Trumpeter 1/48 C47 Dakota ++FINISHED++

[pacificmustang]

Gday All

What a great GB for all us modellers of all things RAAF. I just had to join in and what better day to start than ANZAC day here in Australia where we remember all our dead from all conflicts past and ongoing that Australia has been involved in

.

Lest We Forget

Onto my chosen kit. The Trumpeter 1/48 C-47A Dakota. Australia used C47B's not sure what the differences are yet, hopefully research will turn them up, anyway onto the required box and sprue shots

and this last one shows the multi media parts included in the kit, those being rubber tyres, metal landing gear and some PE, also shown are the quick boost corrected rudder,some resin corrected cowlings and Voyager aerials

I am awaiting some further Eduard sets from Hannants

Regards

Bruce

Edited August 18, 2014 by pacificmustang

[Mozzy19]

Nice. Gotta love the Dakota!

Sean

[Phil Podmore]

I've just completed this kit - and its a big beastie!

[pacificmustang]

Anything I should watch out for Phil?

[Mozzy19]

Here's his build: http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234935624-trumpeter-c-47a-148/?hl=dakota

Sean

[Nobby57]

What a great idea! I'm looking forward to this one.

The more we can represent the different participating nations in the UN's first, and hopefully last, major war, the better! Good on ya!

Small aside: if any of you are ever in Battery Park, New York or haven't done so before, please find the Korean War memorial and just walk around and in it.

Unassuming and perhaps a little insignificant, it still packs a powerful punch...just wish I'd had a camera that day.

Edited April 25, 2014 by Nobby57

[Aimee'sDad]

Ooooo.didn't know there was a 1.48 of the Dakota!

[Mozzy19]

Ooooo.didn't know there was a 1.48 of the Dakota!

Revell also have one that's been around for longer than I have!

http://www.scalemates.com/products/product.php?id=120736

Sean

[Aimee'sDad]

Cheers Sean, I really should open my eyes more...

[pacificmustang]

Got a bit more done today

I can now understand why people use those quick boost resin engine fronts that replace the trumpeter engines.

Jiminy Crickets!! Each engine is made up of 6 parts that a include a complete exhaust manifold and separate pushrods that are attached to a ring

It all comes together with a bit of fiddling and clamping. You will never see the exhaust ring unless you have the cowlings off, but they're there, anyway here they are, the pushrods still need a bit of fiddling so they line up

exhaust are painted with MM burnt iron, cylinders with MM buffing Aluminium, ignition wires picked out with Vallejo pale brown, then the whole assembly given a wash using MIG oil and grease wash.

Next the interior. As this machine was used to ferry ordnance the seats were removed. Bewdy I thought, no fitting umpteen PE seat belts. unfortunately no seats means the location holes had to be filled on the floor and some ejector pin marks filled on the fuselage interior where they could be seen by peering through the door

Here, the ejector pin marks are filled with Mr Dissolving Putty. They will be sanded smooth when dry

I thought the holes in the floor would be easy to fill with some evergreen strip, unfortunately I had none the proper size so just laid some thin strip over the top of them. I used my cutter to ensure they were all cut to the same length.

Once the floor is painted they will hardly be noticed, thats the plan anyway. Looking at this pic of the Dak kept at the South Australian Aviation museum, you can see the kit interior bears little resemblance to an actual RAAF interior anyway, there are no ribs along the floor as depicted on the kit floor

I'd probably be better just sanding all the detail off the floor!! Actually a couple of years this is probably what I would have done as well as building up all the stringer detail from strip.

These days with limited time for modelling and a large stash that I want to build, my philosophy is to just build. Correcting the interior would add many hours to the build for little return, plus I want to get this finished for a coming comp.

In this pic. one fuselage half has been painted as well as the floor. The subject of my build A65-121 was disposed of to the Indonesians and there are very few pics -(read no) pics of her that I could find .

RAAF interiors from the pics I did find and the extant machines I have photographed show grey interior or grey/green interiors very similar to RAF grey/green. I have no idea what colour applied to what airframe or what time period. I went with a grey/green interior with the cockpit in RAAF cockpit green with dark green quilting on the sides

In retrospect a silly idea as I had no RAF cockpit green. I used tamiya Japanese cockpit green which is not really a good match being too green in colour. Anyway, it is what it is. The dull green is Xtracrylix RAF green with the cockpit floor in a 50:50 mix of HU2 & HU3 (I'm trying to use up all my odd paint lines )

Anyway, thats where things are at the moment, sorry for waffling on. Now working on a bottle of Adelaide Hills Sauv. Blanc with the wife

Bruce

[snapper_city]

This is going together well.

[Calum]

Good start Bruce

[pacificmustang]

Nothing further construction wise, as I am away with work, but opened a dialogue recently on AMI regarding roundel diameters following a request from Mal Mayfield, whom I am getting to cut masks

In doing so, opened a small can of worms regarding the colours of the cheat line and titles

http://forum.aussiemodeller.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=8465.

I was just going to go with the red cheat line but it does look the same shade as the outer ring of the roundel in the pics. What do others think? It looks like no-one will be able to prove me wrong whether I go with red or blue

Bruce

[pacificmustang]

Back into it

Interior has now been completed

and fitted to one side of the fuselage

Even though Trumpeter has included a reasonably complete interior,nothing much will be ever seen of the navigators station, even with the door open, in fact, Thanks to the thick transparencies, nothing much can even be seen in the cockpit.

I would not waste money buying any Eduard interior sets for this kit

To each fuselage half were added the windows which were a very good fit, although as stated, quite thick for a newish kit.

The navigators window was also opened up. It is flashed over on the kit, but a window is provided on the clear sprue. Also on each fuselage half there is a faint mould step in front of the cargo door and running underneath it from the wing root fairing back to the tail. I assume this is so a insert can be added for the DC3 boxing, anyway, it is easily removed with a sanding sponge. The fuselage was then repolished and some lines described to make it look like there was nothing ever there

Lastly, I started to remove the moulded flap detail in order to replace it with Eduard PE. This was achieved with skinny sanding sticks and a chisel blade in the old exact knife handle

[pacificmustang]

Fuselage has now been joined

a little bit of squeeze needed in some places!! The tamiya tape I have over the openings is hopefully to keep sanding dust out of the interior. I'm probably better off just tacking the doors in place with some drops of tamiya thin or white glue

Once the seams were cleaned up, panel lines and rivets were reinstated with the help of some tape, a scriber and a rosie-the-riveter tool, and there were a lot to do on the underside of the nose

I am test fitting the wing stubs here. Fit looks to be pretty good. The outer wings attach with the aid of spars which set the correct dihedral. The spars were glued in with Revell Contacta for added strength

Finally a shot of the wheel wells. As you can see, not too bad, will weather this area a bit more before adding the wing underside

[Calum]

Looks good Bruce

[Tomjw]

This is looking excellent. Will follow with interest.

[Cookenbacher]

Those engines look like you could fire them up - beautiful detail on this model!

[-Neu-]

Fantastic build, of a subject that is really interesting. I quite like the kit's rivet details. Do you know anything about its history?

I ask because of some of my recent research. IMO, one of the biggest advances concerning the conduct of the Korean war (except for the widespread use of jet aircraft) was logistics. Certainly air transport was an important part of WWII, but Korea took it to a whole other level, in part due to the area's rugged terrain. Units were frequently resupplied from the air, and the air-bridge between japan and Korea was an critical part of the war.

I hope I'm not thread-jacking, but this was a Korean war C-47 used by the 3rd Air Base Group during the war (esci 1/72).

Edited May 13, 2014 by -Neu-

[pacificmustang]

lovely model Neu, hope my finish comes out that well

Little bit on the operations of 77 SQN here, courtesy of a post from Roger Lambert over on Aussie Modeller

By taking stills from the film, Christopher Brown was able to confirm that the identity of the Dakota was indeed A65-121. Unloading the rockets from the C-47 in one scene from the movie ties in with the following extract from "Korea Remembered":

"The 'Police action' (started on 25th June 1950) soon involved 77 Squadron operating from Japan, aircraft departing Iwakuni, armed and loaded for ground attack sorties, then landing at Taegu (K2) in Korea, where they were met by fitters and armourers that had been placed there by the first aircraft of Commonwealth Flight (Com Flt) 77 Squadron A65-121, captained by Flight Lieutenant (Flt Lt) . Dave Hitchins and the crew and co-pilot Flt.Lt. "Dad" Taplin, Flt.Lt Ivan Pretty, Navigator and Flt.Lt. Joe McDonald, Wireless Operator. The Mustangs were serviced, refueled, rearmed and then proceeding on another strike, then returning to Iwakuni. This role of Com. Flt. 77 Squadron continued until two more Dakotas (Douglas DC3, "Goony Bird") arrived from Australia, A65-109, with Flt.Lt. Noel Elliott Captain, P111 Brian Dorrington Co-Pilot, Nav 111 "Hank" Hurley Navigator and a Wireless Operator W/O Bob Burns; A65-96 Captained by Ron Daniel, with Co-Pilot Leon Murtagh (myself), Flt.Lt. Frank Barkla Navigator and a Wireless Operator, W/O "Blue" Lang, in the first week of October 1950.

Around about this time, the Fighter Squadron moved to Pohang Dong (K3) on the East Coast of Korea and early flights were in support of them, but quickly expanded providing support to 3 RAR and other British Commonwealth Occupation Forces (BCOF) now operating in Korea and expanded to Pusan (K9), Kimpo (K14) near the South Korean capital Seoul, to Pyongyang (K23), the North Korean capital, Yongdongpo (K16) and following the Fighter Squadron's move to Hamhung (K27), high up on the north eastern coast of Korea and supplying the Fighter Squadron until 3rd December, when we were called very early one morning at Iwakuni, to fly direct to Hamhung to Pusan, on the southern coast of Korea. This was caused by the advance of the Chinese in support of their North Korean allies advancing across the frozen Chosen Reservoir. On arrival at Hamhung, aircraft would taxi to a dispersal point, be filled up, doors closed and take-off with a 'split-bottom' turn as soon as the wheels cleared the ground in order to avoid the front line around the perimeter of the airfield, making sure you didn't dip a wing into the ground during the turn. The normal operating weight of an RAAF Dakota in Australia was then 28,500 lb. We had been cleared for a 1,000 lb overload, that is a take-off weight of 29,500 lb. What weights we departed Hamhung were not calculated very accurately. However, 2 good engines (Pratt-Whitney's) didn't let us down and performed well, helped by the very cold below zero temperatures and the Fighter Squadron was successfully evacuated to Pusan."

Note that the quote "Commonwealth Flight (Com Flt) 77 Squadron" is in error and should read "Communications Flight (Com Flt) 77 Squadron".



Cheers

Roger

[justin1980]

A fantastic build so far, its a pity that not much can be seen of the interior.

[pacificmustang]

Back into it

Wings assembled. I think Trumpeter have mistaken the ailerons for flaps as they suggest you can have both down!!

They were a push fit to the wings, once again, I have had minimal problem with fit on this kit, Not sure why it gets roundly slammed on some fora. I am enjoying it far more than the ancient and poorly fitting monogram kit. My opinion only, of course

It has a few accuracy issues but nothing major. Trumpeter have given you a metal rudder where it should be fabric. The kit one will be replaced with one from Quickboost

and finally finishing off todays efforts, the tailplanes and wings were added. She is starting to come together

[Gumbie Air Services]

I must get one of these, and I still have the original "Buzz Buggy" decals from the old Monogram kit.

[Calum]

Looking good Bruce

[Mozzy19]

That's looking lovely.

Sean