Profile Photo
George Schembri
48 articles

T-38A Talon ‘USAF Thunderbirds 1974 – 1981’ Hasegawa 1/72

May 11, 2021 · in Aviation · · 16 · 1.8K

This is the T-38A in USAF dress from 1974 through 1981.
The kit is 's A17 T-38A Kit with instructions showing the kit is basically an F-5B with its leading wing edges trimmed back.
The Decals used were Microscale 72-138 T-Birds/Blue Angels sheet.
I am not sure which is older, the kit or the decal sheet.
This kit was actually started a number of decades ago. It was only recently pulled out of its storage box to be part of the Aerobatic GB (Thanks to Allan Withers @kalamazoo) and after I found a backup set of pre-owned decals at a LHS.
I took a chance with the ‘newest' decal sheet only to have them fall apart when applying the nose section decals - so that front section was masked and airbrushed after using a photo copy of the decal sheet as a template. Wing tips were also painted.
A thick coating of MicroScale Decal Film allowed me to use the remaining decals, additional mishaps occurred but the model was completed with minimal hair loss.
I decided to show the model in flight after finishing the bottom decals as I wanted to have the underside visible.
With only 'essential shopping' available in Ontario, I had to improvise and decided to use a hockey puck and coat hangers as the in-flight base.
The Thunderbird logo was found on-line and I added the top text after figuring out how to curve text in MS Word. The label was printed onto some sticky shipping labels with an ink-jet printer then carefully coated with Pledge to seal it up.
Thanks for viewing.

Link to the GB:
https://imodeler.com/groups/aerobatic/forum/topic/hasegawa-1-72-t-38a-talon-thunderbird/

Reader reactions:
8  Awesome

8 additional images. Click to enlarge.


16 responses

  1. Absolutely beautiful ! You could probably market the stand, looks great.

  2. What a wonderful build, my friend @georgeswork!
    Putting together, painting, decalling, even the stand, all are excellent!
    What a departure from the simple, classic Hasegawa kit!
    A pleasure to follow it's build thread, as well.
    Looking forward to your next build, another old, classic kit maybe?

    • Glad you like it Spiros (@fiveten) and thanks for following the build.
      In trade for the hockey puck, I’ll soon need to build a ‘Top Gun MiG-28’ for my sons buddies.

      1 attached image. Click to enlarge.

  3. Excellent build! Love the way the display shows off the underside so well. I KNEW there had to be something redeeming about hockey!

    • Thanks Greg, I don't skate that well so this is the best use of a puck I can think of - my son might disagree!
      This is my first 'in-flight' pose and probably won't be my last.

  4. Awesome build, George.
    Good idea to show the bottomside since this looks great as well.
    Using a hockey puck for that base is a well thought solution.

  5. Looks much nicer then mine did in 1976! Great work, George.

  6. Well done George, looks great on it's stand, inspiration to do mine !

  7. Very nice, George (@georgeswork). The intricate markings look perfect.

  8. These colour schemes are great, and displaying it like this is a terrific idea. Definitely liked.

Leave a Reply