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Volume 42 • Issue 04

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T
his month’s editorial is a short one, as I
wanted to try to squeeze the contents
pages to one to make room for more
content for you dear readers.
As I sit to write this, May’s issue is just coming
off the presses, but I have been informed by the
Guideline Directors, that April’s SAM was our
best-selling issue for over eighteen months.
Considering it came out at the beginning of the
lockdown, with newsagents closed, and
everyone uncertain of what was going to
happen next, I am overwhelmed that so many
people have chosen to give the magazine their
support. I want to thank you, each and every one
of you, for choosing to buy and read SAM, and in
a great many cases, for making that extra
commitment by subscribing. Also, at the time of
writing, there is talk of lifting the lockdown in
the UK, where we are published, and in other
countries were some of you are reading. It will be
a long hard road for certain, and I think, it will
take a long, long time, to get back to normal; but
when we do, I for one and really looking forward
to shows again, and to meeting readers in
person.
Until then, stay healthy, look after yourself and
others, and keep modelling.
Chris

4 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K

THE LATEST INDUSTRY NEWS AND NEW RELEASES WITH NEWS EDITOR COLIN PICKETT
Airbrushes.com
http://airbrushes.com/
A new offering from Iwata in the form of their
Revolution HP-CR3 Airbrush with R3 Nozzle
[#IW-RV-CR3]
should prove popular, especially to modellers
of larger subjects as it has an increased
capacity fluid cup of 0.24 oz / 7 ml. The Gravity
fed dual action airbrush also continues to use
Iwata’s standard high quality features such as
a spring-steel needle to resist bending and
breakage whilst the PTFE needle packing
resists solvent degradation. This, and the
specification below, makes it ideal for model
making.
Airbrush Specifications:
Spray Performance Category: Effortless
Az models
https://www.azmodel.cz/
AZ Models will be releasing a completely new
Kovozávody Prostějov
models
https://www.kovozavody.cz/
Kovozávody Prostějov have announced that they
are working on the release of a 1/32 L-29 Delfin
U P D AT E S
coverage and quality
atomisation at low air
pressures
Series: Revolution
Spray Scale: Fine to Wide - Fine line to 1 1/2"
(0.3mm to 38mm)
The Revolution HP-CR3 Airbrush is now in
stock with UK importers, The Airbrush
Company.
1/72 DH-103 Hornet this coming June as Also in development is a brand new
Messerschmitt Bf 109 E (Emil) in 1/72 to help
revealed in the exclusive on of FaceBook page
increase the already impressive range of Bf 109’s
recently. that AZ produce.
in cooperation with HpH / Infinity Models This
will be made in injected plastic , with a fine
Great War modellers will be pleased to see that a
trio of Sopwith Triplanes in 1/72 are due soon,
surface details. KP expect that the model will be covering “Russian Service”, Black Flight and Aces
available during this summer. Please note the
images supplied are for demonstration only as aircraft, whilst Dewoitine D510 in the same scale
they depict the HPH model built by Dr. Zdeněk is also due. In 1/48 a Grunau Baby GB IIb
Šebesta. Luftwaffe training glider will be released soon.
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 5
U P D AT E S
EDUARD
http://airbrushes.com/
Bf 108 1/32 (#3006) Scale plastic kit
This month sees the release of the 1/32
Messerschmitt Bf 108 as a ProfiPACK. Includes
five marking options, pre-painted photo etched
parts, a set of paint masks, and a resin propeller
to replicate the wooden item.
Bf 108 PE-set 1/32 (#3006-LEPT) Photo-etched
accessories for the Eduard kit.
Bf 108 wheels 1/32 (#632150) Brassin - resin &
photo-etched accessories for the Eduard kit.
Bf 108 wooden propeller 1/32 (#632151) Brassin
- resin & photo-etched accessories for the
Eduard kit.
Bf 108 wheels spoke 1/32 (#632155) Brassin -
resin & photo-etched accessories for the Eduard
kit.
Bf 108 LööK 1/32 (#634017) Brassin - resin &
photo-etched accessories for the Eduard kit.
Bf 108 Taifun 1/32 (#32452) Photo-etched
accessories for the Eduard kit.
Bf 108 TFace 1/32 (#JX253) Masking sheet - die-
cut adhesive shapes for the Eduard kit.
Bf 109G-14 1/48 (#82118) ProfiPACK Scale plastic
kit, including five decal options, pre-painted
photo etch and a masking set.
Fokker D. VII (Alb) 1/72 (#70134) ProfiPACK Scale
plastic kit, including five decal options, pre-
painted photo etch and a masking set.
Fokker D. VII Bowke! 1/72 (#BFC100) Scale plastic
kit – Bunny Fighter Club exclusive including an
extra decal sheet.
Fokker D. VII (Alb) PE-set 1/72 (#70134-LEPT)
Photo-etched accessories for the Eduard kit.
Fokker D. VII rib tapes 4 colour lozenge 1/72
(D72019) Decal sheet for the Eduard kit.
Fokker D. VII rib tapes 5 colour lozenge 1/72
(#D72020) Decal sheet for the Eduard kit.
Fokker D. VII rib tapes in blue 1/72 (#D72021)
Decal sheet for the Eduard kit.
Lysander 1/48 (#11138) Scale plastic kit
The ex Gavia 1/48 Westland Lysander returns to
an Eduard box in the guise of a limited edition
(#11138)
Lysander Mk. III PE-set 1/48 (#11138-LEPT)
Photo-etched accessories for the Eduard kit.
6 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
Lysander upgrade set 1/48 (#481015) Photo-
etched accessories for the Eduard kit.
Lysander seatbelts STEEL 1/48 (#FE1089) Colour
photo-etched accessories for the Eduard kit.
Spitfire Mk. VIII 1/48 (#84159) Weekend edition
scale plastic kit with two decal options.
Wellington GR Mk. VIII 1/72 (#BIG72155)
Advantageous set of Photo-etched and Mask
sets for the Airfix kit.
F-35B canopy & undercarriage 1/72 (#72700)
Photo-etched accessories for the Italeri kit.
Hurricane Mk. IIc 1/72 (#73708) Colour photo-
etched accessories for the ARMA Hobby kit.
Hurricane Mk. IIc landing flaps 1/72 (#72701)
Photo-etched accessories for the ARMA Hobby
kit.
Hurricane Mk. IIc 1/72 (#SS708) Colour photo-
etched accessories for the ARMA Hobby kit.
Hurricane Mk. IIc 1/72 (#CX568) Masking sheet -
die-cut adhesive shapes for the ARMA Hobby kit.
F-14A exterior 1/72 (#72702) Photo-etched
accessories for the Academy kit.
F-14A 1/72 (#73707) Colour photo-etched
accessories for the Academy kit.
F-14A 1/72 (#SS707) Colour photo-etched
accessories for the Academy kit.
F-14A 1/72 (#CX567) Masking sheet - die-cut
adhesive shapes for the Academy kit.
He 162A 1/72 (#SS709) Colour photo-etched
accessories for the Special Hobby kit.
He 162A 1/72 (#CX571) Masking sheet - die-cut
adhesive shapes for the Special Hobby kit.
T-33 1/72 (#SS710) Colour photo-etched
accessories for the Platz kit.
A-4M 1/72 (#CX569) Masking sheet - die-cut
adhesive shapes for the Hobby 2000 and Fujimi
kit.
OA-4M 1/72 (CX570) Masking sheet - die-cut
adhesive shapes for the Hobby 2000 and Fujimi
kit.
Tornado GR.1 LööK 1/48 (#644047) Brassin - resin
& photo-etched accessories for the Eduard and
Revell kit.
JP233 dispenser pod 1/48 (#648551) Brassin -
resin & photo-etched accessories for scale plastic
kits.
P-51D-5 LööK 1/48 (#644049) Brassin - resin &
photo-etched accessories for the Airfix kit.
P-51D-5 LööKplus 1/48 (#644051) Brassin - resin
& photo-etched accessories for the Eduard kit.
P-51D-10 LööKplus 1/48 (#644052) Brassin - resin
& photo-etched accessories for the Eduard kit.
A-26B Invader 1/48 (#BIG49247) Advantageous
set of photo-etched and mask sets for the ICM
kit.
UH-1N 1/48 (#BIG49248) Advantageous set of
photo-etched and mask sets for the Kitty Hawk
kit.
Hunter F.4 1/48 (#491082) Photo-etched
accessories for the Airfix kit.
Hunter F.5 1/48 (#491083) Photo-etched
accessories for the Airfix kit.
Hunter F.4 1/48 (#FE1082) Colour photo-etched
accessories for the Airfix kit.
Hunter F.5 1/48 (#FE1083) Colour photo-etched
accessories for the Airfix kit.
Hunter F.4/ F.5 seatbelts STEEL 1/48 (#FE1084)
Colour photo-etched accessories for the Airfix
kit.
Hunter F.4/ F.5 1/48 (#EX696) Masking sheet -
die-cut adhesive shapes for the Airfix kit.
Hunter F.4/ F.5 TFace 1/48 (#EX697) Masking
sheet - die-cut adhesive shapes for the Airfix kit.
Bf 109C 1/48 (#491085) Photo-etched
accessories for the Modelsvit kit.
Bf 109C 1/48 (#FE1085) Colour photo-etched
accessories for the Modelsvit kit.
Bf 109C seatbelts STEEL 1/48 (#FE1086) Colour
photo-etched accessories for the Modelsvit kit.
EA-6B 1/48 (#FE1087) Colour photo-etched
accessories for the Kinetic Model kit.
EA-6B 1/48 (#491087) Photo-etched accessories
for the Kinetic Model kit.
EA-6B seatbelts STEEL 1/48 (#FE1088) Colour
photo-etched accessories for the Kinetic Model
kit.
Tiger Moth 1/48 (#491073) Photo-etched
accessories for the Airfix kit.
AIM-54C Phoenix 1/32 (#632148) Brassin - resin
& photo-etched accessories for scale plastic kits.
AIM-9X 1/32 (#632153) Brassin - resin & photo-
etched accessories for scale plastic kits.
U P D AT E S

RODEN
http://www.roden.eu/
The previously announced 1/32
Boeing-Stearman PT-17 Kaydet (#
631) has been released. Still in use
in private hands today, this bi-
plane trainer was using in training
a huge number of allied pilots
RS MODELS
http://rsmodels.cz/
There is no doubting the
continued enthusiasm
for “Luft ’46 subjects,
especially in 1/72 as the
release of RS Models
Blohm & Voss Ae 608
(#92246) shows. This
injection moulded kit
comes with four decal
options.
The 1/72 Heinkel He-280
V2 (#92251) certainly did
during World War Two, especially make it to the air,
those who travelled to the U.S. to proving to be a
wellbalanced early jet
gain their wings. The sprue shots
enclosed show that we have much aeroplane. The kit
to look forward to. It is also worth includes four decal
noting that the 1/144 Fw200 options..
Condor should be available by the The Bell P-39 D Airacobra
time you read this. (#92252) returns, with RS
Models’ 1/72 offering

SPECIAL HOBBY
https://www.specialhobby.eu/
Starting with 1/72, Special Hobby have released
a new version of their Saab Viggen, this time the
SF-37 Viggen ‘Swedish Eyes’ (#SH72390) which
depicts the reconnaissance version of the canard
aeroplane. In order to carry out the role it
required a different-shaped nose section to
allow it to carry photographic cameras and
sensors instead of radar equipment. As with the
other kits in this series this is a superbly detailed
and really accurate model. Decals for three
different machines are supplied, including the
anniversary airframe with a painting of the lone
wolf on its tail, or for those more adventurous
with their masking that legendary splinter
camouflage is also an option. It is worth noting
that a wide range of detail resin sets, pilot
figures and pre-cut canopy masks are available
from Special Hobby and CMK too.
Progress continues on the 1/48 Reggiane Re
2000 kits (#SH48204/208). The wing parts sprue
is based on the Classic Airframes kit, whilst other
sprues are from new moulds. Small pieces will be
will be injection formed by using metal moulds,
allowing for greater detail and accuracy. The kit
will contain four injection moulded sprues in
total as well as a clear injection moulded sprue

ICM
http://www.icm.com.ua/
ICM bring us some variations on previous themes
this month with the arrival of the A-26С-15 Invader,
WWII American Bomber, with the kit containing
some two hundred and fifty two injection moulded
parts and decals for three options (#48283), whilst
their He 111H-3 is brought to us with two marking
options
covering the types use by the Romanian Air
Force, with a parts count of three hundred and
eighteen parts to keep you busy (#48266). If you
are looking for something slightly different to do
with your 1/32 Gloster Gladiator Mk.I/II the
second part of the Foreign Services decal sheet
has been revealed, providing markings for four
aircraft, included are two
Finnish, one Latvian and one Irish Air Force
(#D3205).
A new addition to the aviation related figure
range is the release of three female crew under
the title “U.S. WASP” (1943-1945). The box
contains three brand new figures formed of
twenty five parts (#32108).

8 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K

to cover the canopy. The first release for these
revised and new moulds will be the J-20/Héja I
'Re 2000 Export Birds' 1/48 (#SH48208). This
boxing covers the Re 2000 fighter wearing
colours of the two export operators, Hungary on
the Eastern Front while the Swedish ones
watched over the neutrality of this Nordic
country. Included decal options cover two
Hungarian airframes, one of which was piloted
by István Horthy de Nagybánya who was killed
while flying this machine. Decals for two
Swedish aircraft are also included.
3D renders of the sprues for the 1/72 Mirage III
series of kits have been released, providing us
with a taste of what to expect.
Special Hobby are preparing a new 1/48 Grunau
Baby IIB training glider kit. The colour scheme
and decal options for the first boxing of the
model are ready, but expect further versions of
this widely utilised aircraft too.
One of the new projects by Special Hobby is the
twin kit box of the Supermarine Spitfire Mk.XII &
V-1 buzz bombs or “Doodle Bug”. (#SH48192). As
well as the aforementioned models the kit will
include a matt black stand to allow you to pose
your creations at the moment of interception
and as such a resin pilot figure will be included
too.
Other releases of note include the reissue of the
1/48 Blackburn Roc (#SH48050) and the 1/72
Fouga Magister in Irish, Belgian and of course
French Air Force markings (#72371). Work on the
MODELSVIT
https://www.modelsvit-eshop.com/
An upgraded re-release from ModelSvit in the
form of their excellent Mirage 4000 (#72053).
Already proven to be a fast seller, the inclusion
of three new sprues to add armament
alongside two canopies to allow for it to be
depicted open or closed adds to the appeal. In
addition to this the kit also includes decals for
ZVEZDA
http://www.zvezda.org.ru
Zvezda re-release their 1/144 Tupolev TU-134
UBL to depict the aircraft’s use as a training
plane (NATO code Crusty-B) (#7036). The kit
features a revised nose cone to reflect the
1/72 Piaggio P108B also continues.
Siebel Si 204/Aero C-3 Engine 1/48 (#4386) in
addition to the previous accessories for the
already excellent Siebel Special Hobby add even
more detail to the Siebel Si 204 / Aero C-3 family
of models to allow you to show the engine
installation. The set consists of an engine nacelle
with open cowl panels and the engine
compartment beneath them. The other side
nacelle is left closed, The set contains both right
hand and left hand side engine nacelles (open /
closed), so that you can have equal levels of
detail on either side of the aircraft. Photo etch
parts are also included to provide engine wiring
and piping for the exposed engine.
Reggiane Re 2005 Supercharger Air Intake 1/48
(#Q48366) - The Fiat RA.1050 RC-58 (DB 605)
power plant installed in the Reggiane Re.2005
airframes had the characteristic feature of
having the supercharger air intake mounted on
the port side fuselage. In the kit, this part has to
be modelled using two halves, whilst this
upgrade set provides this as a single piece just
requiring the removal of the resin casting block,
adding much finer surface detail.
Reggiane Re 2005 Main Wheels 1/48 (#Q48364)
- designed for the Special Hobby Reggiane Re
2005 the cast wheels incorporate higher levels of
detail compared to the original items supplied in
the kit and the tyres are also weighed and come
in one part, so you do not require assembly from
two halves.
two versions as well as a photo etch sheet, self-
adhesive masks and a transparent foil for the
head up display.
Another interesting re-release in the ModelSvit
range, the U-36A Learjet (#72006) in the bright
target towing markings of the Japan Maritime
Self-Defense Force.
A future release will be a Dassault Mirage IIIB in
1/72. As with previous kit the model will
include photo etch parts and decals.
changes made to ninety aircraft to allow it to
be used in the training for crew members for
the TU-22M supersonic bomber..
The excellent Zvezda 1/72 MIL Mi-8 Rescue
helicopter 1/72 is re-released to reflect the
world’s most numerical helicopter in its use as a
search and rescue asset (#7254).
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
U P D AT E S
A-4B/Q Skyhawk Undercarriage Set 1/72 (#7436)
- Special Hobby introduce another upgrade set
to bring even more detail to your 1/72 Airfix A-4
Skyhawk model. This set replaces the original
plastic wheel bay which is lacking essential
detail.
Heinkel He 162A Ejection Seat 1/72 (#Q72361) -
Whilst the seat provided with the kit will suffice
for most modellers, this upgraded item, with
additional detail and etch parts will take the
cockpit to another level.
Heinkel He 162A Wheels 1/72 (#Q72362) - A
weighed tyre set which incorporates even finer
levels of surface detail than the standard plastic
wheels provided in the He 162 kit.
Martin-Baker Mk.6 Ejection Seat for the Mirage
SMB-2 (FAH) and others 1/72 (#Q72363) – One of
the most widely utilised Martin-Baker products
the Mk.6 ejector seat can be found in the cockpit
a vast number of aircraft such as the Blackburn
Buccaneer, the MB-326 or Fiat G.91 and even
French or Israeli aircraft such as the entire family
of the Mirage III / Kfir / Dagger jets, the Super
Etendard and the Argentine Pucara.
Phantom FG.1 Cockpit Correction (#7441) 1/72 -
This set completely replaces the original plastic
parts of the Airfix kit, with highly detailed resin
and photo etch parts including a new cockpit
tub, instrument panels and ejector seats to
revise and super detail this focal area of the
Phantom FG.1.
ARMORY
http://armorymodels.com/
Two new 1/144 Messerschmitt Bf 109E from
Armory, to cover both the "Foreign Service
Aces", Pt.1 with markings for Spain,
Switzerland, Yugoslavia, Serbia (#AR14306) and
"Foreign Service Aces", Pt.2 with decals for
Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia
(#AR14307)
The critically acclaimed 1/48 Fairey "Flycatcher"
returns, but this time with modifications to
depict the late service version with the Jaguar-
IV engine (#AR48002)
9
I N B OX R E V I E W
Bristol Beaufighter TF.X Sets
CMK
1/72
D
esigned for the already rather excellent
Airfix 1/72 kit, CMK have released a series
of three detail sets which add even more
to the base kit.
The first is a complete cockpit set (#7437),
Supermarine Spitfire Mk IX
“The Longest Flight”
AZ Models AZ7634
1/72
T
he wings supplied are spot on in shape and
detail. The machine that this kit depicts is
clean, nothing that might get in the way of
its aerodynamic character. They have no lumps,
bumps or fairings that need removing, thus
preserving the smooth racing finish. However,
wingtips are supplied as separate pieces
because the kit supplies clipped wings, this
means you must remove the end of the clipped
wing and attach the elliptical parts; you will have
to do this carefully and the resulting join will
have to be smooth if you are to do justice to
your metallic finish.
Whilst it would be lovely to say you could
build this thing straight out of the box there are
a few idiosyncratic details that are missing from
the kit. Slightly aft of the cockpit on top of the
fuselage there is a radio antenna, in the port left
rear canopy there is what looks like a fuel filler
intake cover, and at the rear of the aircraft, under
the tail, is the two-pronged cats whisker of
another antenna. None of these details are
beyond the reach of most modellers.
10 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
which features a set of side walls, instrument whilst also providing scale thickness to the parts.
panels, seat, and an etch set for further details. This is joined by a further set to add in the
Provided in the very familiar yellow bubble pack, dinghy bay and dinghy (#7439) to the upper
the parts are crisply moulded and free from any
wing surface to add further interest to your
air bubbles, or moulding defects. In the same
style, the main undercarriage bays set (#7438) model. The parts are all high quality and
offers an upgrade on the kit parts, as it contains represent some of the very best in resin casted
some of the details that Airfix have omitted, parts available. Colin Pickett
You should also be aware that the cockpit is
supplied as a standard historic Mk IX. G-IRTY's
cockpit has a blind flying panel, joystick and
seat, but there is no gunsight and lots of modern
radio, nav equipment and other gizmos on
board. You won't find a Sutton Harness in there
either, but a modern harness, more like that you
would find in a Grob Tutor.
The decal sheet, which is the star of the show,
is crisp. The markings are complete and include
the IWC sponsor logo. There is no mask or decal
for antiglare panel and that might be something
that requires some patience to get right. There is
only issue with the markings that I would query,
is the Spitfire in the silver Spitfire logo. In the
photos that I have seen the Spitfire is the same not sure how you’re supposed to measure that in
colour as the fuselage itself i.e. silver. The decal this scale but is good to know that the
sheet renders this as white and I see this has manufacturer is expecting you to get this right,
sparked some debate elsewhere. as this is such an important part of the look and
The fuselage shapes are spot on. Parts on the character of the machine.
sprues are not numbered but the kit is simple This has the potential to be a real gem of a
enough that this should not be a problem. model if done well. You can get lots of photo
Wheel-wells have separate parts to simulate reference from G-IRTY's website;
depth inside the wing. Dihedral is correctly www.silverspitfire.com. Highly recommended.
marked at 5.98 degrees in the instructions. I’m Andrew Lansley
KIT REVIEW
Plus Model Firebee Drones
Very much considered the grandfather of
today’s drone technology, the Firebee drones
were intended to provide a high-speed target to
replicate the increasing speeds of jet powered
fighter aircraft. Now Plus model bring us three,
all new 1/72 kits in styrene.
Firebee BQM-34A 1/72 (#AL7028)
This boxing contains a pair of BQM-34A
Drones, each exhibiting finely etched surface
detail on the medium grey plastic parts. The
individual drone is made up of fifteen
components and two etched brass tail finlets.
The kit also includes a set of pylons to allow you
to mount your Firebees onto your drone carrier
of choice, either a Lockheed Neptune P2V, A/B-
26 Invader or a C-130 Hercules. Decals are
Special Hobby Hienkel He 162 Spatz (#SH 72341)
Towards the end of WWII, German forces
turned to increasingly unusual aircraft designs
and concepts in a bid to turn the tide of war in
their favour. One of the theories considered was
to develop a jet fighter so simple to fly, that the
untapped enthusiasm of the “Hitler Youth”
movement, alongside other enthusiastic military
and civilian individuals could pilot it. This was
the Volks Jaeger, or “Peoples Fighter” concept.
The Heinkel He 162 was one of these designs. A
simple single engine, single seat aircraft built
from a large percentage of strategically in
important materials such as wood. The design
ethos was to allow the aircraft to be flown in
combat with a minimal amount of training
12 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
included for four different drones, the
construction and markings for which are
included in the eight page colour instruction
booklet.
Firebee BQM-34A with transport cart 1/72
(#AL7035)
Although containing a single Firebee as
outlined above, this boxing contains a resin and
etched brass transport cart making it ideal for a
loading diorama with your drone carrier of
choice. The cart is made up of fifteen finely cast
resin parts as well as a length of plastic rod and a
further seven etch brass parts to create a
detailed base to display your Firebee on. It is
worth noting that this boxing does not include
the pylon set
given, a quite desperate idea.
A surprise release at this year’s Nuremburg
show, the Special Hobby He 162 arrives in a
simple end opening box hiding a real treat
inside.
Opening the plastic bags reveals three dark
grey sprues of highly polished and finely
detailed parts. The engraving is perfect for the
scale, thin, the right depth, and sharp. It almost
seems a shame to cut the parts off the sprue to
build the kit, however the test fit showed the
parts to go together perfectly, so the build
should be effortless. The level of detail is
excellent too, though should you wish for more,
Plus Model Firebee KDA-1 1/72 (#AL7036)
The final box contains two KDA-1 drones,
made up of sixteen engraved injected plastic
parts with etched brass finlets. The drones come
with four different decal options as well as a set
of pylons.
These kits are well worth investigating if you
have a hankering for drones, or you want to
build something slightly out of your comfort
zone. Each kit is well detailed and quite
fascinating in its own way. These are also an
ideal way to revamp that Drone carrying
Hercules you may have tucked in your stash.
Colin Pickett
Special Hobby have a resin ejector seat, engine,
wheels and gun bays on the way too. The
cockpit transparencies are perfect, thin and
crisp. The kit comes with four decal options,
varying from a partially completed airframe to
three operational aircraft. The decals are in
perfect print register, sharp and with minimal
carrier film and include some delicate stencils as
well as the main subject markings.
This kit represents a further leap forward in
production quality for Special Hobby and
certainly looks as if it will be a delight to build in
every way.
Colin Pickett
ROCKWELL B-1B LANCER “BONE”

ROCKWELL B-1B LANCER “BONE”

1/144 By Jose Luis López Ruiz
“The low-altitude pass let the enemy know we were directly overhead and was usually a morale boost
for our troops. We´d come in almost supersonic and it would scare them back into their holes”
B-1B pilot Capt. Richard Morrison of the 37th BS (2003-Afghanistan)

The B-1B was Nowadays, after a complicated process during

during the the Conventional Mission Upgrade Program

S
uch a beautiful airplane, isn´t it? This
80´s that I (CMUP), the “Bone” is one of the most
supersonic swing-wing bomber was
saw this appreciated and valuable airplanes of the
designed in the early 1970s as a response
airplane for the USAF´s heavy bomber fleet, as it can act as both
to the demand for an “Advanced Manned
first time, in the a strategic heavy bomber and as a close air
Strategic Aircraft”. During the Cold War, the
movie “Real Genius” where a support platform (widely used in recent Middle
design was resurrected by President Ronald
high-power super-laser was mounted in the East conflicts). With around sixty airframes in
Reagan (Jimmy Carter preferred Cruise missiles)
belly of a “Bone” and hijacked to fill a professor’s service, it is expected to remain in service until
and used as a fast bomber able to perform
house full of popcorn. But that´s another history!
nuclear attacks, whilst evading enemy radar. It 2036.

3 4

14 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K

The B-1B has a crew of four and the cockpit is
highly user friendly and more comfortable than
the B-52. Fighter-style “stick” columns have
replaced the yokes so typical in large aircraft,
and pilots report that the machine like “a great
big fighter”. The crew workload is assisted by the
systems in the aircraft. The cockpit avionics
include dual ASN-131 radar altimeters, an inertial
navigation system, an APN-218 Doppler radar
velocity sensor, an ARN-118 Tactical Air
Navigation System and an ARN-108 instrument
landing system.
In terms of offensive systems, a total of
34,000kg of weapons can be carried in the
aircraft´s three weapon bays. The Block E
upgrade allows the airplane to carry a total of 30
WCMDs, 12 JSOW and 24 JASSMs and launch all
of them simultaneously.
General characteristics
- Crew: 4
- Length: 45m
- Wingspan: 42m
- Height: 10m
- Wing area: 181m2
- Powerplant: 4 x General Electric F101-GE-102
afterburning turbofan engines
- Maximum speed: Mach 1.25
- Service ceiling: 18000 m
- Combat range: 5540 Km
- Wing loading: 820 Kg/m2
- Thrust / weight: 0.28
5 6
The Kit
Doyusha´s 1/144 release is a reboxing of an
Academy kit [Academy 12620, released 2019,
Ed.] and in my, not very experienced, opinion of
aircraft kits, is just a correct kit. Although not
used to airplanes (I´m a sci fi and AFV guy), the
level of detail of the kit seems very basic to me,
including some parts, such as the engine
exhaust, that are very crude. And maybe for the
scale, the panel lines are too wide. But, I repeat,
just a rookie´s opinion. The assembly of the kit is
quite straightforward, with no mayor issues,
excepting the always critical moment of gluing
the two halves of the fuselage.
If you want to make this airplane with the
highest level of fidelity in scale, I strongly
recommend using detailing sets for the exhaust
and an afterburner set. I discovered all this stuff
too late! Anyway, as a first approach to aircraft
modelling, I feel satisfied.
Now, let´s see the different steps I took to
build and paint this beautiful aircraft:
The Build
From the start, I wanted to make the airplane
wheels-down. For this reason, I put two small
iron balls at the nose (1), glued with
cyanoacrylate. Later, I decided to make the
airplane flying! This extra weight helps to ensure
that your kit will lean on the frontal wheels,
instead of sitting on its tail. I primed the interior
of the cockpit (2) and painted it light.
Unfortunately, the details in the cockpit were
very basic, just with decals for dials and no detail
in the seats. Nothing to be proud of… thank
God, it is barely visible once the kit is finished.
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
ROCKWELL B-1B LANCER “BONE”
The kit is simple, without many parts, so
assembly is easy. That being said, special care
must be taken with the seam between the two
halves of the fuselage. Patience, putty (3), and
different sandpapers are necessary. Always start
with the more aggressive sandpaper to do the
hard work, and finish with a very fine grain
sandpaper (2000) to achieve a smooth finish
without any flaws (4). I had to putty, sand, fill
again, sand… many times until I was “happy”
with the result (far form perfect, I must say). A
new task for me: scribing! Oh man, a tedious and
eternal step! I had to repeat some panel lines
many times! (5). Sand, fill, sand … like “The
Karate Kid”! “Wax on, wax off…” Anyway, I
learned quite a lot and for the next airplane, I´ll
do things much better!
Once the kit was fully assembled and
polished, I applied a nice coat of primer over it to
detect flaws and assembly mistakes (once again,
wax on, wax off…). I was really close to crying,
but I managed to achieve an acceptable base to
paint on it in the end! First, following typical
airplane painting techniques, I added a general
pre-shade all over the model with diluted dark
grey paint, following the panel lines (6). The
airbrush must be close to the surface (not more
than 3-5 cm, the closer, the better), ant at about
1-1,50 Kg/cm2 (15 to 20psi) air pressure. (7)
Using different shades of grey, I painted the
different panels of the aircraft looking for some
contrast like those found in my reference
pictures. Try not to be symmetrical with this!
Using AMMO of Mig´s Airbrush Stencil (8), I
added some additional colour variation on the
different surfaces with small random spots. The
stencil really helps in this step! In my experience,
I prefer to be very aggressive with the contrast of
15
ROCKWELL B-1B LANCER “BONE”
9 10
11
the B&W Base, as you can always reduce it when
airbrushing the base colour on the kit (9). If
you´re too shy, the base colour will hide any
contrast (10). Anyway, it´s a question of taste.
Maybe I like contrast and weathering too much! I
glued the canopy using acrylic ‘ultra glue’ from
Ammo of Mig (perfect for transparent parts! (11)
Now it is time for the base colour. I used a mix
of French Blue (AMig-062), black, and white to
emulate the bluish grey of the operational B-1B
(12). Depending on the picture it goes from a
dark panzer grey to an intermediate bluish
grey. I tried to make the bluish
grey option. With a highly
diluted mix with
16 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
12
13
14
thinner and transparator form Ammo of Mig (a
kind of retarder and translucent agent), I started
to airbrush the base colour over the different
areas, with varying intensity (13). This thin and
transparent layer applied over the B&W base will
provide an attractive look, with several shades of
the base colour all over the kit. If you think that
the contrast is excessive, just add more base
colour over it! Just adding some white to the
base colour, you can add more contrast if
required (14). With a small fine brush, you can
also highlight some small details of
the surface, like small panels, hatches, so on (15).
Decals are always complicated. On AFVs there
are not too many of them, but on airplanes, my
Gosh! I cut them out, one by one, with the help
of a sharp cutter and put them in place with
Ammo of Mig decal products. I was not able to
put the “walk on this line” marking on the wing
(the decal just broke into hundreds of small
pieces), so I had to mask it (16). Decal softer is
necessary to ensure the perfect fit of the decal in
the surface, including the recesses and panel
lines. Repeat the process of adding this Decal
 ROCKWELL B-1B LANCER “BONE”

15 16

17 18

19

20 21
softer many, many times. Tedious but necessary! I must say, I was disappointed with the
(17) exhaust. As I said before, the detail is crude and
Washes are always my favorite steps! All the overscale. I settled for applying some steel
details become alive! Once I finished with the colour with a brush and airbrushing the burned
base colour and the highlights, I airbrushed a areas with pure black in the edges. Must
nice coat of Tamiya´s Clear X-22 diluted with X- improve this area in a future! (20)
20A. Once dry, I made several mixes using Blue I love
for German Panzer Grey wash (AMig-1006) and watercolours! I
PLW [Panel Line Wash] Deep Grey panel liner think they are a very
(AMig-1602) (18). Using just one wash colour powerful tool for
will make the model too uniform, several mixes subtle weathering
and shades of washes will make the result more and delicate effects. I
colourful! I am very crude while applying the use Caran D´Ache
washes and one hour later, I remove the Supracolor II range
excess using a modelling cotton swab pencils (21). Why?
… and my finger! (19) They´re not
designed

JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 17

ROCKWELL B-1B LANCER “BONE”

22

23

for
modelling
and the colours
are not “military”, but
the texture of the 3,8 mm
lead is just perfect for this
task. It´s soft but hard enough for
precision works and fine lines (22).
And take note, I use a professional
sharpener to ensure it´s perfectly sharp in
each use. I´ve used other brands, including
watercolours for modeling but the lead is too
soft, maybe more suitable for general
weathering of large areas where accuracy and
scale are not so important. You can paint with
them easily to reinforce a panel line, create some
dirt and rain marks, or smoke effects for the final
touch (23)
The final steps are always confusing, as you
use all the previously mentioned techniques to
correct mistakes and improve the final result:
more washes to some panels, more dirt lines
here and there with watercolors,
so on. A kit is
never finished,
we just start
the next one!

Such an experience!
I must say that I really
enjoyed making this
airplane.

Conclusion
Such an experience! I must say that I really
enjoyed making this airplane. Assembly steps
really are more complicated (and I did not make
the running gear!) and you cannot allow yourself
any mistakes. But, I must say, painting is as fun
and pleasurable as any tank or an AFV. Now, time
for the next one!

Introduction
I
n the August 2019 issue of SAM
James Hatch gave us a full build
article of the Nieuport Early XVII from Copper
State Models
(Volume 41 06, back issues available from
www.scaleaircraftmodelling.co.uk). Now CSM
bring us the Nieuport XXI and XXIII,
developments of the Nieuport XVII and logical
progressions for their first 1/32 styrene kits.
Although the Nieuport XXI was a
development of the XXVII, it did not supersede
its older brother. It was, instead, a lateral
development project to produce a lighter, more
fuel-efficient version of the machine, intended to
produce exports for the fledgling flights of
bomber aircraft. Ultimately it would never serve
in this role, as daytime bomber operations were
cancelled, and instead it served alongside the
XXVII, as a fighter. Despite the fact it’s La Rhône
9C engine was less powerful than the Nieuport
XVII’s La Rhône 9J, its lower weight gave it a
superior climb rate; it was however, significantly
slower in level flight, with a maximum speed of
c90 miles per hour, compared to the XVII’s
110mph. Like the XVII, the XXI was armed with a
1 2
The Editor builds a test-shot of the
Vickers MG mounted on the top wing, but unlike
the XVII, it never carried the cowl-mounted
Vickers MG.
The Kit
The kit comes on three large sprues from the
Nieuport XVII (early) and two all-new small,
darker grey, sprues. We also get a new fret of PE
specific to this release, a large decal sheet, and
the clear film from the XVII release. It comes with
a beautifully drawn, well laid-out and clear
instruction manual. Markings are provided for
three aircraft, all of them in Russian service.
The Build
Construction starts with the Jaeger
Tachometer. This comes with a very nice dial
decal, but benefits from a dab of gloss on the
face to represent the glass. Personally however, I
would leave adding this till later on in the build;
its connection to the sidewall is very small and
you do risk knocking it off and losing it while
working on the cockpit if you add it right away, I
put mine aside to fit when the cockpit was
completed. Meanwhile I painted the frames buff.
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
NIEUPORT XXI
Copper State Models 1/32 kit
For woodgrain on the cockpit frame, I used
ochre and raw sienna oils. I left it to dry off for
about 30 minutes, before taking an old brush
and dragging it (dry) along the ‘wood’, removing
the oils and leaving it streaked, much like wood
grain (1). I set these wooden parts aside to dry
and turned my attention to other parts.
One of the changes to the XVII boxing comes
very quickly, in the form of the fuel tank. There is
a large tank on the XXI, and it comes with a
delicately moulded fuel gauge (2). The firewall in
the XXI is again new and features an oil tank. I
attached it to the firewall and base-coated the
whole thing in Vallejo dull aluminium (77.717).
The tank is copper, so I painted that with Vallejo
Model Color Copper (70.999/176). Next, I used
some dark washes to pick out the detail. I let it sit
quite heavy, and painted back into it with
Aluminium shades, and pure copper, for
highlights (3).
A new combined carburettor and driveshaft
piece is included in this boxing, I painted it steel
and fitted it to the engine support tube. You are
instructed to fit the support braces at this point,
but I found it easier to seat the drive shaft
through the firewall first, than manipulate
3
19
NIEUPORT XXI
7 8
10
everything into place. I chipped the fuel tank
and interior metal parts, just for some visual
interest. To do this, I painted the chips in lighter
blue, with a fine brush, then I painted in the
centre with dark grey.
When fitting the side frames to the firewall,
take care to get a really good close fit, scraping
any paint from mating surfaces and removing
any mould seams. There is no wriggle room, you
need to make sure it’s a very clean fit. For the
rigging in the cockpit, I used stretched sprue (4).
The seat was painted a lighter wood colour,
for plywood, and installed, as were the various
other frames and controls. The leather pilot’s
head rest and the panel in the frame behind the
pilot, were pained a dark brown using Vallejo
Model Colour Flat Brown (70.984/140) and black,
more on the brown with only a touch of black. I
then applied small dots of heavily lightened and
very thinned brown all over them randomly.
When that was dry, I did the same thing with
very heavily thinned darker brown, almost black.
I played around doing the same thing with
various shades until I thought it had an almost
cloudy, leathery appearance (5). The seatbelts
are very thin PE. I annealed them on the fret with
a candle first, then cut them out and assembled
them, bending them to shape for the seat before
painting them. I started with the same dark
brown mix I used for the other leather items. I
then mixed Vallejo Model Color Basic Skin Tone
(70.815/017) and the flat brown to get a very
20 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
5 6
11
light colour and used that to make ‘cracks’ in the
leather. Finally, I gave it a wash with a very dark
mix of black and brown to bring it together, and
painted the metal parts a mix of steel and black.
For all the control cables and remaining rigging, I
used Infini Models rigging line. Plenty of
different views are given in the instructions to
help you place items and get the correct colours.
The cockpit was now assembled (6), so I
moved on to the lower wing which clips onto
the bottom of the cockpit frame. The middle
section makes the floor of the cockpit, I painted
it in a darker wood than it should be, for a
shadow effect to ‘background’ it from the
internal cockpit details. The tail comes in two
halves, with a frame of ribs and stringers for the
top, that you can leave exposed, should you
wish (7). Even if you want to fit the top cover you
are directed to add it, but if you are adding the
top cover, you can just leave it off, which I did.
Similarly, the tail skid has a couple of
reinforcement plates inside the end of the tail,
you are better off including them as they
provide a solid base for the plate that mounts
the skid later. You won’t see them once it is
assembled, so you don’t need to paint them.
A couple of notes on assembling the tail:
Firstly, on the first of the marking options in
this kit, the footstep built into the left side of the
fuselage is deleted. This is easier to do before
you assemble the fuselage to the cockpit
assembly. You will need to sand off the rim of the
12
metal step that stands proud of the fuselage skin
and fill the recess.
Secondly, there is a locating pin on the
internal floor of the fuselage near where it mates
to the rear edge of the lower wing. In order to
seat the cockpit frame correctly inside the rear
fuselage, you need to reduce this a little (8).
with the tail mated to the cockpit, I added the
horizontal stabilisers and elevators. These are
moulded as a single piece, so if you want to have
the elevators posed lowered, or whatever, you
will need to cut them off and repose them. There
are control horns in the elevators and rudder. I
drilled out the holes in these with a 0.8mm bit
(9).
Next, I added the blast plates to the lower
wing (10). Again, these are very thin PE, but I still
annealed them to make them easy to form to
the wings. These are fitted if you are using the Le
Prieur rockets, which I was, on the scheme I had
chosen. They conformed very well, I tacked the
front edges first with CA, and worked my way
back, to ensure no wrinkles. I switched my
attention to the upper wing, and here you need
to use the centre part C6 (11). Depending on
which machine you are building, you need to
check if you are fitting the over-wing mounted
Vickers. My chosen machine had no guns at all,
so I had to blank off the mounting holes and
square the opening towards the rear of the wing
between the two wing frames.

Painting
I fitted the side panels and cowl to the cockpit
(the latter is another new piece in this release,
make sure you use the one with no aperture for
an MG) and the basic aircraft was ready for paint.
I started with a pre-shade (12). This is something
I never do, but in this case, I thought it might
work well with a canvas covered aircraft. I
sprayed black where there would be frames and
stringers, referring to drawings of the internal
structure of the aircraft. Next, I sprayed white
between the shaded frames and sections to
increase the contrast and trim the black a little
where there was unwanted spray. I followed that
up with a thin coat of Tamiya flat Aluminium (XF-
16). I use this for dope because, ironically, its not
very convincing as a metal colour and looks like
a metal paint, just as aluminium dope does. I
applied a couple more coats until I had the effect
I wanted, with the pre-shading just showing
(13). I masked off the metal blast panels and
sprayed them with Vallejo Metal Color Dull
13
15
Aluminium. When it was fully dry, I ‘polished’ it
with a static free cloth which produced a variety
in the metal surface like mildly distressed metal
(14). I then over-sprayed with a mix of XF-16 and
XF-2 white in some areas, and XF-16 and XF-1
black in others, to increase the tonal variety in
light and shade.
Somehow though, it still looked a bit flat and
lifeless. So far I have resisted the fashion to use
airbrush templates, but I recently bought a set
by Artool, ‘Texture FX3 Mini Stencils’ from the
Airbrush company (www.airbrushes.com) and
decided to try them out. I noticed that when the
basic XF-16 caught the light, even though it was
darker than the same colour mixed with white, it
appeared brighter, so I lightly airbrushed pure
XF-16 mixed with X-22A thinner over the
surfaces of the model, through the stencil. I
experimented with different distances from the
model for the stencil, but in the end, it seemed
to work best right on top of the surface. The
paint was thinned about 70% thinner to 30%
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
NIEUPORT XXI
14
16
paint, at about 15psi. This gave a very subtle
effect when it caught the light, that was not
overly visible (15). Where the pattern was a bit
too strongly visible, I misted over some very
heavily thinned XF-16 to blend it in more.
When that was dried, I gave the whole model
a wish with AMMO’s Neutral Wash (A.MIG1010)
which is a sort of dirty mid-grey. The leather
strips that hold the cowl on, were painted in the
same way as the pilot’s headrest, as was the
leather surround on the cockpit opening. The
centre of the upper wing was painted wood
brown and woodgrain was added using an RB
Productions woodgrain stencil (RB-T08), with
buff. I looked at using the clear film that comes
in the kit, to cover this section, but Edgar at
Copper State told me others had got really good
results with… Sellotape, so I tried it out. It really
is a fantastic solution, self-adhesive and easy to
cut! (16)
The engine was painted with the same Vallejo
Dull Aluminium then the cylinders were painted
21
NIEUPORT XXI

17 18 19

20

21

22

with Vallejo Metal Color Exhaust Manifold
(77.723). The intake manifolds were painted with
Vallejo Model Color Brass (70.801/174). Details
on the cylinder heads were picked out with
silver, and the whole thing was given several
dark grey washes, with black washes on the
cylinder cooling fins (17). We are directed to add
0.1mm wires on the reverse, I used rigging
thread again instead, then painted them silver
(18). The engine cowl was painted with Vallejo
Dull Aluminium, then various washes were
added with black, and Exhaust Manifold, then
the cowl was buffed with a 12,000-grit sanding
cloth from Albion Alloys to wear it a bit (19).

22 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K

25
Next the aircraft was thoroughly decaled,
there are a lot of roundels on this thing, no fewer
than fourteen! These are mostly great, with a
couple of niggles. On the ones on the upper
wing, they are in two parts, one part goes on the
wing and the others on the ailerons. The ones on
the wing have tabs that cover the aileron hinges.
Unfortunately, these tabs are all blue, but they
intrude on the white portion of the roundel (20),
so you will need to touch them up with a tiny bit
of white (21). Secondly, the underside decals for
the stabilisers do not have a cut out for the
support struts. I would advise attaching the
struts after decaling for this reason. The decals
are very nicely printed and sat very well, but this
left me with an issue that they were very clean
on a weathered
23
26
Aluminium Dope surface. To solve this, I used the
airbrush stencils to add very heavily thinned
grey weathering to the decals (22). I then
matted them completely as they were
considerably more shiny than the rest of the
model. After that I blended them in with an all-
over satin coat. The wheels and undercarriage
and were built up and weathered with dirty
acrylic washes of light to mid brown with a
touch of grey (23). The same wash was spattered
on the underside of the model. The top wing
was added, and the engine and cowl fitted, and
we were on the home straight (24).
The prop was also painted with and RB
Productions wood stencil, (this time RBT09). Of
course, propellers are made from laminated
wood, not a single piece, but this stencil, when
used with a light paint than the base colour,
gave the impression of a laminated prop, shaped
and showing its layers (25). Before rigging,
the final job was to fit the excellent
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
NIEUPORT XXI
24
Le Prieur rockets provided in the kit. The thing
lacking here, was the wiring used to fire them. I
did some research and chatted it over with
Edgar at CSM and went with the method seen
on most Nieuports; the bunch of cables led
along the wing to go in though the cockpit side
panel. I used a bit of artistic license on the
positioning as hard evidence was in short
supply, but I think it captured the look (26).
Finally, I rigged the model with Infini thread and
Gaspatch buckles and the model was done.
Conclusion
I really enjoyed the Nieuport XVII, but with the
experience of building that under my belt I
enjoyed this one much more. I have tried to
distill all the pointers and things I discovered
building these kits into this review, but honestly,
just get one and try it yourself. It’s a wonderful
kit that offers a great build experience and a
fantastically rendered replica for your shelf.
23
CO P P E R S TAT E N I E U P O R T X X I I I

Flip Hendrickx builds a test-shot of the new Copper State Models 1/32 kit

Introduction

T
he Nieuport 23 was largely the same as
the definitive 17. The main difference being
the use of a new machinegun synchronizer.
The gun was offset to starboard, the fuel and oil
tank arrangement and the center section rigging
were changed to suit, and the rear spar packing
pieces were also redesigned. Nieuport 23s were
operated by French, Belgian, and British
squadrons alongside Nieuport 17s until their
replacement by later types
The Kit
The basis for this kit is the Nieuport 17, with
two new sprues, a new PE set and a beautiful
decal sheet with markings for two Belgian and
one Russian aircraft. The first thing that struck
me after looking at the sprues, was the way this
kit, and more specifically, the fuselage, is
engineered. First you have to build up the, very
detailed, cockpit; which then needs to be mated
with the rear fuselage. Separate cockpit walls
complete the fuselage construction.
Personally, I would have preferred a more
traditional breakdown, to make construction
easier, the way the kit is broken down now, gives
the builder the option to show of the detailed
cockpit without having to cut up the fuselage.
The detail of the parts is crisp and without
flash. So very little cleanup will have to be done.
I’ve built several Wingnut Wings kits and I was
always impressed with the engineering and fit,
so I was quite curious if this kit would compare.
Let’s find out.
Being Belgian myself, I was happy to see that
Copper State included decals to build a Belgian
aircraft out of this kit. I chose to build the 5th
escadron Nieuport that was flow by Lieutenant
Edmond Thieffry in 1917
The Build
The kit’s Le Rhone 9C engine is nicely detailed,
consisting of twelve. Although the engine comes
with separate cylinder heads (no seam to clean
up here), gluing the back and front together
leaves a seam along the cylinders themselves,
which is very hard to clean up without
destroying the ribbed cylinder details. The
engine was painted silver, using the excellent
Tamiya TS30 Silver leaf. (1) To my eye this colour
represents aluminium realistically. The paint
comes in a rattle can, but in order to have some
control over what I’m doing, I decant it, so I can
use it in my airbrush. The paint was thinned a
little with Tamiya lacquer thinner (yellow cap).
After the paint was dry, I airbrushed the engine
parts with a coat of Tamiya Gloss to prepare for
weathering.
Weathering was done with oil paints. First, I
covered the engine with some washes of heavily
thinned Van Dyck Brown. After these were dry, I
followed up with heavily diluted Burnt Umber oil
paint. The idea is to leave a tinted sheen on the

1 2 3

4 5

24 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K

7 8
12
engine.
Next, I picked out the details with a pin wash
of Van Dyck Brown. (2)
The cockpit in this kit is extremely detailed
and takes up about 70% of the building time. I
started out painting the woodwork. To replicate
the woodwork, I like to use the RB productions
woodgrain templates. They are easy to use and
give quick and realistic results. (3) The parts were
then given a glaze with oil paint. The oil paint,
Burnt Umber in this case, was applied,
completely covering the part with a thin layer.
After about ten minutes, the paint was wiped
away with a dry clean brush to achieve the
desired effect. (4) To speed up the drying time, I
always add a little drop of linseed oil.
To paint the metal parts, I masked off the
woodwork and painted airbrushed these parts
with a mixture of Tamiya medium blue and a bit
of flat white. Subsequently, all cockpit parts were
airbrushed with Tamiya Semi Gloss. All details
were picked out with pin washes. In this case, I
used very diluted Van Dyck Brown oil paint. (5)
At this point, I decide to rig the side frames as
well. I used 0.1mm monofilament fishing wire,
Bob’s Buckles eyelets and 0.2mm brass tubes. (6)
However, I should have left the rigging on the
forward part of the frame off, because, following
the instructions, it is impossible to install the
crankshaft with Carburetor intakes with the
rigging in place. Since it would have been too
10 11
difficult to re-rig it with monofilament wire at
this point, I chose to re-rig the frame with Lycra
rigging thread. Quite a bit of work went into
painting the engine firewall, since it contains
brass and copper parts. The wall was painted
with Tamiya Medium blue and masked once dry.
For the metal parts, I started with a base of
decanted Tamiya Silver leaf, applied with an
airbrush. On top of that, I airbrushed a thin coat
of Alclad brass.
This was followed by masking and, as a last
step, the oil tank was airbrushed with Alclad
copper. (7) The cockpit side walls were painted
during this stage as well. The rest of the cockpit
was constructed as per instructions. The thin PE
seatbelts were easy to form on the seat. They
were primed with Tamiya fine primer and
painted with Life Color acrylics. (8)
Before mating the cockpit section to the lower
wing, the floor was given the wood treatment.
(9) While working on the cockpit, I also
constructed the aft fuselage. The instructions
call for installation of the control wires at this
point. This makes sense because, at first glance,
it would be very difficult to glue these wires in
once the fuselage is closed.
The downside of this way of working, is that
the wires are constantly in the way while
working on the model. You can tack them to the
fuselage with some tape to keep them from
dangling about during construction, but for my
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
CO P P E R S TAT E N I E U P O R T X X I I I
13
next build, I think I’ll leave them off and tread
them through the fuselage control wire
openings after painting. The fuselage itself went
together without any problem.
At this stage, we are ready to mate the cockpit
part to the fuselage. (10) A word of caution here:
This kit is tightly engineered, even paint on the
parts can impair the fit. To make sure the cockpit
part fits neatly to the aft fuselage, it’s a good
idea to thin the inside of the fuselage walls. I also
had to sand the cockpit frame to assure a good
fit. Constantly checking the alignment between
the parts is necessary to prevent fit problems
later. The side walls and front fuselage top were
attached. This step required a little bit of sanding
of the cockpit frames as well, but afterwards fit
was good and only a little bit of filler was
needed. The fuselage was now prepared for
paint. (11)
I decided to use Tamiya TS 30 Silver leaf as a
base paint for the silver dope and aluminum
parts. After the paint had dried, I masked off the
linen covered part of the fuselage and used
various shades of Tamiya grey create the illusion
of slightly sagged linen on the frame. Although,
looking back at the final effect, I wished I had
made it more subtle. Aizu micro masking tape
was used for the masking job. (12) Next, the
fuselage was masked off and the top of the
fuselage was airbrushed with Gunze 303 green
(13).
25
CO P P E R S TAT E N I E U P O R T X X I I I
18
The lower wing top was airbrushed with
Gunze sail color first to prepare for the shading
effects on wing. (14) The wing’s inner structure
was roughly masked off, using micro masking
tape and the shading effect was airbrushed with
Tamiya Olive drab with a little bit of flat black
mixed in. I always remove the masking tape
immediately after painting to avoid leaving any
adhesive residue. This happened to me before
and I think it is caused by the thinner in the paint
that reacts to the glue in the tape. Gunze 303
green was airbrushed over the wings in thin
layers, to control the level of translucency and
shading effect. The horizontal stabilizer was
given the same treatment and finally, the model
was given a coat of Tamiya gloss varnish to
prepare for the decals. The decals that come
with the kit are very good. They are thin without
26 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
14
16
19
being fragile and react well to decal setting
solutions. This aircraft had only very few
markings, the meteor being the most
prominent. (15) The most difficult decal to place
was the white oval marking with red bar, on top
of the fuselage, but with the help of a bit of set
and sol, it went on well, without leaving any
wrinkles.
Unfortunately, I had to omit the Belgian
cockades for the bottom of the lower wing after
an accident. Before applying the cocarde decal, I
accidentally brushed Liquid decal solution onto
the wing instead of Micro Set. (Liquid decal
solution comes in exactly the same container
with blue lettering like Micro Set) At first, I didn’t
notice anything, but when I applied the decal, it
started dissolving straight away. Only then I
realized the mistake I made. I removed the decal
15
17
straight away, but since the paint had dissolved
as well, I had to let it dry out, then sand and
repaint this part of the wing. Since I was on a
very tight schedule to finish the kit before the
deadline, I had to omit these markings. This
wasn’t the only, self induced disaster I met
during this build though. The observant reader
will notice that the left cabane is missing in this
picture. At some point I accidentally broke when
handling the model. As a last step of the
decaling process, the model was airbrushed with
Tamiya semi Gloss to prepare for the weathering.
All weathering was done with oil paints. (16)
Details were again picked out with a pin wash of
Van Dyck Brown. To enhance the weathering
effects that were applied by airbrush, I applied
various filters of earth tones, using stippling
techniques. Finally, some chipping around the

22
cockpit area was added, using Lifecolor acrylics.
Given the fact that part of the inside of the
cowling can be seen, I decided to weather this as
well. I tried to recreate the effect of oil been
thrown around by the revolving engine.
Van Dyck brown, Burnt Umber and Burnt
Sienna oil paint filters were used to create the oil
staining. (17)
The model was set aside to build and paint
the wheels. The caps were painted white and
gloss coated to prepare for the red decals, which,
once again went on very easily.
Weathering was done with oil paints. (18) The
tyres themselves were painted with Scale75 grey
tones. (19) The undercarriage was installed and
rigged with monofilament wire and Bob’s
buckles eyelets and tubes. (20) Note: only after
20
24
the model was finished, I noticed that I got the
rigging wrong. The wires should have run to the
top front of the undercarriage, not the back. The
instructions were clear enough, but in my rush
to finish the model in time I didn’t take the time
to check the instructions properly.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t correct the mistake
without running the risk of damaging the model,
so I left it as it is.
The Top wing was painted with Tamiya TS-30
and the top of the wing then airbrushed over
with Gunze sail color, to prepare for the same
treatment I gave to the lower wing.
The sail color was then gloss coated for
decaling. Looking at the pictures and drawings
in the instructions, the top wing was initially
painted in the same silver dope color as the rest
of the aircraft. I couldn’t find any information on
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CO P P E R S TAT E N I E U P O R T X X I I I
21
23
25
it, but it looks like the green camouflage color
was painted over the silver dope afterwards.
While doing this, they didn’t seem to have
bothered with the top wing roundels which
were roughly over painted. To recreate that
effect, I added the decals first. The decals went
on perfectly with the help of set and sol decal
solution. (21) After airbrushing a gloss coat over
the decal to protect it, the wing’s inner structure
was masked off. (22) The wing was pre shaded,
using Tamiya olive drab, with a bit of flat black
mixed in (23). Gunze 303 Green was airbrushed
on the wing in thin layers, partially covering the
roundels. (24) As a next step, the paint on the
wing was faded and weathered using the well-
known stippling technique with oil paints. These
dots where blended in with a flat brush damp
with white spirit. (25) Strangely enough, this
27
CO P P E R S TAT E N I E U P O R T X X I I I
aircraft also carried national roundels on the
underside of the top wing. (26) The inter-plane
struts were painted separately before installation
(27)
As mentioned earlier, I use monofilament wire
to rig my aircraft models. I prefer this material
over the elastic wire that is sold by a few
companies, for several reasons.
First of all, the monofilament wire gives
rigidity to the model, once installed, much like it
did on the actual aircraft. Also, the elastic wire is
actually flat, meaning that when you install
it, you have to be very careful not to
twist it, since this will be very
visible and create the illusion
that the thickness of the wire is
inconsistent. Also, monofilament wire is very
strong and won’t disintegrate with time. I first
started using this wire for rigging more than
Editor's Note:
Copper State have become
aware the the Comet decal for the
starboard fuselage is incorrect. they are
printing corrections and all production kits will
have the corrected marking.
28 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
27
26
28
10 years ago and the wiring on the models I built
at that time is still good and shows no sagging.
Unfortunately, something went wrong with
the pictures I took during the rigging process, so
I won’t be able to show exactly how I did it.
The model was finished with the prop. This
was painted in various wood brown tones, using
the RB Productions wood grain stencils (28) then
coated with burnt umber oil paint. Afterwards,
this was sealed with a couple of layers of Tamiya
gloss. (29)
29
Conclusion.
First of all: I really like this kit. Copper State did
a wonderful job and is treating us to a well
researched and engineered kit. The plastic in the
original Nieuport XVII kits, which is the base for
this kit, is a bit soft and not as crisp, but the
additional sprue was moulded in a darker gray of
a higher quality, which brings it on par with the
Wingnut Wing kits.
I didn’t have a lot of time to finish the model
and I ran in to some problems here and there as
a result of that, but I’m planning to build another
of these models again in the future. I’m also
looking forward to Copper State’s future
releases.

PART 2
Jonathan Kunac Tabinor builds
the Hong Kong Models 1/48 B-17G
Last month I went through construction
of the fuselage.
T
he wings come ready trimmed and dry-
fitted, the fit being positive thanks to
internal pins that also prevent flexing. The
multi-part inserts undercarriage bays benefit,
once painted, from washes to enhance the
detail. Supercharger and intercooler intakes on
the leading edges need plastic card trunking to
stop you seeing into the interior void and are
simply airbrushed aluminium. The oil cooler
intakes between the engines have push fit
inserts and PE grilles to add. They aren’t quite
right (in reality the grilles were split, the lower
half sitting further back, to allow air flow should
they ice up) but will be fine for all but the most
fastidious.
The air intake tunnelling in position. Making
the tunnels triangulate together to close them
off is easier than trying to build up detail
inside that will barely be visible.
More of the wheel well detail is shown here.
The grey piece at left is the main nacelle
exhaust insert whose fit is less than good, one
of the only places on the kit where this is the
case.
Re-riveting the nacelles after further seam line
clean up
The engines’
locator spigots
fit over the
firewalls assisting
wing join grip but are
a tight fit, so I employed a
swiss file to slacken this. I used MEK to join the
wings, allowing it to ooze out of the nacelle
joins, giving an easy to clean bead of plastic. It’s
not truly a perfect join, so this allows for the best
outcome in my opinion. The inner nacelles have
an insert for the exhaust pipe that has a
tendency to drop in a little. The instructions
recommend fitting this after the wings are
joined. I tried attaching before and after, and the
instructions are correct! Make sure the wings’
fuselage slotted attachment areas are well glued
Don’t forget to paint the inside of the wing
first. Aluminium for the tunnelling and some
spare black was used “just in case” one could
see through any of the numerous vents.
The wing intake tunnels are topped off with
aluminium painted plastic card. Because they
only occupy the lower wing half there’s no
danger of fouling the wing joins.
Replacing the rivetting under the fuselage
after cleaning up my clumsy flat spot I’d
created initially when I’d sanded out the join.
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
48 T H F O R T R E S S – pa r t 2
too. It’s a great method of attaching the wings,
giving a tight join that allows for painting of
main components separately if required. Kudos
to HK for this well thought out approach.
Double checking the cleaned nacelle seams, I
decided to reinstate the rivet work here, so I
used my riveting wheel to add “divets”. This
revealed the slipshod nature of my initial
cleanup of these areas; I redid everything,
sanding and polishing until I was happy. This
lead (not, alas, Arthur C. Clarke-like to a beach in
Beautiful wheel well detail is revealed with
some washes. The wheel wells are well
moulded and fit together with ease.
With all the clear parts masked and interior
colour painted, the airframe can now be seen
its full glory. The wing and tailplanes are just
push fitted, and the fit is very very good
indeed. HK has done a terrific job in ensuring
this and it makes the modeller’s life a lot easier.
Undercarriage wiring adds a touch of
complexity and that troublesome retraction
brace with its reinforced brass pin.
29
48 T H F O R T R E S S – pa r t 2
A simple solution to hiding the join
line in the leading edge light wells.
Basic painting on the engines. Even though
washes and dry brushing add the interest, it‘s
important to do this neatly.
The ball turret is the poor cousin in the additional
detailing stakes as very little can be seen.
Sri Lanka) to further inspection of the lower
fuselage which showed over-sanding had
created a flat spot along the seam. So, it was out
with the finishing tools again until I was satisfied.
I left the rear lower join as a sober penance to
remind me to be more careful.
The complete airframe components were now
ready for painting. First though, various sub-
assemblies needed completing, so I set to work
detailing the undercarriage legs. Copper wire
was heat annealed and using internet and book
references, brake lines were added. I used tape
strips to mimic cable stays, but the wires were
actually anchored using discreetly drilled holes
and thin CA. I also added a robust pin to the
retraction brace. Test fitting everything showed
that the location of the brace was indistinct in
the front of the bay, so a strip of card was added
to give a firmer fit. The legs were sprayed
aluminium at a later stage and then detail
painted.
The inside of wing leading edge lights have a
difficult-to-remove seam. My fix for this was to
cut new plastic card rear walls, secured with
Tamiya Green liquid cement. The clear lamp
parts’ locating lugs were removed from their
rears, as they were visible through the front. A
small dimple “bulb” was drilled into the rear,
painted bright silver with the dimple a duller
shade. These were CA’ed in place and the clear
covers attached which required a little filling
work around their edges to make good. Eduard
masks were added, and riveting reinstated
around them. One final wing area to complete
was the wingtip navigation lights. These are
supplied as single piece clear sections of wing
tip and the small light bulge. I painted behind
30 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
Leading edge landing lights
before and after improvement.
Four Wright Cyclones all painted and done.
Wiring and a few extra details makes a
massive difference in this area when the
model is complete.
The finished ball turret with sponge chipping
applied. You can see how ‘wobbly’ the clear
plastic is distortion wise.
them red or green, cemented in place and
cleaned up the joins. No masking for these, I
have a simple trick for them post-painting.
The engines were airbrushed dull, dark
aluminium with a black-brown oily wash. The
central casings and ancillaries received a bluey-
grey hue. After dry brushing Vallejo steel to
bring out the detail, the intra-cylinder baffles got
a coat of Vallejo black-grey and the push rods
true black. The ignition wires were red-brown
with attachment points in copper and the
distribution ring aluminium. I used various
photos to confirm these colours aiming for the
appearance of well used, but well cared for
engines.
With these areas completed, I now “turned” to
the turrets. The top, Sperry turret has some nice
detail as supplied. I decided to add extra, feeling
this would be another more visible area. Plastic
card, sprue and a glorious little Eduard PE ring
sight created feed chutes for the guns plus an
improved sighting area as well as concealing an
obvious seam on the turret ring inside. I wanted
the guns to be slightly elevated, and this change
required more work than expected, both to the
turret ring and glazing. Once again the gun
bodies were drilled for the Master barrels, and
the transparency masked using the Eduard set.
The belly ball turret only had a little work
added, as it would be hard to justify much else
given its location. Eduard’s mask set paid its way
here making a tedious, error strewn task the
work of minutes. Some careful painting,
weathering and the Kits World stencil decals
finished the unit which was reserved for later
fitting.
Landing light installed and faired in, with
the clear cover polished smooth again.
Extra detailing on the top turret. Plastic card
and sprue serve to do the job well. Note the
Master brass barrels and the Eduard PE ring
sight.
Filing in the erroneous gaps at the back of the
chin turret.
The chin turret, the principal visual difference
between the G model and its predecessors, was
developed by Bendix to protect the vulnerable
nose from frontal attack ( a favourite tactic of
Luftwaffe fighters). The kit turret has a good
shape but misses a few tricks. It comes with two
large slots in its lower and rear. In reality these
were only on the underside, allowing the guns’
bodies clearance at maximum elevation. On the
rear there were two clear inspection panels. As
the turret is often seen rotated 90 degrees for
servicing, these panels would be evident. The kit
gives rigid inserts to represent the zippered
canvas gun slot covers, fixing them at a neutral
elevation angle. I wanted my guns raised, as
frequently seen, and I also wanted to use
Master’s barrels and flash hiders too.
The first task was to pack the rear slots with
card, fill and make good. Locations for the two
clear panels were marked with Dymo tape,
drilled, trimmed and cleaned up. To replicate the
zippered slot covers, I doubled over Scotch 3434
tape and cut strips to match. These were slit
down the middle save for a rounded top area
and Bostik UV cured adhesive used to carefully
glue in place. The internal mounting block was
modified so the two gun bodies sat further back,
their bodies extended so they poked,
prototypically, out of the clearance holes. I cut
two diamond shaped card zip sliders through
which the gun barrels fit into the zippered slits. A
final sliver of Tamiya tape replicated the zip itself.
It was all rather fiddly, but once done looked
pretty cool!
The UV cured glue proved its worth again,
glazing the clear inspection ports. I couldn’t
think of a way to do this with clear sheet, while
 48 T H F O R T R E S S – pa r t 2

Dymo Tape is used to mark out the window Chain drilling and removal of the window One done and one kit version. As you can see,
areas. areas. It looks rough but will easily clean up. there’s a bit of a difference!

Chin turret glazing begins.

The Sellotape square goes
UV cured glue is your friend here. With one done and one inside the hole to hold the
kit version, you can see that there’s a bit of a difference! clear UV glazing glue in place

Lengthening the
chin turret gun
bodies so they
will protrude out
the back properly.
A drill bit makes a perfect
de-swarfer for the Master
barrel jackets.

the holes were too big and curved for clear PVA
to give a conformal surface. On a hunch, I cut
two squares of Sellotape and stuck them inside.
Liquid UV glue was then dropped into the
recesses from the outside, taking care to trap no
air bubbles. UV light set this rock hard and clear,
and it was sanded back and polished to match
the turret shape. It all sounds simple but was
fiddlier than a stringed instrument player sitting
on a roof. Much to my amazement it all worked,
so with a wimpy Tim Henman hand pump of
delight I set this aside to mask and paint later.
I had been using two Master barrels for test
fitting, but this seemed like a good time to
assemble them all. There is swarf from the jacket
perforations, and this makes pushing the inner
barrel though the jacket tricky. I found that a
0.8mm diameter drill bit was perfect to push
through each jacket to remove this swarf. Once
you have done 13 of these you will see
microscopic brass waste on your fingers. Make
sure you wash your hands thoroughly. I once got
a tracking arm abscess from metal shavings
carrying dirt into a cut cuticle, and it was not
pleasant!
Swarf cleared, it’s now easy to insert the
barrels and secure them with a drop of CA. I
mounted all of them onto Blu Tack and
airbrushed gunmetal en masse.
Remember that jig from part one that I used
to mask the prop tips? Well it was now recycled
to use as a positional guide for the prop decals.
The kit decals provide stencilling that is legible,
but if you want it to run across the blade (as it
often did) rather than along the length, the
stencil block is a little too wide. I used the Kits
World versions with their Hamilton Standard
logos, and they were easily positioned using the
jig as a guide. I ran stencilling across 3 props and
along one to suggest a replacement. Incidentally
photos show the stencilling often wore off in
use, and it could run across the blades or along
in both direction, so take your pick.
The cowlings and cooling gills attach to the
nacelle firewalls via a tongued tube fitting into a
notched base on each spigot and I couldn’t get
the cowlings to sit properly using these. I
removed the tongue and this allowed the
engine to rotate freely for a better fit but I had to
ensure the engine orientation was correct
though as the oil sump needs to be at the 6
o’clock low position.
Finally, I’d reached a stage where I could paint.
My subject “2nd Patches” had a replacement
main fin section, starboard outer wing and rear
crew door from a natural metal B-17. Coupled
with the weathered Olive Drab and Neutral Gray
airframe and the chin turret sharkmouth it
would be an interesting scheme. And, like many
B-17s, it also showed a greener Olive Drab on
some parts (from different subcontractors I
assumed). I elected to paint the natural metal
first using Tamiya lacquers so they could be
safely masked off. Tamiya LP-11 Silver and LP-38
Flat Aluminium represented the wing panels,
and fin and duller canvas covered rudder
respectively. All thinning was done using GSI
Rapid thinner. Weathering using thin mixes of
dirty grey -brown and darker silver shaded and
distressed the panels. Uschi Van Der Rosten’s
Trinity splatter templates created tonal variation;
this being knocked back with tinted gloss
oversprays that also left the areas decal ready.
Happy with everything, I masked them off.
Before commencing on camouflage painting, I
needed to ensure I had enough paint. I mixed up
Tamiya lacquers; LP-29 Olive Drab 2 with
decanted spray can AS-22 Dark Earth to give a
very brown mix; neat Olive Drab 2; LP-28
greener Olive Drab, and some LP-30 light sand
mixed with LP-29 to give a lighter hue. Nothing
drab about that lot! For the Neutral Gray I

APRIL 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 02 31

48 T H F O R T R E S S – pa r t 2
Tamiya LP-11 silver lacquer gives a very tough
smooth base to work on.
Masking out the fin fully
keeps it safe from overspray.
combined LP-36 Dark Ghost gray with LP-1
Black. This gave me the base colour with the LP-
36 and LP-37 Light Ghost Gray as accents.
It was easier to paint the top colour first. My
plan consisted of brown drabs on wing inner
sections, green drabs on port outer wing and
areas of the fin fillet. Tailplanes and fuselage
would be normal LP-29 Olive Drab 2 (the
browner of the two) with faded drab on the top
areas and the greener drab around the cheek
guns. Faded fabric elevators and ailerons were
airbrushed a drab lightened with RLM02. This
was then all worked into using the Uschi
templates in certain areas, with darker mixes to
shade panels and translucent layers over the top
to modulate colour and break up the monotony.
Finally, I mixed a tinted gloss varnish using GSI
GX112 Super Clear UV and some brown drab
mix, plus a smaller batch with the greener LP-28.
These blended everything together giving a
glossy decal friendly surface.
Did it all work? There is a lesson to learn here.
Never overwork things too much. Step away and
come back with fresh eyes. I think I overdid the
varnish blending as a lot of subtlety was lost
once everything had dried out thoroughly. I left
things alone while I did the Neutral Gray.
The demarcation for the gray needed to be
32 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
Rejigging the Jig!
Once again this
made a repetitive
task simpler and
more consistent
in result.
The troublesome engine mounting
tongues, and their nemesis!
Working into the metallic starboard wing. The
Uschi templates are perfect for adding subtle
“randomness” into the finish.
A selection of the lacquer colours used for the top scheme.
There’s no such thing as “overall” Olive Drab on this model!
slightly soft edged. Taking a new pack of Blu
Tack, I cut thin strips that were then applied to
the fuselage, nacelles and wing with Tamiya tape
extending masking back to contain overspray.
Photos of “2nd Patches” show the demarcation
line extended ahead of the tailplane leading
edge, so I matched this.
I airbrushed the basic Neutral Gray keeping as
close and as perpendicular to the Blu Tack as
possible. The masking was left in place while the
other grays were applied to shade the underside.
The Trinity templates again broke things up
using a dark grey tinted varnish. I learnt my
lesson and was less liberal in the blending layers
so the result looks more lively and interesting.
The engine cowling sub units were painted
separately, allowing for the camouflage to be
airbrushed onto the entirety of the nacelle
without the gills masking out the ends. At this
point an online modelling friend enquired how I
would deal with the gaps between the open
cowling gills. Ah … yes of course … I was going
to sort that out later. I scratched my head.
Looking at reference pictures, yes, there are
blanking plates between each gill when they are
open. Too small to fill with plastic, I mixed some
PVA glue with Vallejo Black-Grey and ladled it
into each gap from the inside. It was messy but
worked. An aftermarket solution would be a
The finished “replacement” fin area with the
Uschi template.
good thing here for the detail conscious!
Wing and tailplane leading edge deicing
boots were painted using Tamiya LP-65 Rubber
black and tape masks. The chin turret and fairing
were masked and Tamiya gloss red applied,
undercoated with LP-2 gloss white to give a
strong bright red.
Masking removed, revealing the paint work in
all its dull drab might, I was happy to find that I
didn’t need to do many touch-ups. A piece of
torn foam was employed to add some metallic
scratches to areas like the fin fillet, cockpit
framing and engine cowling lips. I used a piece
of Scotch Brite pad to work into this a little,
something I’ve just recently discovered having
long wondered what people meant by it. So
thanks JM for the explanation online!
I had already purchased both Superscale
decals set 48-1123 and Print Scale set 48-115 to
see which gave the better version of “2nd
Patches”. The Print Scale decals are better sized
for the fin markings, and Superscale give better
size national “star & bars”. However, the Print
Scale decals are tricky to use. Regardless of
water temperature, they release from the
backing paper like an indolent teenager asked to
tidy their bedroom, sluggishly and with resentful
sloth. This makes positioning them tricky,
 48 T H F O R T R E S S – pa r t 2

The initial Olive Drab undercoat

provided a base for the other variations.

Fabric control surfaces received a contrasting faded, greyer colour. You

have to be very fond of masking when making this model.

Shading in
action. It took
several hours
of airbrushing
to get to this
stage. Shading was varied to try and make top surfaces more heavily weathered
and faded, while fuselage sides stayed a little less so.

A good view of the colour variations

in the various olive colours employed.

Shares in Blu Tack and Tamiya tape would make me a rich

man! Note the unusual forward demarcation of the
tailplane camo. The photos show this, so I followed them.

tending to drag, their stretchy nature easily
distorting things. I tried a couple of spare
markings, gave up and used the Supercale fin
markings which went on perfectly, although the
diamond is a little too big and the lower “I”
needed shortening slightly. But it all looked
good once settled in place. The aircraft name
was taken from the Superscale sheet, again
snuggling down perfectly. I felt the yellow
seemed dull, and looking at the mission tally
markings, the Superscale rendition was far too
small. So very carefully I took the Print Scale
decals one at a time, soaked them and when I
was sure they would move off the backing
paper, applied them over the Superscale ones.
To my delight the two decals matched perfectly
(as I suspected they might). I left well alone until
they grabbed, then applied some microsol to
bed them down. The Print Scale bomb tally was
now gingerly applied too. The white teeth for
the chin turret came from the Superscale sheet
because they promised to be easier to use, and
because they gave spares in case of mistakes.
Bearing in mind these decals were designed for
Monogram’s kit, they fitted very well. I used the
spares to add teeth all around the turret,
touching up things with some Vallejo White. The
canvas covers were painted pale olive green
with off-white zippers. After a wash of brown,
the gun barrels were added. I left the flash hiders
off till later to avoid losing them.
Stencilling was mixed from the Kits World and
Superscale sheets. The fuel filler point markings
are different on both sheets but as neither
supplies enough for the number on this kit, I
mixed them up for variety. Black wing walkways
can be added to the upper wings, but photos of
Olive Drab G’s with them are few, although most
natural metal G models seem to show them. I
added them to the starboard replacement wing
section, as much for interest as veracity.
With that I started to seal in all the decals with
another coat of GX112 thinned with GSI Mr Self
Levelling Thinner. Normally I mist on a few coats
then go in for a wet coat. I wanted a glossy finish
as my plan was to apply some oil washes to try
and pop out the rivet detail etc, and to allow for
some extra weathering effects.
This is where a situation occurred that any
WW2 bomber crew would recognise. Namely,
Gremlins making merry and ensuring all was
SNAFU (Situation Normal, All “Fouled” Up). I
sprayed the top wings and then elected to gloss
the rear fuselage first to ease handling. My mist
coats went on fine and as I went for the wet coat,
horror-struck I saw the Superscale tail decals
start to shrivel. An inspection of the other side
showed a similar reaction too, and the fuselage
stars and bars. The paint remained unaffected
and beautifully glossy! At least the top wing
marking was not as badly puckered though. I
assume the varnish mix was too hot for the 2006
vintage decals and I had been too liberal in my
wet coat. I called Hannants. They promised to
get a Superscale set out next day to me. Top
notch service from Suffolk’s finest!
I decided to sand out the wrinkling and apply
the new decals. Using 8000 grade Micromesh I
very soon had glass like surfaces. I could mask
some areas and spray these, which would give a
far better finish. The replacement decals could
then provide new serials and national markings.
Once masked, the diamond outline, “Y” and “I”
were airbrushed LP-1 Black followed by rubber
black through the Trinity template. It looked just
slightly weathered and aged. Talk about clouds
and silver linings.
Removing the masking pulled off the serial
decal and some of the weathering layers

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48 T H F O R T R E S S – pa r t 2

Masking the wings with sponge filling the undercarriage bay. The Blu
Tack needs careful manipulation around the nacelle to wing transitions The underside after its three colour shading and fading. I did a better job
to allow the paint to get where it needs to go. on the bit you can’t see, which is of course typical!

Gill filled with tinted PVA. It takes a Deicing boots are simple to
An engine unit mocked up - but what about little longer to dry than normal PVA mask and spray rubber black.
those cooling gill gaps…? but it does work.

Looking like a toothless shark, the chin turret is masked and

airbrushed red. A white undercoat helps the red cover better. Is it Halloween? The spare white teeth decals
are used to decorate the rest of the turret.

exposing bright, clean aluminium and this
proved difficult to blend back in. There’s another
phrase WW2 aircrews knew: FUBAR (“Fouled” Up
Beyond All Recognition). I was now FUBAR! In
danger of throwing good after bad, but with the
new decals on the way, I decided to strip the
paint and start again. Out came the Tamiya tape
and it was all cleaned off with self levelling
thinner.
Studies of photos showed the fin top leading
edge to be very bright, so I repainted the fin with
GSI Super Stainless 2 adding contrast to Tamiya
LP -11 silver. Their matt aluminium dulled with a
drop of grey did the rudder. I worked into this
with thinned black brown and the templates.
The result was actually better than the first time
because I’d varied the basic tones more. I also
had noted a small area of natural metal on the
front wing tip of the starboard wing, so this was
masked and airbrushed at the same time. There
is some very evident chipping on the fin fillet
area too, and this was reproduced with the
sponge and fine brush using some dulled down
metallic shades
My tail disaster occurred on Friday 20th
March. On Monday 23rd the UK went into
COVID-19 lockdown. Despite notification from
Hannants the decals had posted, by midweek it
was clear that they weren’t going to arrive to hit
my deadline, as for obvious reasons the Royal
Mail were starting to prioritise more important
things than stickers, and were also losing staff as
they self isolated. With deadlines looming, I
could either build a Spitfire or man up or grab
the other decals by the stretchy, obdurate horns!
Like a gunfight scene from a Clint Eastwood
western, I surveyed the Print Scale decals though
mean, poker faced eyes, and decided I could lick
‘em (not literally though, I tried that already.
Didn’t work). The Print Scale decals for the
“Diamond Y” and “I” were liberally soaked and
floated on in a bath of Mr Mark Setter, which
allowed a degree of adjustment. The serial
would need to be made up from spares though
as I’d already ruined one. Staring at photos of
“2nd Patches” again, it became clear that the
serial was actually of the stencil variety, rather
than the solid numerals on both sheets. The kit
decal serials were of the stencil style. However,
the last three numbers “201” would need to be
“stencillized” from elsewhere and modified to
match height. So at least my fin markings would
be more accurate after the “mishap”.
For the national markings I used the Kits
World decals but for the fuselage markings I had
to shorten the bars to eliminate the show-
through from the original transfers by matching
their bar lengths. I sealed things in with gloss
varnish thinned with both Mr Self Levelling
Thinner and GSI Rapid and applied in much
lighter coats.
Looking at the completed scheme I was
unhappy with the top surface painting effects. I
had blended them together too much, and it did
actually all look very drab (there are USAAF
Camouflage spirits in the ether clapping their
ghostly hands in glee at this I’m sure!). But I just
didn’t like it. I worked back into things to up the
contrast between colours and tones more, re-
emphasing the difference between green drab
areas and brown, re-masking fabric flying
surfaces too and accentuating them with lighter

34 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K

How she looked after the
first decalling attempt.
Repairing the fin
attempt No.1. Fail,
shades. I recently read that the late master
modeller Francois Verlinden used to over-
emphasise the weathering on models he
finished to photograph for his books, as he felt
that was the only way they would look “correct”
in print. I can see what he meant; to my eyes the
model looked perfectly done now, yet looking at
the final photos it still seems bland!
The Turbo-supercharger units and exhaust
feed pipes were already finished in an array of
natural metal tones and heat discoloured
russets, oranges and blues. Now it was time to
add some exhaust and oil effects. For the
undersurface exhaust staining I first applied 502
Abteilung Wash Brown oil and blended it
backwards with cotton buds and a flat brush.
This gave the base for some airbrushed exhaust
staining, the inner exhausts being a little heavier
than the outer as that is what I saw in photos. On
the top of the wings and nacelles, B-17s seem to
leak oil the most. There are two things to note
about the top wing oil slick stain patterns: They
don’t flow perfectly straight back, they are
blown slightly to port by the prop wash; and
they flow around the spill air vents because
that’s relatively clean air exhausting from them. I
mixed up a very, very thinned concoction of
Tamiya acrylic black and GSI H47 red brown.
With the trigger stop on the H&S Evolution
Silverline set to a small pattern and the pressure
dialled low, I began to build up the patterns,
aiming backwards to mimic airflow as much as
possible. With four sets to do, I tried to create a
uniform randomness of variation, which I hope I
achieved.Once again my over-eager initial
painting taught me to stop and look and think
while doing this. Finally, and I suspect it’s a
modelling cliché, I used a slightly more browner
to stain the fuel filler caps.
Once everything had been checked, and
double checked GSI GX114 Super Smooth Matt
Repairing the
fin attempt
No.2 Success!
and Rapid thinner was misted in a few light
coats giving a perfectly flat final finish. Now for
one of the most nerve wracking parts of
painting and finishing - unmasking the
transparencies. Eduard, as ever came through.
Every single mask worked. It’s this moment
when the model starts to come alive!
Remember the wingtip navigation lights? To
reveal them I cut small oval holes into strips of
Tamiya tape, applied this over the paint-
obscured bulges and then using a cotton bud
lightly moistened with Mr Self Levelling Thinner,
removed the paint.
The wings were click fitted in place and tail
planes pushed on. I decided to not try and hide
the joins, as to my eye they are an acceptable
compromise in return for the ease of the
modular finishing they enable. Exhaust and
turbo piping were installed using PVA glue and
then the undercarriage legs were installed.
These still proved annoying to fit, with the
retraction braces fighting me all the way until
vanquished with some dollops of CA. Once
done though the wheels fitted perfectly, and
with the tail wheel installed she sat on her legs
properly for the first time.
I could now attach the engines, I used PVA
again for this as it allowed all four units to be
viewed from face on and tweaked to ensure
each was correctly aligned with oil sumps
perpendicular to the ground.
There was just one last area to do. The tailgun
mantle. There are two formation lights at the
base of this, not moulded onto the kit part, so
they were drilled, glazed with UV adhesive and
then painted from behind in red and white. I
think that the tail guns are also a little widely
spaced, so I filled the location holes, drilled news
ones that were closer together and then built up
the canvas cover with CA and talc to attempt to
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
48 T H F O R T R E S S – pa r t 2
Decal &
varnish
reaction
causing a
total
mess. I
took this
very
calmly…
Micromesh soon smooths
out the micromess!
Turning a 9 into a 3 and shortening the last 3
to match. Sharp scalpel blades are de rigueur,
and a steady hand.
show the guns in a raised position. Once painted
and washed I glue in the two gun barrels and
stuck it to the rear of the fuselage. It looked
good, but I elevated the guns too much. There is
a small ring and bead site on a mechanical arm
for the gunner to lay his weapons. I cut off the
solid plastic kit sights and used Eduard PE ring
and beads to improve this. A tiny detail that adds
a little touch of interest.
Final additions were the remaining gun
barrels, which all slipped into place perfectly,
secured with a drop of PVA. The two crew entry
hatches were added. The rear metal one was
shut as it shows off the paint scheme better that
way, while the front one was left open, as it was
a terrible fit closed! The top and ball turrets were
inserted unglued, free to turn. Finally, aerials,
pitots and DF balls were applied, followed by the
propellers. Done.
There is much to be said about this model,
and my modelling. There are my mistakes, and
kit mistakes. There are aftermarket parts of use
and of superfluity.
Let’s start with the kit itself. This is a good kit.
It is pretty accurate, it builds and fits well, and is
well engineered. The surface detail is lovely, you
get decals options for both shiny and drab
options. There are also some starting over-
simplifications such as the cockpit throttle area,
the lack of gun ammo feeds, the single piece
Norden sight and the simplified chin turret. The
cockpit area side walls narrow things down
somewhat, there’s no detail in the lower fuselage
where the crew access hatch is, and the stairwell
from cockpit to nose is a “watch that first step,
it’s a doozy” moment! Finally, the gun barrels are
a little thin and the transparencies are a bit thick
and optically wobbly. That sounds like a lot of
negatives, but it’s not. Most kits will simplify
some detail areas and compromises are often
made for engineering reasons. At £115 retail this
35
48 T H F O R T R E S S – pa r t 2

Oil paint is applied to start the

exhaust staining and refined
using the cotton buds.

Various metallic lacquers were worked over with Vallejo coppers and
brasses to get to this used look. Reference photos are useful when trying
to get the look right as there’s a definite pattern to be seen here.

Building up the pattern of the oil

staining is a slow task, but it pays off Tail guns in a modified raised pose,
in the end. Reference to photos is vital albeit too raised. The PE sight just
to try and achieve an authentic result. adds a little refined touch.

isn’t cheap, but then Revell’s 1978 vintage F
model is about £40, while Monograms G is, if
you can find it, somewhere between £40 and
£100 on auction sites, but without any postage
that can nearly double this if sent internationally.
If you want a recessed panel line model of a B-
17G with decent fit, this is the kit.
Is it accurate? Published dimensions for the B-
17 G are a wing-span of 31.6m and a
length of 22.7m The kit equates well
at 31.4m span and length 22.8m.
Close enough to say it looks
reasonable! There was some online
chatter about the outer engine
nacelles’ shape and sit relative to
wing, but then it was also noted that
the nose area is improved over the
1/32nd scale release. I stared at the outer
nacelles for a long time, and yes, they do sit
centrally in the wing leading edge, when they
should sit lower. It’s an issue. Does it detract
from the overall look once finished? Not for me,
but it will do for some. They can correct it if they
so wish (and I did think about trying just to show
you, believe me) or live with it.
Aftermarket wise, there has
been a surge of stuff
released
by the usual suspects for this kit, and some will
want to buy it all. From my experience, I’d say the
Eduard masks are a necessity, and the Master
gun barrels, or similar, really add to the finished
look. Seat belts of any kind will be useful for
some areas, as would some ammo flexi feeds for
the nose. The rest is all icing and as the model is
each modellers cake, it’s up to you how much
you add! I’m sure there will be more decals
sheets for this kit, although there are many
available for the extant G kit anyway. As I
mentioned in part
one, just make sure
you
marry up the markings to the airframe version if
you want it accurate.
My mistakes, for which I alone bear blame are
several. I’m pretty sure “2nd Patches” had the
later single glazed panel side gun windows, but I
loved the scheme so much I ignored it. I really
should have found a scheme that could have
been used on the kit without moving those side
windows, and I think that’s how most will do it,
but I offer the defence of “it’s there if you want to
know how to” in mitigation. I should have been
more careful with cleaning up some of the joins
too and I forgot to add the PE grilles to the wing
intakes. Should I have used aftermarket? Yes, I
think so. Not everyone wants to build
out of the box and I think it’s better
to show these things than ignore.
I really liked this kit, I have a
really cool looking Flying Fortress
to add to my collection now,
although I did feel like
Pheidippedes at
times. Sitting here
in isolation, I am
thankful to have a
hobby that keeps me
interested, busy and
safe. Whoever
would have
thought that
model making
might be a life saver!

36 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
AIRCRAFT in PRoFile
ISSUE 51
Editor’s Note: All quotes contained in this part of the series, are from squadron and pilot reports. Spellings of place names
are as they were written in the reports. The quotes are verbatim and have not been corrected for spelling or grammar.
The Gloster Gladiator Pt 3
A Squadron Story: 80 Squadron RAF
Over Africa
T
he Gladiator gave further commonwealth
service in Africa from early 1940, to the end
of the war (although latterly in very much a
support capacity). When the war began in the
Western Desert, egypt was very much a
secondary concern to the empire, the best types
were needed in France to fight the invasion,
then in Britain for home defence; so the RAF in
the region was equipped primarily with
Gladiators and Blenheims.
on 14th June 1940, the first air combat for
the RAF in egypt came, against the italians. A
CR.42 of the 90° Squadriglia, 10° Gruppo, 4°
Stormo, flown by Tenente Franco lucchini shot
down a lone Gladiator. However, that afternoon,
when Gladiators of 33sqn RAF, supporting an
attack on Fort Capuzzo, claimed four CR.42s in
combat.
on 4th August, four Gladiators of 80sqn RAF,
including the legendary ace Marmaduke ‘Pat’
Pattle, took off having received orders to escort a
lysander from 208sqn on a mission to collect
intelligence on enemy troop dispositions. Pattle,
Pilot officers Wyekham-Barnes and lancaster,
and Sgt Rew, located the lysander at 6000ft. Two
of the Gladiators took up a position astern of the
lysander, 3000 feet above, and two (including
Pattle), took up position 4000 feet above the
208sqn machine to the starboard.
Unbeknownst to the 80sqn fliers and the
lysander, eleven CR.42s of 97° Squadriglia took
off from Benghazi to rendezvous with twelve
CR.42s from 96° Squadriglia, and nine CR.42s
from 10° Gruppo to provide aerial cover for 2nd
Divisione libica’s move from Bir el Gobi to Gabr
Saleh. later that afternoon, six Ba.65s and six
CR.32s of 12° Gruppe Assaulto, 50° Stormo took
off to attack British positions near Sollum, with a
further 30 CR.42s flying escort.
The two italian formations rendezvoused and
set off to attack their targets. As they neared Fort
Capuzzo, they spotted a formation of Blenheims
and Gladiators and the fighters attacked. in the
ensuing intense combat, the italians claimed a
total of nine Blenheims, and four Gladiators, but
it seems probable that a number of these are
claims for the same aircraft, and the real
numbers were nearer five Blenheims and three
Gladiators.
Spotting a trio of Gladiators from 112 Sqn, 97°
Squadriglia broke off to attack and soon only the
50° Gruppo formation was continuing towards
their target. As the evening drew on, they came
across a number of British vehicles on the border
at Bir Sheferzen. They made two attack passes
and it was on the second that they were spotted
by the lysander from 208sqn, then by the four
Gladiators lead by Pattle. The lysander was
forced to turn for home, but the Gladiators
stayed and Pattle and lancaster dived to look for
the italians, but failed to immediately locate
them. Wykeham-Barnes and Rew had broken off
to look for their own attack and soon they were
engaged with the 50° Gruppo aircraft, claiming a
Ba.65 quickly. Rew was not so lucky though and
80 Squadron
Gladiator K7971,
Greece, 1941
was quickly shot down and killed in the
engagement. The Ba.65s dispersed and the
Gladiators temporarily separated as each aircraft
pursued a private war. During the next furious
few minutes, two more Bredas were shot down
but then the Gladiators were seized upon by the
CR.42 escort and Wykeham Brown was shot up,
bailing out and surviving to fight another day.
Pattle meanwhile had two of his four guns
jammed, when he was set upon by CR.42s. He
managed to claim one, before managing to
escape the combat and turn to home. one the
way back though, he was set upon again by five
more italian fighters. His remaining guns
jammed and he forced to use all his skill and
experience to evade them, eventually though,
one shot out his rudder, and unable to steer, he
was forced to bail out himself.
Pattle rejoined 80sqn after being picked up,
and soon they were equipped with Mkii
Gladiators. The situation in Greece at this time
was worsening and 80sqn was one of a number
of British and Commonwealth units transferred
from the, already stretched, forces in egypt to
Greece to meet the italian invasion there. The
unit arrived on 8th november 1940 and was
based at eleusis, north of Athens [we looked at
Hellenic Air Force Gladiators in Part 2, in the May
issue of SAM, ed.]. it remained in Greece for six
months, only leaving when the German Forces
invaded, and the allied front collapsed, on April
1941. While fighting the italians, they did enjoy
considerable success.

The first significant success for 80sqn was in
the battle of Korytsa. This was a major battle on
the ground in the Greco-Italian phase of the
invasion of Greece, and in the air, it meant RHAF
and RAF machines saw combat again with the
Regio Aeronautica. on 19th November, Flight
Lieutenant Pattle took off from Eleusis leading a
mixed flight of nine Gladiators and three PZLs of
the RAF and RHAF. They climbed to 14,000 feet
and proceeded to Korytsa to patrol, where at
14:40PM they encountered around twenty
enemy aircraft, CR.42s and G.50s, in groups of
three and four. They managed to approach
unobserved and attacked the enemy aircraft.
The situation soon turned into what Pattle calls
in the Combat Report a ‘general dog fight’. The
report claims one Gladiator lost for nine
confirmed Italian losses and two probables.
Pattle himself claimed two CR.42s shot down
‘one in flames’ and records an unsuccessful
attack on a G.50.
Flight Officer Graham lead a part of that
formation on the patrol over Korytsa.
“At approx. 14:50 hours I sighted two monoplanes
enemy fighters in formation, probably Macchi 200
or G.50 type. These two aircraft were about 3,000 ft
below my flight approaching from ahead and
slightly to starboard. I half rolled and dived
vertically on the leading aircraft and immediately
the two aircraft split up and pulled up into a steep
climb. I engaged the leading monoplane for
approx. 15 minutes. I found that I was unable to
close to effective range for anything but very short
periods as the E.A. dived away on each occasion
with superior speed’’
It seems that each time the agile, but slower
Gladiators engaged more modern Italian types
they would dive away to gain speed, before
returning to attack.
“However after diving away for several thousand
feet the E.A. on each occasion pulled almost
vertically up and then towards me and
endeavoured to attack me from head on or from a
flank. I was always able to avoid the enemy fire and
to manoeuvre onto the tail of the enemy. After
about fifteen minutes I closed in to about 200 yards
when the enemy was climbing and fired a long
burst. The enemy rolled over and went vertically
down. At first I thought it was doing the usual
manouvre, but as I followed it down it continued its
dive and hit the ground bursting into flames.”
80sqn did not spend their whole time in
Greece in aerial combat. On 24th November,
Squadron Leader Hickey took part in a nine-
Gladiator offensive patrol, 14 miles from Korytsa.
They failed to locate any enemy aircraft but at
13:15, they did come across a large enemy
convoy of ‘’100 pack mules plus 20 M.T.
enclosed. Small camp and about 2-3 hundred
troops.” They strafed the convoy, claiming one
truck set on fire and several damaged, and a
number of mules and personnel killed. Ten
minutes, and six miles later (according to the
report), they encountered a second convoy, this
time stationary or 12 large motor transports,
penned mules and a large number of personnel.
Again, they set one truck on fire and killed a
number of personnel and mules. Shortly after
that they found a third, smaller convoy and
attacked with similar results, before returning to
base and reporting the location of these
formations for bombing.
Sgt. Gregory had a very successful encounter
near Delvinakion on November 28th. The patrol
took off in two flights of three Gladiators, with
Gregory in number 3 position of the second
flight. They were flying at 8,000 feet, 10 miles
south west of Delvinakion, with the two flights
Flying Officer Linnard, 80 Squadron Egypt 1941, note
the liquid staining on the fuselage, and round iron sight.
AIRCRAFT IN PROFILE
at three miles apart, when Sgt. Gregory spotted
twenty enemy aircraft, apparently CR.42s flying
in flights of threes and twos. He saw one flight of
three diving on the lead flight of Gladiators:
“I immediately gave a Tally ho and position of the
enemy, I also pointed them out to my leader F/L
Jones. It was only possible to do a short climb into
the sun as the enemy had already engaged the
leading flight. I dived down with my leader and
pulled out the left looking for a target. It was at this
moment I noticed a flash of flame and then a
parachute descending, it had the appearance of a
British parachute” [This is probably FO Tap Jones,
commanding, A Flight.]
A CR.42 had spotted Gregory and dove to
attack from his stern,
“…with extra speed from my dive I was able to pull
up above him and carry out exactly the same
attack as he had attempted. I opened fire with a
deflection shot, closing range until I was finally
astern at 50 yards. The 44 rolled over and went into
a very wide spin”
Gregory attempted to follow the CR.42 down,
but at that point he spotted a CR.42 behind a
Gladiator in an attack, so he immediately broke
his pursuit of the first and fired a deflection burst
at the second, which promptly rolled over and
crashed into a hill. After checking his tail to
ensure he was not about to be bounced by an
enemy aircraft hitherto unnoticed, he spied a
third CR.42 and pursued it. The chased each
other in a series of tight turns until at last, in an
attempt to shake Gregory, the CR.42 stalled and
crashed into a hill.
Soon he spotted a fourth,
“I saw a 42 about 500 yards ahead flying across my
track. As I flew towards it, it turned away from me
so that it was/very easy matter for me to fly right
AIRCRAFT IN PROFILE
AIRCRAFT IN PROFILE
AIRCRAFT IN PROFILE
AIRCRAFT IN PROFILE
AIRCRAFT IN PROFILE
AIRCRAFT IN PROFILE
AIRCRAFT IN PROFILE

up to its tail, firing from 100 yards until I had to pull
up over it. As I went down in a wide spiral I thought
it was going to force land but it crashed and burst
into flames close to another one already burning. I
returned to base with only a few rounds in my
fuselage tanks.”
in the Combat ‘fighter’ reports, fo Price
owen confirms his flight claimed another two
Cr.42s in the same action.
on 29th, Squadron leader Hickey was leading
a flight of three Gladiators when they
intercepted three SM.79s. They attacked, and the
italian’s dropped jettisoned their bombs. They
could not claim any shot down, although
damage was observed, they diverted from their
target and unable to complete their bombing
mission.
on 2nd December, Pattle was conducting
weather tests in a lone Gladiator when he
sighted a lone ro.37. Approaching it
unobserved, he managed to destroy it before
the pilot or observer had even sighted him.
in December of 1941, 80sqn was joined in
Greece by a detachment of 112sqn, also in
Gladiators and the two units operated joint
patrols, usually in formations of twelve or
fourteen Gladiators.
80sqn had the fight mostly their own way
during this time, inflicting regular and significant
losses on the regio Aeronautica, but on 21st of
December they would be mauled while
intercepting enemy bombers. The action was led
by Squadron leader Hickey, ten Gladiators took
off from Jannina at 10:40 to proceed to an area
between Tepelene and the coast. flight
lieutenant Pattle describes what happened
next, in his report.
“On approaching the patrol line just north of
Argyrokastron a formation of three enemy
bombers were sighted, dead ahead. The “tally ho”
was given and the squadron prepared to attack.
No.1 section leading. While approaching the
bombers, I (leading No.2 section) searched for
escort fighters and in doing so, I saw a formation of
three BR.20s approaching the port beam. As these
were in the more favourable position for attack, I
turned my section towards them, at the same time
continuing to search for fighters. I saw the escort
astern of us and about 10,000 feet above. I sent a
warning over the R/T. giving the position of the
fighters and opening up to full throttle attempted
to engage the bombers before the escort
intercepted us.
Pattle’s number 2 section attacked the bombers,
but only managed one pass before they were
bounced by no fewer than twenty-seven Cr.42s,
in nine sections of three, looking above them,
Pattle could see another formation of twenty-
seven more Cr.42s behind them preparing to
join the attack. The ten Gladiators of 80sqn were
about to be embroiled in an intense melee:
“…although I tried to keep touch with the rest of
the Gladiators it was impossible to do so as I was
forced to use continuous evasive action against
repeated attacks of the 42s in quick succession.
After each attack the enemy would climb up for
height while another would dive down to attack. In
this way I was unable to climb up to their height as
continuous evasive action made climbing
impossible. At times two of these would attack
together and very violent evasive action was
necessary to prevent being shot up. For fully five
minutes I was kept on the defensive without being
able to fire a shot in return. I then noticed another
Gladiator at the same height being harassed by a
42 on his tail. In between evading attacks from 42s
above me, I manoeuvred into a position behind
this E.A. and fired at point blank range. The E.A.
climbed vertically upwards, stalled and spun into
the foothills a few miles north of Argyrokastron.
[Gjirokaster, Albania]
Realising that I was ineffective unless I reached the
height which the enemy were circling, I wriggled
out of the fight and climbed to 20,000 feet. I could
not see any Gladiators and the fight seemed to be
over.
Squadron leader Dunn, 80 Squadron, egypt 1941.
note the extensive chipping to paint on the metal
parts of the fuselage, and mirror on the upper wing.
AIRCRAFT in Profile
I singled out the neared 42 as my target but
unfortunately when still about 300 yards away the
pilot saw me and dived for the ground. I gave him a
quick burst but did not do any noticeable damage.
The E.A. must have been on the point of leaving as
the remainder by this time were on their way
towards Tepelini. I circled Argykastron for a further
five minutes but could not see any other aircraft so
returned to base landing at 11:50 hours. On
landing I discovered that Sgt. Gregory had received
a wound in the right eye and F/O Linnard was hit in
the left leg. S/Ldr. Hickey and F/O Ripley did not
return from this engagement.”
flying officer ripley, and Squadron leader
Hickey were both killed in the action.
These actions continued to much the same
pattern 80sqn Gladiators fighting regio
Aeronautica Cr.42s, G.50s, SM.79s and Bredas,
with a few other types encountered, until 80sqn
finally received Hurricanes in mid-february 1942.
The Hurricane gave 80sqn a machine that better
matched their skill and experience, its superior
armament and performance rewarding the rAf
pilots with greater effectiveness and damage in
an attack. But soon things would change again
when Germany came to the aid of the faltering
italian offensive in Greece in April 1941, their
intervention putting allied forces under far
greater pressure than the italians could apply,
and leading to the collapse of the Allied forces in
Greece soon afterward. Pattle himself would be
killed, shot down probably be a Bf 110 of
Zerstörergeschwader 26, over Pireaus, defending
Athens.
The actions of units like 80 Squadron and 112
Squadron rAf in Greece would be the last
hurrah for the Gladiator in British service. for a
type that was already considered obsolete at the
outbreak of war, it had proved itself to be a
nimble and useful machine in dedicated and
skilled hands, and a fighter that deserves its
place in the affections of those interested in
WW2 fighters.
SEA VIXEN
IPMS (UK) Report
With IPMS Vice President and
Publicity Officer: John Tapsell
O
ne of the unintended consequences of
the Coronavirus lock-down appears to
have been a major upsurge in people
making models. I suppose it makes sense in that
it's a hobby we can pursue in our own homes
and many of us are finding we have additional
time on our hands, not always for the right
reasons. I'm in the fortunate(?) position of being
able to work from home – 'wherever I lay my
laptop is my office' to mangle an old line from
Marvin Gaye – but many others have been
furloughed or worse still, laid off. Even if you are
still working, many of the leisure activities you
normally pursue are off the agenda at present so
its a case of finding something to do.
The modelling forums and social media have
been filled with comments about how much
extra modelling was being done and I thought
my modelling output had also increased until I
looked back at how many kits I'd completed by
the same point last year. More careful analysis
made me realise that my choice of projects is
different at the moment. A couple of them are
far more complex than I normally undertake. My
'big' projects tend to be spread out through the
year but working on two at the same time is
unusual.
Another unforeseen consequence has been
the surge in business for the many online
retailers. If we can't buy things at shows and
high-street shops, then it stands to reason that
we need to order them online. That's great in
theory but several of my usual online sources are
reporting huge spikes in order numbers in the
past few weeks. Many of us already have far too
many models in the stash but it's the
consumables that we still need to purchase. I'd
run low on a couple of colours recently and tried
to order more. I finally tracked some down but
only after checking at least three different
retailers to find one who had them in stock.
One retailer I know of is saying that they are
receiving as many orders per day as they would
normally expect per week – a five-fold increase
48 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
in their business volumes. Many of these guys
are small businesses and whilst they can still
operate, they are having to protect their own
staff and that often means that only one or two
staff can be on site at any given time to ensure
the usual social distancing rules can still be
adhered to. Its a double-whammy for them – a
vast increase in orders coupled with an enforced
reduction in the number of staff who can service
those orders. Similarly, their own supply chains
are often being impacted so 'out of stock'
messages are not uncommon.
Significant delays are therefore inevitable,
something that hasn't gone unnoticed in the
modelling community. We're generally spoilt
with our ordering turn-rounds these days –
ordering what we want, when we want it and
from wherever we choose - with next day
deliveries commonplace and even standard
deliveries taking as little as 3-5 days. Coronavirus
has changed all that and delivery times of 15-30
days are becoming the norm.
Perhaps however, there is a silver lining to
these challenges. One of the interesting themes
that is emerging is the number of people who
are picking up the hobby once again after a long
lay-off, or even for the first time. That won't help
the retailers in the short term but perhaps it
might increase interest in the hobby in the
longer term.
Being at home more is also a chance to do
some of those other jobs we've been putting off.
I recently built a small rack to hold my figure-
painting stands. All it took was some offcuts of
MDF and wooden battens, plus my toolbox and
a couple of hours of applied effort. It's not the
best woodwork I've ever done but I now have
somewhere I can put my part-painted figures
without them rolling all over the workbench. I
could easily have bought something to do the
same job but this was much cheaper and got me
away from the modelling bench to work outside
for a couple of hours.
Finding kits to build isn't a problem
at the moment but why do you
always run out of the exact paint
colour you need at the wrong time?
D A M B U S T E R S L A N C A S T E R B I G B U I L D : PA R T 6.

The Big Build:

The 1/32 Hong Kong Models’ Dambuster’s Lancaster, part 6, with the Editor
Get Your Motor Running then adding black for a pin wash. On the header versions. The Upkeep carried on the raids was
tank I worked with aluminium, black and white smooth. I filled them with putty and sanded

L
ast month we looked at detailing the Rolls
Royce Merlins provided in the kit. As the
engines then fit into supporting frames,
exposed engines need to be painted first, as
doing so after full assembly into the nacelle
would be difficult to say the least. Let’s have a
look at painting the engine in a few basic, but
effective, steps.
I painted the engine matt black. This is really
to check for flaws and provide a key for the next
stage. After that, I sprayed it with gloss black (1).
I find gloss paints have a little less ‘grip’ than
matt colours, but with the first stage matt base,
it was easy to lay down a gloss coat with Tamiya
Gloss Black thinned 70/30, thinner to paint, with
Mr Levelling Thinner. I added a touch of gloss
white to the gloss black and sprayed from above
for a subtle zenithal lighting effect (2). I painted
the detail with Vallejo aluminium mixed with
white for the discoloured bare metal parts (3),
and Darkstar Miniatures copper. I gave the
engine a dirty wash of buff mixed with flat
brown, diluted with water and applied with a
brush (4). I concentrated on selected areas, like
the exhaust pipes and header tank (5). I varied
the colour of the buff wash. Making it lighter at
first on the exhausts, for heat discolouration,
for a variety of tones. Finally, I drybrushed some
raised areas with pure black again, to bring back
some definition lost when the dirty wash was
added.
The Upkeep
With the fuselage largely done for now, and
wanting to move on to, and concentrate on the
wings and everything they entail, I decided to
add the Upkeep. The Upkeep Mine was of course
the defining feature of the Type 464 Provisioning
Lancaster. It was carrying this giant ordnance
that required whole new fuselages to be built,
simply to carry it; and it was this massive bomb
that Barnes Wallis was so famous for and spent
so many hundreds of hours working on.
Needless to say, it is the focal point of this model.
The kit provides a styrene Upkeep that is very
easy to assemble. Regrettably, it does not full
match the version carried on Chastise. However,
with some basic modelling skill and a little light
scratch, you can fix it…
The first thing I did, was fill the incised lines on
the kit Upkeep. This appears to represent the
wooden planking that surrounded the early
them smooth. I also removed extraneous rivets
on the central hub ring that were deleted for
weight saving, as they were judged non-
essential on the final mine design. On the
starboard side (as carried) of the Upkeep, I
added the fuse covers in the centre, and a few
small bolt details specific to the final version. The
other side is much easier. The extra bolts on the
central hub ring were removed again, and a
single nut and bolt added, using RP Tools punch
and die sets. Some machined holes were added
to the outer rim, in line with the Red Kite book
reference. Twelve are added at each end, in four
groups of three, at 90-degree intervals (6). The
release mechanism is difficult to locate in the
bomb bay floor. Use this picture as reference (7).
According to my reference, the forward bomb
bay fairing was closed at the rear, not open as in
the kit. I blended in plastic card to blank it off (8).
I found the drive belt used to spin the Upkeep,
too long. I trimmed about 2mm from one end,
near the drive wheel, and re-glued it after
placement.
I hope you have enjoyed this instalment of the
Big Build and look forward to seeing you again
soon.

1 2 3

4 5 6

7 8

50 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
D A S S AU LT S U P E R M YS T È R E
Sébastien Tartar builds the Special Hobby French Cold-War Warrior
Introduction :
D
esigned and built par Dassault Aviation,
the Super Mystère B2 or SMB-2 was the
first French aircraft to achieve supersonic
speed in level flight, and the last variant of the
Mystère series to enter mass production.
It entered production in 1957. Circa one
hundred and eighty airframes were built, and it
served with the French Air Force (Armée de l’Air)
until 1977. Twenty-four were sold to Israel, who
later upgraded them with a non-afterburning
version of the Pratt & Whitney J52. Honduras
used them well into the 1990s.
In the French Air Force, it served with the 5th,
10th and 12th Escadres de Chasse (EC). The 12th
EC was based at Cambrai military base. This air
base being close to where I was born, I opted for
an aircraft from the 12th EC.
The kit:
I am usually an armour guy, but when I came
across this kit at the Azur-FRROM stand during a
show, was immediately attracted by the nice
The PE parts improved the aspect of the main landing bays. More details were added later.
The inlet and exhaust, painted and weathered.
I painted the exhaust turbine in aluminum
rather than dark steel, to make it more visible
at the back of the exhaust tunnel.
52 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
box art of this 1/72 kit, depicting a so-called
“early” SMB-2 of the 10th EC, in bare aluminum. I
just had to buy it. And could not resist building it
immediately…
The kit dates from 2019 and is moulded by
Special Hobby. Some say the engraving is too
deep, but I did not find it overly so, in
comparison to other brands. The only
differences between this “early” boxing and the
late one is the decal sheet and the colour
profiles (bare aluminum vs camouflage)
The build:
Building started with the cockpit. The level of
detail out of the box is good enough for can be
seen. However, I decided to make some small
improvements. I sanded off the instrument
panels to accommodate the pre-painted PE
parts, sprayed some matt varnish on those parts
to remove their sheen and added Future ‘glass’
deposited with a fine tipped brush inside each
instrument location.
I detailed the back and the top of the
The finished cockpit. The pre-painted PE parts
look nice, after a layer of matt varnish, and save
a lot of time and improve the level of detail.
instrument panel using copper wire from old
earphones painted using a black felt-tip pen.
Tedious but worth it. I also added some cabling
in the cockpit rear.
The cockpit was primed in black, then sprayed
a highly diluted mid-grey tone to achieve a
zenithal effect. I applied a black wash and a light
grey drybrush to bring more volume. I added
paint chips on the top of the cockpit sides
(mostly on the left side where the pilot steps
into the cockpit) using the sponge technique
and acrylics: grey first, then yellow-green and
finally aluminum. The details were painted with
acrylics referring to a walkaround for reference.
To finish, I applied some light washes of dust
tones in some areas (floor, rear cockpit area). I
applied the same process for the ejection seat,
starting with a grey primer.
Next, I turned my attention to the wings.
Accommodating the landing flaps was easy
enough.
I first painted their inside in cockpit green,
only to realise I should have opted for aluminum
after checking my reference…
I painted the exhaust in dark steel and used a
black wash and aluminum on the raised areas
to add some volume.
Accommodating the PE landing flaps is quite
easy. Note that these are usually closed on the
ground.
D A S S AU LT S U P E R M YS T È R E
The nose cone will not fit correctly unless
you fit it while the air inlet glue is still
fresh after closing the fuselage halves.
Once I had assembled and painted the air
inlet, outlets, and PE, I could glue the fuselage
halves together. This is where I encountered
three minor issues.
First, you need to sand quite a lot the top of
the air inlet where the cockpit floor lies.
Otherwise, you will be left with a gap at the front
end of the fuselage. Dry fitting is necessary at
this stage to make sure you get it right.
Second, I would advise to fit the nose cone
right after closing the fuselage before the glue
has dried. Otherwise, the air inlet sits a tad too
high and you will not manage to fit the cone
properly living a gap. I remedied mine using a
thin strip of plasticard.
Third, although the top of the fuselage closes
perfectly, that is not quite the case on the
bottom which required some filling and sanding.
I glued a few PE parts on the bottom that
saved having to reengrave most of the details
lost during the sanding process, the rest being
restored using a needle. Finally, I drilled the
location of the landing light using a spherical
drill bit, painted it using a chrome Molotow pen
(very highly recommended!) and covered it with
a piece of clear acetate punched at the correct
diameter, striped using a needle, and glued with
clear varnish.
Before applying the primer, I replaced the part
that represents the opening mechanism of the
canopy with a scratchbuilt item. Indeed, the kit
part was rather gross and shows the mechanism
at a 90° angle while the angle should be more
54 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
The fins on the fuel tanks are much too thick. I cut them off and used the
original parts as a template to make them in 0,25mm thou plasticard.
Overall fit is good,
and filler is hardly
necessary.
open when the canopy is fully lifted.
I then prepared surfaces for priming, starting
with 400 to 3000 sanding pads, then I used some
Alclad 6000, 8000 and 12000 sanding cloths and
finished off polishing the surface using a
polishing pad.
After applying the primer, I noticed some
surface defects, particularly around the nose
cone. These can ruin a bare aluminum finish. So
needed redoing before I could proceed.
Once the primer had cured, I applied the
aluminum paint. I sprayed it straight off the jar at
1,5bar of pressure suing a 0,2mm nozzle. I then
masked some panels and painted them using
silver, duralumin and matt aluminum. At this
stage, I also painted the wing tips in green, the
tailfin and the dorsal fin in beige mottled with a
brown colour, and the black anti-glare panel
ahead of the windscreen.
I could then proceed with the part I dread
most, i.e. weathering! Unlike the EE Lightnings
that were visibly kept in pristine condition, many
pictures of bare aluminum SMB-2 show worn
out aircrafts with an excessively dirty
appearance. This is what I aimed to reproduce.
Only acrylic water-based products were used
during this process. No enamels, no oils, no
smelly solvent-based stuff!
I started off masking the panels that I wanted
to remain “clean”, using masking tape or Maskol.
Although Vallejo metal colors are rather resistant
once dry, I would advise to reduce the sticking
power of the masking tape by applying it several
The main
landing gear was
detailed with
copper wire and
masking tape.
times on the palm of the hand. Better to be safe,
than sorry. Then, I applied some Maskol
randomly with a sponge on some of the
surfaces. The target was to vary the effect by
leaving some parts randomly clean after the
mottling. However, I was not pleased with the
effect and toned it down with some highly
diluted smoke in some areas, and highly diluted
base colour in others.
I followed with the mottling effect using
highly diluted smoke applied with the airbrush
very close to the model at 0,5 bars with a 0,2mm
nozzle, gradually building up the effect.
Where I felt I had been heavy handed, I
applied some layers of the base colour diluted at
90% to tone it down.
The application of the decals and stencils
followed, I did not varnish beforehand. The decal
sheet is comprehensive, and the decals are
nicely done, thin, and easy to apply. I trimmed
most of them with a new blade (although that
was not really necessary) and applied some
softener to help them conform to the recesses
and panel lines. I did not enjoy applying tens of
stencils, but they did a lot to bring some variety
to this aluminum livery.
Final weathering started with post shading
along the panel lines using highly diluted smoke
and building up the effect progressively. Straight
after shading, I took a brush moistened into
isopropyl alcohol and made some strokes in the
direction of the airflow, in order to obtain a basic
dirty effect on the belly. I went softly to avoid
 D A S S AU LT S U P E R M YS T È R E

Airbrushing the base

colours required a
lot of masking.

The decals are very good and add some variety to the aluminum livery. I
The anti-glare painted the spine just behind the cockpit in aluminum, after realizing it
stripe and decals was not beige on the reference pictures.
were faded
using a light
grey tone. The Some panels were post-
area around the shaded using smoke.
guns was
painted black
and kept “new”.

JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 55

D A S S AU LT S U P E R M YS T È R E

The washes bring more volume to the model. I gently brushed the belly
using a flat brush moistened in thinner following the airflow to give a At this stage, I added the antennas and pitot tubes, and made some dirt
first streaking effect. stains and streaks concentrating on the belly. Scratches were applied
using a sponge and aluminium paint on the areas prone to wear.

I decided to detail the

landing gear bays once The open canopy does not
the models were sit at the correct attitude,
finished, using copper out of the box. I improved
wire and plastic card. the mechanism at the back
and replaced the struts to
have them stand vertically

attacking the base coat and ruining the finish. I
airbrushed a highly diluted coat of light grey
over the decals to fade them a little, then
sprayed on a coat of Future to seal these effects
and blend the decals in. I used the same mix to
do some mottling on the antiglare band.
I then masked off the areas around the guns,
which I painted black. I did not do any
weathering on these other than the washes and
dusting as I wanted them to look newer than the
antiglare band.
Two days after applying the clear varnish, I
polished the model with an 8000-grit sanding
cloth and applied the washes. I used a 25%-75%
mix of black and dark brown on the aluminum
panels, varying the proportions in some areas to
provide more variety, pure brown on the beige
areas and light dust on the antiglare band and
around the guns. The washes I used flow very
easily into the recesses and cleaning is minimal if
you are careful when applying them. The 0,2mm
black felt-tip pen came in handy for marking the
rivets and fins.
I could then turn my attention to dirtying and
dusting all this. On the pictures, the top of the
aircraft is generally clean. Therefore, I limited
myself to representing the characteristics traces
of grease around the stabilisers and some
scratches around the nose and wingtips, using
aluminum paint applied with a sponge. Pictures
also show that the belly is really dirty. That is
where I focused my attention, always trying to
keep the effects as close as possible to the
reference pictures.
I made some dirt streaks first using the same
dark brown, brown and black washes. I applied
thin lines with fined pointed brush that I
stretched almost immediately using a flat brush
moistened in water. I repeated the process until I
was satisfied, varying the intensity of the effect
depending on the area.
I then made streaks of earth behind the
landing gear bays using different dust tones and
completed the dirt effects by projecting speckles
of dust tones behind and around these. I applied
the same weathering process to the doors.
I randomly airbrushed some matt varnish on
the aircraft to give some sheen variations and
called it done...
…Until I decided that the gear bays might be
visible and deserved some detailing! Copper
wire and plasticard were out again. That
detailing proved completely invisible once the
landing gear legs, hatches and tanks were glued
in place. Oh well, I know it is there...
I then dealt with the accessories. I tried to give
them as much attention as the aircraft itself.
I glued the PE part that holds the rear-view
mirrors for the canopy, then masked off the clear
part on the canopy and windscreen, applied a
black underlayer and then painted it aluminum. I
made some scratches on the black areas that
were prone to wear using aluminum applied
with a fine brush.
I could find less than a handful of pictures
showing SMB-2s with AIM-9B Sidewinder and on
these pictures the body of the missile was very
dark. I opted for a dark green with highlights in
olive drab, black wash in the recesses and some
dirt marks using a dust wash applied with a
sponge. I painted the head white and applied a
grey wash. Finally, I painted the tip in black and
applied a coat of clear acrylic gel. I made some
scratches on the white part of their supports
using a mid-grey tone applied with a sponge.
The landing gear legs and actuators were
detailed using copper wire and masking tape
and painted following the pictures found in the
walkaround in reference.
The external fuel tank fins were cut off and
replicated using much thinner plasticard. The
tanks were then painted and weathered much
like the aircraft, with the addition of scratches on
the areas that were prone to heavy wear using a
mid-grey tone applied with a sponge and a thin
brush.
I could then proceed with the final assembly. I
struggled with the canopy as it sits on two thin
vertical struts and a main mechanism at the
back. Keeping it level proved a challenge!
Note that Azur-FRROM got the position of the
canopy wrong: the main mechanism should be
more open than 90° and the struts should be
vertical.

56 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
 D A S S AU LT S U P E R M YS T È R E

Conclusion:
This is a very good model by Azur-FRROM and
it will sure look good out of the box.
With some reasonable detailing, it can be
turned into a very nice rendition of this iconic
aircraft for any French Air Force enthusiast.
Representing a bare aluminum plane is always
a challenge. It takes an unusually long amount of
time for an armour guy in filling, sanding and
polishing, as metallic paints do not tolerate
anything other than a perfect surface. But it is
very rewarding when you achieve a good result. I
tried to depict a highly weathered SMB-2 like the
ones in my reference pictures; and it turned out
like I wanted, which is rare enough to be
mentioned!
I must point out that the landing flaps and
main landing gear doors are normally closed on
the ground. But I found one picture where they
were open: it did exist! To conclude, I thoroughly
Accessories were enjoyed building and painting this kit. So much
painted carefully. so that I decided to also build the “late”
camouflaged version!

JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 57

TA M IYA F 4 U - 1 D C o r s a i r
Ugur Kenel builds the
1/48 aviation icon
with Magic Scale
Modeling Additions
T
he Vought F4U Corsair was designed, by
Igor Sikorsky and Rex Beisel, as a carrier
based fighter and entered service in large
numbers with the U.S. Navy in 1944.
It was a large, heavy aeroplane designed and
built to withstand the stresses of operating from
aircraft carriers. The fuselage was constructed
from alıminium panels, with internal ribs and
stiffeners for added strenghth, that conformed
as closely as possible to the big Pratt and
Whitney R-2800 engine. When the first Corsairs
were delivered to US Navy, pilots found that with
the long engine stretching in front of them, they
had to lean out of the side of the cockpit to see
where they are going.
The aircraft was not cleared for carrier services
until 1944, by which time the pilot’s seat and
canopy had been raised to improve visibility.
After this upgrade, the Corsair quickly became
one of the most capable carrier-based fighter-
bombers of World War II. It was succesful, both as
I started by dividing the pilot into parts. I am
going to convert it to a seated position. This is
WWII Corsair pilot provided by Tamiya. Not
‘resin figure’ quality, but not bad.
I always put the all the resin parts together,
without glue, first. I check the general view
and condition of the parts, and the fit, with
the aid of Tamiya masking tape.
58 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
an air superiority fighter and a strike aircraft
carrying eight bombs or rockets. In aerial
combat, kill ratios of around eleven enemy
planes shot down to every Corsair lost, were
achieved. The history of the Corsair did not end
with the final days of World War 2, as the type
was pressed into service as a close-support
platform during the upcoming Korean War.
In this article i will demonstrate how to build a
Tamiya F4U-1D Corsair with some aftermarket.
One of them was not ordinary aftermarkt!
Instead it is and a electronic kit that produces
sound and a rotating propeller. This product was
provided by Magic Scale Modeling, and you can
buy it direct from them, plus find a lot of other
options, at www.MagicScaleModeling.com. I
used their Authentic Pratt & Withney Engine in
1/48 scale. This includes an electric motor for the
propeller, a full range speaker, a programmed
circuit, 3D printed parts for alignment and a
battery pack with on-off switch. The engine set
After cutting it apart, I placed it on the seat with
a piece of ‘tack-it’ reusable adhesive for a dry-fit
test. After some trimming and trial and error, I
found the correct position and assembled the
pilot. Arms, legs and body are not fully
compatible, as expected,it needed some putty
and sanding, to get the correct shape.
Next, I put all the plastic and resin together to
check the fit. If needed, I sand some parts until
I get true alignment.
that i used was not only for Corsair. You can
attach it to all Pratt & Withney engine users
fighters.
When you first turn the switch on, a
preliminary musical tone plays to show assembly
of the circuit is correct. This is followed by
amazing Pratt & Withney sounds, as
simultaneously the propeller starts to rotate as
the real engine, first with slow movements and
then getting as fast as normal range.
You just need four alkaline battery to start it
and some patience to find a place for correct
assembly, which I will show you in the build
photos.
I used Tamiya’s Vought F4U-1D Corsair kit for
this build, box number 61061. I also used an
Aires resin cockpit set as the main detail set,
beside the Magic Scale Model engine set. I also
used a colored photoetch instrument set from
Eduard as we will see.
The Tamiya Corsair has nice raised side detail
in the cockpit; but if you use resin sets which
have more detail, This has to be removed for
good fit of the resin sets.
When I get the correct position, I attach the
resins side panels with Cyanoacrylate glue.
Note that only the side of the resins were
glued. After this, I released the rest of the
parts for painting.
 TA M IYA F 4 U - 1 D C o r s a i r

While that was drying, I worked on the

First, I painted the cockpit interior green,
then applied a coat of clear varnish. After it
dried, I added a wash and painted the details
with a fine tip brush, followed by dry-
brushing with metallic colors.
modified and seated pilot. First I filled all gaps
around the joining points of the arms and
legs, then I painted it as per the previous step.
I also used Anyz Decals on the seat belts to
imitate the belt holes.
I used an instrument panel from Eduard. It was
colored photoetch, so I just glued it in place.
This way I skipped the time consuming job of
instrument panel painting. Note, Aires gives
an uncolored instrument panel.

It’s time to close the fuselage. I glued the cockpit tub to one side, before I built the model in three sub-assemblies: nose cowl, fuselage and wings.
closing the fuselage. This is the last chance to check for inner cockpit I did it to keep housing spaces for electrical engine and its cabling. All
equipment. parts were sanded and missing panel lines rescribed seperately.

Meanwhile I glued on the canopy and

masked it. This will keep the pilot and cockpit
safe while working on the electronic engine
and its cabling in the next steps.
Here are the components of the Magic Scale
Modeling engine set. 1. is Battery Pack with
on-off switches. 2. is Full Range Speaker. 3. is
Programed Circuit. 4. is Electrical Engine. and
5. Resin Parts.
Let's start with preparation for the electrical
engine. Resin cylinder parts are given by Magic
Scale Modeling sets for correct alignment.
Pratt & Whitney engine, cowling and propeller
are provided by Tamiya. Note the cowling and
cylinders were painted before.

The kit's engine cowling was drilled with a

Dremel tool. The hole size must be same I placed and glued the resin in the hole. It looked like this after I placed it.
diameter as this resin part.

JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 59

TA M IYA F 4 U - 1 D C o r s a i r
This resin cylinder was placed inside the
previous resin. No preparation was need at
this stage because these two Magic Scale
Modelling parts are a good fit.
After cutting the axle of the propeller, I again
drilled a hole with the same diameter for the
smaller resin cylinder. This drilling work must
be very precise, if you make it even slightly
off-centre, the propeller is going to oscillate
while rotating.
Most of the detail will be invisible after i place
it in the fuselage, so iI just painted the cables
and placed them according to the real engine.
Cable will travel through the wings to the
tyres, according to my plan. To do this
another hole must be create in the tyres.
This hole must be on the ground side.
60 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
The Tamiya propeller needs some cutting as
shown, for the next part of preparation.
The resin parts house the electrical motor.
The electric motor was a perfect fit with the
resin cylinder, so placing it was very easy.
After checking the correct diameter and
alignment have been attained, the smaller
cylinder was glued in place
I just added some cable to Tamiya’s Pratt &
Whitney engine for detailing.
After some dry fit tests, I found the inner hole Another preparation, this time on the wings.
of the Tamiya engine was too narrow for the I am trying to make all cabling invisible so i
opened some holes to create a line between
electric motor, so I enlarged it with a knife.
the fuselage and landing gear.
Here are the circuit and speaker connected,
waiting for attachment. With the Tamiya Magic Scale Modeling provides a self
Corsair, there is enough space to put all these adhesive band for good attachment of the
parts without any extra effort. speaker, which is very easy to use.
 TA M IYA F 4 U - 1 D C o r s a i r

Just to be on the safe side, I prepared a piece Next, I placed the electronic circuit in Here is the main assembly of the electronic
of tack-it reusable adhesive. I filled the inside the same space. Placement was strong parts. Propeller engine cable placed towards
of the fuselage with tack-it and placed the enough with the help of tack-it. the nose direction and main power cables to
speaker on it. wings.

Wings and fuselage were joined and then

The power cables exit from the landing gear glued. Black power cables come via the right
Main power cables which are thick red, and bays. After you set the cabling like this, you wheel bay, red power cable via the left wheel
black for the battery pack, via opened lines can glue the wings to the fuselage. bay, and propeller engine cable toward to
inside of the wings. nose cowl.

Time for painitng now. I placed power cables

I airbrushed Vallejo Model Air 71004, mostly
in the wheel bays as shown in the picture,
ton the upper fuselage, then a coat of clear
then I masked the wheel bays for painting. I did almost the same thing on the lower
varnish.
I did the same thing for the engine cable that I fuselage, but added a few drops of black to
placed in the nose section. the blue. This way, the undersides look
darker, giving a shadowed effect.

Decals were applied. I used the Tamiya

decals ,which are typically thick. So I Its time to start weathering for this NAVY
airbrushed two or three coats of clear fighter. First I touched the upper surfaces with Here is the result. I only weathered upper and
varnish after decalling, to reduce the a lighter tone of main blue colors. I used a leading edge of the fuselage and wings.
thickness of the decals. piece of sponge for to apply it. Lower parts stayed in full shadow effect.

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TA M IYA F 4 U - 1 D C o r s a i r

After that, I concentrated on the walkway

areas, which are typically the most
weathered parts of Corsairs. I did the same
technique with a lighter tone of blue color.

Next up, was adding chipping with a fine I continued to create chipping with a brush
brush. Again I did it mostly on walkways, but but this time I painted them with metallic
I also added some chipping on panel lines colors. Concentrating on the same areas as
with green tones. before, mostly walkways and some panel lines.

Antislip panels were added. To do this, I

mixed plaster with a drop of black color. Then
I applied the mix as a line with help of
masking tape.
All completed weathering works were sealed
The same sequence of techniques were
under another coat of clear varnish.
applied on the nose cowl.

After all flaps were painted and weathered,

Also,the flaps of the Corsair must have the
same worn effects. They need more metallic
worn surfaces because they are movable parts.
they were added to the wings. Note the
extended option for all the all flaps is
provided by Tamiya.
The lst weathering application was adding
some black pigments. I did it mostly on walk
way areas and engine sections. After that you
cannot touch the model with bare hands.
Otherwise you will take off the pigments.

Painting and weathering was finished and all

masks were removed. Just be careful while
removing masks in the cable area, because Next I glued the landing gear without gluing
you can damage the cable easily. the cables. Cables must be free under the struts. Same for the other landing gear struts.

62 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
 TA M IYA F 4 U - 1 D C o r s a i r

Then i placed
the wheel rims.

Then I carefully placed the power cables in

the holes I had drilled in the wheels. After the excess of cable was stretched, wheels
were glued to landing gear struts. I left the
inner cable slack on the strut to give a little
shape to imitate hydraulic lines.

After the black

paint dried, I
connected the
cable to the strut
because it was a
little loose. Then
I added some
detail painting
like metalic clips.
Next I need to glue the nose cowl. First, I have
to place the electrical propeller cable in the
nose cowl. Again i left the cable loose and I
I painted the red power cable black, as the glued the nose section to fuselage.
original hydraulic lines were black. The
other power cable was already black so
there was no need to paint it.

Finally the
propeller
was gently
pushed onto
the electic
motor.
After you draw the excess of cables under
the ground base, you will get totally
invisible cabling.

Next I tucked the excess of the cables into

the inner space until the engine sits in its
place on the cowling.

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V O L K S J ÄG E R

Volksjäger
Jonathan Kunac-Tabinor builds
Das Werk’s first 1/32 complete kit,
the Ju-EF126 “Elli”

Background plenty of opportunities for variation in art and instructions, it is an inviting package,
configuration and markings. although not without the odd foible.

D
esigned as a contender for the Nazi 1944
Emergency Fighter Programme, the pulse
jet powered Ju-126 and rocket powered
127 never saw active service. Only a brief
unpowered flight by a towed prototype ever
seems to have happened. Nevertheless as a
“what-if” subject, the Das Werk model presents
The kit gives single and twin pulse jet, as well
as rocket motor options, with alternate stands
for either a take-off and recovery trolley, or a
trestle to show the aircraft partially built. Cleanly
moulded in grey with recessed sharp panel lines
and details, several decal options and good box
I started, in a fit of lockdown craziness, by
following the instructions and assembling the
two trolleys. The wheeled version was attacked
with various sanding pads to try and create an
impression of rough metal. Both were then
primed in Tamiya lacquer silvers, foam-dabbed

Components for both the wheeled taxi trolley and the factory trestle. Citadel washes and Mig pigments created the final weathered look. You
Silver is used as the weathering base, I mottled it with two shades, but can just see the added texture on the flight trolley, highlighted by the
you can’t tell on the finished items! finish.

The twin rear pylon

is taped in place to
allow it to set at the
correct angle,
Good quality sprue nippers matching the front,
make short work of these or the pulse jets
sprue attachments. won't align.

64 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K

Deepening the panel of the join means they
don’t disappear. The fine sanding stick will be
used next to polish it out
With some filling of the joins and gentle
sanding the gun ports are neatly blended in.
Parts count for the
cockpit is low, but
they are nicely
detailed and look
convincing.
RLM 66 was applied
as the base layer. In
lockdown, any dark
grey will do!
Maskol was applied and GSI RLM 02 grey
airbrushed over the top. This gave a nicely worn
chipped finish, further enhanced with washes,
weathering powder and dry brushing. I am sure
that the trestle could be painted as a wooden
assembly if one wanted this too. This factory
stand proved a useful jig during construction, so
it’s worth gluing it together just for that!
Construction of the main components is
simple, although using good quality sprue
cutters to remove parts helps as many have
attachment points on mating edges and these
need cleaning up for a precise fit. There are also
ejector pin marks in some areas that
compromise fit; the mating surfaces for the
double pulse jet forward support arm halves
require their removal, as do some on the twin
rudders and tailplanes. The kit provides optional
rear fuselages for the pulse-jet and rocket
Removing this small section of engine
reinforcing band improves the sit no end.
Swiss needle files are great for reaming out
plastic, so brass tubes will fit properly. On the
left, you can see the outer sheath with the
smaller diameter barrel pushed in to test the fit.
Das Werk would have you paint the dial details on
this, but most of the faces have no detail anyway.
versions. The pulse-jet option features tin-
panning effects around the Schmedding RATO
attachments, but not on the rocket parts. They
look a little stark on the naked plastic but calm
down after painting. Similar effects are found on
the twin rudder parts too, but only on the outer
faces and everything fits well with some very
positive locating pins. The little ‘swivelly’ thing
under the rear fuselage is designed to fit onto
the flight trolley forward wheel for steerage, so if
you want this to castor, make sure you keep it
unglued.
I decided on the twin pulse jet powered
option, as it’s the weirdest looking to me, but to
give you an idea of the other versions, I also
assembled the optional parts. The rocket version
has nicely detailed two-part Walther rocket
nozzles, but the top nozzle isn’t blanked off. A
piece of plastic card will be needed to prevent
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
V O L K S J ÄG E R
The rear of the pulse jet benefits from having
its lip refined and thinned down. A scalpel is
used to pare down the plastic first.
Adding plastic card to blank off hollow areas
on the seat headrest and rear bulkhead.
The hollows are just the reverse of details on
the other face so should not be there.
see through here. The lower nozzle should orient
with a down angle, as shown in the instructions,
and the piece is moulded to fit like this, so don’t
be thinking it’s out of true. I used this spare
fuselage to tack the booster rockets onto for
painting and weathering, so it served a purpose
in the end. It fits very well to the front fuselage
too, should you wonder.
The pulse jet rear fuselage has optional inserts
for the single or two engine pylons. If you go for
the twin version, I found it helpful to bend out
the forward one slower section slightly to better
match the fuselage curvature. A little clean up
gives a good fit here for either single or twin
mount. The fit for the rear pylon mount wasn’t as
good for either pylon, although in fairness I was
trying to show all options and I’m sure if I’d
glued in the appropriate pylon now it would
have been OK. You might need a little fettling to
65
V O L K S J ÄG E R
The ejection seat with the Eduard steel belts
added. I used an Indian snake charmer to
persuade the right-hand belt to stay in
position.
The Trimaster stainless steel scribing template
curves are perfect for this kind of work. Tamiya
tape holds it in place as it is rather springy.
achieve a perfect fit, otherwise you’ll be needing
a tad of filler and some gentle sanding here like
me. Before cleaning up adhesive seams (I used
Tamiya quick setting cement almost exclusively
on this model) I ran a scriber through the panel
lines, deepening them a little on the join, so
sanding wouldn’t eliminate them. Foam sanding
sticks made short work of this without flattening
off the curvature. Further clean up with
polishing pads gave a great result, and having
already deepened those panel lines all I needed
to do was re-emphasise and clean them out with
a gentle swipe or two of the scriber.
The Argus pulse engines were next, and
having airbrushed the insides and front lattice
faces Tamiya light gunmetal, with a black fade
out at the efflux end of each pipe, I assembled
them with Tamiya white label glue and elastic
bands and left them to set. The engine faces
with their small internal liners were weathered
with a dark wash and some steel drybrushing.
These were not glued together, nor were they
mated with their outer cowlings yet, as I
suspected this would make painting much
simpler. It did, the fit of these parts being good
enough that later assembly presents no
problems anyway.
Each pulse jet has a locating arm that slides
into a slot down one side of the appropriate
front pylon. I must admit, it seems a strange way
of doing this; but as long as you clean up the
mating surfaces and check everything, it will
work. It does mean that the jets aren’t handed,
but potentially gives a trickier clean up than a
more traditional slot and tab at the top might.
After 24 hours the pulse jets were cleaned up,
the resinous properties of cement ensured no
ghost seams once fully cured. To eliminate the
66 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
Every Luftwaffe cockpit must have a yellow
cable! The instrument panel comes to life with
some decals and glazing. If only the kit decal
sheet had them like it has those great
placards!
A little more sanding will blend out the seam
line. The plastic reacts well to Tamiya cements.
seam line inside the exhaust of each pipe and to
thin down the rear lip, I shaved the area with a
new scalpel blade and then twisted each tube
around an inserted, rolled sanding pad to give a
smooth finish. The lumps you can see looking
down each tube are in no way the pin join
locators for each half, they are (of course) hi-tech
temperature gauge fairings. Any similarity is
pure coincidence … I improved the engines’ sit
on their rear pylons by carefully removing a
section of the final reinforcing band where it met
the pylon, allowing each engine to rest more
realistically on them. They looked a little
tentatively perched otherwise. It’s a small thing,
on a model of something that never existed, but
when has that ever stopped a modeller
“improving” things?
Unlike the vertically split rear, the forward
fuselage is horizontally separated, allowing for a
simple cockpit assembly. There is also a choice of
wing bulkheads; sparred and un-sparred. The
latter designed to be used with the factory and
show the wings unattached, which is a
thoughtful touch. Two inserts for the 20mm
cannon troughs need attaching and need
careful alignment if one doesn’t want to end up
with a step. They still need a little filling, but I
used a slower setting glue here nudging them as
they dried so they sat nice and level with the
outside surface. Looking at the relationship
between the gun access covers and the gun
troughs, I felt that the barrels might have been
visible (Actually I just liked the idea of this, so
there you have it). I filed out the inside cockpit
walls and CA’ed a section of brass tubing in to
act as a sheath for a smaller diameter brass
barrel to be added later. The side consoles sit
over this, so if you too prefer this look (and you
With no use for
Euros at the
moment, I invested
them in this!
The Walter rocket nozzles for the 127 rear
fuselage with one open, one closed. I suspect
a tooling mishap!
are a reader of taste after all), check the tubing
doesn’t interfere with the consoles’ fit. You can
do no wrong checking these fit into their
locating notches anyway, as I found they needed
a little trimming and a touch of sanding on their
back edges to locate without fret.
Cockpit detail is very nice, just a few parts
creating a busy atmosphere. The rudder pedal
mount has a small locator that needs careful
cleaning up to fit well and I found it best to
remove the small locating ridges on the side
console bases (not just the 2mm the instructions
suggest). These were sanded flat and the
detailed top console glued on. Each was painted
and detailed separately before adding, while the
backs of the ejection seat headrest and of the
cockpit aft bulkhead have small areas which
benefited from blanking off with plastic card. To
further detail the seat, I sourced some seatbelts
from an Eduard FW-190 set, as no PE fret is
provided with the kit. The instrument panel is a
nicely moulded plastic part, but while many
companies might provide decal dials for this, the
instructions suggest painting them. Even with a
head magnifier this is going to be arduous, so I
used Airscale instrument decals, bedded in with
setting solution. With a retail price of just over
£30 in the UK, I can understand why there’s no
PE in here, but a kit decal option for the
instrument panel might have been nice too. The
kit gives optional clear and solid plastic Revi
gunsights, which can be added later, sitting atop
the coaming.
Painting was overall GSI RLM66 black-grey (or
RAF Dark Sea Grey would suffice if you are stuck
in lockdown). Weathering washes helped pop
out the details with a little dry brushing and
some Vallejo paint to pick out things. There is a
 V O L K S J ÄG E R

This photo shows This photo shows

the options for the options for the
the Rocket Twin Pulse, Twin
Configuration of Rudder version.
the kit.

This photo shows

the options for the
Single Pulse, Single
This photo shows Rudderless version.
the options for the
Single Pulse, Twin
Rudder version.

Twin pylons added and

This photo shows
cockpit masked, the fuselage
a possibility you
is joined and ready to paint.
can build as a
Note the sturdy wing spar.
flight of fancy!

Initial paint
Once painted with the colours applied. I
fluid removed it was studied as many
attached with a wooden late war schemes
stick and a scourer to try as I could find to
and create a battered try and get a feel
“landing in a field” look. for things.

cable running along the cockpit floor, and if you
paint it yellow, it looks nice and suitably
“Luftwaffery”. Das Werk makes the lack of dial
decals more puzzling by providing some lovely
flap selector, stall warning and guns armed
placard decals to adorn the cockpit, adding
touches of colour in very visible places.
I stuccoed the seat pad with liquid cement to
give it a more fabric look, and added small
triangles of plastic to locate my seatbelts. Once
all was painted, and matt varnished, I glazed the
dials with UV cured adhesive and attached the
flexible steel belts, hanging one over the top of
the seat (I’d seen a picture online of a Dornier
235 seat so festooned), while the other was bent
so it would dangle over the cockpit side when
added it during finals.
Before joining the fuselage halves, I glued in
some coin weights behind the cockpit bulkhead.
If you want to use the factory stand, I suspect
the kit will tail sit, especially with the twin Argus
option, as there is a lot of weight behind the
wings; so I opted for better safe than sorry!
Fuselage clean-up was simple using sanding
sticks and pads, I re-scribed panel lines where
required, using a Trimaster stainless steel etch
curve template, positioned with masking tape.
The wings are simplicity, each a two-part affair
that fits well and slides onto the wing spars
tightly enough to not need any glue. Opening

JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 67

V O L K S J ÄG E R
The initial scheme was too brown.
I just didn’t like the way it dried
Tailplanes are mottled
and the underside
colour wraps over too.
It’s painfully close to
pastiche but I was
rather fond of this
area!
Stripes? Nope!
Not Germanic
enough.
Repainting the engines starts with RLM02,
RLM 83 and dull silver for the rear sections.
up the holes for the R4M rocket panniers
showed a good fit, but I left them off to paint.
I now mocked up each variant and
photographed this “rogues’ gallery” to show
what could be achieved. There is a slight
discrepancy in the instructions here, the box art
on the side shows the single pulse jet with twin
rudders, while the instructions show the single
pulse jet on its V-1 style pylon with the 127-style
tailplanes, which would leave it rudderless!! Take
your pick. With that, it was a quick task to glue in
the twin pylons to the rear fuselage, make good
the joins and then mate the front and rear
fuselage giving a set of subassemblies for a
painting.
Before painting commenced, I masked off the
cockpit aperture with Tamiya tape, and did
68 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
The original colouring
of the pulse jets tied
in too closely with the
fuselage scheme I felt.
When in doubt, copy something else. The
FW190 camo pattern looked far better!
A variety of colours applied in translucent
layers create the heat stained exhaust areas.
likewise with the three part canopy. This has well
defined frame lines making them easy to follow
with a sharp blade if that’s how you like to do
your masking. The canopy is rather thick, and
while very clear, I went “Old Skool” and dipped
them in Klear to give a real sparkle.
Extrapolating that the Ju-126 would have
been built in sub-assemblies by various
contractors like other German types, I decided I
could paint the fuselage, wings, tailplanes and
pulse jets independently to show variations in
finish that one sees on real late-war Luftwaffe
aircraft.
The fuselage, engines and tailplanes were all
sprayed late-war creamy-grey RLM76. Over this I
airbrushed a solid RLM81 Brownviolet and then
added disruptive strips or blotches of RLM82
I toned down the
Brownviolet with olive drab
giving a more khaki
appearance (that Brownviolet
could look like it seems!)
Yellow painted
outer fins. Note
the card mask for
the Hakenkreuz
area standing
away from the
surface to give a
soft oversprayed
demarcation.
Further shading blended the front
camouflaged sections in more. Note that the
struts are painted in the fuselage colours and
show the subtle difference between the
RLM76 and the 02 on the nacelles.
Light Green. Being built in the middle of Corona
lockdown I had to mix some of these paints or
find “near matches” in my existing stocks. The
light green was Tamiya XF-5, the sky coloured
RLM-76 was Tamiya Sky lightened with white
and a little pale grey and the ‘brownviolet’ was a
mix of a dark green and hull red. The latter
colour dried far too dark red-brown, so I
overcoated it patchily with GSI H304 Olive Drab
giving a shade somewhere between khaki and
brown. I felt my engine pods were much too like
the fuselage so repainted them with RLM02 grey
and a wavy-edged coat of RLM83 Olive green
from the GSI range. The tailplanes and rudders
stayed in the original ‘brownviolet’ with 83
blotches and patches. It proved hard to get
something that looked “mix and matched”
without looking contrived, or indeed rubbish!

Post shading is built
up slowly to weather
the underlying
colours. Very thin
paint can build up and
will suddenly go from
subtle to too much if
one rushes things.
The R4M tray was wooden so
the launch area was painted
to reflect this, while the sides
were RLM75 for contrast.
Trim tabs are red. It’s not mentioned
in the painting instructions, but that’s
what Luftwaffe fighters had. I masked
them to avoid ham-fistedlly getting
the red paint everywhere.
The underside landing skid had been painted
lacquer silver first, and was stipple masked with
a foam pad and masking fluid before getting the
RLM76 overcoat. After the masking was removed
I worked into this with a wooden stick and
various scourers trying to give the impression of
something that was seriously scuffed from a few
landings.
I wanted to have the wings in a totally
different scheme to the rest, so I settled on a FW-
190D style RLM77 Light Grey ( RAF Light Aircraft
grey!) with disruptive RLM83 Olive Green
pattern. My first attempt was diagonal stripes
and I didn’t like it, so I cleaned it off and followed
the Dora’s disruptive scheme, masking out with
blu-tack for a feathered edge. The underside for
these was classic RLM76 Blue Grey. The R4M
panniers were RLM75 Grey-Violet and the launch
The decal sheet has a plethora of markings and the
bottom half are stencils from different aviation works to
go on the bare aluminium panels if you are making an
unpainted airframe.
area painted to resemble bare wood. The rockets
got a coat of RLM70 Black Green, with nose fuses
picked out in a dark metallic shade.
As a final touch the pulse jets’ nose intake
cowls and outer faces of the rudders were
airbrushed RLM04 Yellow, borrowing this from
He-162’s and FW-190D’s I liked the look of. I
added a raised card mask on each rudder to
leave a square of RLM76 for the Hakenkreuz,
ensuring it feathered well to suggest hastily
overpainted yellow.
The pulse jet exhausts got a coat of silver,
followed by translucent layers of orange and
blue and Tamiya smoke, with a final blackened
smoke mix to darken the ends. The kit suggests
the canopy framing is black, and liking the look
of this, I did likewise. Weathering was limited to a
thin mix of Tamiya acrylic black and brown, post-
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
V O L K S J ÄG E R
Black canopy frames are
unusual but they look good,
so I was happy to follow the
instruction’s suggestion.
Airbrushing a cupful of neat Self
Levelling Thinners over the
varnish as a last coat, re-wets it
and it comes up very glossy.
Use the decals as you see fit. Memories of an
old Heller 1/72nd Me 109K led me to use the
solid crosses underwing.
shaded over panel lines and to suggest rocket
and gun residue as well as some general
patchiness.
Paints used were either Tamiya or GSI thinned
with GSI Mr Rapid lacquer thinner regardless of
whether they were acrylic or lacquer. This mix
dries very quickly and is great for mottling when
the paint is well thinned and applied at low
pressure. I wore a proper cartridge-filtered paint
half-mask, and ensured I had my painting area
well ventilated, as the fumes are nasty.
GSI GX112 varnish and Mr Self Levelling
Thinner gave a brilliant gloss finish ready for
decalling. The kit decals are nicely thin with
good density and offer a number of options for
you to consider matched to their own invented
colour schemes. I picked out things for my
markings, substituting only some Xtradecal
69
V O L K S J ÄG E R

The booster rocket

nozzles were fitted into
drilled holes for painting.
The spare fuselage makes a convenient holder A 1.6mm diameter hole
for the RATO bottles while they are painted up. works perfectly.

Fortunately, it all worked well,

and yes that is another yellow
cable. And of course it’s accurate!

Masking out the landing skid

”bay”. I forgot to do this earlier so
had to be careful of the decals.

stencil-style swastikas for the rudder as I didn’t tabs red or the landing skid internals, so they relented using tweezers. I now attached the
like the two part decals that the kit sheet were masked, airbrushed RLM02 and weathered. model to its launch trolley making it easier to
supplies. If you want to do an unpainted version A final generous coat of well thinned GSI UV handle for final fitting of the ejection seat,
there are hundreds of maker’s stencil decals for matt varnish finished things off, and allowed me gunsight and canopy. The Schmedding launch
the aluminium panelling: A really neat touch to unmask everything. rockets, previously painted, had their nozzles
that will go a long way to giving a very plausible The “fiddly finals” now commenced, with a attached and were glued onto the fuselage sides
effect. There are a few rash of smaller parts to paint up; the landing skid and the last act was fashioning a new wing pitot
stencils to apply struts and links, the canopy opening lever and from fine brass tube, the kit one having snapped
that really help give stay arm, the gunsight ( which painted on the sprue. There are two underwing ground
a convincing aura up well and looks the part). R4M support struts you can add. I left them off as
here too. With that rockets were attached to their launch they dangled incongruously.
done I noticed I hadn’t trays and stuck to the wing I really like this model. It fits well, is easy to
painted the undersides, the ground build, and its problems are minor. There’s
trim handling loops were nothing to tax
painted RLM02 and any
stuck in position on modeller
the wing undersides with a few
too. The landing kits experience,
skid proved fiddly to while the subject
assemble, but matter and
almost
infinite
finishing options mean no
one can tell how it’s
inaccurate either. It would look
good in captured Allied
markings too,
perhaps an
overall blue-
grey French
one?
As an
adventure into
“whiffery”,
this is a
great
kit.

70 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
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CO LO U R C O N U N D R U M
Colour Conundrum By Paul Lucas
RAF Photographic Reconnaissance Colours 1939 – 1945
Part 1 - 1939 – 1941
A
MO A.664/42 dated 2 July 1942 stated
that Photographic Reconnaissance Unit
aircraft were
'...coloured and marked in accordance with
operational requirements. The camouflage and
colouring do not necessarily conform to the
standard, nor are the national markings invariably
carried in the orthodox positions or painted in
standard colours.'
Thus in a World War full of rules and
regulations, those which covered the
camouflage and markings of the RAF's
Photographic Reconnaissance aircraft explicitly
stated that there were no rules and regulations.
As such, there is a great deal about this subject
which remains uncertain and it is therefore
difficult to compile a cohesive account of the
development and use of the camouflage and
marking schemes used on the RAF's
Photographic Reconnaissance aircraft.
The development of special camouflage
schemes for RAF Photographic Reconnaissance
aircraft during the Second World War period
appears to have started as a result of the private
enterprise of an Australian named Sidney
Cotton. Cotton had become involved in the Air
Section of the British Secret Intelligence
Service's attempts to obtain intelligence on Nazi
Germany by virtue of his wide experience of
flying and aerial photography and his business
connection with a firm which was trying to
expand into Germany thus providing a plausible
cover story for repeated flights over and around
Germany. At Cotton's suggestion three
Lockheed 12A aircraft were purchased from the
United States through British Airways Limited.
One would be used by the British, whilst the
other two would be used by the French. The
British aircraft was given a special colour scheme
so as to help avoid visual detection.
According to Cotton's own account published
in his biography, Ralph Barker's 'Aviator
Extrordinaire' he got the idea of using a special
camouflage colour whilst watching the
departure of the Maharajah of Jodphur in his
Lockheed 12a that was painted a pale greenish
blue colour noticing that it disappeared from
view very shortly after take off. Following
72 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
Port side elevation of Spitfire PR. IA N3071 of No.2
Camouflage Unit in November 1939. Overall Sky with
roundels using the 'dull' shades of red and blue. Serial
number approximately 4 inches high in Medium Sea Grey.
delivery of the first Lockheed 12a to Heston in
January 1939 Cotton had it painted a high gloss
duck egg green colour which he termed
'Camotint' to DTD 63 obtained by direct
purchase from Titanine. This duck egg green
Camotint colour was eventually adopted for use
on the under surfaces of day flying RAF aircraft
under the name 'Sky' from the spring of 1940.
The use of Sky by No.2 camouflage Unit that
became the Photographic Development Unit
before finally becomming the Photographic
Reconnaissance Unit with effect from 8 July 1940
is fairly well documented on account of the
widespread use of Sky from 1940 onwards. The
problems lie with almost all the other colours
which were used by the PRU, most of which are
poorly documented. The problem of poor
documentation is exacerbated by the
unreliability of the evidence provided by
photographs as there are so many variables
which might affect the relative tones visible in
any one print. Further to this, it is usually
impossible to accurately date the photo thus
making it difficult to position it on a timeline
which might offer some clue to the colours
being used. There are however, a number of
documents available which do shed some light
on the subject.
'Eggshell Blue', a new Sky Blue?
Paragraph 3 of the minutes of an informal
meeting held on 10 January 1940 where the
provisioning of Camotint dopes required for
application to the under surfaces of 'cleaned up'
Blenheims was discussed stated
'Mr Serby produced samples of the original
'Camotint Green' egg shell finish together with a
sample of the new egg shell blue finish. The latter
appeared to be superior, but the question as to
which will be finally adopted will depend upon
which gives the best results for invisibility'.
In addition to this, during early October 1940,
trials were held at Thornaby with a view to
revising the camouflage of Coastal Command
aircraft and part of the correspondence which
dealt with these trials also made reference to a
'new sky blue colour'. A letter from Thornaby to
HQ Coastal Command dated 20 October 1940
stated
'3) As to the under surfaces the discussions with the
RAE expert revealed the fact that the PRU unit at
Heston had evolved a sky blue camouflage for the
under surfaces which is an improvement on the
standard duck egg blue colour. The sky blue under
surfaces reflect considerably more light than the
duck egg blue and make the whole aircraft very
inconspicuous when viewed from underneath. I
was given to understand however that there were
certain difficulties in producing this new sky blue
colour and that therefore the duck egg blue had
been adopted as standard for day operational
aircraft.'
As ever, colloquial terms are being used to
describe the colours and whilst 'the standard
duck egg blue colour' was almost certainly Sky,
there is a question as to the identity of the 'new
sky blue colour'. Was it the same colour referred
to at the meeting of 10 January as 'egg shell
blue'?
Reference to the adoption of 'duck egg blue'
(Sky) rather than the 'new sky blue' due to
difficulties in producing the latter colour
suggests that it might have been, because this
would fit the known chronology. Camotint, also
known as 'Sky' and 'duck egg blue' came first,
with the PDU then producing the improved blue
colour referred to at the meeting of 10 January
as 'the new egg shell blue' which 'appeared to be
superior' but which proved difficult to
manufacture leading to the adoption of Sky as
the standard under surface camouflage colour.
The PDU/PRU however might have been able to
continue using 'the new egg shell blue' as the
amount of this difficult to manufacture colour
they required would presumably have been
comparatively small.
Assuming that the ' the new egg shell blue'
and 'new sky blue' were one and the same
colour, the question arises as to exactly what hue
this was as there are no colour samples in the
files from which these references were taken.
Thanks to the Thornaby correspondence
quoted above, it is apparent that the PRU 'new
egg shell blue/new sky blue' was still being used

Starboard side elevation of Spitfire PR.IA N3117 of
the PDU spring 1940. Overall PRU Electric Blue No.1.
Serial number 8 inches high in Medium Sea Grey
in October 1940. On 29 November 1940 HQ
Fighter Command signalled HQ Bomber
Command noting that No. 3 PRU was now
operating from Oakington with Spitfires and
Wellingtons and asking for details of any
variations from normal camouflage and
markings. The reply on 30 November was that
there were no variations. Writing in his book 'RAF
Camouflage of World War 2' Airfix Magazine
Guide 11 published by PSL in 1975, MJF Bowyer
referred to this exchange of signals and stated
that stated that this was not the case.
'From observation it can be said that they wore an
assortment of light colours – pale green, electric
blue, matt white and even pink overall. The unit
flew Wellington 1cs T2706 and 2027 in standard
night bomber colours without codes.'
Though no specific date for these
observations is given, there is reference to a light
colour which Mr Bowyer describes as 'electric
blue'. Is this a reference to the PRU 'new egg shell
blue / new sky blue'?
Electric Blue
With regard to the term 'electric blue' being
used as a colour name, it fails to appear in the
Methuen Handbook of Colour, but an internet
search leads to a definition offered by Wikipedia
that 'electric blue' is a colour whose definition
varies but is often considered close to Cyan.
Wikipedia then goes on to offer five different
variations of electric blue, using the Hex Triplet
notation that is used in a variety of computing
applications to represent colours. Of these five
variations, the lightest, Hex triplet #7DF9FF, or
something like it, might offer some insight as to
the appearance of the PRU 'new egg shell blue /
new sky blue'.
When Hex Triplet #7DF9FF is compared to
British Standards by way of a computer based
conversion programme, the closest colour is
given as BS 4800 16 E 50 which is sometimes
described as 'Turquoise'. By way of comparison,
Cyan, defined by Wikipedia as Hex Triplet
#00FFFF also has BS 4800 16 E 50 given as its
closest British Standard colour when converted.
BS 4800 16 E 50 has a theoretical specular
reflectivity of 60%, whilst that of Sky is 42%, thus
making #7DF9FF / BS 4800 16 E 50 a much
lighter colour, thus correlating with the colour
referred to as the 'new sky blue' that was stated to
'reflect considerably more light than the duck egg
blue'. There was already a colour called Sky Blue
which which might be described colloquially as
being a 'duck egg blue' that had a theoretical
specular reflectivity of 52% thus also being
darker than the 'new sky blue' but this was a
standard colour that had been developed by the
RAE before the war, not the PRU and thus it
would seem unlikely that this was the colour
being referred to by Thornaby.
According to Terrance O'Brein, writing in
'Chasing After Danger' whilst at St.Eval in March
1941 he saw PR Spitfires 'Some painted a clear
azure blue for high altitude observation, others
having dove-grey for cloud base flights'. At this
time, the camouflage colour known today as
Azure Blue, intended for use in the Middle East
had not long been invented and is not thought
to have been available, so it is likely that his use
of the term 'azure blue' was a colloquialism in
the same vein as 'dove grey'. The reference to
dove grey might be a colloquial description of of
either Medium Sea Grey or Sky Grey both of
which were standard colours.
With regard to 'azure blue' however, the
Methuen Handbook of Colour states that the
term azure blue is synonymous with cyan (blue)
(new) and gives the same notation, 23A7 (-
24A7), as for cyan. This is a light blue, which was
placed between 23-24A7 thus giving it a slightly
greenish hue. This leads back to Wikipedia
Electric Blue, Hex Triplet #7DF9FF and BS4800 16
E 50 sometimes known as 'Turquoise'.
It is therefore suggested that the 'the new egg
shell blue finish' mentioned at the meeting of 10
January and the 'new sky blue' that is referred to
in Thornaby's letter of 20 October 1940, both of
which had their origin attributed to the PRU; the
'electric blue' referred to by MJF Bowyer as being
used by No. 3 PRU at Oakington and the 'azure
blue' referred to by Terrance O'Brein at St Eval in
1941 were all one and the same colour. It is also
suggested that this colour might have been
similar to that of the modern colour Cyan, Hex
Triplet # 00FFFF, or Wikipedia Electric Blue Hex
triplet #7DF9FF the closest standard colour to
both being BS4800 16 E 50.
In the absence of any indication of the correct
nomenclature for this colour, until such time as
such nomenclature might come to light, it is
proposed that this light electric blue colour be
referred to as PRU Electric Blue No.1.In model
paint terms, Vallejo 70.832 (position No. 202 on
the rack) 'Verdigris Glaze' is just a little bit
brighter than BS 4800 16 E 50 and thus might be
provisionally considered representative of PRU
Electric Blue No.1.
It is impossible to confirm the use of this
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
CO LO U R C O N U N D R U M
colour on any specific aircraft since it is
impossible to determine colour from black and
white photographs. With this in mind, for
illustrative purposes only, Spitfire N3117 which
can be seen in photographs to have had a single
light colour overall is shown here in PRU Electric
Blue No.1.
Hudson and Spitfire colours
Unfortunately, PRU Electric Blue No.1 did not
figure in the set of coloured paintings which
were circulated to the Headquarters of Fighter,
Bomber and Coastal Commands on 31 March
1940. These drawings featured a Hudson in a
green, grey and Sky finish and a Spitfire and
Blenheim both finished in overall Sky. The
Hudson scheme illustrated in these drawings
was described in the author's book 'The Battle
For Britain – RAF May to December 1940'
published by Guideline Publications in 2000 and
thus need not be discussed any further here and
the overall Sky finish needs no further
description.
On 20 July 1940 the Air Ministry sent a
Postagram to all Home Commands and a host of
other interested parties such as the Admiralty
stating that reports had been made of the
enemy operating British types of aircraft and
giving details of the latest authorised colour
schemes of British aircraft. Paragraph 8 stated
that
'Aircraft of the PDU are not coloured in accordance
with the above. Full details of the colour schemes
used by the PDU have been notified to
Headquarters Fighter Command who will take
action to ensure the safety of these aircraft.'
On 25 July 1940 HQ Fighter Command wrote
to its Operational Groups and HQ Anti-Aircraft
Command to notify them that the PRU,
previously known as PDU was now under the
operational control of Coastal Command under
whose orders its aircraft might operate from
Heston, Wick or St Eval and that its aircraft
operated in non standard camouflage which was
described as follows.
'Hudson – All under surfaces are coloured a pale
greenish buff, and carry red, white and blue
roundels.
All upper surfaces are camouflaged in olive green
and dark grey colourings and carry red and blue
(only) roundels.
Red, white and blue roundels enclosed in a yellow
rim are carried on the sides of the fuselage and red,
white and blue vertical stripes are painted on the
73
CO LO U R C O N U N D R U M
Port side elevation of Spitfire PR.IC P9385 '15' of the PRU circa summer 1940. Overall PRU Electric Blue No.2. This aircraft should
have a red, white and blue roundel under the wings of 35 inch diameter. The fuselage roundel has a thin yellow surround.
Codes 24 inches high; serial number and '15' 4 inches high all in Medium Sea Grey.
fins.
Spitfires – are painted all over either electric blue or
a pale greenish buff. They carry red, white and blue
roundels on upper and lower surfaces of both
wings, and similar roundels are enclosed in yellow
rims on each side of the fuselage. In each case a
rectangle on the fin is painted with red, white and
blue vertical stripes'.
This letter was describing the colour schemes
circulated by the PRU in a set of coloured
paintings sent to HQ Coastal Command from the
PRU at Heston on 21 July 1940 along with a
covering letter that requested that HQ Coastal
Command send two copies to HQ Fighter
Command for information. These paintings once
again included a Hudson in a grey, green and
Sky finish, though this time of a different pattern
and two Spitfires, one in overall Sky and one in a
shade of blue.
Unfortunately, the Hudson plan view diagram
is split along the centre line to show half of the
upper surface and half of the under surface so
that the whole of the disruptive pattern applied
to the upper surfaces cannot be discerned. The
shade of grey on the Hudson is a dark bluish
grey that could be intended to represent Extra
Dark Sea Grey, whilst the green is a dark blue
green which might be intended to represent
Extra Dark Sea Green. If this is the case, then this
drawing possibly shows that the Extra Dark Sea
Grey and Extra Dark Sea Green combination
which would go on to become the standard
Photographic Reconnaissance (Low Flying
Scheme) was in use from as early as July 1940.
74 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
The Sky hue on the under surface is
unmistakable and appears to be a fairly good
match for the actual colour. This same colour is
also shown as the overall finish on one of the
two Spitfires thus needing no further comment.
PRU Electric Blue No.2.
The shade of blue used in the illustration of
the blue Spitfire that is described in the covering
letter as 'electric blue' neither looks anything like
any of the standard camouflage colours used by
the RAF during the whole war or the hue of PRU
Electric Blue No.1 as previously discussed.
Returning to the Wikipedia definitions of electric
blue mentioned previously, perhaps the most
relevant of these to the colour of the painting
which is referred to in the covering letter as
being 'electric blue' is that given as 'Medium
Electric Blue' which according to the Wikipedia
entry was the colour defined as 'Electric Blue' in '
A Dictionary of Colour' by Marez and Paul,
published by McGraw-Hill, New York in 1930.
This interpretation of the term 'electric blue' was
therefore contemporaneous in the late 1930's
and could well have been the sort of colour
which a serving officer at HQ Fighter Command
in the summer of 1940 might well describe
colloquially as 'electric blue'.
The Hex Triplet notation for this colour as
given by Wikipedia is #035096 which when
converted into a British Standard colour comes
out as BS 381C No.166 French Blue. This is a very
similar colour to the shade of blue used in the
Port side elevation of Spitfire PR.IF X4384 of the PRU circa Summer 1941. Aircraft painted in
overall PRU Blue. 'Dull' red and blue roundel on fuselage, 'dull' red, white and 'dull' blue fin flash.
Codes 24 inches high, serial number 4 inches high all in Medium Sea Grey.
painting. The paint used on the Spitfires cannot
have actually been BS 381C No. 166 French Blue
as this was not introduced to BS 381C until the
1948 edition. In FS 595 terms No. 166 French
Blue equates to FS 15123. In model paint terms,
Humbrol No. 14 Gloss French Blue is virtually
identical to the BS 381C colour.
In the light of this, it is suggested that the
colour illustrated in the PRU drawings of 21 July
1940 and described as 'electric blue' in the letter
from HQ Fighter Command are one and the
same colour, and that in modern terms this
colour is approximately matched by BS 381C No.
166 French Blue which has a theoretical specular
reflectivity of approximately 13%.
Given that the PRU Electric Blue No.1 of
January 1940 was described as being lighter
than Sky that had had a theoretical specular
reflectivity of approximately 43%, it is unlikely to
have been the same 'electric blue' of July 1940
which would appear to be much darker,
apparently having a reflectivity somewhere in
the region of 13%
In the absence of any indication of
the correct nomenclature for this colour, until
such time as such nomenclature might come to
light, it is proposed that this darker July 1940
shade of 'electric blue' provisionally matched to
something like Hex Triplet #035096 and BS 381C
No. 166 French Blue be referred to as PRU
Electric Blue No. 2
For illustrative purposes, Spitfire PR IC P9385
'15' which was active with the PRU throughout

Starboard side elevation of Spitfire PR.IG X4784 of 140 Squadron
circa September 1941. Overall PRU Pink. 'Dull' red, white and
'dull' blue fuselage roundel and fin marking. Codes 24 inches
high, serial number 4 inches high all in Medium Sea Grey.
the summer of 1940 which can be seen in
photographs to have been finished in a relatively
dark colour is shown as being finished in PRU
Electric Blue No.2.
All the July 1940 paintings showed the
national markings as being applied in identical,
but possibly unusual hues. The blue appears to
be the pre war 'bright' V.B. 2 Blue which in
modern terms is matched by BS 381C No. 108
Aircraft Blue and FS 15056. The red appears to be
somewhat brighter than the existing 'bright'
Red, V.R.3 which in modern terms is matched by
BS 381C No. 538 Post Office Red and FS 11140.
The hue of the red in the painting is similar to
that of BS 381 (1930) No.37 Signal Red (FS
11310) that was the shade of red used to mark
British Bombs that had a high explosive filling
and would thus presumably have been readily
available. The shade of yellow used in the
fuselage roundels also appears to be different
from the usual, resembling BS 381 (1930) No. 55
Lemon. These slightly 'odd' colours have the
effect of making the roundels more prominent
but because it is not known how accurately the
hues of the painting represent the colours used
on the real aircraft, it is impossible to say
whether non standard identification colours
were used as a deliberate act of policy or not. In
view of the statement made in AMO A.664/42
about the use of non standard marking colours
quoted at the beginning of this article, there
must have been some variation at some point,
but whether these markings are representative
or not is unknown.
Finally, the PRU's code letters 'LY' are shown in
what appears to be Medium Sea Grey aft of the
roundel on the port side elevations of the
Hudson and both Spitfires.
PRU Blue
March 1941 now seems to have been the
most likely date for the first appearance of the
colour known today as PRU Blue. On page 59 of
'Above All Unseen The Royal Air Force's
Photographic Reconnaissance Units 1939 – 1945'
by Edward Leaf, with reference to the
introduction to service of the Spitfire PR IV at the
end of March 1941it is stated that
'As the PR IV was brought into service considerable
effort and many tins of paint were expended trying
to find a suitable camouflage colour which could
be used for both high and low-level operations.
Varying shades of green and blue were tried before
Benson came up with a dull shade of Prussian blue.
Known as 'PR Blue', this was to be used on all PRU
aircraft for the rest of the war, though there were a
few exceptions; some of the low level armed PR
Spitfires used against the channel ports retained
their pale shade of pink right up to 1944'.
Whilst the precise date of the origin of what
became known as PRU Blue is not known, it is
apparent from a number of primary source
documents that this colour was being obtained
by RAF Benson from Titanine to DTD 63A with
reduced gloss by local purchase under the name
'Cosmic' by July 1941. Following trials to try to
determine a suitable camouflage colour for the
under surfaces of high altitude aircraft as
discussed in the 'Colour Conundrum' article 'The
Deep Sky Blue Mystery' which appeared in the
May and June 2017 issues of Scale Aircraft
Modelling, on 5 September 1941the Air Ministry
sent a Postagram to HQ Coastal Command
referring to the high altitude trials carried out by
the RAE asking if HQ Coastal Command wished
to adopt the new high altitude camouflage
colour referred to as 'Extra Dark Ultra Blue'. By 26
September 1941 HQ Coastal Command had
replied to the effect that they were satisfied with
the colour they were currently using, and by 3
October 1941 the decision had been taken to
provision 'Cosmic' for Stores under the name
'PRU Blue'.
Finally, with regard to the Wikipedia
definitions of 'electric blue', it is interesting to
note that the darkest of them, 'Dark Electric Blue'
Hex Triplet #53678 when converted into a British
Standard colour is matched by BS 381C No. 636
PRU Blue.
JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04
CO LO U R C O N U N D R U M
PRU Pink
The origin of PRU Pink is even more obscure
as there is so little information available about it.
It seems to have been available by August 1941
as on 17 August a memo from the Operational
Requirements Branch of the Air Ministry to
Research and Development (Materials) at the
MAP concluded with the following paragraph
'4) A specimen card of the Special Pink (as supplied
by Titanine's) used for low flying P.R.U. aircraft in
adverse weather conditions is also forwarded for
record purposes.'
The colour of this specimen card is perhaps
something like Hex Triplet #DFD2D9 which
when converted into a British Standard colour is
most closely matched by BS4800 24 C 33 that is
sometimes referred to as 'Lilac'. This however is
too dark and too heavily saturated thus
appearing 'warmer' than PRU Pink with an
approximate theoretical specular reflectivity of
61%. There is no close FS 595 match.
It has been said that 1416 Flight which
became 140 Squadron had a number of PRU
Pink Spitfires on charge during September 1941
such as X4784 as illustrated here. Despite PRU
Pink apparently remaining available for the rest
of the war in Europe, it never seems to have
been provisioned for the RAF Vocabulary of
Stores and it can sometimes be seen as being
referred to as being 33B/NIV, meaning 'Not In
Vocabulary'.
It is well known that 16 Squadron operated a
Flight of Spitfire FR IX's which were finished in
overall PRU Pink during the summer and autumn
of 1944. Less well known however is the fact that
they also operated at least one Spitfire PR XI in
the low level role that was finished in PRU Pink.
The Squadron ORB entry for 20 September 1944
states
'F/Lt. G.H. Bastow airborne at 13.10 for the D.2's
and L2's near Arnheim in pink spitfire No. PL.834,
with 14'' oblique to take photographs, observe and
report on a big drop, did not return.'
F/Lt Bastow was taken prisoner.
75
 WARPAINT No.124
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 CO A S TA L C O M M A N D

Paolo Portuesi builds the Airfix Wimpy

in Coastal Command Colours

I
n my early years, there was an Airfix box art
that really caught my imagination. A twin-
engine bomber flying just above the sea,
chased by a couple of fighters. In retrospect, I
have to say that everything in that box art was
perfect, the light, the perspective,
everything.
The completed, left portion, of
the interior, ready for paint.
That was the Seventies, the bomber was a
Wellington, and the artist was Roy Cross.
However, what was inside that box was far from
perfect. The moulding technology of the late
1950s not impressive. For "advanced" modelers,
that kit was
little more than a canvas on which to exercise
their scratch-building skills.
Since
then, four 1:72 Wellingtons have been released,
first by Frog and then Matchbox, MPM and
Trumpeter, and all of them had issues, some
serious and some less so. A new, Airfix,
Wellington in 1:72 scale was long overdue.
When holding this new kit in my hands for the
first time I had a good feeling. The box is big,
heavy, and solid. Airfix packaging has improved
much with the passing of years, and now it is
second to none. Honestly, this kit has a very
interesting box art telling the
incredible story of a British
airman

The front of the interior and The geodetic airframe was

cockpit. For the belts I used the
Eduard parts, they were lightly
weathered with brown oil paint
The seat is well reproduced in
the kit. It was painted with
Tamiya XF-71, cockpit green,
with the cushion in black
painted aluminium, then aged
with a brown oil wash. For
aluminium chips on the black
parts, I used a Prismacolor silver
pencil.
For the Radios, I used the Eduard
PE parts. The ‘wood’ effect was
reproduced by applying Mr Color
H-85 Sail, then Gunze Clear
Orange. Finally, a wash of Van
Dyck brown oil paint was added.

View of the competed interior. For the

floor and side frames, I used Alclad
Aluminium. The base of the panel
interiors, is dull red. The cockpit area is flat
black. The other parts are in grey green.

JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 77

CO A S TA L C O M M A N D

I used Uschi spray templates to vary the

tone on the fuselage, this is essential to
avoid a dull, flat, uniform colour.

The fuselage is painted, but not yet weathered. I prefer

to do it this way before attaching the wings, to better
handle the parts. The canopies are also inserted at this
point and I was pleased to see they required no filling. Here you can see the delicate variation in the
top colours. I used the Uschi templates to
create this subtle effect. You have to be very
careful with the tones you use to avoid them
looking to stark and unrealistic.

extinguishing an engine fire, in-flight, but it is far

from the magic of the old one. The box is packed
with the typical highly detail parts that have
lately become an Airfix trademark. Airfix deeply
researched this aircraft and it clearly succeeded
in the not-so-easy task of replicating the
geodetic surface in scale. Like other recent Airfix
releases, this kit has been designed in such a
way, that other versions of this bomber can
easily be released.
This new Wellington Mk IA and Mk 1C from
Airfix (A08019) is offered in six clean, blueish-
gray sprues with
a total of 126 parts, and one additional sprue
with 15 clear parts. The aircraft interior is very
well detailed including many floors, bulkheads,
seats, instruments, and other equipment. Bomb
The fuselage is almost completed. Before inserting the turret, I bay doors can be displayed open or closed.
painted the interior matt black. The wings will be added later, Engines, propellers, spinners, and cowlings are
as the fit is so good, they do not require filling at the joint. quite convincing. The same holds true for the
undercarriage legs, and the flattened wheels.
Control surfaces are separate parts. A couple of
very thin and clear canopies are included, one
has the side windows open. A third one,
supposedly for a future version, is marked not
The chips and for use. Canopy frames are not too pronounced,
scratches and decals are good as many aftermarket sheets.
behind the Turrets are great as well. Wrapping all this up, I
turret were have to say that this is a great kit.
made with a Well, I was so happy with this new kit that I
silver pencil. The got the second version released by Airfix, the
window frames Wellington Mk. VIII (A08020). Adam Tooby did
were painted in another such a good job with his box art that he
matt white. left me no choice but
to build a Coastal Command Wellington in the
so-called Temperate Sea Scheme. The problem is
that I hate the antennas typical of this version,
although acceptably supplied in one of the two
additional
frames provided in this very new kit. The
solution was an aftermarket decal sheet,
precisely Xtradecal no. X72302, including
markings for a very interesting Wellington Mk Ic
in Dark Slate Grey, Extra Dark Sea
Grey, and White among its eight options.
Planning this build I feel the need to use some
other aftermarket items, like Eduard resin wheels
At this point I had not yet inserted the side windows. 672158, etched parts 73639, and canopies mask
The codes were painted with Xtradecal cockade grey. CX563. Once in a while, I love to open up some
The side machine guns were replaced with Aires items. panels and cowlings, and the just released
Eduard Brassin Wellington resin engines are

78 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
 CO A S TA L C O M M A N D

On the port wing,

I wanted to show
the engine
uncovered. For
this, I used the
Eduard Brassin
set, the detail is
superb; and the
fit is excellent.

The wings are assembled to the fuselage. Here it is a

dry fit, but you can see that the fit is perfect, which
meant the wings could be painted separately..

The exhausts were painted

Alclad Burnt Iron.

The port wing, painted and weathered. The camouflage was sprayed
freehand. The exposed engine was completed before final fit of the wing
to the fuselage.

icm.com.ua
facebook.com/ICM.Models

JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 79

CO A S TA L C O M M A N D

The Brassin engine fit is perfect, but you do have to be very careful with The white was given a coat of satin varnish before being washed with a
the PE. The exhaust collector ring was painted with burnt iron then thin dilution of ‘dark earth’ oils. The canopies were masked with the
weathered with oils. Eduard set CX518.

The undersides were painted and

weathered using the same techniques
and templates as the upper surfaces.

The gear legs were painted with flat aluminium, then given a wash of
brown oil. The wheels were replaced with Brassin wheels from Eduard.
The exhausts were also replaced with Brassin items.

The model is almost completed,

The interior of the engine was painted in matt black, and unhappy with but I still needed to add
the exhaust collector rings, I replainted them with Alclad Dark propellers and a few small details.
Aluminium.

simple irresistible.
After collecting all these decals and etched
parts, it was time to actually build this kit! In a
process that, according to the Airfix instruction
sheet, takes over 100 steps; Construction starts
with the cockpit. It was a clean process, in which
I took advantage of the Eduard Photoetched
belts and dashboard, and consequently, there
was not much to report, as construction easy
and fast. Interestingly, Airfix clearly shows all
those cockpit parts intended to be invisible, or
almost invisible, once you have assembled the
two semi-fuselages, so to make it easy to leave
them aside and speed up the build. Well, I really
didn’t
feel like losing all this fun, and fun it was.
Removing and cleaning all cockpit parts parts
from the sprues was not difficult, and for once
even mating them together with the Eduard
photoetched parts was easy. Building up this
aircraft interior was a surprise-free process.
Bringing all this to life with my trusty airbrush,
oils, and Tamiya and Gunze acrylics paints was
even more enjoyable. The Wellington interior
was a mix of black, aluminium, red, and green
(the dominant interior colour when it comes for
Royal Air Force aircraft). Painting the cockpit, the
only real challenge is a geodesic structure that it
supposed to stand out against the red side walls
of the fuselage, with its aluminium colour. My
solution was an overall layer of Tamiya X-1 Gloss
Black, followed by Alclad ALC-101 Aluminium,
then a layer of Tamiya XF-68 Red. When the red
was dry, I sanded it down with 3000-grit
sandpaper, until the aluminium beneath was
visible. Where the main colour was black, like the
forward flight deck and the floor, I just painted it
all Tamiya XF-1 Black, then dry brushed it with
Humbrol H-56 Aluminium. To replicate the
wooden bulkhead, I first resorted to Gunze H-17
Cocoa Brown, then a very light and diluted layer
of Gunze H-85 Sail Colour and, finally, I covered
everything with another layer of Gunze clear
orange H-92. For every other surface I choose
Tamiya XF-71 Cockpit Green.
The last step, was to add a very thinned wash
of Bruno Van Dick oil. In this build I felt like
closing the bomb bay, just to avoid breaking the
fuselage shape. In a way it was a pity because I
like how Airfix moulded the bomb bay doors as
a part of the side fuselages.
The Eduard Brassin engine parts are as
beautiful as they are delicate, you must be very
careful when preparing them for assembly. To

80 W W W. S C A L E A I R C R A F T M O D E L L I N G . CO. U K
 CO A S TA L C O M M A N D

I used AK interactive ‘rust’ effects to replicate

burning and heat discolouration around the Dirt on the engines was added using brown oil For the white on the rudder, I sprayed white
exhausts. For the smoke staining, I used from AK. The light aluminium chips were over brown, building it up slowly to create
heavily diluted Gunze H-17. made with a pencil. shade.

The Airfix kit perfectly captures the lines of the Aircraft. Montex masks were used for the markings.

prepare them for painting, I covered them Aldergrove, North Ireland. After a very thin layer this scale. In addition, the fit is so good,
entirely with the Tamiya X-1 Gloss Black and then of Tamiya Clear X-22 my Wellington was ready that you can assembly the fuselage and the
with Tamiya XF-86 Matt Clear. Finally, I painted for the decals. A few drops of Micro Set were all wings together at the very end, after the
them overall with AK Burned Iron and then I the national insignias needed to look painted painting and the decaling process. For sure, this
sprayed some AK Rust, just on their middle. This on. Upper surface camouflage was done with a will not be the only Airfix Wellington I will build,
time, I resorted to the airbrush for the exhaust Gunze paints: (H-33 (extra dark sea gray) and a and I am looking forward to the next Airfix
stains, gradually spraying many layers of a mix of 50% H-58, H-333) for dark slate gray. releases. To this extent, I would to like to see
diluted very dark brown (70%Gunze H17 - 30% I loved building this kit. Given the geodic Airfix the release of a special edition, a kind of
black). The under-surfaces were painted in surface, there are almost no panel limited collector’s version, of this and other of
White. lines, which can quite their recent kits (like the Blenheim, the B-17, the
When it comes to weathering, I have to say often look Do 17, Bf 109, P-51D, etc.) in a replica of the early
that I am a post shading guy. This time I did my unrealistic in seventies box. I know, it is crazy, but for me, and I
post shading using a relatively new product, guess for many other of my generation, it would
Usci van der Rosten something absolutely irresistible.
Trinity Splatter Airbrush Paolo
Stencils. I really think that
I am going to use a lot in
the future, but extreme care
is needed to avoid the
overlapping layers standing out
too much. Another thing I will
use again in the future, are the
Montex Mask I used for the
side fuselage code, KX-N,
identifying this Wellington as
belonging to the 311th
Squadron (Czech)
based during the
spring of 1942
in

JUNE 2020 • VOLUME 42 • ISSUE 04 81

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