Top Gun Tamer: 1/48th Monogram A-4E/F Skyhawk
A-4 Skyhawks were initially utilized as adversary aircraft in latter part of 1968 at VF-126. The United States Navy Fighter Weapons School (also known as Topgun) was then formed to continued this practice months later in March 1969 at Naval Air Station (NAS) Miramar, in California. There are so many different paint schemes for these Adversary aircraft you could have a large collection of these colourful aircraft alone.
Monogram's A-4 series is still a decent bargain option for a 1/48th A-4 kit to this day, due to its good overall shape, detail and typical low price-point. Not up to today's standard but a fun project build that can net a good result, with a bit of extra work.
You can see more detail of this build with additional photos at: https://www.flypastrush.com/post/top-gun-tamer-1-48th-monogram-a-4e-f-skyhawk
Thanks for looking & good luck on your next build.
Great looking Scooter, I know 'Jester' would definitely approve.
Thanks George, If Jester would approve, I must have done something right 🙂
Fantastic Scooter! Congratulations!
Thanks Spiros, I have a few more Scooters in the stash that will end up with Aggressor markings
Very nice result, @flypastrush
Great article on your website as well.
Cheers, John (@johnb) I have a couple of TA-4J in the stash that will follow suit here (someday). Thanks again for looking
Definitely done this iconic Skyhawk justice with this build. Great result
Got to like that fact that you can still do up an under $10 kit and make it look nice enough to shelve - Thanks Neill
The adversary scheme sure looks good on the Scooter!
Very nice paint work and overall finish, congrats.
Adversary paint jobs are a favourite theme of mine Alfred - Thanks again for looking
Nice color scheme! Your other birds look great as well.
Robert, I have always liked the A-4 series, and have several more in the stash to get to at some point - Thanks for looking
Lovely work @flypastrush these kits are still good even compared to Hasegawa, I think.
Nice job on the cranked probe - will check out your build.
Yes, tough to beat the “Bang for the Buck” on this Monogram A-4 kit David. (And I found out how shockingly little heat you need to get a bend in the probe - EZ does it 🙂
Well done Hotrod!
Thanks Greg, I did a couple of more of these kits “In-flight” a few years back. It certainly was “Heinemann‘s Hotrod” setting benchmark design points.
Looks great! I used the same kit to build a Blue Angels A-4F, and it resulted in a stress free build.
Thanks Scott. That was my fourth Monogram A-4 build. Next I will probably do one of the Hasegawa versions in the stash which is very nice but the Monogram kit still gets respect after all these years