GB-40 1/48 Vickers Wellington Mk. III - Heavy Hitters III

Good stuff Andy - looks the biz.

Agreed

Nice !

What a job so well done, Andy. =D>

I have already commented on my threads, many times windows, lighting and visual access, makes it difficult and limited to appreciate all the work and commitment that the interiors keep.
The time dedicated to that detailed pays off in fun, learning and challenges met.
In addition to leaving evidence of it in photographs, that at the time of sharing, we all enjoy, learn and comment on it.

Hermoso trabajo, gracias por compartirlo

Thanks guys. I agree Luis but there comes a point when I need to move on. I still have more to do in the nose and then comes the bomb bay and wheel wells. Maybe I will finish before August!

Totally in agreement, you mark yourself up to where and until when.
More so when in this case, we have a termination date. I also start to worry about what is missing in my AW177 !!
...el tiempo apremia...

good stuff Andy.

Nice work Andy (love the wooden effect of the flooring!)

Good heads up on the visibility too. I won't go overboard there when I do my Wellingtons then, especially as mine are 1:72.

Great work so far Andy!

Wonderful work Andy

Thanks very much my friends!

A question for the pundits. I had assumed, maybe wrongly, that the interior of all the FN bomber turrets were painted black. Taking a closer look at the below photos posted earlier, I'm wondering if some of the earlier turrets were done in a lighter colour.





In the first picture it looks to me as though the front turret innards aren't black but something much lighter. The second pic is a bit odd as it seems to show the rear turret with a shadow across it but again there is a portion in the light that could suggest a lighter colour.

Thoughts? Were the early turrets perhaps interior grey green or something else? I see a future repaint of my front turret but want to be sure before I do the rear one.

Originally, crew areas of RAF bombers were Cockpit Grey Green, with the Lanc being entirely in this colour, whilst the Halifax and Stirling had 'silver' interiors, except for crew station areas.
The Wellington, being fabric covered, had clear-coated alloy structure, with the dull red doped fabric showing brownish red inside, due to penetration of the fabric weave, but cockpit, possibly the radio op area, and the internal turret structures were in the Grey Green.
In an effort to reduce light-coloured areas being visible from outside at night (to night fighters), these areas were then re-painted matt black.
However, a combination of these colours could be seen, for example on Lancs, where the bomb aimer's compartment and turrets remained in Grey Green, but the cockpit forward of the nav station (the visible area from outside) was re-painted black. (the first pic above appears to show a light-coloured cockpit, probably Grey Green).
The black finish was eventually applied on production lines, but it is very likely that existing, in-service aircraft, when re-painted in cockpits, retained the original Grey green colour in the turrets, as to re-paint these areas would entail removing and disassembling the components, in order to re-paint the frames and supports etc.
So, it's entirely possible to see a Wellington with a black cockpit and nose area, but retaining the original Grey Green internal structure in the turrets.

Just done a further check of some original colour photos (Charles Brown originals, not 'colourized' examples).
On the Lanc and Wellington front turret in particular, on 'early' examples, two colours can be seen on the interior structure and supports.
The two colours are the Grey Green, and what appears to be bare metal, the latter in a greysih aluminium shade.
This 'metallic' colour can be seen on the main 'hoop' towards the rear of the turret, on the gun trunnions (the drum-shaped gun mounts) and on the perforated, triangular brace from rear hoop to trunnion mounts, and also on the ammo feed chutes, and it's likely that the remaining structure is also this finish in these cases.
The other colour seen, the Grey Green, appears to be the overall finish.
This would suggest that the interior structure started on the production line as bare metal (possibly annodised or clear coated), was then replaced by finishing in Grey Green, which was in turn replaced by black.

I knew you would come through Terry. Thanks so much. I did notice the cockpit colour in the first photo as well and it got me thinking that possibly the lighter colour could be the result of direct sunlight streaming through the clear glazing. The fuselage, being a matte finish, shows up darker.

I don't suppose we have a date when the switch over to black occurred on the FN production lines.

Not sure about that Andy, but at a guess, I'd say late 1942 to mid 1943.
A well-know colour pic of Lancasters in final assembly at Avro, Woodford, taken in summer 1943, shows the black finish, and there are B&W pics of both Lancs and Wellingtons, in early 1943, which appear to have the black turret finish also.

Thanks Terry. I tried pinning down a date for my subject aircraft. The block of s/ns in which mine was made began rolling off the production lines at Blackpool in the fall of 1940. X3763 was about 3/4 of the way down the production run of 500 units so I suspect it's a mid/late 1941 machine.

Sounds like I should redo the front turret in the early colours and that means that I need to bust off the clear cover. It's glued on with PVA so I don't think that should be an issue but I certainly won't force it.

In the meantime, here are a few updates. There are pics and videos showing what appears to be an air-tight door behind the front turret that is attached to a bulkhead. I made the bulkhead out of plastic card that was carefully cut to match the contour of the interior and then split at the center so I could glue it to both halves. The below pic shows the test fit with on side glued and before cutting the bulkhead in half. Unfortunately, there's no way to install the turret after the fuselage halves are glued Unless I cut off the teardrop fairing on the top. Still weighing whether or not this will be of benefit. Also seen is another wooden floor part that I scratch built next to the crew hatch.



Viewed from the front, there remains a gap behind the turret at the floor level and this will need to be filled as well.



Trumpeter provides parachute packs that are supposed to be glued to the fuselage walls at the crew positions. These take the form of a simple pillow shaped object. In actual fact, racks are provided on the aircraft at multiple locations into which the crew would stow their chutes when boarding the aircraft. I will depict the aircraft bombed up with guns installed and ready for its crew to board on its final mission so these chutes would not yet be stowed. Rather, empty racks would be more correct and so I made up 3 of these which will be seen in the nose section. Below are the finish but unpainted racks along with a sample of the kit part. The racks are about 6mm square and the construction is obvious.



And finally, a pic of the racks installed awaiting paint. Also appearing in this photo is a cushion for the bomb aimer. This was made of styrene card that was liberally coated with PVA



The air tight door will be a bit of a challenge in that it's bowl shaped and will likely interfere with my scratch built bombing computer which, it seems, sticks out too far. I will find a way though!

As always, thanks for the input and feedback.

Very nice work on the additional detail Andy.
BTW, the date for my post # 237, regarding the Woodford colour pic, should read 'summer 1943', not 1944 as originally shown - I've edited the post accordingly.