GB-47 1/48 P-61A Black Widow - WW2 D-Day and After - Western Front

[Donivanp]

Working in the gun bay and found a photo posted P-61 Black Widow by Johnbr of the gun bay.

As I suspected the kit gun bay leaves a lot to be desired, I'll close it up as I don't have time to try and scratch build everything and can't find a detail set for it. I looked at Monograms and it is lacking as well.

 

[Donivanp]

Update, I've been working on the cockpit/radar operators section, seats, seat belts side walls and panels. The seats are a bit if intricacies as the seat pan, back, arm rest and pedestal are all separate. The gunners and radar operators seats are the same and have a two part pedestal, one part frame with two separate arm rest a seat pan and a back. Looks good but a bit fragile trying to get it all together. In retrospect I should have mated the pan and back to the frame and attached the belts then the arm rest (I did do this on the second seat). the pilot's seat is a pan and back and frame. the seat belts were attached after assembly but may have been better attached to the pan before the frame. That one is a personal call and would be a bit of an alignment issue either way. I just shot Vallejo Gloss black primer on sections of the fuselage and will work on sub assembly. Yes Andy I know this is a bit out of sequence but I'll be assembling the center fuselage and booms separately and painting them separately before assembly. This I learned on the C-2 Greyhound I did last build. painting and marking can be quite difficult attempting to do this paint scheme while fully assembled. Touch up is not so bad.

 

[Wurger]

 

[Crimea_River]

...... Yes Andy I know this is a bit out of sequence but I'll be assembling the center fuselage and booms separately and painting them separately before assembly.

Probably what I would do as well actually, given the difficulty of painting everything when it's all together.

 

[Donivanp]

Probably what I would do as well actually, given the difficulty of painting everything when it's all together.

I learned this lesson from the Greyhound. I cursed the Greyhound because I should have left the engines off till all painting and markings were on.

 

[Crimea_River]

I painted the inside of my Mosquito nacelles before attaching the wings for the same reason.

 

[T Bolt]

Nice start Don
There are hundreds of pictures of that P-61 restoration here : MID-ATLANTIC AIR MUSEUM - THE WIDOWS WEB - P-61 - THE RESTORATION

 

[Donivanp]

Nice start Don
There are hundreds of pictures of that P-61 restoration here : MID-ATLANTIC AIR MUSEUM - THE WIDOWS WEB - P-61 - THE RESTORATION

Yeah thanks Glen. I've been looking at that site. I'd love to see it flying.

 

[Gnomey]

Lovely work so far!

 

[fubar57]

Good stuff Don

 

[dneid]

Sure is looking good. I have that kit and I am watching this build and making notes for when I finally get around to mine.

 

[Donivanp]

Thank you all for checking in, Update. I have shot the exterior in gloss black primer and then I tried to lay on a kinda pre shading in the form of Vallejo Metal Colors Aluminum, Instead of using the Model Master lacquer as I did on the wing. I don't know how this will work but "It's only plastic" right!

 

[Wurger]

 

[Gnomey]

Nice work so far!

 

[rochie]

interesting effect

 

[Crimea_River]

With Karl. Will have to see it all together.

 

[fubar57]

Agree with the above. I'm coming up to an all-black (more than likely dark blue) aircraft and looking for ideas on how to break up the monotonous monotone monotony.

 

[Donivanp]

Thanks Geo, trying a couple of different ideas, I'm looking to liven up a basic build I've always seem to have done. So let the games continue.

 

[Donivanp]

OK so a bit of update here.

I painted the wing with Model Master Metalizers Aluminum, which is a lacquer paint and then painted Vallejo Model Air OD and NG paints top and bottom. This allows me to chip away the top coats and have paint flaking. Problem is it comes off way too easy. But I am getting the results I was looking for, just a bit too much. Need to do what I want and seal it.

So as mentioned before I'm trying Vallejo's Metal Color lines on the rest of the fuselage in a kind of pre shading style so I can try to chip away at just the panel lines.

We'll see how that all works out.

I built out the two booms and and there is an open section forward of the main gear that looked like it was just waiting for some weight. So after talking to Dale, (Yeah I know, only bad things can come from talking to him), I followed his advice and it worked like a charm. Test fit bird shot into the hole, pour it and some two part epoxy into a mixing cup and after mixing, pour said back into the cavity. I did start this process out by sealing the front of the boom with Tungsten putty. The engine mounts to the boom via a hole in the front of the boom and so I would not block the mount and not let shot run out the tungsten putty filled the hole and leaves room for the mounting of the engine. Mike turned me onto this stuff some time back, though I use it sparingly as it is quite expensive.

Next I started working on the Wright R-2800 engines. The Vallejo Metal Colors paint sets each come with a back card that when opened up give you how to suggestions wo do something. There are four paints in each set and I have picked up all four. The Four are "Engine", "Metallic Panel", "Jet Exhaust", and Aluminum Dope". Here is the how to for the Engine set.

Though it looks pretty slick I did not think it depicted the R-2800 correctly. I must say though, I really like these metals.
From Wikipedia

I started by painting the whole tree Vallejo Gloss Black, which is highly recommended when using the metals. These paints brush on as nicely as they airbrush on. I brush painted the rest of the engine using three paints so far. The exhaust is in burnt Iron, the cylinder heads I used dull aluminum and the ring I used steel. The burnt Iron and steel aren't showing through well as they are dark but it looks pretty good so far ro me. Still have quite a bit to do to it but it's moving.

 

[fubar57]

Be careful when you start chipping. As much as I like Vallejo, they are more prone to chipping than other paints and you might go through the top colour and then the Vallejo down to the primer