright but I'm probably going to add a few hydraulic lines just to make it look a bit more busy.post pics soon

Here are some pics of the assembled weapons bays.....



67 parts in all just in these areas

that's really some detailed stuff,looks great.

Assembly continues...

After assembling the exhaust tubes I noticed something was missing.The F-22 has a coupling between the exhaust tubes and the directional elevators(dont know if thats the tech word but works for me)and it looks like multiple tiles linked together.Hasegawa left theres plain but no biggie just scribed in the lines and continued...



Working on the intakes now and then I'm on to mating the fusalge halves together update soon.

Building continues and preparing for paint.....


Shot of the rear wheel bay theres good detail here also and Hasegawa gave lots of data on the decals to put in its stores and on its landing gear and in the bays.

The red circles surround the bottom of the intakes where they meet up with the fuselage these are suppose to be smooth all the way back to the detail...so I filled these lines in with super glue and sanded.The inside of the intakes got the same treatment.

Questions welcome so far this kit builds great right out of the box I really dont see a need for AM stuff on this.

Wow, I thought the Academy kit had detailed bays, but Hasegawa puts it to shame

I know I said I was on the fence about detailing the bays but I fell off and went nuts just couldn't resist.The electric and Hydraulic lines are way to light and after many trial and error sessions Ive given up conventional and with my new found Friend SOLDER I started running all the lines.post pic's soon

alright time to put up or shut up.Here is what is taking so long



more soon figure at this rate I might be done in 2012 some time

I didn't know the Raptor had hydrolic lines and such. Being a zillion dollars a piece I just figured everything worked by magic.

Looking good man. The added detail is sweeet. I think when I get around to building my Academy kit I'll go with closed weapons bays. BTW.........since you're the modern aircraft campaign guru, I smell a "stealth" campaign coming up.


Hermon

Well, with 4000 PSI HYD system, it better have hydro lines

There are Hydrop lines in the main weps bays, though the visable lines would be for the PDUs that drive the doors. Also note these are relatively thin (3/8" - 1/2") and would be best represted by fine wire. The size they are appearing in the build are over scaled.

There are more wire harnesses and ECS ducts in the main Weps bays, than Hydro lines.

Mike V

Agreed on the size for the hydro lines but bending guitar wire is a pain in the $&@ so solder it is.I plan on using the fine wire up front.there so many hoses and wires in the back of the bays this filled a little better an I may rethink the idea now that someone said something.

@hermon I tried nobody was interested

Looks great Justin,This will all be very helpful when I get around to building mine.