Grand Phoenix's 1/48 scale
McDonnell F3H-2N Demon

by Christian Bruer

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The first flight of McDonnell’s newly designed Demon was on 7 August 1951. The US Navy ordered 519 aircraft but problems with the less powered Allison J71 engine induced that the first modern jet fighter was out of production in 1964. More powered fighters than the F-8 Crusader or the F-4 Phantom II replaced the beautifull and powerfull looking Demon. 

Grand Phoenix produced a nicely detailed multi media kit in 1/48 scale. The main parts, wings and fuselage are injection are moulded with minimal flash, plus fine and clear engraved panel lines.  

The cockpit, landing gear, gear wells, engine etc. are cast in resin. These resin parts are made by Aires to their accustomed high standard! Some photo etched parts are also supplied for the instrument panel, brakes, engine etc. The clear parts are well done as is the rest of the kit! For payload, the kit contains only the iner pylons with external fuel tanks. What I really missed in the kit are outer pylons and Sidewinders.  

Building the model was real fun but there are some tricky steps such as  fixing the multi piece fuselage together. Fitting the resin cockpit and the gear wells to the fuselage and wing parts needs also a lot of attention.

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Thumbnail panels:

For fixing the wings to the fuselage, the kit contains only one small plastic cross member. Because of the weight and for a more robust fit I made some more spars from brass rod! The main parts fit well together with only a few areas that need some filler.  

The Demon is finished in the typical USN look of the late 50s and early 60s - upper fuselage FS36440 Light Gull Gray, underside FS17875 White. I decided to build the Demon BuNo. 143410m, this plane was aboard CVA-41 USS Midway with VF-64. I used the decals out of Eagle Strikes “Deadly Demons Part I”. Painting was done with colors from Xtracolor, these high gloss colors are fine pigmented and a good choice for painting 1/72 and 1/48 scale aircrafts.

Preshading was done with black. After that I painted the underside in cloudy patterns to get depth effect on the surface. I did the same with the gray on the upper surface. I need more than one session for the whole paint job because of some masking work on the upper surface - white flaps and dark gray walkway, the black nose and the yellow wing tips and the yellow stripes on the vertical fin. To get a used looking surface I added a weathering with dark brown water colors thinned with water and dishwashing liquid. After that I applied the decals, they work well with a little bit Micro Sol and Micro Set.

This model was made for the experienced modeler. This was not my first multi media kit but it still needed a bit more attention and time to fit. But when it is done you are rewarded with a unique and rare model for every model show.

Model, Images and Text Copyright © 2008 by Christian Bruer
Page Created 14 January, 2008
Last Updated 14 January, 2008

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