MOC: US Navy SH-60F Sea Hawk

[Ralph_S]

Several years ago, back at a time when I wasn't really active on EB, I built a US Navy SH-60F Sea Hawk helicopter. At the time I didn't have the parts to build it in the grey colour scheme that is normal for the SH-60, so instead I built it in the somewhat unusual markings of the Navy Strike Air Warface Centre (NSAWC), which flew on of their SH-60Fs in an overall black scheme. I was reasonably happy with the end result, but I continued to want one in grey.

Last week I finally got around to building it, and here is the end result. It's an SH-60F assigned to US Navy anti submarine helicopter squadron 3 'Tridents', in the markings it wore back in 2001 when the unit was assigned to the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise.

SH-60F Sea Hawk (1) by Mad physicist, on Flickr

On many pictures of the real helicopters they carry external tanks, so I built those for mine as well. The starboard hardpoint interferes with the sliding door, but like on the real helicopter, I solved this by having a gap in the door. When the door is closed, the gap is covered by a separate hatch. This arrangement was almost directly copied from the old model, with minimal changes.

SH-60F Sea Hawk (9) by Mad physicist, on Flickr

Many US Navy helicopters have a slightly darker shade of grey on top than on the bottom, and I replicated this on my model by using old light grey for most of the top and new blueish grey for the bottom. I didn't make many changes to the design when I rebuilt it in grey, apart from a few changes needed because the parts that I used in black aren't available in the right colour grey.

SH-60F Sea Hawk (3) by Mad physicist, on Flickr

One more change that I made for the rebuild was replacing the non-LEGO windows on the original with brick-built versions. They might not be as transparent as the old ones, but I do prefer a 'purist' solution if I can. For compact storage aboard ships, the rotor blades and the tail can be folded.

SH-60F Sea Hawk (6) by Mad physicist, on Flickr

It can be fun to revisit an older model and give it a fresh new look. I hope you agree that the end result turned out well.

Cheers,

Ralph

[lightningtiger]

Totally AWESOME chopper 'Ralph_S' ....the detailing are wonderful and those fold back rotor blades are just the bomb, dude !

Brick On Fly On 'Ralph' !

[gcanik]

One of the best "blackhawk" based helicopters I have seen, great job, u definitly caught the overall shape of the fuselage which I think is the hardest thing about Blackhawks.

[Ralph_S]

Totally AWESOME chopper 'Ralph_S' ....the detailing are wonderful and those fold back rotor blades are just the bomb, dude !

Brick On Fly On 'Ralph' !

Thank you. As you know (and like you) I like to have some functionality in my models. It also means it takes up less space on my shelves

One of the best "blackhawk" based helicopters I have seen, great job, u definitly caught the overall shape of the fuselage which I think is the hardest thing about Blackhawks.

Thank you. The main challenge when building this, IMO, was not so much the shape but getting the details to look right. In particular getting the sliding door to work was hard. I'd like to build a proper Blackhawk someday, but I tend to build US Army helicopters in old dark grey. Some bits of this design were already somewhat tricky to 'translate' from black to light (blueish) grey. Building this design in old dark grey would involve a pretty substantial redesign. For instance, the lower parts of the engines are built using brick, modified, 1 x 4 x 1 1/3 No Studs, Curved Top and this part simply doesn't seem to exist in old dark grey. They're not in sets and none have ever been sold on bricklink. The closest that I can come to building a BlackHawk is building one of the USAF MH-60Gs. Their colour is much closer to blueish grey.

Cheers,

Ralph

[grohl]

Where is my jaw??? ah, found it on the floor.

As a huge fan of anything that flies I really love all the details you put in your model. Last week I published a Technic helicopter with foldable rotor and tail and I am glad to see this beauty with similar functions.

[treeboy]

Marvelous just marvelous.

[Toadtorrent]

This is amazing...fantastic work. Your other plane MOCs in your folder are fantastic as well!! Bravo!!

[Ralph_S]

Where is my jaw??? ah, found it on the floor.

As a huge fan of anything that flies I really love all the details you put in your model. Last week I published a Technic helicopter with foldable rotor and tail and I am glad to see this beauty with similar functions.

Thank you. So am I. I did not see your technic helicopter when you posted it, but just had a look at it. It's a different aesthetic, obviously, but neat nonetheless.

Marvelous just marvelous.

Thank you very much.

This is amazing...fantastic work. Your other plane MOCs in your folder are fantastic as well!! Bravo!!

Much appreciated. Many of them have been posted here in the past, although in particular my US Navy models are a few years old. I'm currently giving a fair few of my aircraft a make-over, and once done, I'll probably post the updated models here as well. In particular my F-16 is having major surgery done :-)

Cheers,

Ralph

[treeboy]

I'm thinking you should time-lapse photo your builds. I think I remember reading in your flickr page that you don't like doing directions and you don't use CAD so maybe time-lapse is a solution, unless your intent is to encourage others creativity through inspiration and not crutches.

[Toadtorrent]

In particular my F-16 is having major surgery done :-)

Fantastic work. Your ability to capture the lines is incredible...very good "vision".

[Ralph_S]

I'm thinking you should time-lapse photo your builds. I think I remember reading in your flickr page that you don't like doing directions and you don't use CAD so maybe time-lapse is a solution, unless your intent is to encourage others creativity through inspiration and not crutches.

I don't really have an intent. I enjoy building stuff and showing it to others. I've done a few step-by-step photographs as a favour for people who wanted to build copies and I have even made some instructions, but I found both to be pretty tedious. Beyond allowing people to build copies, I'm not quite sure what the point would be of me sharing the details of everything I do. People who may see my models as examples to improve their own building are probably best served not by building copies, but having a go at figuring out stuff on heir own. I guess you're right with your remark about crutches!

Fantastic work. Your ability to capture the lines is incredible...very good "vision".

Thank you very much. Much appreciated.

Cheers,

Ralph

[Hiawatha]

Great MOC! it is really detialed and you did a great job with the symbols.

I have no idea why that was posted three times. Could someone remove the other two?

Edited October 23, 2011 by Hiawatha

[Hiawatha]

Great MOC! it is really detialed and you did a great job with the symbols.

[Hiawatha]

Great MOC! it is really detialed and you did a great job with the symbols.

[treeboy]

I don't really have an intent.

Sorry I didn't mean to make it sound like you are conspiring against us less talented, or lazy, types. But on that subject I did find your instructions for the Corsair, Hellcat and Helldiver you designed for project Intrepid. Great stuff and thanks for sharing.

[Ralph_S]

Great MOC! it is really detialed and you did a great job with the symbols.

Thank you. I like fiddling around with details, obviously.

Sorry I didn't mean to make it sound like you are conspiring against us less talented, or lazy, types. But on that subject I did find your instructions for the Corsair, Hellcat and Helldiver you designed for project Intrepid. Great stuff and thanks for sharing.

It was clear to me that you weren't insinuating anything. I made the instructions for the aircraft for Intrepid because we were going to build multiple copies. Making the instructions was a bit of a pain, but ultimately it ended up saving time.

Cheers,

Ralph

[Legostein]

Hello!

Besides the usual excellence of building techniques portrayed in your helicopter, I also appreciate that you still care for your older models and update them. I often do that as well, and I think it's part of our building progress. You can see how your building techniques and styles change with time.

Cheers,

~ Christopher

[Ralph_S]

Hello!

Besides the usual excellence of building techniques portrayed in your helicopter, I also appreciate that you still care for your older models and update them. I often do that as well, and I think it's part of our building progress. You can see how your building techniques and styles change with time.

Cheers,

~ Christopher

Thank you. Some people collect sets. I collect my own models. Being able to hang on to them is a precious luxury and I've had many of models for years. That does mean that some of them start to look a bit old. In part it's because you do gain new building techniques, your preferences change over time and also because LEGO keeps releasing new parts that weren't available when the original model was built or that you didn't have at the time. When I decide to rebuild older models, it's usually this which leads to the biggest changes.

Rebuilding older models cab be a fun process. It's not unusual for me not to remember how exactly I built the inside of my models years ago, and I sometimes come across surprises when opening them up.

Cheers,

Ralph