Stephen Allen

Type A1 roundels in place on the fuselage sides, and the serial numbers applied. I did some testing of the chosen decals before applying. I mocked up a section of fuselage with rivet holes drilled in and also applied by a riveting wheel, together with a raised panel line and a scribed line. I’m glad I did this as my first choice of decal, one of the new no carrier film type, just didn’t work for me, refusing to sink into the surface detail despite repeated applications of a variety of decal solvents. I’m not suggesting for a moment that it couldn’t work, only that it didn’t work with my current techniques. I will experiment further. Instead I settled on decals taken from a Fundekals Spitfire sheet. These settled into the detail with a bit of help - all decals tend to struggle with the kind of exaggerated surface detail you get with modern kits. Ironically, my new set of Crafting Well roundel masks arrived just after I finished. I used some Becc red vinyl for the red gun muzzle tape. It’s a bit strident at present, but I will tone it down with some weathering. No underwing roundels, and no carrier squadron markings, which I understand would be correct for a machine land-based during the Battle of Britain in the period shortly after the lower surfaces were painted to someone’s best guess of Sky/Pale Blue/Duck Egg Blue.

More work on the undercart. Tailwheel assembled with scissor links, and the main doors modified to reduce the size of the attachment points and scraped to remove the many ejection pin marks. I have also picked up an error, or perhaps simplification, in the way that the retracting struts for the leg are modelled. The top strut should, in fact, be dual struts with small external springs, and doesn’t mount to the top of the main leg but to structure within the wheelbay. To be cut off and replaced once the leg is insitu.

And yet more infelicities. Cleaning up the undercart while the gloss clearcoat dries. The undercarriage detail is actually quite good, with all of the relevant retraction jacks present. Trumpeter somewhat spoils an otherwise nice arrangement with the placement of the lower mounting pin for gluing the undercarriage leg to the door - would make for a nasty jolt on landing. So the lower pins and the corresponding socket on the door are coming off. The tailwheel assembly, on the other hand, is very nice, once you drill and hollow out the scissor legs after removing them from a lot of flash and thick attachment points. They even have the correct assymetric offsets top and bottom. I think I have solved my issue with the wheels. After looking at wheel and hub diameters, and looking for something that would be closer to the original four spoke, small hub style (the surviving Fulmar in the FAA museum has some later style of wheel and tyre - maybe Firefly?), I have ordered some Barracuda Studio Whirlwind wheels. These are within half an inch of the overall correct tyre circumference, and the hub looks the right size and style. It’s certainly better than the kit wheel. I ordered a second set, in case I ever get brave enough to try and replace the wheels on my old Cooper Details Whirlwind.

The big reveal. After spraying the Dark Slate Grey I didn’t waste any time in getting the masking off - carefully, given the paint rip off problems discussed earlier I didn’t want the tape on the surface any longer than necessary. I sprayed the pattern with slightly raised templates as I think this airframe would likely date from the era of slightly blended demarcations. Happily the paint - mostly- stayed in place. I got a few small flakes on the wing leading edges, some tiny dots right at the front of the engine panels, and one or two on the trailing edges. One tip, if you see the first signs of paint lifting with the tape, stop immediately, and start again by working from the opposite end of the tape. That way you will improve your chances of confining the lifting to a small section rather than ripping a long line. Again, shiny plastic was the culprit. All touched in now, and won’t be noticeable once I weather and overcoat. Very pleased with the current state of affairs - painted markings worked very well. I’ll leave it all for a day to settle before a bit of cleaning and a clear overcoat for the decals. I’m still of two minds whether to paint a black walkway on the left wing. I see them in photos of later machines but haven’t clocked an overhead photo of one of the really early ones.

Thank you, but yes, sadly too late to do any more work in the cockpits. Based on the photos I have it’s not that Trumpeter has done a bad job of depicting what goes where, its all just a bit too flat and sparse OOB for a 1/48 pit in this day and age. Never fear, vastly expensive etch and 3D decals have already been produced by Eduard and that other firm whose name escapes me at present. Personally speaking wheels and exhausts would do more for a kit not designed for open cockpit display. cheers Steve

Extra Dark Sea Grey, with a bit of Dark Sea Grey sprayed over to show some fading. Like all of the final colours, these are Sovereign Colourcoats. It’s a quite low contrast disruptive scheme, and it was a bit ‘either or’ as to which of the top colours was sprayed first. Paper templates for the pattern are ready to go.

On with the painting. I studied the few photos of the very early Fulmars to establish a reasonable upper demarcation point for the sky grey fuselage sides. Starting at the front, the demarcation runs parallel with the panel line immediately below the exhausts, continues in a more or less straight but gently uneven line under the cockpits, then angles up to meet the centrepoint of the horizontal fixed tailplanes. Aft of the tailplanes the line follows the mid contour of the slightly bulged rudder base, with the upper part of this ultimately to be camouflaged with the top surface colours. I masked off the locations for the Type A1 roundels as well, so I would have a consistent, and light toned, background for its white, red, blue and yellow. The lower demarcation follows the known demarcation point shown on the photo of the actual aircraft, while aft of this I just followed the line of what would be visible from immediately below. As discussed, my interpretation of this photo shows that the upper wing fillet would be the same colour as the top sides, so I have masked around this as well. I am diverging from all the published side profiles when it comes to the treatment of the wing fillet because I don’t believe they are supported by the small amount of direct photographic evidence for this plane, or for the other very early Fulmars. With that out of the way I then took a complete excursion into speculation, by using Sky Blue as the underside colour, as per Paul Lucas’s recent suggestions in his Colour Conundrum concerning early RN interpretation of what the pale sky blue directed by the Air Ministry might be. I did do some very unscientific comparisons of colour chips converted into B&W to compare the relative tones of Sky Grey, Sky and Sky Blue, and the choice can be made to fit - but I would be the first to admit that its only a guess. All of the tones are quite close together, and I wonder what the finishers thought about overpainting a perfectly good grey interpretation of the colour of the sky with someone else’s idea of what the sky looks like. Maybe we should just thank heaven that Mountbatten wasn’t involved or we would have had lavender pink Fulmars. Anyway, my Fulmar will look different to what you might expect. Top sides next - EDSG and DSG - nothing weird going on there!

Neil My deepest condolences to you and your family on the loss of your father. When finished your build will be a worthy reminder of and tribute to your Dad and to your Grandfather. kind wishes Steve

And everything was going so well! Masking and spraying of the markings continues. The Type B wing roundels are finished and masked up ready for camouflage coats. The tail flash, which started me down the paint road in the first place, has also gone well. What went wrong was the painting of the Type A1 roundels on the fuselage. The masking and painting was fine, what was not good was that masks, when moved, lifted small sections of paint back to bare plastic. Bother! Bad Language! I am using Crafting Well masks, and from experience these are not very aggressive, so its a surface preparation issue on my part. I think I scored an own goal when sanding the fuselage and canopies to the new profile - it’s fine to have shiny smooth clear bits, not so good to have the plastic fuselage also polished to the point where I think the primer just didn’t bite. Using a lacquer thinner with retarder for the primer was also probably a mistake, this stuff lacks bite. Next time, I will make sure there is a bit more tooth to the unclear bits, and will rethink the primer. I may go to an SMS primer as I know the thinner used for these has a bit more bite than either the Tamiya or Gunze products - it turns clear parts to hazy goo rather than leaving them clear. Anyway, one of the more useful aspects of the mild lacquer primers like Mr Levelling Thinner is that they makes excellent paint remover when used with a cotton tip. I’ll spray over these sections and do a check as to whether any sanding is required before moving on. Having run out of masks I might just revert to decals for these markings - I have some of the new Fantasy Printshop ones without carrier film, so I will give them a try. You live and learn.

Rectification work completed. The upper nose needed a bit more work on the centre seam. Bit of Tamiya grey putty, bit of sanding, bit more Tamiya grey primer. All lacquer-based so about half an hour’s work. I was planning to use the quite nice Xtradecal markings for ‘7L’, but decided against it after a couple of niggles. Number one was whether the full width fin flash would fit the Trumpeter tail as it was designed for the MPM kit. Any inconsistencies in the decal fit would need touching in and matching so it was an easy decision to just paint them on. Niggle number two was the size of the roundels on the upper wings. To me the Xtradecal ones look too small when compared with the few upper wing photos I can find. They are also smaller than those supplied in the MPM kit. Thinking it over, it’s only the two wing roundels, and, if I go with a land-based ‘Battle of Britain’ era machine, two Type A1 roundels on the fuselage (none under the wings) so I will mask and paint them on as well. To do this I am switching to enamels, starting with matt white and Sovereign’s RAF/FAA dull red. My preference is to do the markings first, then do the camouflage colours around them. I try to do the colours in a sequence that avoids ‘holidays’, and leaves no ridge at the outer edge of the marking, at least none from the marking colours.

Before committing to paint I looked one last time at the sliding pilot’s canopy, to see whether I might modify it to be modelled open. I concluded that if I cut the sides of the canopy off about the top frame sections, replaced them with thinner sides made from clear sheet, then thinned the rounded top section from the inside and rejoined everything it might just be possible. Yep, sure. Incidentally the side sections of that canopy are 1.5mm thick! It’s actually impressive that Trumpeter can mould a clear part that thick and it is still crystal clear and undistorted - maybe they should go into the optical lens business and give model kits a miss. Anyway, moving on, I used Eduard’s new masking sheet on the canopies and the lights - except for the landing light which Eduard forgot about. A little trimming was needed to account for the more rounded upper canopy profile but otherwise the set fits very well. I used SMS Interior Grey Green for the canopy frames, and Tamiya Lacquer Aluminium for the light frames and wheel bays. Lacquer is needed as the next stage will be an overall primer coat of Tamiya Grey (from the little lacquer bottle not the can) followed by any rectification work. Then the real painting can start.

I have the LFD conversion for the MK XII in 1/32 scale - it’s a beautiful piece of 3D Design and production. As well as this Mk XIV, it would be great to see his other conversions in that scale applied to the 1/48 scale Eduard kits. I would happily buy his Mk XII in 1/48 scale as well. Steve

Thank you. Beautiful work, but it was the demarcation at the wing/fuselage I was querying, not the variations in the upper line of the Sky Grey on the fuselage itself. However a closer examination of photos has, I think, answered my question. Very early Fulmars, including the prototype N1854 and another early aircraft used for trials, N1858, had the wing fillet finished in the upper surface camouflage scheme colours. The photo of possible ‘N1868’ 7L on page 94 of FAA Camouflage and Markings shows a small section of the wing fillet at the front of the wing which appears darker than the Sky Grey above and below it. This makes it likely that this airframe was painted as per the prototype and N1858, and probably shared their early style of upper demarcation between the Sky Grey and upper camouflage colours - straightish but then rising slightly in a gentle line from about the end of the observer’s greenhouse to meet the horizontal tail. Interestingly the aircraft in the photo below on the same page, the later serialled N1881, has the wing fillet matching the lower camouflage colour, which, according to the publication, may be Sky or Sky Grey. The style used on the earlier-serialled aircraft is an interpretation of the S.1.E scheme with all top surfaces visible from above, including the fillet, being the darker paints in the scheme. Why the change to the later pattern with a Sky or Sky Grey fillet I don’t know and could only speculate. I will also follow the same presumption and use the upper demarcation style ala N1854/1858. It’s lot of perhaps and possible, but fits the available photographic evidence of early production machines. Incidentally, its also apparent from the page 94 photo that the machine lacks the later high starboard cockpit sill fitted to prevent Carbon Monoxide entering the cockpit. cheers Steve

So, while I am prepping the Fulmar for painting, I thought I would start thinking about the colour scheme and markings to be carried by the aircraft. I have the Xtradecals sheet which provides markings circa October 1940 for ‘7L’ of 808 Squadron, suggested to be N1868 by several sources (which could simply be a case of circular reporting of one supposition). With the likely removal of the actual code letters to depict a land-based aircraft earlier in the year, this would suit my intention of depicting a Battle of Britain era Fulmar operating under the control of Fighter Command. This aircraft also appears to have a quite interesting colour scheme, showing S.1.E modified with the addition of a Sky underside. It’s a frequently modelled and profiled aircraft; hardly surprising as photos of operational Fulmars from this period, at least in the public domain, are not plentiful. At this point though, my thoughts about the finish of the aircraft run into the more general question of ‘what shade of sky?’, would or could have been applied to a Fighter aircraft in service in 1940, in the period prior to the supply of manufactured Sky paint to manufacturers, units and maintenance units. Paul Lucas has suggested, in SAM Vol 45 Issue 6, that RAF Sky Blue might have been available to and used on the aircraft of a home-based FAA Fighter Squadron, and that the very light tone of this would fit what we see in b&w in contrast to the remnant Sky Grey, which appears a tad darker. He has also pointed out that any misunderstanding over what Duck Egg Blue/Sky/Sky Blue meant was likely to be equally so in RAF and FAA units. Nothing I read suggests when the aircraft (or any others in 808 Squadron) was painted, adding a further layer of uncertainty. The alternative of course would be a more true to description Sky shade - whatever that might have been before tins of the real McCoy turned up. I am the first to admit that the likelihoods and possibilities of what might have occurred, within the FAA, at that period, are beyond my knowledge, but I would like to put the question out there in case there is more research I am not aware of. In the end it’s my choice of course. On a more practical level I have two questions which someone might know the answers to. The first is whether the demarcation line between the Sky Grey and upper surface camouflage on the wing/fuselage junction follows the lower line of the wing fillet(I think so) or is otherwise, and whether a black non-slip walkway was used on the left side only of the early Fulmars, both sides, or not at all.

Grey Beema in terms of outline accuracy, the SH/MPM kit is better. This is almost entirely due to the overly square canopy and top decking profile of the Trumpeter kit. Both kits are arguably a little off in this respect, but the SH kit is less pronounced. The Trumpeter kit also has the odd gun arrangement shown in the Warpaint/Ian Huntley-derived plans, an unarmoured windscreen only good for the first few Mk I’s, while the wing root fillet, folding wing sections etc also follow these plans. This means the front, fixed section of the wing/fillet joint is too close to the fuselageby about 1.5mm. The SH kit gets the front of the joint in the right place but, perversely, runs the rear section joint in a place where there was no joint, making a neat job difficult. Neither kit allows you to pose canopies open out of the box due to the thickness of the clear parts. In my view you can trace all of the Trumpeter kit faults to the probable use of the Warpaint plan as its base, with due allowance for the exaggeration of the squared off top. I wish they had copied the 4Plus plans instead, like they did with the Wellington I am building. On the plus side the Trumpeter kit assembles much more easily than the SH, has more, and mostly appropriate, surface detail, and has the benefit of a foldable wing. The gear bays are nice, the interior is pretty good. Out of the box an experienced modeller will get a fairly accurate Fulmar with the SH/MPM kit, but it’s short run with all that implies for ease of build- so modelling skills apply. Out of the box the Trumpeter Fulmar is an easy build for anyone, with modern fit and, mostly, modern details and options. But it won’t be a good replica of the real McCoy unless you have some good references and a willingness to do the work to correct the squared off canopies and decking, move the wing root joint and attend to the windscreen and wing gun placement. It can be done but you shouldn’t have to do this with a 2020s kit - it’s high time Trumpeter moved beyond this. Or build the Venezuelan option, be happy and move on to the Fairey Battle when it drops.🤓