**** DONE: 1/48 P-51D "Wild Will" - Allied Manufactured Aircraft

[Crimea_River]

Nice little reception in the workshop last night as I discovered that somehow the can of black spray paint managed to projectile-vomit its contents all over the edge of my workbench. Fortunately this happened well away from my project and did little damage.

After cleaning up the mess, I did mask and spray Alclad Duralumin onto the fuselage and underwing panels as a base colour.

I then masked off individual areas today and finished a few panels behind and under the cockpit in plain Aluminum and around the exhaust stacks in Magnesium. The gun ports, a section of the vertical stabilizer, and a panel on the radiator housing were done in Dark Aluminum, but the contrast with the Duraluminum turned out to be very slight.

Ad soon as those areas had dried (this takes only a few minutes), I masked and painted the anti-glare panel using Tamiya Olive Drab

Next up will be the masking and painting of the green nose and hopefully I will get at that tomorrow night.

 

[Wayne Little]

real nice Andy...you must have a gremlin in your house....

 

[Wurger]

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks mates.

The nose and rudder were masked and the green and yellow ID markings painted on. The green is straight Tamiya XF-5, the yellow is XF-3 cut with a drop of red. This was followed by a squirt of Future before beddy byes.

 

[Catch22]

Looks good Andy.

 

[rochie]

Very nice Andy

 

[Wurger]

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks guys. Long weekend here and I should get this one finished by Monday.

 

[ozhawk40]

Very Neat!

 

[Gnomey]

Looks great so far Andy!

 

[Wurger]

 

[Airframes]

That's looking really top b*ll*cks Andy. I'm not sure, as those pics I've seen of the unit's aircraft aren't that clear in showing it, but I'm wondering if the green extends over the top of the cowling?
I'll have a dig though what pics and profiles I have and see what I can find.

 

[Crimea_River]

No, it's a very distinct curve toward the spinner Terry. See close up of Wild Will here:

....and this colour pic which also clearly shows the path of the green paint.

Today, I painted on the black recognition stripes after a ton of masking:

I also finished painting the canopy framing and stripped the tape. Initial cleaning shows that some of the CA blob has been hidden but not all. Too bad as I am really happy with the blending job I did on this.

I'll keep at cleaning this area and touching up to get as good as possible but it will not be perfect

 

[Catch22]

Looks fantastic Andy!

 

[fubar57]

Nice, tidy masking job.

Geo

 

[Totalize]

Yes. This mustang is really looking awesome.

My next build is going to be A P-51D.

 

[Gnomey]

Great work so far Andy!

 

[Airframes]

Looks bl**dy good to me ! If the canopy isn't fixed, maybe make and place a 1/48th scale map or note book on the instrument shroud on the port side, to camouflage the remains of the blemish ?
I checked those pics I have, including the colour shot you posted, shown in '8th AF in Colour' and yes, I now see the demarcation of the green.

 

[rochie]

Very, very nice Andy

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks everyone. As it turned out, the weekend did not provide as much opportunity as I had first thought to finish this kit off but I've never been closer.....

I did get the Aeromaster decals on and these performed well. The spiral on the spinner was a particular challenge and took a lot of finagling to get it to sit properly. Even now I see by the closeup that there remains a small wrinkle that I'll need to work out.

I worked on the canopy blob as far as I could and, using some carefully applied dabs of black paint along joint with the dashboard, I got it to look acceptable.

The next thing to tackle was the busted tail wheel. To do this, I drilled holes in the yoke and strut, inserted a short clip of copper wire, and glued the pieces back together with CA. I took advantage of the break to reposition the wheel with a slight turn.

There are a lot of little fiddly bits with this Hasegawa kit and it should keep my busy for some days yet. In the meantime, thanks for checking in once again and for the nice comments and suggestions.