discussion F4U-2 Night Fighter Corsair 1/48 scale Hobby Craft

[michaelm]

Great cockpit and great job with the belts, I'll have a go at them sometime. Looking really good.

 

[Guest]

Roman thanks,I used cut strips of the instruction sheet and the outer winding wire from a guitar string for the rest. Vaughan ,Ian ,Colin and Michael thanks for the kind comments!Office got a second wash and then joined up the fuse halves along with the wings

 

[aaron]

Looking fantastic Trey, The corsair had no fewer than 990 major modifications and over 20 000 minor mods done during its lifetime but the frame basically stayed the same.

The japanese called this bird "whispering death"

I love this plane.

 

[Guest]

hey trey i love it mate good build

mobear

 

[colin m]

Looking very nice, great progress.

 

[Guest]

I've made some headway on the wing. The kit has been made like the Dragon Ju-88 so that various versions can be done off a single main mold. This does present fit issues,the main ones being gaps around the intakes and gun ports. I used some sheet to back fill the worst gun port on the port wing and green squadron for the rest as they were'nt to severe.

I also tried a new metod for the nav lights using some clear sprue

After several dry fits I secured the wing in place and finish sanded all the seams

Then fitted up the flaps,there was not a real good fit with these and mounting them up was a tad tricky as you have to 'geuss at the proper angle. Also no solid attach point so they move around a lot while the gue sets,very aggravating indeed

Almost ready for some paint now!

 

[Vaughan]

That's some real neat work Trey. I like the clear sprue for the nav lights it works very well.

Vaughan

 

[michaelm]

Real nice work Trey, this is going to be a very cool plane indeed.

 

[Guest]

Vaughan,Michael thanks!

I got the Radom on and the gear fitted,slowly getting close to paint time

 

[Guest]

Nice steady progress Trey, it's coming together well mate... i'm sort of tempted to have a bash at one to be honest after seeing this.

 

[aaron]

Yep very inspiring, I have a revell 1:32 f4u corsair but its so old that it has raised panel lines and huge rivets.

I wish i had the skill set and tools to rescribe it, maybe one day in the future.

Even thinking about getting one in 1:48 id do it as rnzaf of course lane:

 

[Guest]

Colin,Aaron thanks! You should both bust out the bent wings and get cracking! I do'nt let raised panel lines bother me anymore Aaron, I just spray a contrasting color over them first and wet sand them lightly at the end and it works better for me than rescribing(still not a strong point for me)

I'm trying a more agressive approach to the preshade this time and doing a little salt chipping as well,so some silver went down first

Then the shading with black ,zinc and red brown staining

Then put some white down thinned 50% and just enough applied to not bury the preshade

 

[aaron]

Trey thats a great idea adding the redbrown and zinc to the preshading. It adds another dimention to the teqnique. Like it Stealing it.

I cant do my Corsair yet as i need to get around to buying rnzaf decals from Ventura. Procrastination i know.

Good luck with the salt for chipping, Its a great way to do it.

 

[michaelm]

Love it Trey, this going to look fantastic. The salt chipping thing is another technique I've still to try so for me as many pics as you can manage of this the better,

brilliant stuff. M

 

[Vaughan]

Interesting pre-shading Trey looking forward to the end result.

Vaughan

 

[Guest]

Aaron thanks ,hope you get the decals and get cracking on it soon! Michael thank you, I hope the pics show enough to get the basic idea . Vaughan thanks hope it lives up to the anticipation!Here is the salt application

Then after layers of varying shades of blue

the underside

after touching up the white and adding some staining

Well whats the verdict too much,not enough or just about right and leave it alone? Thanks

 

[aaron]

That turned out fantastic as far as i can see, exactly like the pics ive seen of these beauties in teh pacific.

Midas touch on the staining too, what did you use for that?

 

[Guest]

I was going to say, to me, it looked a little "overboard" on the chipping .... but. ... i has a good look through a load of images of these aircraft on carriers etc and quite a few were showing signs of serious wear and tear.....

So, simply ignore my opinion and leave it as is Trey

One site in my search stated that only 34 aircraft were converted to night fighter, not sure if thats accurate or not .... interesting though

 

[michaelm]

Trey, this looks amazing, question; what makes the salt stick?

 

[Guest]

That looks just right Trey! I'd leave it as is.

Cheers

Patrick