8th AF B-17G decals: availablity, choice and other musings.

[lasermonkey]

Hi all,

           having just received the two Airfix B-17s from The Works, I couldn't help but start thinking about what markings I wanted for them. I wasn't massively inspired by the kit choices, to be honest. While the 91st BG example fits my local aviation history interest nicely (Bassingbourn being less than fifteen miles away as the crow flies), the world and his wife have done the 91st to death, whilst the 100th BG is also a popular choice, if not particularly colourful.

 

           A look through my decal stash revealed plenty more 91st BG aircraft, a lone 447th machine  and several 490th Gs. Still, nothing really inspiring. So, what's out there? A look through what Hannants has to offer showed up a number of decal sheets, the vast majority being by Kits World. Some of you might know where this post is headed next.

 

           I have very mixed feelings about Kits World. On the one hand, they offer a good range of subjects, many of which I am interested in. On the other, I have found their research sorely lacking, with more than their fair share of schoolboy errors. Now, while some of you might think I have a one-man vendetta against KW, I really want to like them! Anyway, I thought I'd have  a look at what they had to offer and one particular sheet, KW172173, looked interesting, having one aircraft from the 306th BG based at nearby Thurleigh, plus another one with an attractive diagonal yellow stripe on the tail. Okay, time for a closer look.

 

          The markings and info for 44-6585 seemed to tally with what I could find. Kits World helpfully show a couple of photos of the nose art on the web page, which is a nice touch. So far, so good! The other aircraft with the diagonal yellow stripe, 44-8648 is shown as being from the 324th BS/306th BG. Wait, what? The 324th BS was part of the 91st BG, not the 306th. And the 306th didn't use a diagonal yellow stripe, the 401st did. However, they might just be typos, so let's move on. What about the decals themselves? Oh dear. Squadron codes are depicted as DF, which were indeed used by the 324th BS. A search on the internet showed that 44-8648 joined the 401st initially with the 613rd BS in January 1945, coded IN*M and then transferred to the 615th BS at the end of February, coded IY*N. It was later transferred to the 305th BG in May, when it was photographed with the nose art. From what I read, there are no known photos of 44-8648 whilst with the 401st, and the two photos of the nose art are likely from her time with the 305th, but there's nothing to show what the rest of the airframe looked like or how she was coded. All in all, there's one option out of two on that sheet that has any hope of being vaguely accurate then. Oh well, what else is out there?

 

         Another sheet, KW172332, looked appealing, as one of the aircraft had prominent, yellow areas on the empennage and wings. 43-37975 is shown as being from the 839th BS/487th BG. Squadron codes are shown as RS*A. Uh-oh. The 839th used R5. OK, maybe it's hard to tell from a photo, but the information can be found in literally five minutes on the web. The instructions showed the RS ahead of the national insignia and while most of the photos I could find of 487th BG a/c showed the squadron codes aft, it seems that some were indeed in the fore position, including sister ship 43-37974. Well, at least that one can be used with a little modification.

 

        Overall though, I found the choice of subjects available from any manufacturer disappointing, with many bomb groups completely neglected. The double-striped birds from the 45th CBW, the colourful diagonal stripes of the 94th CBW, the variations in red tails of the 93rd CBW (with the exception of the 490th BG), all ignored.  I have wondered out loud several times on Britmodeller regarding the apparent lack of imagination when it comes to 8th AF Fighter Command decals, with some groups having dozens of choices and others being criminally ignored. It seems that it is the same for the bomber groups too.

 

        Anyway, enough of the ranting. If anyone knows of any decal sheets that have markings for colourful 8th AF B-17Gs, in particular the staggered waist window, Cheyenne-tailed machines, please do shout. And how do you tell which Gs were built thusly?

 

Cheers,

Mark.

[vppelt68]

How colourful do you wish for? For a pair of staggered waist, Cheyenne tail G:s from the same bomb group, this one looks nice. It may lack the colours of many other groups, but the black awfully large triangle looks the business to my eyes, at least.

https://www.kitsworld.co.uk/index.php?GOTO=147&PICFILE=147&STKNR=147&STRH=&ORDN=&RNZ=296843&THISVIEWMODE=2&SUPPLIER=&FINDRETR=&WIDENET=&CATEGORY=5&SUB=1&VWW=1&VANCE=99

We could talk about Fortress schemes for the rest of the year and the next ten years  too . V-P

[Vicarage Vee]

On 12/13/2020 at 9:00 AM, lasermonkey said:

The markings and info for 44-6585 seemed to tally with what I could find. Kits World helpfully show a couple of photos of the nose art on the web page, which is a nice touch. So far, so good! The other aircraft with the diagonal yellow stripe, 44-8648 is shown as being from the 324th BS/306th BG. Wait, what? The 324th BS was part of the 91st BG, not the 306th. And the 306th didn't use a diagonal yellow stripe, the 401st did. However, they might just be typos, so let's move on. What about the decals themselves? Oh dear. Squadron codes are depicted as DF, which were indeed used by the 324th BS. A search on the internet showed that 44-8648 joined the 401st initially with the 613rd BS in January 1945, coded IN*M and then transferred to the 615th BS at the end of February, coded IY*N. It was later transferred to the 305th BG in May, when it was photographed with the nose art. From what I read, there are no known photos of 44-8648 whilst with the 401st, and the two photos of the nose art are likely from her time with the 305th, but there's nothing to show what the rest of the airframe looked like or how she was coded. All in all, there's one option out of two on that sheet that has any hope of being vaguely accurate then. Oh well, what else is out there?

We've talked about KitsWorld before.  I have a few of their sheets, I really want to like them, but the research is duff too often.  This thread has more https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235032118-kits-world-decals-how-accurate-are-they/page/2/

 

Specifically, this same, B-17 sheet, Commando Chief 44-6585 is also incorrectly depicted and has the wrong squadron colours.  To save you trawling, I posted this:

 

"The squadron colour on the tail and the propeller bosses should be blue, not green.  However, Roger Freeman's The Mighty Eighth Warpaint and Heraldry does state that the 369th BS was blue and the 423rd green.

But, a colour picture of 43-39116 'Naughty Nancy' of the 423rd in The Mighty Eighth The Colour Record shows blue propeller bosses and artwork clearly by the same artist as 'Commando Chief'.  Furthermore, in Roger Freeman's original 'The Mighty Eighth' the colours are described as bright green for the 369th and medium blue for the 423rd.  In addition, there is a photograph of 42-31143 'Satan's Lady' of the 369th, albeit somewhat ironically in b/w, in the Squadron/Signal Fighting Colours booklet B-17 Flying Fortress in Colour where the fin tip does not appear dark enough for blue and the text states that the squadron colour was green.

I seem to recall that the 306th BG website as it was back in the early 'naughties' and now heavily revised/replaced had illustrations of the fins for each BS too.

 

The point of all that diatribe?  That even with such a prolific and respected author as Roger Freeman you have to be aware that mistakes in text will occur in such a large volume of work and that it pays to check and double check. This is fine if you are researching and creating a scheme yourself, all errors are your own and yours to live with, but when you are offering things commercially, and at quite a price compared to other manufacturers, people might just expect you to go the extra mile to get it right.

 

Edited to say that Kitsworld also produce a sheet for 'Naughty Nancy' which has the wrong, green, tail flash and appears to have blue propeller bosses.  These should match. These may only be errors in the illustrations and instructions and the decals themselves being mostly black and white and 'stars and bars' (which are relatively simple to source or replicate anyway) are correct, but at £10.20 for a sheet that only has decals for two 1/72nd aircraft, to my mind this isn't really value for money."

[lasermonkey]

Thanks for that. I had used the Schiffer Publications Battle Colours: Insignia & Aircraft Markings Of The 8th AF in WWII by Robert A Watkins as a reference, but that also has the 369th as blue and the 423rd as green. I didn't even think to look at the Freeman books, both of which I have. Having just looked, I agree with the blue propeller boss. I had originally checked as all the colour photos I could find of 306th BG machines showed red tail tips and I wanted to confirm my suspicions that it might have been due to squadron colours. I'm certainly glad I decided to go ahead and air my reservations now!

 

My first run-in with KW was about their pale grey squadron codes for early war RAF fighters. They didn't accept my assertion that they should be Medium Sea Grey and quoted a stores ref. to me that I ran past Nick Millman who explained that the ref. was for a six gallon jug of Medium Sea Grey! When I forwarded that, they stopped responding.

 

The second was when I ordered some white code letters for 8th AF P-51s. When they arrived, they immediately looked too small and when I measured them, they were indeed too small for the regulation 24" and all of the schemes that were printed on the instruction sheet. They also didn't feature the unique stencil "font" used by the 357th FG, despite including some of these on the instructions. I wasn't impressed and neither were Hannants, who refunded me and passed on my complaints. I had messaged KW about it, but never got a reply.

 

Now I don't trust them at all and check every single one of their sheets before even considering a purchase. Chances are I will begrudgingly end up buying a few and doing the necessary corrections but as you say, they aren't cheap for the paltry amount of decals on the sheet and the research is, to put it bluntly, shockingly bad.

 

I have to admit, I'm now thinking about going down the DIY route and doing a 96th BG a/c.

 

Cheers,

Mark.

[Vicarage Vee]

Mark, I can't say I blame you, that sounds like a sensible route.  The nose art on the Kits World sheets is undeniably nice.  Maybe they should stick to that and just do sheets of that!  I have the sheet for Sally B and the BBMF Lancaster, I feel confident that  when the time comes I will have enough references to be sure of what is there.

 

I made Commando Chief with the Hasegawa B-17.  I painted the nose art myself because as you say, most sheets are for the 91st or 100th!

[vppelt68]

One is well catered for if main interest is the 91st, 100th or 447th BG. If not, well... 😞

Has anyone listed the schemes available via Hasegawa's various nose art boxings, and why not Academy's too? Scalemates is unfortunately quite thin on info about these.

I dislike how KW has split its various colour tail numbers and fuselage codes so that one must usually buy several sets to decorate one B-17. And even then, they only give you two triangles and squares per sheet, when you also need the larger third one for the wing... V-P

[lasermonkey]

14 minutes ago, vppelt68 said:

One is well catered for if main interest is the 91st, 100th or 447th BG. If not, well... 😞

Has anyone listed the schemes available via Hasegawa's various nose art boxings, and why not Academy's too? Scalemates is unfortunately quite thin on info about these.

I dislike how KW has split its various colour tail numbers and fuselage codes so that one must usually buy several sets to decorate one B-17. And even then, they only give you two triangles and squares per sheet, when you also need the larger third one for the wing... V-P

I have a Hasegawa G that includes a 305th BG machine. I'll dig the sheet out later and let you know what else is on there.

[vppelt68]

I also have the Hasegawa SP23 Nose Art edition. It has the original release decals included, thus gives all these:

42-97976 A Bit O'Lace, 447th BG

42-31367 Chow-hound, 91st BG

plus

42-97880 Little Miss Mischief, 91st BG

42-97061 General Ike, 91st again

43-37756 Milk Wagon, 447th again and

42-97272 Duchess Daughter, 303rd BG

V-P

[B-17 man]

So, I’ve kitsworld decals to be inaccurate also, but some of them are useful. I have to at least give them credit for making sheets for the current flyers and the Memphis Belle movie markings. 
 

To all the decal makers out there, there are more groups than the 91st. I’m sick to death of the same old markings being done over and over on people’s builds. Tired of seeing chow hound, the Memphis Belle, little miss mischief, a bit o lace. I’m just saying, these get old to look at. 

[fubar57]

Microscale has 5 B-17 sheets

http://www.microscale.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=AC72&Per_Page=14&Sort_By=newest&Store_Code=MD&Offset=0

[lasermonkey]

Sorry it took so long to reply, but here's the options on the Hasegawa B-17G Nose Art Part III edition:

 

44-6009/WF*J/Flak Eater from the 364th BS/305th BG.

 

43-38036/LL*H/Hey Daddy from the 401st BS/91st BG.

 

43-37887/OR*T/Old Battle Axe from the 323rd BS/91st BG.

 

These in addition to the standard "Bit O' Lace/Chow Hound markings. So, one 305th a/c and two more 91st machines.

 

For completeness, I'll add other markings I know of from the various kits and decal sheets.

 

Academy B-17G kit No. 2143

43-37907/+J/Carolina Moon from the 851st BS/490th BG. The decal sheet doesn't include the heart motif for the tail area or some of the other, smaller lettering applied to this aircraft, but at least it's not another 91st BG machine!

 

Academy B-17G Special Nose Art Edition kit No. 12414

44-6483/G/Ruby's Raiders from the 550th BS/385th BG.

 

42-31585/OR*B/Mount'N'Ride of the 323rd BS/91st BG.

 

42-38050/BN*U/Thunderbird of the 359th BS/3-3rd BG.

 

42-31909/OR*R/Nine-O-Nine of the 323rd BS/91st BG.

 

42-32076/LL*E/Shoo Shoo Shoo Baby of the 401st BS/91st BG.

 

42-97880/DF*F/Little Miss Mischief of the 324th BS/91st BG.

 

No less than four a/c from the 91st here! You'd think it was a legal requirement or something. At least the other machines are a little different and are welcome IMO.

 

 

Airfix (ex-Academy) B-17G kit No. 08005

42-38047/EP*D/Fever Beaver of the 351st BS/100th BG.

 

44-6009/WF*J/Flak Eater of the 364th BS/305th BG.

 

Airfix B-17G kit No. A08017

43-37993/DF*N/Mah Ideel of the 324th BS/91st BG. Obvs!

 

43-37521/EP*K/Skyway Chariot of the 351st BS/100th BG.

 

Aeromaster sheet 72-174

42-31678/LL*L/Little Patches of the 401st BS/91st BG.

 

42-39975/DF*Z/Just Plain Lonesome of the 324th BS/91st BG.

 

42-37779/DF*B/Pist'l Packin' Mama of the 324th BS/91st BG.

 

Superscale sheet 72-162

42-97304/OR*C/Priority Gal of the 323rd BS/91st BG>

 

42-107027/LG*Y/Hikin' For Home of the 322nd BS/91st BG>

 

42-102504/LL*D/Time's A' Wastin' of the 401st BS/91st BG.

 

Superscale sheet No. 72-746

42-98008/2S*G/American Beauty of the 834th BS/486th BG.

 

44-8158/H/Bobby Sox of the 850th BS/490th BG.

 

Superscale sheet 72-748

42-31585/OR*B/Mount'N'Ride of the 323rd BS/91st BG.

 

44-8696/K/Looky Looky of the 851st BS/490th BG.

 

Superscale sheet 72-749

42-32076/LL*E/Shoo Shoo Shoo Baby of the 401st BS/91st BG.

 

43-38728/+U/£5 With Breakfast of the 851st BS/490th BG.

 

I'll add to the list as and when I get time to scour the internet. It's funny though how the 91st is so well represented when there's so many other 8th AF groups that are arguably more colourful that have been completely overlooked. It's doubly frustrating that the single manufacturer that has gone down the path less travelled has such a poor (and deserved) reputation for its research and accuracy and has cynically made it necessary in many cases to buy a whole load of its sheets to complete a single model!

 

 

As an aside, I decided to start one of the Airfix B-17s that I got so cheap. It's quite obviously top of the heap in 1/72, but there are areas it could be better. For instance, Airfix seem to have real trouble reproducing right angles on small parts. The cross sections on the seat support brackets are shocking!

 

Cheers,

Mark.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[alt-92]

24 minutes ago, lasermonkey said:

It's quite obviously top of the heap in 1/72, but there are areas it could be better. For instance, Airfix seem to have real trouble reproducing right angles on small parts. The cross sections on the seat support brackets are shocking!

2016 kit, right?

It is somewhat heartening to see that the 2020 kits have improved on that (both the Vc's - Spit and Sherman Firefly).

[lasermonkey]

On 12/19/2020 at 4:26 PM, alt-92 said:

2016 kit, right?

It is somewhat heartening to see that the 2020 kits have improved on that (both the Vc's - Spit and Sherman Firefly).

Yes, that's the one. Reading back, it does seem rather petty, criticising the cross section of a small part that likely won't get seen once it's all closed up, but it is somewhat indicative of something I have seen in several Airfix kits from a few years back. Comparing against another kit I'm currently putting together, the new ICM MiG-25RBT, and the difference in finesse is all too apparent. Still, if the new Spitfire and Sherman are as good as I have read, that's very encouraging. Both are kits I'll be buying, though I think I'll wait for a more ETO-relevant boxing before pulling the trigger on the Spit, as the desert ones don't really appeal to me.

 

Cheers,

Mark.

[vppelt68]

I took the liberty to copy the decal information here in the B-17 STGB section, I hope you don't mind 🙂. V-P

 

[lasermonkey]

 

@vppelt68 not at all! Information is for sharing! 🙂