Giorgio N Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 I really enjoyed the first P-51 STGB and also loved the second, so when a third round of Mustang builds was announced I knew I had to take part ! Really I'm not a Mustang expert, being mostly a Spitfire fan when it comes to WW2 fighters. Said that, the aviation enthusiast in me has a great respect for the Mustang while the engineer actually rates this as even superior to my beloved Spitfire. And the modeller can't overlook the great variety of colour schemes and markings that Mustangs carried during their very long career, so in the end this aircraft features in good numbers in my stash and my collection. This time I will, not unsurprisingly, build a P-51D in service the Italian Aeronautica Militare Italiana. Again ! I say again as I already started such a model in a previous STGB but in the end never completed it as I had problems on the clear parts. So it's Italian Mustangs time again, this time using the lovely Tamiya kit. My kit arrived together with 3 others with no box. I kind of like hunting for lots of unboxed kits, they end up costing less and take less room. Instructions and decals: Really I don't think there's much to say about the Tamiya P-51D that has not been said before. Great mould quality, good detail, simple construction, good engineering. With one exception IMHO, the clear parts do not include the lower frames, meaning that it's possible to damage them. I believe that Hasegawa here choose the best approach by moulding the windscreen with part of the fuselage, but the Hase kit is inferior in several areas to this one. I have started this model around a week ago, so I'll post most of the construction steps today, starting from the cockpit. This was built mostly OOB, but I plan on adding seatbelts at some point. Tamiya offers some nice detail in the cockpit and it was quite easy to get this reasult: The only addition was to the seat, that I've decided to not glue into the cockpit yet. I believe that seatbelts improve the look quite a lot and while Tamiya offers these in decal form, I'd rather go with something different. I often make belts out of thin lead or similar foil, however this time I'll get some PE parts. These have been ordered, as soon as they arrive I'll attach them to the seat and put this and the rear armour into the cockpit 10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TEMPESTMK5 Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 Good afternoon Giorgio Welcome aboard an Italian Stallion will be another interesting build that I will follow By the way very nice start .. Have fun Patrice 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RidgeRunner Posted January 4, 2020 Share Posted January 4, 2020 A great start, Giorgio. I should start an Italian Mustang but will leave it to those who know about them ..... You ;). I look forward to seeing your completed build. Martin 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gingerbob Posted January 5, 2020 Share Posted January 5, 2020 Hi Giorgio, glad to see you in the group. Yesterday, after failing the "stick challenge", I got the major airframe parts of a 72nd Airfix D flying in formation (not glued). I haven't made it an official build thread yet, but probably will. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 7, 2020 Author Share Posted January 7, 2020 On 1/2/2020 at 1:11 PM, TEMPESTMK5 said: Good afternoon Giorgio Welcome aboard an Italian Stallion will be another interesting build that I will follow By the way very nice start .. Have fun Patrice Thanks Patrice ! I should have started earlier and I could have already finished... but other things got in the way On 1/4/2020 at 11:50 PM, RidgeRunner said: A great start, Giorgio. I should start an Italian Mustang but will leave it to those who know about them ..... You ;). I look forward to seeing your completed build. Martin Thanks Martin, they are interesting subjects. Not that they carried that many markings, in the end the Mustang was not in frontline service for long in Italy. although some used for secondary duties ended being very colourful On 1/5/2020 at 1:29 PM, gingerbob said: Hi Giorgio, glad to see you in the group. Yesterday, after failing the "stick challenge", I got the major airframe parts of a 72nd Airfix D flying in formation (not glued). I haven't made it an official build thread yet, but probably will. Thanks ! Well, the stick challenge is one of the reasons why I decided to go Tamiya this time, so I fully understand you ! Looking forward to your thread Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RidgeRunner Posted January 7, 2020 Share Posted January 7, 2020 2 minutes ago, Giorgio N said: although some used for secondary duties ended being very colourful oo .... they would be good to find and build Martin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 7, 2020 Author Share Posted January 7, 2020 Let's post some progress... While waiting for the seatbelts, I've decided to keep building the airframe. Fit of the fuselage halves was pretty good, atlhough not perfect everywhere... I think I did something while assembling and painting the cockpit, as during the test-fit of the unpainted parts everything looked much better. Anyway, I can't complain really, particularly when thinking of some other kits... Next step will be adding the wings and these will need some little work... 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 7, 2020 Author Share Posted January 7, 2020 10 minutes ago, RidgeRunner said: oo .... they would be good to find and build Martin Will try to post a few pictures of the aircraft used for target towing, these featured red checks in several areas 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RidgeRunner Posted January 7, 2020 Share Posted January 7, 2020 Mmmm ..... they sound very nice Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RidgeRunner Posted January 7, 2020 Share Posted January 7, 2020 13 minutes ago, Giorgio N said: While waiting for the seatbelts, I've decided to keep building the airframe. Fit of the fuselage halves was pretty good, atlhough not perfect everywhere... I think I did something while assembling and painting the cockpit, as during the test-fit of the unpainted parts everything looked much better. Anyway, I can't complain really, particularly when thinking of some other kits... Giorgio, I have found that despite being an older kit it was engineered superbly. This means that tolerances are very small and even a layer of paint can affect hte fit. I have striggled with the front windscreen. If you get too much paint on the coaming it wont fit well..... Martin 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnson Posted January 7, 2020 Share Posted January 7, 2020 Like you Georgio I'm more of a Spitfire fan then Mustang, but as you say, a great plane. Your build is progressing very nicely and I will follow with interest as I don't have a Tamiya example in 'the stash', possibly something to rectify. Cheers, 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 8, 2020 Author Share Posted January 8, 2020 18 hours ago, RidgeRunner said: Giorgio, I have found that despite being an older kit it was engineered superbly. This means that tolerances are very small and even a layer of paint can affect hte fit. I have striggled with the front windscreen. If you get too much paint on the coaming it wont fit well..... Martin Makes sense, I believe I ended up with a coat of paint that is too thick, and this had its effect... explanation for the excessive paint thickness to come soon... 18 hours ago, Johnson said: Like you Georgio I'm more of a Spitfire fan then Mustang, but as you say, a great plane. Your build is progressing very nicely and I will follow with interest as I don't have a Tamiya example in 'the stash', possibly something to rectify. Cheers, Thanks ! The Tamiya kit til now has been a very pleasing experience. Not that the Airfix kit that I originally planned to build is bad, however the mould quality is quite different and it shows in several areas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 8, 2020 Author Share Posted January 8, 2020 Further progress, that really took little time. With the fuselage closed it was time to add wings and tailplanes. All these parts went on with no fuss, really good fit here. Notice how the wings have been primed while the fuselage has not. Reason is that I tried to go heavy on the wings with primer to tone down the panel lines. Italian Mustangs were all late war USAAF aircraft and as such they most likely had primed and painted wings, so showing little trace of panel lines. I didn't want to remove them completely but decided that it would have been enough to tone these down while leaving the fuselage surface detail untouched. I will only find now later if the idea was good or not. Mind, I still have sort a couple of details to the wings, thanks to for pointing them to me, The windscreen was also glued in place and while not visible in the pictures above, I had a little problem on the right side while removing the sprue attachment gate: I removed a bit too much plastic and this shows a bit. I will have to paint a frame slightly higher to hide this, don't know if it will work. Speaking of windscreen, some may notice that the central part looks less clear than the rest... simply there is a light grey vinyl mask over it. I'm preparing masks for this aircraft and while I managed to get the central part right, I got the size of the sides wrong so I have to do some more work on them. Work is now suspended for a reason: my compressor stopped working ! I've had a few problems lately with the compressor. First the original rubber tube going to the airbrush broke... no problem here, afterall it was a 9 year old part and it was easy to replace with a longer braided tube... Then I replaced the nozzle as it had worn. Again no problem, it's part of the maintenance regime. For some reason however I couldn't get good results. I feared it was the new nozzle, but then I realised that I had a lot more moisture than usual in the filter. I changed the tube back to the original rubber one and everything worked fine again. For some reason the longer tube affected the way the filter worked and I had too much moisture in the air. The simple solution is to add a filter just before the airbrush and these are available for a tenner or little more, so worth investing in. Then everything stopped working completely ! This time it was more serious, the compressor simply didn't switch on. A quick check of the contacts showed that the pressure sensor contact was open, guess that this broke, I have ordered a replacement part, it's only £17 delivered but means I'll have to wait until the part is here before painting the model. Of course hoping that the replacement will sort the problem, otherwise I fear it will have to be a new compressor 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TEMPESTMK5 Posted January 8, 2020 Share Posted January 8, 2020 Good afternoon Giogio Very nice work so far .. Too bad for your compressor I hope that the replacement will work .. All the best Patrice Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Angus Tura Posted January 9, 2020 Share Posted January 9, 2020 Hi Giorgio. I am watching this with interest. I couldn't agree with you more about the problem of the canopy being molded separately from the frame. The Airfix one is the same and it's agony getting rid of the joint line between the two. Equally the Hasegawa/Academy way with the windscreen is much better than the Tamiya/Airfix way. I'd carve back the coaming under the windscreen so that the glue you use for the windscreen, whatever it is, doesn't wick up between the windscreen and the coaming. Anyway, enjoy! what markings are you using? Alan 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted February 5, 2020 Author Share Posted February 5, 2020 (edited) On 1/9/2020 at 1:06 AM, Angus Tura said: Hi Giorgio. I am watching this with interest. I couldn't agree with you more about the problem of the canopy being molded separately from the frame. The Airfix one is the same and it's agony getting rid of the joint line between the two. Equally the Hasegawa/Academy way with the windscreen is much better than the Tamiya/Airfix way. I'd carve back the coaming under the windscreen so that the glue you use for the windscreen, whatever it is, doesn't wick up between the windscreen and the coaming. Anyway, enjoy! what markings are you using? Alan Sorry for the very late reply Alan... been away from this GB for too long for some reason... Agree with you, the hasegawa way is the best. I hope that one day all companies will follow this approach whenever moulding clear parts, makes for a so much easier assembly. Regarding markings, I was originally planning on using generic decal sheets but then I was very kindly gifted a set of 4 Stormo markings from an Xtradecal sheet from @RidgeRunner. Thanks a lot ! I realise that it's been almost a month since I worked on this model, so I'd better keep moving ! It took me some time to properly mask the windscreen, with this done it was time to start priming the model. Here I'll be using Vallejo's black primer. Fuselage is done... or better was done when I found that some dirt had been trapped under the paint so out came the sanding sponges and I'll now have to respray the area. Oh, and I forgot to take a picture but I received a box of goodies from a French model shop that included a set of steel USAAF seatbelts from Eduard. These went on very easily, really a good product. Edited February 5, 2020 by Giorgio N 9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RidgeRunner Posted February 5, 2020 Share Posted February 5, 2020 (edited) Nice progress, Giorgio :). Those little hiccups happen :(. In fairness they were an exchange with Ash @Doccur. I'm sure he is happy they went to a good home . He also kindly sent me some Haitian decals which will be great for a futue Latin build :). Martin Edited February 5, 2020 by RidgeRunner 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Angus Tura Posted February 5, 2020 Share Posted February 5, 2020 That's looking good Giorgio. I think that's going to be natural metal fuselage and painted wings? I'm looking forward to seeing that effect, which I want to try on my next outing with this good but frustrating kit! Alan 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doccur Posted February 6, 2020 Share Posted February 6, 2020 Looking good @Giorgio N Those decals would have just gathered dust for a while (at least). More than happy for @RidgeRunner to have gifted them to you. Hopefully the mustang turns out alright! Ash 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted February 12, 2020 Author Share Posted February 12, 2020 On 2/6/2020 at 9:49 AM, Doccur said: Looking good @Giorgio N Those decals would have just gathered dust for a while (at least). More than happy for @RidgeRunner to have gifted them to you. Hopefully the mustang turns out alright! Ash Thanks a lot Ash, hope I can do justice to the scheme and put the decals to good use... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted February 12, 2020 Author Share Posted February 12, 2020 On 2/5/2020 at 6:26 PM, Angus Tura said: That's looking good Giorgio. I think that's going to be natural metal fuselage and painted wings? I'm looking forward to seeing that effect, which I want to try on my next outing with this good but frustrating kit! Alan Thanks Alan ! Yes, these aircraft seem to have retained the painted wings with the fuselage in NM. I had a plan to represent this but I'll have to change it... Let's see where we are now ! It took me a couple of steps to fully prime the model. I generally just apply a single coat of Vallejo primer but this time I decided to smooth down the first coat with a sanding sponge and then apply a thinned second coat. The result was quite good, very smooth Then I started painting... I generally use the Vallejo Metal Color series for metallic finishes, they are very good and dry very quickly. They are also very robust so can be masked easily without paint lifting. Very important when dealing with metallic finishes as spraying the various panel needs a lot of masking ! The first coat to go on was with Satin Aluminum on the wings. This was supposed to represent the painted wing surfaces. I unfortunately forgot to take a picture of this so the next picture is of the model during the application of a different shade.m I like using cling film to mask large areas as in this way I don't have to apply tape everywhere. There is of course still plenty of tape used... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted February 12, 2020 Author Share Posted February 12, 2020 Then yesterday evening it was time to remove all the masking.. and I was not too happy ! Now you may think, what's not to like here ? It's a decent metallic finish, with some variations in some areas. Yes, it's true and the areas that are supposed to be in natural metal are indeed nice. However I don't like the wings ! The paint I used is really semigloss and as such gives the idea of being painted rather than in metal, but it's too dark for my taste.. Meaning that looks too dark compared to the finish I see on wartime Mustang pictures... The same can be said for the rudder: this was painted in Vallejo's Dull Aluminum, but again it's a bit on the dark side. This and the wings need a respray ! What I will probably do is to paint them with Vallejo Model Air Aluminum. This is another great paint, not as shiny as the Metal Color though. The wingtips in the picture have been painted with this colour, see how they differe from the ailerons (that are in Metal Color Aluminum). I may then apply on top of this a clear coat to slightly dull down the shine. At that point I will also spray the gun hatches as I believe that these were in natural metal 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andwil Posted February 12, 2020 Share Posted February 12, 2020 I agree that the wings are too dark. Going by most photos there wasn’t a huge difference in colour between the natural metal fuselage and the aluminium painted wings. I’m sure you’ll sort it out though. Looking great otherwise. Like the cling wrap as masking idea. AW 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted March 2, 2020 Author Share Posted March 2, 2020 Took me some time to post this update, as I have hit a small problem. First of all, I have repainted the wings, as they were really too dark. To sort the matter, I sprayed the originally filled and painted panles with Vallejo Air Aluminum. The plan is to coat this with a clear coat to give a better idea of painted surfaces in contrast with the panels left in natural metal. This is what the wings looks like at the moment: Much better than before IMHO ! Now what is the problem I've hit.. I've poured over many pictures to understand the proper location of the national markings and found a couple of different positions for the roundels over the wings. Of these, I came to the conclusion that one is more typical of earlier aircraft and is the one that I believe is more likely to have been used on my subject. The problem is that the Xtradecal roundels for the upper surfaces are way too large ! The real roundels were likely like the smaller ones that Xtradecals suggest for the lower sirfaces and sides. The ones on the sides were again probably smaller than the ones in the sheet, so assuming that I can use these for the upper surfaces, I now need a couple of smaller roundels for the sides. In the end I checked all the Italian roundels I have in the stash, from kits and aftermarket sheets, trying to find 6 roundels close enough in proportions and colours. I found a number of Tauromodel roundels that are likely of the right size, but the quality is not the best. Then I checked the ones on a Sky Models sheet and they are nicely printed but I know from experience that they are very stiff and don't go down well even using decal setting liquids, so I'd rather not use them on a kit with such delicate engravings as the Tamiya Mustang. In the end I'm leaning towards using the Xtradecals roundels for the wings while for the fuselage I could use the roundels from the Meng G.91 kit, that look very simlar to the Xtradecals ones. In the meantime I received some information from a two fellow Italian modellers on the official riules concering sizes of roundels, after checking these I'll be able to decide on the proper size of the roundels 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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