1/48 Republic P-47D 368th FG 395th FS 'Miss Second Front'

[ozhawk40]

Hi Guys

Well I know its been a while to get cracking on this project, but with the Commonwealth GB out the way and some 'free' time over Easter I can finally make a start.

This one is going to be build straight from the box, with no add ons apart from the decals and DIY seat belts.

Pic 1
Here's the seat. Very basic and a bit thickly molded for 1/48.

Pic 2
Here I've sanded down the sides as much as i'd dare.

Pic 3
Interior gets a spray of DDG, or Dull Dark Green. I believe the P-47's were all this colour, except for the G model made by Curtiss, which had the 'normal' AAF interior green. Instrument panel is gloss black at this stage in readiness for the Hasegawa decal, after which I'll matt coat it.

Pic 4
One thing I'll need to contend with is this crack in the fuselage. Postal transit damage. Anyway should not be too difficult to fix.

I've now broken the 'drought' with this one so hopefully I'll have more updates soon.

Thanks for looking. 8)

Cheers

Peter

 

[Airframes]

Good start Peter. I'm wanting to do a 1/48th 'razorback' myself sometime soon - when I can fit it in !

 

[Crimea_River]

Looks good. Fortunately that crack doesn't look too bad at all. Much more difficult when the plastic deforms like it did when I snapped the wings on my 109E.

 

[ozhawk40]

Thanks T and CR.

Next instalment on progress.

Pic 1
Interior nearing completion. Colour is Dull Dark Green I've high lighted detail with dry brushing and hit wear areas with some aluminum. A final dirt wash for the floor. Instrument panel used the Hasegawa decal. I'm not a huge fan of the way they presented the dials, but it's presentable. Side panel detail is simplified, and the Tamiya is much better in this area particularly.

Pic 2
The engine was painted aluminium, with a grey reduction gear case, copper ignition harness and black push rods. I finished up with an 'oily' wash.

Pic 3
Alighting gear legs were painted Dark Olive Drab. The 'official' colour is Olive Drab 41 and they were painted this way from the factory. It's certainly handy to have some great colour photos to study!

Pic 4
The cowl and cowl flaps hit with a coat of white on the outside and yellow zinc chromate on the inside. Looking at the photos, I think the cowl insert should probably be in white 'overspray', so i'll fix this up.

Pic 5
Interior of the alighting gear bay, gear doors etc are all yellow zinc chromate.

End of update.

Cheers

Peter

 

[Airframes]

Looking good so far Peter. Are you sure about the colour of the main gear legs? In the colour photo, they look metallic grey, and that's the colour shown on other colour pics I have too.

 

[jjp_nl]

Pity about that crack in the fuselage, but shouldn't be too hard to fix me thinks BTW I have a Hasegawa P-47 Razorback sitting on my 'shelf of doom' One reason why it ended up there was a particularly odd and nasty kind of sinkmark on the upper part of that big one piece cowl. Is this present on your kit as well? I'm still somewhat in the dark as to how to fix this, so I threw the darn thing aside and moved on for now

 

[ozhawk40]

Pity about that crack in the fuselage, but shouldn't be too hard to fix me thinks BTW I have a Hasegawa P-47 Razorback sitting on my 'shelf of doom' One reason why it ended up there was a particularly odd and nasty kind of sinkmark on the upper part of that big one piece cowl. Is this present on your kit as well? I'm still somewhat in the dark as to how to fix this, so I threw the darn thing aside and moved on for now

No jjp, it's all okay, so you must have got a bad one. I would guess that Hasegawa would replace it for you - do they have an EU distributor? Make a claim and see what happens!

Cheers

Peter

 

[Crimea_River]

Looks great Peter!

 

[Wurger]

With all here , Peter. Keep working on.

And undoubtedly the number was 275323 .

 

[ozhawk40]

Looking good so far Peter. Are you sure about the colour of the main gear legs? In the colour photo, they look metallic grey, and that's the colour shown on other colour pics I have too.

Almost positively probably could be Olive Drab 41 T. I did some Google action to find that Republic were instructed not to use silver paint because it used aluminium, a 'scarce' resource at the time. Republic used the Olive Drab, Lockheed used Neutral Gray, and Bell used, well.... Bell Green. Some manufacturers didn't change from the silver, and later the shortage was overcome, so silver was reinstated. Oh almost forgot - it was also specified in the dash 2.

Okay, so I have the bombs painted Olive Drab and I go back to the reference photos to check markings and I do a double take. Seriously. Someone must have been a comedian for sure. Do you guys see what I see?

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Yep, I see it Peter, it's Mr Squiggle and his mate, kind of wondered where he had gone. BTW you're making good progress mate.

 

[ozhawk40]

Thanks Vic, more to follow soon.

 

[Airframes]

I like the humour !
I've just re-checked the colour photo I had in mind, and it seems that you're right about that time period. What I thought was an all - metallic gear leg is in fact a dark colour, with either a rather broad data plate, or bare metal band, around the top. Some other colour shots I have it's too difficult to tell for certain what the colours are, but certainly later production aircraft had 'metallic' coloured legs, which are clearly visible on, for example, 'bubble top' kites.
Good info you've got there Peter !

 

[Wayne Little]

Good stuff Peter, keep it moving along....!

 

[ozhawk40]

Okay thanks guys.

More progress today.

Pic 1
Cockpit tub all together. I added seat belts made from Tamiya tape painted buff. So next step is to add it to the fuselage and get the wings on.

Pic 2
Here you see the gap between the wing section and the fuselage, the "Achilles Heal" of this kit, and long complained about. Some resort to adding plastic sheet here to fill the gap.

Pic 3
Adventurous me reckons the best way to handle this is with the right amount of brute force! Fingers crossed.

Pic 4
There you go. Tamiya fit quality on a Hasegawa T-Bolt! Better cross the toes also!

Cheers

Peter

 

[Airframes]

Nice one !

 

[rochie]

looks good Peter, but that clamp is a bit serious isn't it !!!!!

 

[Crimea_River]

Whatever works! Looks good Peter.

 

[ozhawk40]

Thanks T Karl and CR

For this update, I have been sorting out the fuselage and getting ready for paint.

Pic 1
The completed fuselage. Very happy about the fit of everything in the end. I only used a little bit of filler around the fuselage/ wing joint, and had to sand back and replace by re-scribing a couple of panel lines just below the wing leading edge.

Pic 2
I masked off the cockpit and hit it with the first coat of primer to check for any issues. A couple of small area needed a bit of rework, but otherwise good.

Pic 3
I'm going to paint the ID bands and D-Day stripes, along with the squadron codes and ID letter. To facilitate this, I painted the general areas where they are located in white and will mask off the stripes and codes soon.

Pic 4
Shot of the underside showing the areas for the D-Day stripes. I also painted the gear doors.

Cheers for now. 8)

Peter

 

[Airframes]

Looking good Peter. I got a few shots of the razorback being re-built at Duxford last Friday, if you think they might be useful? They're mainly 3/4 head on, but there is some detail to be seen, around the cowling and wheel bays.