POST JSI F-14 SPOT REPAIR IDEAS HERE

pcoughran · Post by **pcoughran** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 6:07 pm

Jericoeagle1 wrote:
tko211 wrote: Sorry, The NAVY fix would require another stencil and second color paint / masking process on the largest part of the plane (the main body) So to keep it at the 100 turn key price I opted to just live with it. Too bad it's not there... Oh well. The spots are gone and that is good!
Maybe a decal would do?

I guess I was just hoping that after putting $350 into a model that I would be past the point where I have to put my own decals on it to have it be accurate. Guess I'm just being too demanding. I love TKO's work though. Top notch.

Shin Densetsu · Post by **Shin Densetsu** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 6:17 pm

TKO you TKO'd that fix quite well, BRAVO on a job well done man! THAT'S how it should look!

Great job again man!

Stug45 · Post by **Stug45** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 6:32 pm

Awesome job tko, this is how the F-14 should have been painted

pcoughran · Post by **pcoughran** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 7:12 pm

I don't personally like the "lighted" special edition. But, thought some of you guys might want to "Pimp" your tomcat a bit with the position lights. I've never used this stuff, but it looks pretty cool. I couldn't find a pic of a tomcat at night showing the position lights lit up so had to go to MSFltSim, excuse the picture.

This glow in the dark paint comes in many colors and both water based and solvent based. I haven't gotten my tomcat yet, but it appears the postion lights have raised area around the edge so it wouldn't be too hard to paint on. It might even look more accurate during the day than the "yellow" that is currently painted on. There are many other colors as well if you wanted to "dot" some red in the cockpit or on the vertical stabilizers where there should be another light.
http://glowinc.com/
I don't work for or have any personal connection to the above company and like I said before have never used their product.

snake · Post by **snake** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 7:37 pm

Great job Zach.
And a very reasonable price.

On criticism,that you can't do anything about.
I noticed a couple of areas that are still darker
They are under the decals that you have masked.
Absolutely nothing you can do,short of repainting the ENTIRE plane.

I am currently looking into shipping costs,to see if this is worthwhile.
Your cost of the repaint is more than reasonable,but I am in Canada,and shipping could easily be $60 each way.

Thank you for taking on this project.

I believe that you have just saved JSI lots of returns/cancellations.

tko211 · Post by **tko211** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 8:06 pm

snake wrote:Great job Zach.
And a very reasonable price.

On criticism,that you can't do anything about.
I noticed a couple of areas that are still darker
They are under the decals that you have masked.
Absolutely nothing you can do,short of repainting the ENTIRE plane.

I am currently looking into shipping costs,to see if this is worthwhile.
Your cost of the repaint is more than reasonable,but I am in Canada,and shipping could easily be $60 each way.

Thank you for taking on this project.

I believe that you have just saved JSI lots of returns/cancellations.

Yeah, those darker backgrounds around some of the markings are indeed going to occasionally show up from the original paint from JSI. From what I can tell those areas could also vary from plane to plane as they appear to be random behind some of the markings. Like you pointed out, there is little than can be done without repainting the whole bird. And that gets to be another 100+ on top. Really though the occasional dark area behind a number or letter isn't a show stopper when you see it in person. The missing NAVY mark was also a disappointment when I realized that JSI missed that too. It's unfortunately in the worst possible spot on the largest piece and would require so much additional masking and time that I just decided that it had to stay off to keep the price of 100 shipped. I felt that this plane finished in this manner is actually worth a 350 or so price tag. I mean really it is a cool plane. Obviously the most frustrating thing is that it didn't have to happen at all right?

The goal here in this re-paint solution was to provide a finish that was as good as it could be within the time and budget constraints. And once you see how improved the spot situation is the trade off is acceptable I think.

It really is just too bad that JSI missed the mark on the spot issues. Im curious to see what other think once they start to get them with the spots. I frankly am hoping that people like the spots or decide it's too much money or trouble for me to fix them because this little fix it program is going to get not fun very fast if I start getting more than 40 or so orders! My intent was only to provide a workable solution for the members here who have higher standards and expectations. I really have no intention of starting a business doing this as there simply aren't margins to make it anything more than a side distraction.

STARMAN 352 · Post by **STARMAN 352** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 8:30 pm

Zach,
Great repaint on the F-14. Now how well are those spots on there ? Can they come off with something (acetone nail polish remover or thinner) without having to repaint the whole Tomcat ?
JP

SLRFAN · Post by **SLRFAN** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 8:42 pm

Snake,may I suggest that if your ordering from a US retailer why not have the plane shipped directly to tko?It will save you 60.00 and it would be a lot quicker to.Thats what I'm going to have aikensairplanes do,it will save me 30.00 as I don't have to mail it tko myself.

tko211 · Post by **tko211** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 8:45 pm

STARMAN 352 wrote:Zach,
Great repaint on the F-14. Now how well are those spots on there ? Can they come off with something (acetone nail polish remover or thinner) without having to repaint the whole Tomcat ?
JP

Well it's just paint, so they they are on there to stay but for sure thinner and acetone will pull the paint out. The problem, I have found with my years of modeling is that while this approach sounds good on paper it really has limited success and ends up creating a big mess, even to the point that it ruins the model for good.

Those spots are actually pretty dark under the light gray over spray. That thinner will cut right through the light gray and you will immediately see just how dark the paint actually is. Then it will run down every panel line and do bad things.

Even if you were successful in removing the spots carefully one at a time the major problem is that the paint is now also thinned down to the point that it behaves badly and starts to do things that are not normal, like paint becomes tacky and flat paint becomes gloss paint. It's just much more headache in reality than just painting over. Someone else here tried it on one spot and came to the same conclusion. I know because I have tried to strip paint and weathering before in the past only to ruin the model for good.

JSI made this one tricky problem to fix without doing exactly what I have done. you simply have to mask it all off and repaint it over. Sorry, but yeah it's either that or live with spots. It's still a cool plane no matter what you chose to do. But I would not thin the spots down.

glcanon · Post by **glcanon** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 9:50 pm

Just noticed this post fm BadCat's website "talesofthecat.com" :

Merit, our distributor for the 1:18 F-14, told us container #4 of the Tomcats is leaving LA on Mon, bound for our warehouse in N. Calif. In all, there were 4 containers brought in from China and the last one, is BCAT's...

Is it me or does 4 containers sound like alot?

Someone more mathematically inclined than myself, pls do the math. A container is 10'x 10' x 20'. The JSI box is 36" x 10" x 24"

How many of these boxes can fit in one container?

There's a piece of Aiken's candy waiting for the human computer who posts the answer : )

tko211 · Post by **tko211** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 10:17 pm

It's a lot of F-14's!

STARMAN 352 · Post by **STARMAN 352** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 10:38 pm

Thanks for the tip Zach.
JP

vmf214 · Post by **vmf214** » Sat Dec 12, 2009 10:43 pm

Great idea, it looks so much better spotless.

I think I'm gonna leave my 2 alone and in the box. Right now don't even have the space for a Pegasus V-1, if tried to display the tomcat my wife would go high karate on me.

SierraMikeBravo · Post by **SierraMikeBravo** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 12:33 am

glcanon wrote:Just noticed this post fm BadCat's website "talesofthecat.com" :

Merit, our distributor for the 1:18 F-14, told us container #4 of the Tomcats is leaving LA on Mon, bound for our warehouse in N. Calif. In all, there were 4 containers brought in from China and the last one, is BCAT's...

Is it me or does 4 containers sound like alot?

Someone more mathematically inclined than myself, pls do the math. A container is 10'x 10' x 20'. The JSI box is 36" x 10" x 24"

How many of these boxes can fit in one container?

There's a piece of Aiken's candy waiting for the human computer who posts the answer : )

Roughly 1440 planes given the fact there is 2 feet of left over space length wise in each container. If common sense were to play in here, they utilized the space to put more planes in the container which would yield an additional 32 planes per container extra time 4 yields 128 extra planes, so the absolute maximum amount of planes there could be with 4 containers is 1568 planes shipped to the US ...given they like round numbers in most production runs...I would suspect 1600 planes produced (more likely 1750 with the additional 250 SE's yields a total of 2000 aircraft produced with this paint scheme). Does that sound about right...provided they are done with this scheme? Edit: After reading Bcat's blog...I will stick to my guns and say 1500 airplanes shipped to the US. I think there may be some left over...at least for a little bit.

iflabs · Post by **iflabs** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 2:10 am

Oh oh oh oh! Nice refinishing of the F-14 TKO! I might need one of those...

glcanon · Post by **glcanon** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 8:06 am

Good job, SierraMikeBravo. I guessed around 1,500 without doing the math. Somewhere b/t 1500-2000 is safe bet. And that's pretty much the saturation limit one might guess. Century Wings usually sells out runs of 1000 on preorder. Runs of 1500 tend to take a little longer but eventually sell out. Runs of 2,000 generally don't sell out, or take long time to sell out, based on $79-$89 diecast 1/72 models. Not apples to apples, but I think saturation levels are similar as both are pricey for their respective scales.

Which means TKO will be refinishing around 2.67% (lets say 3%) of the Spotcats, given his present bookings of around 40.

Amazing. I'd say JSI owes TKO 3% of gross sales on those Spotcats that aren't being returned. He's saving them alot of embarrassment.

Post by **aferguson** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 9:41 am

the tomcat is about 6 cubic feet in size (the box) and a container is 2000 cubic feet (assuming that's the internal volume) so that's roughly 2000/ 6 = 333 tomcats per container and their are 4 containers so that's about 1300 and change. Not including the special editions, which i as assuming arrived by other means since they got here earlier. Also assuming there are other Tomcats that were shipped to etailers in europe, asia etc i would guess a production run of 2000 tomcats including the 250 special editions.

All of them with goofy spots.

CW4USARMY · Post by **CW4USARMY** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 9:56 am

aferguson wrote:

All of them with goofy spots.

LOL!!!

tko211 · Post by **tko211** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 12:30 pm

glcanon wrote:Good job, SierraMikeBravo. I guessed around 1,500 without doing the math. Somewhere b/t 1500-2000 is safe bet. And that's pretty much the saturation limit one might guess. Century Wings usually sells out runs of 1000 on preorder. Runs of 1500 tend to take a little longer but eventually sell out. Runs of 2,000 generally don't sell out, or take long time to sell out, based on $79-$89 diecast 1/72 models. Not apples to apples, but I think saturation levels are similar as both are pricey for their respective scales.

Which means TKO will be refinishing around 2.67% (lets say 3%) of the Spotcats, given his present bookings of around 40.

Amazing. I'd say JSI owes TKO 3% of gross sales on those Spotcats that aren't being returned. He's saving them alot of embarrassment.

What JSI should do is pay that percentage of sales back to you guys who now have to pay more to me fix the problem.

Sabrefan · Post by **Sabrefan** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 2:27 pm

Beautiful job Zach, you really make the Tomcat model shine.

glcanon · Post by **glcanon** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 10:35 pm

aferguson wrote:the tomcat is about 6 cubic ft in size (the box) and a container is 2000 cubic ft (assuming that's the internal vol) so that's roughly 2000/ 6 = 333 per container and there are 4 containers so that's about 1300 & change. Not incl the Special Edtns, which i as assuming arrived by other means since they got here earlier. Also assuming there are other Tomcats that were shipped to etailers in europe, asia etc i would guess a production run of 2000, incl the 250 Spec. Editions.

My outer dimensions were off, should hv been roughly 8' x 8' x 20'. I worked in the ISO Container industry for 7 years, so pulled out some old references on interior dimensions of std 20' dry box. Typical internal dimensions: 19' 4.24" x 7' 8.625" x 7' 10".

If Militarytoyshop.com is correct and JSI box dimension is 22" x 10" x 33" then you can load boxes 4 wide x 9 high x 7 deep. That comes to 252 boxes per 20' Dry Box. Or 1,008 Tomcats for the 4 Containers.

Maximum packing leaves 4" to spare in width, 4" to spare in height, and only 1.25 " in depth. Pretty tight. My guess is 250 boxes per Container, or 1000 for the U.S. This means the Spec. Editions probably occupied one of the four dry boxes themselves, and makes sense, with max cap being 252.

So if you were thinking the market would be glutted, maybe not, especially factoring in GI Joe collectors. Will the Spotcats ever go on sale? Probably depends on the number of returns. I doubt GI Joe collectors will return them though as they're already used to ugly paint schemes ; )

Look for bargains. Aiken's Airplanes charges $269 for Special Edition where Flying Mule is asking $369 and BadCat $280. Huge variance. Aiken's only charges $15 for shipping.

Jason of Admiral Toys · Post by **Jason of Admiral Toys** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 10:53 pm

Why would JSI send over 4, 20' containers and not 2, 40' High Cubes? They could fit more for less that way. My guess is that a few more than you would think were sent over. You usually never make fewer than 3-5 thousand of your first release of new model. That is the one that sells out the fastest. Admiral Toys sold out their first container of the White 8 in under 28 minutes, 2 hours for the F-86 and that was 1,500 hundred of each, 3000 models. I will not state final production numbers.

Regards,
Jason

glcanon · Post by **glcanon** » Sun Dec 13, 2009 11:05 pm

Jason of Admiral Toys wrote:Why would JSI send over 4, 20' containers and not 2, 40' High Cubes? They could fit more for less that way. My guess is that a few more than you would think were sent over. You usually never make fewer than 3-5 thousand of your first release of new model. That is the one that sells out the fastest...

You asked why 4 x 20' containers instead of 2 x 40' cubes. Because BadCat said he got one of the four containers for his own inventory. Plus, there's no such thing as a 40 foot cube, it wouldn't fit on a railcar... must be intermodal... The most common container is the 20' ISO. There are 40' ISOs, but are more rare and you just don't see them as much. Obviously they would hold twice as much, 4 boxes wide by 9 high by 14 deep, which means 500-504 Tomcats per Forty Foot ISO. This would put U.S. imports at 2000. Is possible? Yes, given that 40' ISOs exist. Is likely? Get BadCat to tell you how many in his ISO, then you will have your answer. I still think 1000 for U.S. mkt.

I'm also thinking the U.S. mkt is their largest. If 1K is the number, maybe double it for rest of world, which makes the run 2K. Or 4K if 40-foot ISOs were used. That sound about right, Jason?

BTW, I checked out the magazine racks today at the mall. Looked in all the aerospace magazines. I saw full page glossy color adverts from 3: Merit Intl, BadCat, and Aiken's Airplanes. Interesting. How many Admiral Toys getting?

If someone can get BadCat Rob to tell how many he's getting, pls post here. Then we'll know if 1K or 2K imported into U.S. Double that number, and you probably hv the entire global 1st run. If first run really is 4K, I don't think they'll sell out quickly, not looking like they do. Unless there's more GI Joe guys than I figured.

Jason of Admiral Toys · Post by **Jason of Admiral Toys** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 12:03 am

glcanon wrote:
Jason of Admiral Toys wrote:Why would JSI send over 4, 20' containers and not 2, 40' High Cubes? They could fit more for less that way. My guess is that a few more than you would think were sent over. You usually never make fewer than 3-5 thousand of your first release of new model. That is the one that sells out the fastest...
You asked why 4 x 20' containers instead of 2 x 40' cubes. Because BadCat said he got one of the four containers for his own inventory. Plus, there's no such thing as a 40 foot cube, it wouldn't fit on a railcar... must be intermodal... This would put U.S. imports at 2000. Is possible? Yes, given that 40' ISOs exist. Is likely? Get BadCat to tell you how many in his ISO, then you will have your answer. I still think 1000 for U.S. mkt.

I'm also thinking the U.S. mkt is their largest. If 1K is the number, maybe double it for rest of world, which makes the run 2K. Or 4K if 40-foot ISOs were used. That sound about right, Jason?

BTW, I checked out the magazine racks today at the mall. Looked in all the aerospace magazines. I saw full page glossy color adverts from 3: Merit Intl, BadCat, and Aiken's Airplanes. Interesting. How many Admiral Toys getting?

I missed were Rob Miller states that he has a 20' container on the way. I have sent Rob full containers in the past and they have always been 40' containers. Admiral Toys has never imported anything under 40' into the US from China. And if you have visited the HK or Yin Tin ports in China you will be hard pressed to find anything under 40'. Let me know if I am missing something.

Admiral Toys is not getting any of the F-14s, nor is their retail store, to the best of my knowledge.

Regards,
Jason

glcanon · Post by **glcanon** » Mon Dec 14, 2009 12:31 am

Rob didn't say he had a 20' on the way. He said he was getting one of the four containers himself. Didn't say whether a 20 footer or 40 footer. When we know that, we know the number of imports, and likely the first run.

Anyone friends with Rob - let us know if 20' or 40' container.