1/72 Hasegawa Consolidated B-24J Liberator

[Roman Schilhart]

Hello and thanks for your interest,

this is my 1/72 Hasegawa B-24J, representing "The Shack" of 458th Bomb Group, 754th Squadron.

The model was built using aftermarket parts from Eduard, CMK, Aires, True Details, Scale Aircraft Conversions and Decals from Sky Models Italy.

This beast fought me for over 18 months.

Most work went into the paint job.

It was painted with Alclad lacquers, which require a perfectly smooth surface preparation.

Due to the massive weight (90g) I chose to use metal landing gear from Scale Aircraft Conversions.

Photographs by Wolfgang Rabel of IGM Cars & Bikes.

... and here is how it all started.... lots of aftermarket items, lots of motivation and optimism!

Cockpit interior:

Interior detailling underway:

Fuselage halves before closing up:

Cockpit again:

A lot of weight went into the foward area of the fuselage to prevent a tail-sitter:

Model primed Gloss Black (Tamiya14) in preparation for Alclad paints:

Paint issues all along the way, of course all my own fault:

Making the mask for the code letter "E":

Final bits and pieces....

Glad I finished this, even if it took some time and a lot of Patience.

But have a look here - there's already a "roll-out" queue on my workbench:

Thanks for lookin'.

See you next time!

Best wishes from Vienna

Roman

Edited August 14, 2016 by Roman Schilhart

[JWM]

Very nice!

Cheers

J-W

[Paul Alan Bardell]

Thats great work

a very nice looking B24!

[Buzby061]

She's a beauty, great work & worth the pain.

Pete

[polo1112]

Beautiful !!!

[Parabat]

Excellent. Details, photos, weathering, simply brilliant.

[batcode]

very nice looking build, great job

[Air-to-Air]

Beautiful work. Well done.

[spiton]

Impressive !! I like wery much schape of this plane. thick hull and long wings , looks very elegant ,_)

[Pawel Szczudlyk]

it looking very good. a lot of work has been done but it was worth it.

cheers

[Learstang]

Beautiful work as always, Roman! But what is that high-wing monoplane in that last picture? (The other two aircraft are too easy - Spitfire and Ju-88.)

Regards,

Jason

[TheBaron]

Excellent photography Roman, it really displays the formal and aesthetic detail you've put into this build, to great effect. I'm grateful to you for including shots of some of the painting blobs and fingerprints that crept in along the way - very reassuring to see I'm in good company in such matters.

That last shot has the makings of a Paul Nash diorama...

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/nash-totes-meer-dead-sea-n05717

Splendid work sir.

Tony

[Stew Dapple]

Lovely work Roman; it might have fought you for 18 months but you were the clear winner in the end

Cheers,

Stew

[PlaStix]

Wow!! That is stunningly beautiful Roman and very well worth the effort! Utterly superb! Very well done.

[Val]

Stunning model!

[Fanakit]

Awesome B-24 ! Congrats for all the work performed !

Ivan

[Alpha Delta 210]

I'm so pleased that you persevered, as this is the best model of the oft-overlooked B-24 that I have ever seen!

[Josip]

Very good work on a seldom seen model.

However I can't really see the need for all that aftermarket, especially on the interior as so little can be seen.

I would suggest that you paint the gun barrels in a darker tone.

Cheers!

Josip

[jean]

Absolutely fantastic B-24!!!

Congrats for persevering.

Did you add the rivets or are they on the kit?

Superb!

JR

[arbrownra]

Absolutely fantastic. Thanks for sharing -what a marvellous piece of work.

[Alan Sannazzaro]

Very nice modelling. Well worth all the extra effort. I love the aftermarket additions, the tyres and gun barrels look fantastic. Very nice work on your metal finish also.

Thanks for sharing it with us all.

Regards,

Alan

[Roman Schilhart]

Impressive !! I like wery much schape of this plane. thick hull and long wings , looks very elegant ,_)

Thanks for your feedback Spiton - but I do not agree with you!

Actually the B-24 is one of the ugliest aircraft in my collection.

It reminds me of a train wagon with wings.

The B-17 is aesthetically much more pleasant, in my humble opinion.

Beautiful work as always, Roman! But what is that high-wing monoplane in that last picture? (The other two aircraft are too easy - Spitfire and Ju-88.)

Regards,

Jason

Jason - this is a Kovozavody Prostejov Piper L-4, to be painted as General Patton's personal aircraft.

It's currently in the painting stage, I hope to present it within the next coming weeks.

Very good work on a seldom seen model.

However I can't really see the need for all that aftermarket, especially on the interior as so little can be seen.

I would suggest that you paint the gun barrels in a darker tone.

Cheers!

Josip

Thanks for feedback, Josip.

I will overpaint the gun barrels, you are right, they are too shiny.

And I totally agree with your opinion on the aftermarket sets.

In the end, hardly anything can be seen when the fuselage halves are closed up.

I also found that some afermarket sets add little if any improvement to the model;

although I had bought an Eduard photo-etch wheel bay I didn't use it, just like the CMK resin bomb bay set, which is hardly any better than the plastic parts from the kit, but involves a lot of work and reduces the stability of the whole build.

If I ever do another Liberator, I will just add Scale Aircraft Conversions landing gear (essential with the nose weight), True Details wheels and maybe photo etch parts for the landing gear covers. That's the areas you do see in the end.

Thanks for all your kind comments.

Best wishes from Vienna

Roman

[tomprobert]

A beautiful rendition of an often overlooked warrior. Love the NMF you've achieved.

One minor thing if I may? The lower crew entry door behind the ball turret actually opened inwards and upwards, not down wards as you have depicted. I hope you don't mind me pointing that out?

Tom

[Winenut]

Unquestionably a work of art Roman

Superb.

Having experimented for the first time with Alclad just recently I know exactly what you have achieved!

Brilliant build

Cheers

Bruce

[Meatbox8]

A brilliant looking B-24 Roman. All that effort on the painting really paid off. The metal finish looks superb. I have a question. The plate that covers the artwork of the young lady. Is it additional armour plate? I noticed it covers the pilots 'vitals' as well as the young lady's!