Revell 1/72 Hurricane

[Giorgio N]

 

Yes, the original, the one Revell issued in 1962!

I'm not even sure which variant it's supposed to represent, guess a Mk.I although I've read that the cowling is more like a Mk.II (making this maybe a Mk.IIa).

Does it matter? Probably not as the kit is so inaccurate that there's no point in trying to define the variant. 

Decals are for P3059 SD-N of 501 Sqn., so a Mk.I. of course the decal sheet only includes the codes and no serial but since the decals in my bag are useless I'll be free to choose whatever aircraft I want, or better whatever aircraft my spare decals will allow me to build.

Did I say bag? Yes, this kit came with no box. It was sold in a plastic bag at some point in the '70s as gift with an aviation related encyclopedia. Each issue came with a kit, some were Revell's and some Airfix's. These can still be found here in Italy, generally sold for little money. 

What to do with it? Just build it from the box! No point in adding details or trying correcting anything...

Pictures to follow!

[Troy Smith]

33 minutes ago, Giorgio N said:

I'm not even sure which variant it's supposed to represent, guess a Mk.I although I've read that the cowling is more like a Mk.II (making this maybe a Mk.IIa).

I was pondering on one of these myself,  as I have one.... I've not looked into trying to pin down what is is closest to as yet....  it was also scale down for the 1/144th kit,  and I built quite a few of those as a child....

cheers

T

 

[stevej60]

Welcome Giorgio and with a great classic kit too, it was a law to have either this or the Airfix Hurricane in the collection for our back garden air battles as a kid.

[JOCKNEY]

7 hours ago, Giorgio N said:

 

Did I say bag? Yes, this kit came with no box. It was sold in a plastic bag at some point in the '70s as gift with an aviation related encyclopedia.

 

Just build it from the box! No point in adding details or trying correcting anything...

 

 

Hi Giorgio

 

OK OK I give in, where did the box come from.   

 

Oh and can you do any other magic tricks ? 

 

Good luck with this one 

 

Cheers Pat 

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Welcome to the build Giorgio. 

[jean]

Hi Giorgio,

this is a kit I almost built.

I bought it in a small modelling shop in Milano, but when I arrived at my grandma I noticed that the canopy was missing...

So the next day I went back and exchanged it for a Revell P-40... And to this day I have not yet built a Hurricane!

Have fun with this super classic.

JR

[PeterB]

Hi Giorgio,

 

I remember building 2 of these as when they first came out the only Hurricane readily available was the ancient Airfix Mk IV. As I recall one of the problems was the flat fuselage underside? The later Revell ones are rather better but still have a few problems - like many Hurricane kits the area at the back of the cockpit is wrong I seem to recall.

 

Pete

Edited July 1, 2022 by PeterB

[Giorgio N]

On 6/25/2022 at 4:58 PM, stevej60 said:

Welcome Giorgio and with a great classic kit too, it was a law to have either this or the Airfix Hurricane in the collection for our back garden air battles as a kid.

 

On 6/25/2022 at 11:50 PM, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Welcome to the build Giorgio. 

 

Thanks a lot ! A kit like this is something quite different from what I generally buy these days, will be interesting to see what comes out of it...

[Giorgio N]

On 6/25/2022 at 11:38 AM, Troy Smith said:

I was pondering on one of these myself,  as I have one.... I've not looked into trying to pin down what is is closest to as yet....  it was also scale down for the 1/144th kit,  and I built quite a few of those as a child....

cheers

T

 

 

I'm not sure if it's worth checking... I was planning to compare the fuselage to Arma's Hurricanes but then I asked myself why bother... 🤣

I may still do it though, sometimes I do things that make little or no sense...

 

 

On 7/1/2022 at 10:40 PM, jean said:

Hi Giorgio,

this is a kit I almost built.

I bought it in a small modelling shop in Milano, but when I arrived at my grandma I noticed that the canopy was missing...

So the next day I went back and exchanged it for a Revell P-40... And to this day I have not yet built a Hurricane!

Have fun with this super classic.

JR

 

I have the P-40 as well but as it had been startd I thought it would not be the best option for the Gb. Looking at both I'd say that you did the right thing in taking the P-40 instead of the Hurricane, the former is IMHO much nicer than the latter

 

On 7/2/2022 at 12:07 AM, PeterB said:

Hi Giorgio,

 

I remember building 2 of these as when they first came out the only Hurricane readily available was the ancient Airfix Mk IV. As I recall one of the problems was the flat fuselage underside? The later Revell ones are rather better but still have a few problems - like many Hurricane kits the area at the back of the cockpit is wrong I seem to recall.

 

Pete

 

The fuselage undersides are indeed pretty flat, what I noticed first though was how narrow the nose ends, there's no way a 1/72 Merlin could fit in such a shaped cowling. Not that this is the only problem of the kit of course...

[Giorgio N]

On 6/25/2022 at 6:26 PM, JOCKNEY said:

 

Hi Giorgio

 

OK OK I give in, where did the box come from.   

 

Oh and can you do any other magic tricks ? 

 

Good luck with this one 

 

Cheers Pat 

 

Good point ! I should have said straight off the bag... 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

 

And here's the bag:

 

 

These kits usually had the instructions printed on a cardboard insert, that however is missing here. Actually I have a few somewhere, can't remember if the instructions for the Hurricane are among them. In any case the number of parts is so low that instructions are not really needed....

Opening the box we find the plastic parts, in all their early '60s glory with the addition of some early '70s flash in several areas. The wings were separate:

 

 

The rest was on a couple of runners, although several parts have detached in the 40+years since this kit was first sent to a newsagent somewhere in Northern Italy

 

 

Well, what can we say about the plastic ? May sound unusual for such an old kit but actually this has recessed panel lines !!!! Yes, exactly like today wonder-kits, with the small difference that these panel lines are not exactly fine but feel more like trenches. Still, some Airfix kits from a few years ago were not much better.

There is however one little problem with these panel lines: they are mostly placed according to whatever the designer thought they were and the panel pattern bear little resemblance to that of a real Hurricane ! This is particularly visible above the wings, where there is no representation of the ammo bays.

Similar problem with the spent case ejection slots under the wings: it's great that the model represent these, however their position is not the same as on a Hurricane.

What recent kits today generally lack are the rows of raised rivets, here very prominent as was the fashion of the day. Other features of this kit are similarly old fashioned: no wheel wells, no radiators, a single part for the propeller-spinner assembly and a very bare cockpit. The latter consists of a badly moulded pilot-seat single part, that I've immediately decided to bin,

The bag also includes decals, although these are likely not useable today:

 

 

Well, even if they were useable I would probably not use them as the proportions of upper wing and fuselage roundels are totally off. Interestingly the kit is stated as produced by Revell in Great Britain, I am not all too familiar with the various incarnations of Revell but I remember how they also made kits in the UK. Someone may sure know more about the matter.

 

One last picture for today: the upper wing half bears the year when the kit was issued:

 

 

 

I'd say this is old enough to qualify for the Group Build... it's actually older than I am by a few years and I have to say that it's been a while since I built such an old kit. Mind, I've got an older one in the stash, again from Revell... if I don't throw this in the bin during the construction I may build that other one too....

 

 

 

[Giorgio N]

So where should I start with this kit ? Well, I started by adding some plasticard here and there... I know, I know, I had said that I'd have built this one from the bag but really I could not stand that massive void where the radiator was supposed to be. Couple of plasticard bits and at least now it's not possible to look into the fuselage and straight across the radiator anymore.

 

 

And yes, while I was at it I also cut some plasticard to make a rudimentary wheel well

 

 

The additional plasticard insert at the rear is there to close the slot for the in-flight stand. Really I prefer my models on their wheels, on the basis that yes, aircraft are designed to fly but really they spend most of their time on the ground.

At that point I glued the two wing halves together, here's the lower surfaces showing the filler needed to blend the radiator ramps in.

 

 

While the glue was setting I looked at the pilot... I'd have used the kit part, that represents the pilot and the seat, however this was badly formed and I decided to look into the spare box, where I found a number of old Airfix and Matchbox pilots and a few seats. The pilot I chose was already partly painted so it was just a matter of adding some more detail. it will sure be better than the "thing" supplied by Revell

 

 

Of course as often happens with the various photo-hosting services the picture is much larger than the real thing, still the pilot of unknown origin is sure better than Revell's alien lump of plastic

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Troy Smith]

Thank you Giorgio...

Now we know  where HR Geiger got his idea for the pilot of the derelict ship  in Alien from... 

 

 

Edited July 11, 2022 by Troy Smith
speeling

[Giorgio N]

Well, the Revell pilot is indeed very similar to the Alien one... 🤣

 

Time to glue the fuselage halves together ! That was easy enough, although fit is not the best... I tried to have the halves decently aligned around the upper cowling, not sure I managed to do it...

 

 

A view from the bottom shows what I added into the fuselage... almost nothing ! only thing I did was building up the rear canopy bulkhead, that of course did not exist in the kit.

 

 

How did I do that ? It's a secret ! Actually it's not.. I used a UV setting resin, that worked pretty well, filling the space I needed.

I then glued the seat in place, using every kind of glue and resin to prevent this from moving. Of course there are no attachment points for this since it's not one of the original Revell parts. And then I forgot to take pictures of the seat in place, so the next picture will show an almost complete airframe

 

 

How was the fit ? Well from the top it doesn't look too bad. From the bottom however things are a bit different

 

 

Massive gaps everywhere ! And of course the fit on the lower fuselage wasn't great either. Fortunately this area is quite flat so I should be able to sort it somehow.

The fuselage halves are also distorted in a few points, that makes things even more "interesting". Not to mention the various sink marks. Who said that building an old kit from our youth is a therapeutic experience ?

[Giorgio N]

Let's continue with the horror tales from this build...

The kit fortunately has only a few parts, as all seem to need some kind of work to fit. The tailplanes did not escape this of course ! Fit was pretty bad as the tabs threw the position of the stabilzers either too high or too low compared to the fairings moulded on the fuselage. The solution ? Simple, get rid of the tabks and use something else !

In my case I decided to use a brass rod with a diameter similar to the slot in the fuselage, removed the tabs from the kit parts, drilled a suitable size hole in each of them and them used both CA glue and plastic cement to glue both tailplanes in place. The result is sure nothing particularly impressive but at least now they are at the same level relative the fairings.

 

 

The picture of the lower surfaces also shows part of the work needed to try and remove the massive gaps: filler of various types and plasticard were used liberally, the result is not bad here but there's still to work. The picture from the top shows how in any case gaps exist where the tailplanes meet the fuselage... but isn't filling gaps what the hobby is all about ?

One other thing can be noticed in the upper view: some lovely sink mark on the wings ! I'll probably leave these as they are, removing them would mean removing the rivet detail and as much as consider this an obsolete feature, it would be a pity not have such nice oversized rivets on a model built from a kit like this. Afterall raised rivets were all the rage in those years, makes sense to try and preserve them.

Or does it...

 

The fit of the upper fuselage didn't seem too bad unitl I sprayed a first coat of primer. This revelaed a very different story so it was out with sandpaper and filler. This meant losing a lot of the rivet detail on the cowling, so I decided to remove all rivets from the cowling panels. At least having a few clearly defined panels with no rivets makes some sense even if the rest of the metal covered part of the airframe is riveted,
A lot of work and a few primer coats later, we are at this point:

 

 

 

 

 

Now I have to say that at some point I felt that using so much mr. Surfacer on this kit was a serious waste of money, but then I realised that Mr. Surfacer is afterall a good product and even if the kit I started from isn't the best, better use a good primer than having paint lifting. In any case the result is not that bad, sink marks are still there, I'm not sure I actually managed to properly finish all gaps but really, I feel that this will do... although I've yet to glue the canopy in place, canopy that is one of the worst piece of clear plastic I've seen in my years as a modeller.

 

On the positive side, I found some suitable roundels: I built a Hobbyboss Hurricane Mk.IIc a while ago and didn't use the roundels from the box. Since these are early war roundels, they'll be perfect for this model In any case they'll be a serious improvement over the ones in the kit.

I've yet to choose a subject and how to sort the individual codes. I have a set of old but still good Modeldecal Medium Sea Grey generic letters, I may use these. At the same time I recently got from Ebay the Eduard set with two Arma Hobby kits, I may get the codes from that decal sheet since includes a few Mk.Is

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 13, 2022 by Giorgio N

[Giorgio N]

Now painting ! At some point I contemplated using brushes and Humbrol enamels for this model, just to paint it as most kits of that era would have been painted... but then I wondered why do something different from what I do on all other models ? Today I mainly airbrush using acrylics, it's a good and quick way for me to achieve decent finishes, I have my process that I know and I'm happy with, why bother changing anything ?

So it was down to my trusted H&S airbrush, Vallejo acrylics and my usual technique: the first coat is always a lighter version of the required paint, be it by mixing some light grey or by using a lighter paint from the start, with the idea that the more weathered the finish the lighter the lower coat. This is then followed by the proper paint mixed with Vallejo's Glaze Medium, that turns the paint into a semitransparent coat. With this I can add darker tones where I feel it's needed. Here's the result after Dark Earth has been applied to the whole upper surfaces

 

 

 

The result is quite sible here as I didn't want to overdo the weathering. After the final clear coats will be applied everything will be even less noticeable.. but really, apart from some cases, I like it this way: subtle ! And mind, the picture does not really show the differences, the fabric areas for example show more variation than what can be seen in the picture.

 

 

 

[Giorgio N]

Of course with the Dark Earth coat in place it's time to decide on a subjest ! The Hurricane carried two camouflage patterns at that point and before masking for the Dark Green area I have to at least have decided on one pattern

I had mentioned I how have decided to use the roundels from a Hobbyboss Mk.II, at some point I realised that I had built another Mk.I in some very distant days: the Airfix kit !

This had been built as a Sea Hurricane, my first "conversion" when I was probably 14 or 15. This meant that the codes had to be somewhere and of course I found them in the box where I keep all unused decals from older kits (yes, I still have decals from models I built in the early '80s...). And here they are, together with the Hobbyboss ones

 

 

 

First of all, let me say that the Airfix decals look better than the Hobbyboss ones in a few aspects ! However being close to 40 year old I had to first check if they were still useable, so I cut part of the subject name from the sheet (that in the kit was supposed to be applied to the clear stand) and tried it on an old model I use for various test (the awful Heller P-51D). The decal worked very well, detaching with no problem from the sheet and adhering nicely on the surface, with a very clear carrier film.

Having good behaving decals will be critical on this model as it's covered in huge rivets ! Every decal will have to adhere well or the result will be a mess.

 

With the subject decided, I started what is maybe my least loved aspect of the hobby: masking ! Yes, I hate masking !!!

Fortunately I have found a great material named Oracal 810, a film specifically made for masking that sticks well and can also be stretched a bit. The way I use it is simple: cut a patch of the right size, remove from the backing sheet, place on the model, draw the pattern, remove, place on the backing sheet again, cut, re-apply on the model.

Here's the model with the masking in progress, placed onto the Eduard Hurristory instruction booklet that I'm following for the camo pattern. Eduard also offer the same P3395 of the old Airfix sheet, likely with better quality decals but really for this model the Airfix ones will do.

 

 

Masking is not completed, yesterday at some point I gave up ! It's roasting here and drawing and cutting all masks is still a time consuming exercise that needs patience. I'll finish sometime today or tomorrow. Then it will time to spray the Dark Green.. I'm thinking of trying the AK paint I got as part of an Ebay deal (of which the Hurristory box was part), I'll do a test on some scrap plastic first though, I'm not too convinced by these paints and how they claim to reproduce "scale effect". Of course a model like this would be a perfect test mule for a new paint, as even if the finish is not ideal it's not something on which I've spent months getting all things right...

[Mottlemaster]

1 hour ago, Giorgio N said:

Having good behaving decals will be critical on this model as it's covered in huge rivets ! Every decal will have to adhere well or the result will be a mess

Thats a good point Giorgio . I was intending to use the original decals from my 1973 Typhoon but like you say good decals that behave on lots of large raised rivets are essential .

Nice masking by the way .

 

Cheers

Alistair

[John Ballman]

Your doing justice this one, keep up the good work, Thanks for sharing.

JB

[Giorgio N]

Well, I have to apologize for the long time since I posted any update... to be totally honest, I was just on holiday ! A week in the French Riviera, a place that I love: stunning scenery, great food, plenty of culture... there are even a couple hobby shops ! There's a reason why the very rich of the world gather there, really it's a beautiful area. And even the not so rich can actually enjoy a good holiday by choosing the right places and planning in advance.

 

So back to work and back to the hobby... what did I do last week ? Well, I painted.... I've now completed the main camo scheme of the aircraft. First were the upper surfaces, where I completed the masking process and then experimented with the Dark Green in the AK interactive RAF set... that was a bit of a disappointment, although the green is not too bad. Could be a bit more olive but looked much worse in the bottle. Procedure was my usual: first a lightened coat, followed by postshading using thinned original paint.

 

 

 

I should mention that the pictures were taken after a gloos coat.. and it shows ! I often add a gloss coat to the upper surfaces before masking for the lower, in my experience such a coat helps reducing problems with paint lifting. Of course some may wonder why I paint the upper surfaces before the lower when all manuals recommend painting the lighter colours first... really I just do it because it makes masking easier to me and I do it when I'm using paints that I know will cover the darker colours without problems. I know, it's not the right way to do things but I'm not perfect...

 

With the uppers done it was time to mask again and then spray the lower surfaces... here I used the AK paint from the set as the lighter base, onto which I postshaded using Vallejo Air's Sky. The two paints are quite different, AK's more on the bluish-greenish side and Vallejo's yellower and greyer.

 

 

Since there's no gloss coat here, the effect of the postshading work is muc more visible. I know that once the various clear coats are applied the effect gets toned down, so better overdo it a bit.

Unfortunately some touch-up was needed, that I've now completed. Next will be painting the area of the MG muzzles in red and the walkway in black.. and then it will be decals time !

 

 

Edited August 8, 2022 by Giorgio N

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Looks good to me, sounds like the holiday was enjoyable. 

[stevej60]

Look's great Giorgio looking better than I've ever seen this kit!

[PhantomBigStu]

Looking lovely, really tempted to get one myself now, got the 70’s airfix spitfire last week so would be a nice pairing, in fact I’ve now just put a bid on the telegraph issue on eBay. 

[Mottlemaster]

Neil Young should use your group build entry for his record cover of Like a Hurricane. Music and modeling , all as one

Cheers Alistair

[Giorgio N]

On 8/8/2022 at 12:13 PM, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Looks good to me, sounds like the holiday was enjoyable. 

 

Thanks ! Well, the holiday was very enjoyable but I don't know if I can say the same of this kit... 🤣

 

17 hours ago, stevej60 said:

Look's great Giorgio looking better than I've ever seen this kit!

 

Thanks ! Goes to show that some decent painting can hide a lot. At some point I considered an "old school" brish finish but then I wondered how an old kit would have looked like painted and weathered as I do on the more modern ones I generally build... I have a feeling that if I had sanded the rivets I could have made pass this for a much better model than it actually is...

 

16 hours ago, Mottlemaster said:

Neil Young should use your group build entry for his record cover of Like a Hurricane. Music and modeling , all as one

Cheers Alistair

 

Thanks ! Not sure he'd have appreciated but you never know... thinking about it, one of my favourite songs ever is indeed titled Hurricane, the Bob Dylan song about boxer Rubin Carter

 

16 hours ago, PhantomBigStu said:

Looking lovely, really tempted to get one myself now, got the 70’s airfix spitfire last week so would be a nice pairing, in fact I’ve now just put a bid on the telegraph issue on eBay. 

 

Thanks ! I don't know however if I really want to be guilty of convincing you to buy this kit.. If you mean the '70s Airfix Spitfire Mk.I or V then this Hurricane is way worse in any respect. The Airfix kits show that they are from a different era, with much more refined detail. Well, at least having the two side by side will show how much plastic model kits improved over those 10-15 years.

[PhantomBigStu]

No worries, I think the bulk of the guilt lies at my feet, anyway fate is sealed either I’ll get the kit and all it’s joy or I’ll dodge that bullet…..