F35A Lightning II (Italeri) | Build Log

Ejection seat parts 

Ejection seat assembled 

Assembled and painted, with a wash 

F18 pilot (the only figure I had remotely close to the jet age) 

Painted figure 

With a wash 

Photoetch seatbelts 

Adding PE foot pedals 

Finished dashboard 

Pilot in the seat. The seatbelts are loose since they didn't quite fit 

Cockpit before assembly 

Cockpit with dashboard installed 

The pilot had to go under reconstructive leg surgery because his legs were too long. I had to cut each leg off and then shorten it at the knee, then reattach it. 

Cockpit mated into the fuselage 

Weapons bay parts 

Weapons bay assembled 

Pre shading weapons bay 

Weapons bay painted and with a wash 

Weapons bay installed into fuselage 

Air intake parts 

Assembled air intake 

Turbofan parts 

Assembled F135 engine 

Landing gear bay parts 

Landing gear parts 

Assembled and painted landing gears 

Landing gears mated to the fuselage 

Nose gear bay and parts 

Assembled nose gear 

Nose gear mated to fuselage 

Top and bottom of fuselage mated 

Nose added to fuselage 

Control surface parts 

Control surfaces assembled 

Ailerons added to wings 

Wings and elevons mated to fuselage 

Some gap filling for the wings 

Ladder access hatch closed 

Vertical stabilizer parts 

Vertical stabilizers assembled 

Vertical stabilizers attached to fuselage 

Ready for main body paint job (other subassemblies will be painted and attached separately to make things cleaner in the end) 

Masking off pre-painted areas 

Coated with Vallejo black primer. Ready for some pre-shading 

Pre-shading done! Ready to move on to the real paint job 

Started painting with the light grey tone that is used for the radar tape and nose. Next to mask that off and go over the whole aircraft with it's darker grey fuselage color 

I wish I was exaggerating when I say that it took me 18 hours to mask off all the light grey areas. The kit comes with some sticker masks but those account for less than 25% of what needed to be masked for this kit. You can see the sticker masks that came with the kit in white, whereas the rest of my tape here is green and yellow 

It's finally starting to take shape after the main coat! Peeling off all that tape was very satisfying. The contrast between the 2 greys is a bit too stark for my liking, so after cleaning up a few small areas, I'll apply a thin coat of grey over the whole thing to help blend the colors together a bit 

Softened up the contrast a great deal by adding a few thin coats of a different grey shade. 

Disaster struck today as I tried to darken the whole plane today. I tried to add a thin layer of a black-ish color to darken the whole thing. It ended up being patchy and I kept adding layers to try to even put the coat. I'm really unhappy with how it looks now, so I'll be promptly stripping all the paint off the fuselage and starting over. I've ordered some new paint which matches the exact colors of the F35, so no more guesswork trying to mix paints. Not looking forward to another 18 hours of masking, but you love and you learn. 

Spent a few hours stripping all the paint off, then re-primed the whole thing with a light ghost grey. This is, according to the US Navy, the exact color these are painted (in the trim sections). It looks a bit light to me but we'll see how it looks once the main fuselage color is on. 

Finally repainted after that catastrophe! Took another 30 hours to get back to this point. I'm ready to move on with the build. 

Starting on weapon bay and landing gear doors 

All doors painted and ready to attach to the airframe. I'll probably save this for the last step because it looks like a rather fragile addition and I don't want to risk snapping one of the doors off while I paint up the rest of the plane 

Exhaust can and cover parts 

Exhaust cover painted 

Exhaust can painted 

Installed the bottom of the exhaust cover 

Installed the exhaust can and the top of the exhaust cover 

Decals applied to the main airframe, just need to attach wheels, canopy, and armaments next 

Wing pylon part 

More wing pylon parts 

Assembled pylons 

Assembled and painted pylons 

Sidewinder mount parts 

Assembled sidewinder mounts 

Painted sidewinder mounts 

AIM-120 parts 

Assembled AIM-120s 

Painted AIM-120, ready to be mounted into the airframe 

JDAM parts 

Assembled JDAMs 

Painted JDAM, ready to be mounted to the wing pylon 

Sidewinder parts 

Assembled sidewinders 

Landing light parts 

Assembled and painted landing lights 

Painted gear bay supports and AIM-120 gear bay mount 

Added the gear bay supports to the bay door 

Added all the armaments to the wings! We're almost done with the build now. Just need to add the canopy, wheels, and some other small parts 

Nose radar section parts 

Radar assembled and attached 

Wheel parts 

Wheels assembled 

Wheels painted 

Wheels attached! 

Added a tiny bit of weathering over the top of the airframe, in a copper-ish burnt umber tone to simulate heat rash that I've seen on some F35s 

Beacon light parts 

Painted the underside of the clear parts with acrylic ink to preserve some transparency. Came out pretty good I think 

Installed the beacon lights 

Got the canopy and the pilot tubes installed. It was a struggle getting the canopy on there, the fit is absolutely terrible. You can see that it didn't fit perfectly but fixing that is above my current skill level as a modeler 

She's finally done! This aircraft was an absolute tape queen. I am pretty happy with how it came out, it's not perfect but I think it's my best work so far. Now to make the base before calling this project done. 

I found this wood plaque at Michaels that looks like it'll be the perfect size for the base. 

Going to use cork as the actual material that gets painted up to look like concrete. Cut the cork to size here  

Painted up the base to look like a parking spot. Added some tire streaking too 

The plane on the base. More pics to come!