Welcome to the official website for Tomcat Model Kits. Here, I post updates and short blogs for my model kits that don't make it on my youtube channel or my twitter.

Check them out here!

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-21TUgHUso3N2ifb0d32JQ

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TomcatModelKits

What I've built so far:

New Ray 1:72 F-15 Eagle (not my first kit but the first one I put on youtube)

Animal Cell Model (School Project)

Italeri 1:72 F-104 Starfighter (first model I painted camouflage, first pre-1980s plane I built)

Tamiya/Italeri 1:72 F-16 Fighting Falcon. This was the first model I painted using actual model paints and the first one where I used decal setter for the markings.

Tamiya 1:72 Fw 190 A-3, this was the first non Italeri kit I built so far but this is one of the worst models I ever built because of the hideous paint job and ripped Ballenkreuz on the underside.

Trumpeter 1:48 P-40B Tomahawk. This was my first 1:48 kit which was when my skills started improving, the paintwork is almost brush stroke free, the decals were nicely applied, I used putty to fill in some joints and I highlited the panel lines with a pencil.

Tamiya/Iwjtaleri 1:72 Su-27 B2. This is another tamiya rebox of an Italeri kit, in my opinion this is one if the best models I've built so far. The camoflage looks pretty cool, the paintwork is free of any brush strokes and I put a lot of detail into the cockpit. I lost the original canopy so I had to replace it with a vacuform one. I really wish I didn't spray varnish it because it left milky patches all over the plane.

Tamiya/Italeri F/A-18 Hornet. After building the SU-27, I wanted a model that would be easy to paint, the Enamel paint I used left strange lighter patches on some areas of the model, I used this to my advantage as it made the model look weathered. I added a lot of cockpit detail and I think it looks nice.

Tamiya 1:48 Bf 109 E-7. I think that this is one of the best kits I've ever built, the assembly was pretty good and the paintwork was nice and smooth, the weathering was also minimal, I only applied a chalk wash to the panel lines, created smoke stains and added paint chipping to the propellor. This kit was also the first one which I used gloss varnish before applying the decals. I did lose the canopy, which reduced the kit's authenticity and it doesn't look as good. This was also the last model I painted entirely with enamel paint.

Academy 1:72 F-16A. After the Bf 109, I decided to build an easier kit, so I chose this Academy F-16. I decided to paint it using a two tone winter camoflage because I wanted it to look unique. This kit marked my transition to acrylic paints as they are less toxic than enamels. Even though I used X-22 Enamel gloss varnish, the rest of the paintwork was done with tamiya Acrylic. Since it was an old kit, the decals were really low quality so I had to use some spares leftover from my Tamiya/Italeri F-16.

Hasegawa 1:72 F-35A Lightning II. The F-35 is my favourite jet fighter so I wanted it to look really good. I was really impressed by the kit, the moulding is very good and almost all of the parts fitted well. It was however the last kit where I used superglue to attach the main components.

Hasegawa 1:72 F-14A Tomcat. This plane is what my youtube channel is named after and the kit was an extremely fun build. Thought the kit had a large amount of flash, the parts still went together nicely and the cockpit detail is decent as well. The panel lines were quite shallow so I had to rescribe them before painting. This was the first kit I painted entirely with Acrylic paint.

Tamiya 1:72 Fw 190 A-3 and Tamiya 1:72 P-51D. I put these two kits together because I built them as a diorama, on my Fw 190, I used both acrylic and enamel paints as I alreasy had the colours I needed. The diorama depicts an Fw 190 shooting down a P-51 over a sandy beach. These were assembled using Tamiya Cement instead of Cyanoacrylate, the last time I did this was when I built my original Fw 190.

ICM Bf 109 F-4 Trop

This is the first kit I painted using Mr Hobby Aqueous colours, I found that Tamiya's paints work slightly better for hand brushing. The plastic quality is acceptable, it is soft but has a rough strange rough and grainy finish. This kit was unique because I chose to display the engine open, detailing it was quite a challenge as I have never done it before. The Mr Hobby paints had a beautiful finish but the look of the model was slightly ruined by the terrible decals. The decals were not in perfect register and were very thin, all of them tore when I slid them off the backing paper which made the whole process very frustrating. I weathered it using an enamel wash and I think it looked pretty good in the end.

Italeri 1:72 F-22 Raptor

I got this kit to build at the model club at my school. This was a very nice kit with good details, I painted it with Gunze H-51 and Tamiya XF-54. I think I should've used a darker colour for the base coat because it looks too light. The landing gear was too thin so it snapped after a few months, which is disappointing.

Italeri 1:72 Spitfire Mk Vb and Mk Vb/Trop

I built two versions of the same kit. The first one was a Spitfire Mk Vb based on the Spitfire Mk IIb from war thunder, the second is a Spitfire Mk Vb that was flown during the defense of Malta. These were the first kits that I weathered using chalk washes, I think I over-did it on the Mk Vb, but I got it just right on the Mk Vb/trop. These kits were extremely fun to build and I'm planning on trying out the Italeri Mk IX in the future.

Academy 1:72 Bf109 G-6

Instead of doing one of the schemes included in the box, I decided to challenge myself build this kit with an Erich Hartmann paint scheme (my favourite pilot of all time). The kit had very good cockpit detail, but the panel lines were quite shallow and required some rescribing. The decals were not of the best quality and they had some wrinkles, but at least they're not ICM decals! I weathered the model with a chalk wash, which stuck to the model because the varnish didn't dry fully. In the end, I think this kit turned out pretty nicely.

Tamiya (Italeri) 1:72 MiG-29 Fulcrum

I bought this kit because it was quite cheap, and that the MiG-29 is my favourite Soviet aircraft. The kit had a lot of nicely moulded detail for this scale, which surprised me because Italeri 72nd scale models usually don't have the best detail. Though the parts had quite a few gaps which needed a fair bit of filler, which is always annoying. The painting wasn't anything special, I painted the base coat with Tamiya Acrylic XF-19 and the camouflage with Gunze H-71, the camo had some brush strokes so I had to sand it with a 1500 grit sandpaper, which eliminated them. The shallow panel lines were nearly obliterated by the coats of paint, so I highlighted them with a pencil instead of a wash. After decalling, I created streaking and simulated oil leaks with oil paint and a flat brush, which I think turned out pretty good. Overall, I think that this is the best kit that I've ever done and I never thought my skills would get this far. Hopefully I build an even better model in the future.

Tamiya 1:48 Tiger I Afrika Korps

After building 19 aircraft, I got a little fed up so I decided to buy a tank. Since the Tiger I is my favourite tank, it was a logical choice. 1:35 was too large and 1:72 was too small, so I decided to build the Tamiya 1:48 one. The kit was moulded beautifully with a lot of detailed parts, and the hull is made out of die cast metal which gives the model a feel. This was a very fun kit to build and introduced me to armour models, which are more enjoyable than aircraft.

Revell 1:72 T-90 Main battle Tank

This is the first Revell kit I have every built, and I have to say that I am quite impressed! The parts were of very good quality and fit together nicely in most areas, the kit also had a lot of nice details for this scale and the kit also includes some nice paint schemes. The decals were also in perfect register, but were a bit too soft and wrinkled very easily. Overall, I really enjoyed this kit and am looking forward to building more of Revell's 1:72 armour models.

Academy 1:72 P-47D Thunderbolt

This was a very nice kit! The panel lines are the right width and are pretty deep, the kit features nice cockpit detail and the wheel wells look nice too. My only gripe is that the decals are utterly terrible, they are in perfect register but do not conform to the panel lines at all and are quite fragile. Because of the horrendous decals, I have no motivation to complete the kit, so here is a photo of it in its current form.

Tamiya 1:48 Sherman IC Firefly

This was my third armour model and my second Tamiya 1:48 kit. I really enjoyed this build as all of the parts fit together nicely and the kit has some pretty nice decals. The kit includes 4 marking schemes and I chose the third one, as it was the most interesting looking one. After assembling the kit, I decided to purchase a 1:48 StuG III and a set of 1:48 British infantry figures. After painting and weathering the figures, I weathered the model by drybrushing XF-59 desert yellow onto the lower areas of the hull to give it a dusty look. After that, I gave the model a brown chalk wash, and rubbed it off with a damp paintbrush to simulate streaks of dirt. In the end, I think that the tank itself looked very nice, but the figures could use some improvement.

Tamiya 1:48 StuG III G Fruhe Version

This is my favourite model that I have ever built. The quality of the kit was very nice, there were a lot of nicely detailed parts such as bolts, rivets, the muzzle brake and plenty of pioneer tools. The kit also includes a die-cast hull which gives it a good amount of heft. Since it was winter at the time of building this kit, I gave it a whitewash on top of the regular dunkelgelb scheme, I believe that this made the model look much more interesting.

Original dunkelgelb paint scheme

After the whitewash and weathering

Academy 1:35 T-34-85

This was my fifth armour model and the first in 1:35 scale. I enjoyed it much more than the 1:48 and 1:35 kits I built before, the kit is nice and large, which makes assembling the parts a lot easier, and it also more easily conveys how large these machines are. I originally wanted to put markings from a tank based in Yugoslavia, with large Russian letters painted onto the turret which would make it look really cool, but I changed my mind after finding out that the decals were printed by academy, and not by cartograf. Academy's decals are pretty bad, they don't conform to the surface very well and tend to peel and form bubbles. So instead, I decided to base the model off of the protagonist's T-34 in the Russian film "White Tiger". Which is a really good movie! The tank in the movie only has a single red star on the turret, so even with academy's terrible decals, the finished result wouldn't look too bad. Overall, I think I did a pretty good job on this kit, the bedroll on the rear of the turret and cloth on top of the engine grilles were made out of tissue paper which I dyed brown with vallejo model wash. I also made the antenna wire on the turret using a piece of stretched sprue. Scratch-building these parts was pretty fun! However, I think I did overdo the mud on the tracks and running gear.