**** DONE: GB-57 1/48 P-51K / Mk.IV Mustang - WW2 Foreign Service

[Airframes]

You're welcome Andy.

 

[Gnomey]

Good work so far Andy!

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Nice Andy and good info Terry.

 

[Crimea_River]

So reading the description Terry put up, it's clear that the bare metal parts were coated with a lacquer paint that produced a "high sheen silver surface colour". Presumably this coating would not have been applied over the puttied wing areas that had already received a silver finish at the Dallas plant. So my thinking is that I won't really change what I had intended to do, namely, paint the fuselage and the unputtied parts of the wing using the Alclad Aluminum representing the "high sheen silver" and the puttied wing portions in a slightly different silver.

Makes sense?

 

[Airframes]

Yep, makes sense to me.
As far as I know, the "Aluminium" paint used was what eventually evolved into what was then called "High Speed Silver", a very smooth finish, "glossier" than the "Aluminium", which was first used on RAF Sabres, and then the jet fighters of the 1950's and '60's, such as the Hunter, Javelin etc.
Study of photos of RAF Mustangs suggests that the "Aluminium" finish, although exhibiting a fairly high sheen, was not as shiny as the HS Silver, or indeed, polished bare metal.

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks Terry. I'll probably weather things a bit anyway that will take some of the sheen away. Hope to make decent progress through next week.

 

[Mustangtmg]

Thanks guys. Steph, I'm looking ahead to the ponies GB and have a camo'd Mustang in mind for that. I have realtively few NMF kits so am leaning toward Dooleybird.

I love it when I start googling for reference pics and it just brings me back to this site. Wojtek posted the below pics in this thread 1/32 Tamiya P-51D MUSTANG :

View attachment 711433
View attachment 711435View attachment 711436


It seems clear from the first pic that there is another colour along the lower border of the anti glare panel and the lower sliding canopy frame. As to whether or not it is yellow is another question. The caption on the second pic says it's blue, which makes a bit more sense in my mind as it matches the squadron colours. Still researching.

Whatever publication or book these two photos came from - the captions are "off" by a letter on the name of this model of Mustang.

The UK/Commonwealth version of what the USAAF designated "P-51K," was named "Mustang Mk IVa" to distinguish it from the P-51D Mustang that they had named "Mustang Mk IV."

Tom

 

[Crimea_River]

Good to know, thanks.

Sprayed the glittery stuff these last few days. The puttied wing sections were an experiment as I mixed a little Tamiya grey surface primer in with the Alclad Aluminum to dull it down a tad. I like how it turned out. The hi-temp surfaces around the exhausts were masked and sprayed with Alclad Dark Alminum.

Next step will be to mask and spray yellow areas. Thanks for following.

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Turned out great Andy.

 

[Wurger]

 

[Donivanp]

Like the look Andy.

 

[Airframes]

Very effective, and a good representation of the sprayed "Aluminium" finish.

 

[javlin]

It looks the part Andy.

 

[fubar57]

Beauty

 

[le_steph40]

Nice progress Andy

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks guys. Getting a bit more colourful now. The masking and application of yellow, which was Tamiya XF-4 with a drop of red:

Masks removed - note the damned Montex mask pulling away on the sliding canopy.

Next the yellow on the cowl was masked again and the olive drab was sprayed using straight Tamiya XF-62.

Small steps but getting there. I will likely shoot some white paint on the nose in case the blue and white checker decal proves to be a bit transparent, just to be safe. Have to paint the spinner anyway. Thanks again for the visits.

 

[Donivanp]

Great workmanship Andy.

 

[Wurger]

 

[Airframes]

Looking good Andy.

 

[Vic Balshaw]

Very nice Andy.