SPA Modeler

SPLIT YOUR LUNGS WITH BLOOD AND THUNDER,
WHEN YOU SEE THE WHITE WHALE,
BREAK YOUR BACKS AND CRACK YOUR OARS, MEN,
IF YOU WISH TO PREVAIL!

THIS IVORY LEG IS WHAT COMPELS ME,
HARPOONS THRUST IN THE SKY,
AIM YOUR LANCE RIGHT FOR HIS CROOKED BROW,
AND LOOK HIM STRAIGHT IN THE EYE!!!!!

Good luck, John! I know you’ll do ‘er justice.

Oh this is gonna be really good. I have a Corsair in the stash but not sure I'm ready to do all the weathering.

Medicman71 wrote:Oh this is gonna be really good. I have a Corsair in the stash but not sure I'm ready to do all the weathering.

Weather as much or as little as you like...

And yes, this will be good when he works his voodoo magic on this project...

Thanks for the input, photos, information, encouragement... all of it! The photos are really helpful... even the ones that are not specifically of 740. Painting and weathering will be a challenge on this one and I'll have to think about the extreme fading and wear that is evident in the photos.

Continuing with a look at the sprues...

Sprue G - Engine Cowling



Sprue H - Engine




Sprue K (x2) - Stabilizers and Prop Blades


Sprue M - Landing Gear Wells


Sprue N - Wing Fold


Sprue P - Clear Parts



Sprue R - More Cockpit



Sprue T - External Ordinance


Sprue Z/Y - Pilot Figures

Using another spare engine nacelle from the 262, I painted a mule of the basic colors for this build.




The paints used were:

Interior Green, H-58 Mr Hobby Aqueous
Intermediate Blue, H-56 Mr Hobby Aqueous
Navy Blue, H-54 Mr Hobby Aqueous
White, Mix of Tamiya White X-2 and Flat Earth XF-52

You nailed the blue I can say that for sure. That’s my favorite blue. And you’ve painted it beautiful during your test. Also- I like how you mixed that white. I mix mine with flat white and deck tan, but I think yours looks better. Much better. You’re off to a great start!

My only advice, here -unsolicited though it may be- is to be careful concerning the primer color. Pappy’s aircraft *might* be an earlier Corsair and it might have the salmon colored primer in it. Then again, it may not be. But it’s something I’d check out only because that nearly bit me in the rear end the first time around. If his aircraft isn’t early ‘40’s then you’re good to go. Heck, if this isn’t a Birdcage, you’re probably good to go.

Thanks Kenny! Salmon pink vs Chromate green... I was assuming that the lovely pink color only applied to birdcage F4U-1's and was not used on the F4U-1a but I'll try and double check on that. Let me know if you run across anything!

I may as well continue to show what's inside the Tamiya box. In addition to the plastic parts, there are some other materials that Tamiya has packed with the Corsair. One is a small bag of little metal bits and the oft-derided vinyl tires. Not sure what the metal bits are for but I'm guessing they have something to do with the black plastic stand that comes with the kit, which I'll not be using.


There are a couple of metal photo-etch sprues in the kit.



There is a set of canopy masks printed on yellow adhesive paper. You have to cut the masks out manually but since I prefer these adhesive tape mask over the vinyl Montex masks, I'll probably be giving them a shot.


Tamiya includes two decal sheets with the kit. The larger sheet holds the specific markings for aircraft and the smaller sheet has assorted stencils. Like the vinyl tires, Tamiya decals are not universally loved. They tend to be noticeably thicker than Cartograph, Eagle Editions and other known decal suppliers. I'll have to test these out to see if I can make them behave with Micro Sol or Solvaset, if need be. I've heard hot water helps.



One interesting feature on the decal sheet are instruments for the instrument panel. Notice that there are no visible gauge markings, just plain black circles. That's because the gauges are printed on the reverse side. They are meant to be applied to the BACK of the clear instrument panel piece, which is then glued to the back of the solid plastic instrument panel. So you get a clear dial face for each instrument but it places the gauge face too far back in the gauge opening. And if I don't know what the instrument faces look like, how do I know if I want to use them on the kit? I guess I can Google it.

Here are some additional photos of 740 that were pulled from 16mm film and included in the Fundekals instruction book. They show some interesting wear, especially on the upper wings.

John,

From reviewing what I’ve read, they were running out of that salmon colored stuff pretty quickly and they switched over to the zinc chromate fairly early on. Which tells me- if it ain’t a Birdcage, and an early one at that, then the zinc chromate is the one they used. So that’s on me- I raised a false alarm. Sorry about that. Modeling the F4U-1A with the zinc chromate is the way to go.

The Tamiya Storch I'm working on right now came with a kabuki tape masking set like that. I was a bit disappointed when I realized they wasn't precut but they was super easy to cut and place so in the end I didn't mind. Eduard is still my go to for canopy masks.