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Brazilian P-47D-25 - Italy October 1944 - completed


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Ok as host of this GB I guess I had better build something!

Well I had it all planned before I went on holidays and I had hoped to buy stuff while I was away but couldn't find what I wanted so just ordered online.

My cunning plan fell to pieces once I got home and started looking at the references I had, I wanted to build a Latin American P-47D. The decals I got were for D-30s and higher, where as the model I was building was a D-25. I then though about modifying the model I had to suit (not a really hard mod to do) until I found the perfect decal set!

So now I’m building Brazilian P-47D-25 of 1°GAvCA used in Italy from October 1944. The decals are from a super rare AeroMaster Thunderbolts Galore set. Plus I will be throwing in a bit of AM stuff as well.

I only have the model at the moment, the AM stuff is stock photos.

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no need for sprue shots for this one...

Aires Wheel Wells…I know the Tamiya ones are nice but these are resin…….. :wub:

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Eduard detail set (plus canopy masking set too)

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Master gun barrel set… I blame Arnold for this….

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AeroMaster decal…rare as hens teeth…..hope I don’t stuff them up!

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And this is what I’ll be building….have already found an issue with the decals, the a/c serial number is wrong for the aircraft ID number! Will sort that out when I get to it.

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I won’t get a chance to start this now until next week, go back to work on Wednesday, plus the AM bits haven’t arrived yet. In the mean time I’m working on “Gold Member”.

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Now you know this is going to interest me Rich!

Never understood why Tamiya didn't include the fin fillet for later D's other than in their M kit, all the more interesting markings have the fin fillet (other than some of the Brazilian a/c in Italy). It's also a pity that someone like Quickboost don't make a replacement, they do in 1/72 but not in 1/48.

I shall be following with interest.

Craig.

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Don't worry I searched high and low for an aftermarket dorsal fin filler, but nobody makes them in 1/48th. There are also a few other differences that would have needed to be addressed, the dive flaps, not a biggy but it would involve re-scribing which I hate. Plus the instrument panel is different plus there are a few cockpit differences as well I think. I thought of using an AM cockpit to correct this but that could have been more trouble than it was worth. I was hoping for a fairly simple build......

The moral is I should have waited til I got home to order....anyway am much happier with my final choice.Once all the bits arrive the fun begins! :D

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Ahhh Finally I am to blame for something. Hahahaha. Thanxs Rich.

Welcome to this GB. I hope you will have a great time here.

That are some nice goodies you have. O If you want to make a 30 or 40 version you should also consider that the cockpit floor is straight, so no beams.

If you have or can find a Hasegawa Bubble top than there should be a N sprue where the dorsal spine is on.

Or!!!

You can always buy a M and cast a resin copy from the dorsal fin.

Cheers,

Edited by Arniec
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I'm looking foward with interest too.

The airplane "C1" was flow by Cap. Fortunato Câmara de Oliveira in Italy (56 missions). The ID number 226756 belonged to P-47D "A4", flown by 2º Ten. Alberto Martins Torres (99 missions over Italy).

Cheers from Brazil

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That's a great option, never knew there were Brazilian planes in Italy so this will be an education for me!

Gold member?! What is that??

Rob

Arrr "Gold Member"........it's a build I started ages ago then resurrected for the KUTA GB....which is probably going to roll over into this years KUTA GB at the rate I'm going! It's the RNZAF's Anniversary TA-4K done in a special gold paint job, really looks amazing!

Ahhh Finally I am to blame for something. Hahahaha. Thanxs Rich.

Welcome to this GB. I hope you will have a great time here.

That are some nice goodies you have. O If you want to make a 30 or 40 version you should also consider that the cockpit floor is straight, so no beams.

If you have or can find a Hasegawa Bubble top than there should be a N sprue where the dorsal spine is on.

Or!!!

You can always buy a M and cast a resin copy from the dorsal fin.

Cheers,

I would have normally have used the aluminum tubing I have for barrels.....but after seeing the ones you are using I thought I'd give it a go.

I thought about all that...but as it's the beginning of the year I'm feeling a bit lazy so didn't want to go the mod path.......will leave that for other project in the year. The new decals I'm getting will be perfect for this model as the actual aircraft was a -25.

I'm looking foward with interest too.

The airplane "C1" was flow by Cap. Fortunato Câmara de Oliveira in Italy (56 missions). The ID number 226756 belonged to P-47D "A4", flown by 2º Ten. Alberto Martins Torres (99 missions over Italy).

Cheers from Brazil

Same here, I have been doing a lot of research and have gathered just about all the photo's I can of these aircraft. I will do the "C1" aircraft as it will be the easiest to change decals to suit. Another interesting thing I noted is that some aircraft have the ID code on both sides of the nose while others only the port side. Don't know why this was, will have to do more searching to find out why and re-check to see which was the case for "C1".

The finish on these aircraft were really quite worn and patchy with the natural metal showing through the paint, so to achieve this look I'll have paint the whole thing in aluminium first, then carefully paint/layer the OD & Neutral Grey in a patchy way. I may even have to attempt to weather/panel the base aluminium first to give it an uneven look. The paint job will be the most challenging part of the build if I want to get the look just right. The colour photo above shows what I mean, plus there are some really good ones on the web as well.

Can't wait till I get home next week to start on her properly. have sort of made a start but only trimming bits as well as gluing rocket pods, bombs, etc.

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After what seems like ages again I'm back to this build.

Well I have plenty of amazing builds to inspire me so I best get to it…

Well the last of the goodies arrived today…

DSCF1403_zpsegh5fqv9.jpg

..and the decals that I really have no use for…

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plus these amazingly rare things that were printed in 1993 and look in perfect condition…no pressure here.

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Well first up I need to do the mods, these being for the Aires wheel wheels. First off let me say now that I’ve done the modifications to get them to fit….they’re not really worth the effort!!

If you’re trying to produce a show stopper/award winner then maybe, but other than that I don’t think they’re really worth all the effort. And yes there is quite a lot of work to get them to fit, Aires resin extras normally take a wee bit of work to sort out, but this wheel wells required a lot of work!

I’ll go through the modification process just in case someone else plans to use them. If the sight of distressed plastic or resin scares you then please look away now.

Ok after the resin blocks have been removed I worked on the fit to the lower wings sections, I only worked on one side till everything was correct then I repeated it of the other side. The three marked sections needed to be removes and smoothed out. The actual resin wheel wells do not quite fit in the space the Tamiya ones do, you need to leave room for the spars as well! Oh and the wheel wells will not be fitted until I have finished painting them as well, so everything you see has not been glued together!

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Ok it’s in the right position now in the lower wing and fits nicely.

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Next up is the cut out in the fuselage, due to the size of the resin wheel wells quite a bit of plastic needed to be removed.

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Of concern was how these wheel wells would fit into the Tamiya wing spars…in short not without some work! The wheel well detail on the rear spar needed to be removed.

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Plus because a lot of material around these spars was removed from the fuselage, so I needed to add small blocks to ensure the spar sits in the correct position.

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With everything now fitting pretty well with the new wheel wells it was time to remove the Tamiya ones from the top wing…..no going back now!!

A lot of extra plastic needed to be removed to get the new ones to fit, the plastic here is quite thin!

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But not as thin as I had to go with the resin wheel wells…..”wafer thin” to the extreme! It needed to be for the wings to close up without any bulging of the wing chord.

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I then repeated the entire process on the other wing.

All up it look quite good, but again was it worth the effort…about 3 to 4 hours work there….well no! Anyway too late now.

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Next up was all the other bits and pieces of PE to be fitted…

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….plus a bit of wiring to the instrument panel….

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…..flaps done…..only because I was in a gluing mood!

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Ok that should be all the modification work and pre-painting work done. Next up will be painting!

The plan is that everything will be painted polished aluminium on the inside, well the aircraft was made of it, the interior will then be painted Zinc Chromate and Interior Green/Bronze Green (or something in between…..need to look at references a bit more closely).

I may do a bit of detail work in the rear wheel area as it is very vacant at the moment…will think about that.

Am happy with all the work do today and hopefully everything now should go together quite smoothly.

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You don't muck around! Looks like you had lots of fun cutting a way resin and plastic... I will follow your build with interest.

By the way, Eduard shows the PE bracket with the three leavers on the cockpit floor at the wrong spot (and it is the wrong shape). Here you can see where it should be: http://www.nmusafvirtualtour.com/media/028/P-47D%20Cockpit.html

You have to rotate in the picture to see it.

Cheers, Peter

Edited by Basilisk
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thanks for that, i've been hard pressed to find a photo of that area.

But I have been going over all the data I have an found this photo, it's from a "D" but probably a -40 judging from the floor (it's a D model).

The bracket is different again, it look similar the to the Eduard one but only has one side!

5501156496_2f7f5bd04e_b_zpsova0gwi4.jpg

I'm not going to get to bothered about it as it will be quite hard to see plus only "rivet counters" would really notice! :D

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Nice progress Rich. I do understand what you mean with the Aires wheelbays. In my eyes you Always have to do a lot!!! of work to get them to fit.

That is why I stopped using them. after two desasters with them I keep my money in the bank for something that is worth a wyle.

But you have done a good job with them.

Now I have seen you have put on some wires to the instrument panel. I forgot that. :fraidnot:

Cheers,

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Beautiful work Rich seeing these larger scale build,s is a real inspiration,I must read up on the Brazilian unit,s and how they came to take part in the

air campaign,my Dad was two year;s in Italy 44/45 and remembers a Mexican guy being posted to his company in the middle of winter poor guy had

to be sent back after a couple of weeks could,nt cope with the cold!

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Beautiful work Rich seeing these larger scale build,s is a real inspiration,I must read up on the Brazilian unit,s and how they came to take part in the

air campaign,my Dad was two year;s in Italy 44/45 and remembers a Mexican guy being posted to his company in the middle of winter poor guy had

to be sent back after a couple of weeks could,nt cope with the cold!

Yeah Italy in winter is not a warm paradise, especially in the north.

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Thats great work Rich, and a lot of goodies you have to add to the kit.

I must admit I agree with your assessment of Aries (and some other) wheel wells, if you add the price of all the bits and bobs you can add to the kit you can easily more than double the cost of the kit itself and then end up not seeing any of it, unless you are okay with random people picking up your kits at shows and turning them over, not something I encourage myself!

Craig.

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Well I forgot to update this yesterday, but after a bit of a slow start which involved racing off to my nearest hobby shop for some paint, I was all was set for painting. As a side note I was sadden to see this hobby shop was discontinuing support plastic modelling, now it’s just an RC shop…….guess I’ll have to do all my shopping online now!

That said I did managed to get some of that new Vallejo’s new Metal Colour Semi Matt Alum, dying to try this out! :bounce:

Anyway back to the build.

Ok painting time first up, everything was given a coat of Model Master Metalizer Buffing Aluminium (will be switching over to Non-Buffing as I’m running out!!), this will be the base coat for everything on the model.

Sorry no photo’s of some of these stages as I got so into the groove I forgot! :doh:

Next up I started on painting up the main wheel wells, these where painted Zinc Chromate Yellow and then weathered and detailed. They ended up looking really nice a grubby. Once finished these were glued in place.

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After this the engine was next, I wasn’t going to get too worried about detailing it, as when it’s in place not a lot will be seen. I initially made a couple of mistakes when building it, but these are hidden, plus they add to the “in-service” look of the engine.

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Depending on the reference material you read the insides of the cowling were either Zinc Chromate Yellow (ZCW) upper section / dark aluminium intake area, or completely dark aluminium in colour. I went with the ZCY/Dk. Aluminium, I will grubby up this area as well. Plus while I was at it I painted some of the other bits as well.

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All up it doesn’t look too bad at all.

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I did some work to the weapons I’ll be fitting as well. I had just been reading about a technique to make the bombs look a little more realistic. This involves using some thinned down filler and a cotton bud, which is used to apply a soft textured finish to the bomb surface. Once dry a quick coat of OD. It doesn’t look too bad at all, it has a nice rough cast finish. I just need to do some strips and weathering and they’ll be done.

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opp's the photo is a bit crap and hard to see.....

Ok the major part of the thread…the cockpit. After all the concerns of what is the correct colour for the cockpits of P-47D’s I went with a Bronze Green colour (Hu 88 to be exact). After reading all I could find and pouring all the photo’s I could find (especially some colour photo’s of unrestored or recovered wrecks) I settled on this colour for my build. Is it correct….who knows for sure!

So all the cockpit area was sprayed with Hu-88 over the aluminium then given a clear coat. Once this was dried, washes, shading and detailing was done.

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Once I was happy with the look the PE bits were added. I didn’t too much extra other than added IP wiring and fiddling with the gun site.

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It looks pretty good when fitted together, I need to finish up a few details then I can glue the whole lot together.

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Again, sorry for the poor quality of the photo...will take some more when it's together properly.

That’s about where I’m up to, have made great progress. I should have the fuselage together tomorrow plus the wings together as well. I wait to spend as much time as I can getting the wing/fuselage fit perfect as I want to see if I can build this beasty without any filler at all, and that include using sprue.

By the time I go back to work on Wednesday I hope to be ready for the painting, which I’ll be next break.

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Wow, that all looks fantastic Rich. I attempted the same technique regarding an aluminum base over the cockpit and wheel wells, but yours turned out way better - very realistic results (the wires sticking out the back of the IP even!)

I've never seen the thinned putty technique you used on the ordnance. That turned out great too.

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