MeneMene

Wing lights now polished and ready Assembled and ready for paint: Started painting with the interior color on the canopy framing

Yes but how to form it into the small teardrop shape? Here is what I'm trying to replace: I made good progress in sanding down the blocks of clear sprue I was using for the wing navigation lights. They are almost to shape now, and I can start smoothing/polishing. For the color selection, I think I'm going to stick with the above choices for the upper surfaces. For the bottom Gris Bleu Clair, I think I'll go for the Mr Color RLM76, it's a little more grey and less blue. I believe that should get me in the realm of "close enough".

After I got the cockpit finished and the fuselage closed, the rest of the kit pretty much fell together. Very straightforward build. One big gap on the underside where the wing join meets the fuselage but some sprue goop and tamiya putty took care of it. Only modification I did was cutting out the wing lights to be replaced with clear ones. There are also a set of navigation lights on either side of the vertical tail, little blister/teardrop shapes. I would like to replace these with clear plastic if I can but I'm not sure how to make them, so they stay as is for now. After closing up the canopy, I added the prominent gunsight support frame from bent plastic rod. Not sure why Tamiya didn't include some representation in the kit, as it's a fairly visible part of the cockpit interior.

Cockpit structure is now assembled, painted, and weathered. It's an almost new aircraft in June 1940, so I limited the wear and tear to some dirt on the floor. The gunsight of the real aircraft was an elaborate square structure with multiple lenses and framework. After thinking about it for a bit I settled for using the kit part with some silver paint along the edges. Test-fit nicely into the fuselage. Next step is to close the fuselage halves, and then I'll need to scratchbuild the support framing that goes on either side of the gunsight mount.

Seat painted and detailed some more. Haven't decided yet, most likely one of the two Battle of France aircraft. I'll probably end up using my own stencils rather than the decals.

As a bit of a break from more complicated projects, I'm now starting Tamiya's D.520. Only aftermarket are some resin exhausts and an Eduard seat harness. The hardest part of the build so far is figuring out what to use for colors. I've settled on the following: Insignia blue for the cockpit interior, XF-23 for the underside, and a combination of C304, C366, and C131 for the upper camouflage. Test fit of the cockpit pieces looks good: The seat needed some alterations for realism. I cut out the empty spaces from around the seat backing, and also added the lever on the right side. Not a perfect scratchbuild, but it should do the job buried in the cockpit. Initial paintwork after some drybrushing. Still lots to do on this front C+C welcome, especially with regards to the color choices. I'm leaving the area under the cockpit floor (the inside of the bottom wing) the cream-colored primer as it seems to be that color in several photographs.

Hello everyone- I'm putting together some research for a future French D.520 build and am having lots of confusion with the colors. From what I understand, the primary colors of the camouflage scheme was Gris Bleu Clair on the underside. The top consisted of Gris Bleu Fonce, Kaki, and Brun. The last two are where I've been having the most confusion, I've seen references to Vert Fonce instead of the Kaki, and Terre de Sienne instead of the Brun. These seem to have been alternate colors- how do I know if I should use them instead? As for finding paints for these colors, I'm trying to find equivalents of Tamiya, Mr Color, or MRP. So far, I have: Gris Bleu Clair: FS35189, XF-23 Gris Bleu Fonce: FS35164, C366 Kaki: FS34087, C304. Vert is apparently FS34223? Brun: FS30099, still trying to figure out a good match. Terre de Sienne is apparently FS30108? Bleu de Nuit (for the cockpit): FS35044, MRP US Insignia Blue Does anyone have any corrections or guidance for the above, especially the green and brown colors? Thank you in advance for any help.

Currently doing a 1/48 Me-262, "Black X" from very late in the war, bomber version carrying two SC500 bombs. The kit comes with the RI-502 take-off assist rockets; does anyone know if these were frequently used operationally? I can only find pictures from testing/development.

US Navy carrier, Pacific

I'm working on the 1/48 Hobby Boss Avenger, and am figuring out what to put in the bomb bay. Does anyone have any images of the bay loaded with ordinance? The kit comes with 2 x 500 lb bombs, or 4 x 250 lb bombs. The 500 lb bombs sit in the back and leave the forward bay rather empty, so I was thinking of putting some of the 250 lb weapons in the front, but I haven't been able to see if mixed loadouts were ever carried.

I'm trying to sort out paint options for my Italeri Mc200, and I need to find matches for Marrone Mimetico 2, Giallo Mimetico 3, Verde Mimetico 2 for the top-side camouflage. Lifecolor has these, but with the complex Italian paint schemes I would like to use the quality MRP paints instead. MRP has some italian colors, but they seem to use different naming conventions and I'm having trouble sorting them out. Here are all the Italian MRP paints For the marrone mimetico 2, I can find MRP 313 Bruno Rossiccio, MRP 314 Bruno Chiaro, MRP 322 Bruno Mimetico 1936, MRP 321 Rosso Mimetico. From what I can find of the original color, it should be a maroon/brown color, and the MRP 313 seems closest. For the Verde Mimetico 2, I can find MRP 326 Verde Mimetico 1916, 1936, Fiat 1940, MRP 327 Verde Mimetico 1916, Fiat 1940, MRP 328 Verde Mimetico Scuro 1940, and MRP 329 Verde Mimetico Chiaro 1940, and MRP 312 Verde Mimetico 1936. IPMS stockholm says this color should be FS34092, which corresponds to MRP 235 Gunship green, although I have no idea if that's accurate or not. For the Giallo Mimetico 3, I can find MRP 323 Giallo Mimetico 1936, MRP 324 Giallo Mimetico 1936, and MRP 325 Giallo Mimetico 1938. IPMS stockholm recommends FS33434, but again I don't know if that's accurate or not. So in conclusion, this is all very confusing and frustrating, with no common designation system. Could anyone with more experience/expertise than myself help out in deciding which combination of the above would be correct for a Mc 200 from 1940-1941? Thanks

Thanks- I saw that AKAN made an acrylic set for them, but not in their very good lacquer range, unfortunately.

What did you use for paint? I'm having trouble finding good lacquer matches for the Soviet bomber colors.

Thanks all. The tail markings are stencils that I can easily make another copy of, so repainting shouldn't be too difficult. I was mainly concerned with the accuracy, but if the consensus is that it's enough contrast then I will leave it.

I'm working on the 1/48 Hasegawa A6M2, doing a Battle of Midway aircraft from the Soryu. Going into it, I knew the fabric controls were a different color than the rest of the aircraft, and used Tamiya's IJA grey for a canvas-look. However, now near the end, I think the color I chose is too similar to the rest of the aircraft. Furthermore, I've seen several references that they should even be more of a barley grey as opposed to grey-green, and should stand out even more. Any suggestions? Is it worth it to go back with some masking and repaint them to be more grey? If so, does that include the rudder? Thanks

What material are you using to make the stencils? I have a stencil cutter as well, but haven't found a stencil material that I'm 100% happy with. Either they're too sticky, or too thick/stiff.

Hello- I'm doing the Tamiya Swordfish I as one of the Bismarck attack aircraft with a torpedo loadout, and I'm trying to figure out what to do about the underwing hardpoints. I've found the one picture from the deck of the Victorious before the first attack, but not in high enough resolution to see what's actually under the wings of the aircraft. 1) There are three bomb racks under each wing. I know the bombs were not carried during the attack, but should the empty racks still be present? I've seen photos both with and without 2) Same questions about the smaller racks for the smoke/flares. I would imagine a torpedo + flare loadout would be very believable, but I'm not finding any reference to flares used in the Bismarck operation. Thanks

Wonderful work. Could you review again your method for working the hairspray chipping with MRP? The exact steps and materials? I've been trying it and can never get it to work, it dries too hard/impermeable and I can't get the water to activate it. Another thing; I can see how you did the paintwork on the wings, but what about the fading on the forward/upper fuselage? Is that chipping with two different shades of blue?

I agree. It just seemed like such an unlikely coincidence that it would be more likely for a replacement aircraft to be given the old tail code, hence why I'm checking if it's the same aircraft. So if the pictures have been touched up, which one should I emulate? I'm aiming for a late summer 1942 Rabaul aircraft, over Guadalcanal, and the Osprey "Betty Units of WW2" book captions the first, black and white photograph as in that time frame. The second image has been colorized- you think whoever did that also added the paint chipping and yellow wing ID stripes?

Strange, they were showing up fine for me. I edited the links, hopefully they work now.

I'm looking into recreating G4M1 "F-319" of the 4th Kokutai. I have found two pictures: First image. Some chipping has started to develop around the tail, maybe some around the engine nacelles, otherwise not much weathering going on. I've seen captions in a few places saying that this aircraft was one of the ones involved in the disastrous Feb 20, 1942 attack on the Lexington, ending with 15 out of 16 aircraft shot down, which based on the subsequent second picture and information, suggests that it was the only one from the unit that survived. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitsubishi_G4M#/media/File:Mitsubishi_G4M_Betty.jpg Second image. Much lower resolution, but you can clearly see the aircraft is much more beat up. The chipping now involves the full height of the stabilizer, with a lot more on the fuselage, engines, etc. The only caption I've been able to find for this aircraft is that it's from the 801 Air Group, which doesn't make much sense as that was a seaplane squadron and its wiki page doesn't mention any G4M usage. If the tail-codes match, should I just assume that this in fact the same aircraft with a very charmed life at different stages of wear and tear? The second image has yellow wing recognition stripes, can't tell on the first. If it is the same aircraft, I guess I need to choose if I want to recreate the earlier example with less weathering and a torpedo for the Feb 1942 operations, or the more weathered and beat-up later incarnation with bombs for operations around Guadalcanal. Any more information would be appreciated.

I have the Tamiya Meteor F1 up next, and the cockpit is very crude and simple. Eduard doesn't have much PE for it, and I can't find any resin detail sets. Any suggestions? Is the old Eduard PE set (48211) really my best option? Thanks

What sort of wire did you use in the landing gear?

Glad to hear it was a success. The CR42 ship has sailed, unfortunately, the kit engine was meant to be mounted from the cowling structure (from the front), and that cowling was in several pieces. The detail of the kit engine wasn't too bad, so I just went with that plus some extra wiring. Now, what to use a spare A-74 on.....

Thanks. In AK-W, any idea what the dark color under the K is? I'm guessing the rest of it is the standard middle stone/dark earth