Tamiya 1/48 P-51B "Berlin Express"

Chris, your'e more than welcome. Always glad to help out where I can.

Regards, Rick

LOL, watch out old man!! i gotta try and knock some of that rusty knowlege out of that memory bank friend!! thanks, they do look very realistic. thanks for the tip. later.

Trying to steal all my secrets are we Chris ? . Well I'm glad to pass on my vast knowledge to you Youngens, LOL. Actually, since these were resin replacements from Ultracast, I first primed them with Floquil grey primer, then sprayed them with ModelMaster Burnt Iron enamel. Let that set a day, then brush painted Vallejo Flat Brown acrylic, only on the stubs, & the hollow ends were painted with Vallejo Black. Let that cure & then gave the whole thing a wash with Citadel Rust Brown ink. This was all done before the exhausts were assembled to the model. They were among the last pieces added. Kinda a lot of work for a couple of exhausts, but they do look pretty realistic.

Regards, Rick

rick, one quick question, what color/technique did you use on the exhaust? that looks pretty cool. later.

MikeV, nkm, Jonathan, Thanks for the comments. Really appreciate it.

Jonathan, They weren't true whitewalls as seen on autos, the crews painted them on.

Waltz41, another anomally seen on "Bald Eagle" was the color of the name. I've seen it done in both black & red lettering. Looking at photos, it appears to be black to me, but red makes a more attractive model. Oh Well .

Regards, Rick

Beautiful build. I really like the whitewalls -- I didn't even know planes had whitewalls, but it certainly adds a unique look!!

-Jonathan

Very nice P-51B. Really there's no such thing as too many Mustang. Just keep building them ( and posting it here).

Fantastic build Rick.
Thanks for sharing that.

Mike

Well, there's that famous formation flight photo, too. I'm relying on memory, but I think it was a four ship, mixed B and D models, OD over metal. Well, I saw that color photo printed in black and white in a respected aviation/modeler's journal and they described it as blue paint over NM. But I'm sure we've all seen the color photo of that stacked formation and they definitely are OD. Tell the truth, I wish they were blue. I sure get tired of OD, and find myself avoiding it nowadays whenever I can. Not hard when my favorite period is 1950-1968, but I've done a lot, and still do some, WW II stuff on commission as well, so I'm also sick of painting the same old RLM hues.
tom

Almost forgot...that almost reminds me, 1) there's a P-51D that's painted that way (Blue) owned by a gentleman in Philadelphia, Jim Beasley...and 2) there's also a big debate still over a few of the 361st FG, 375th FS P-51's, OD or Blue? A few flyable mustangs are painted with a light sky blue, others OD. Dragon actually came out with two versions of their 1/72 P-51D in this motiff, the sky blue being a limited edition! I wonder if we'll ever know!

brian

I just got done "Bald Eagle", a 1/48th Tamyia kit. Came out pretty good, I'll post some pics if i can take 'em soon. There's a lot of mistakes i've seen with that plane, not just the blue paint instead of OD, but also black stripes on the horizontal stabalizers (no no) and Blue/OD top colored horizontal stabalizers (another no no). I found a few pictures of the bird, and all confirm that, these for some reason published things, are errors.

And by the way, very nice work Rick. A+ on that!

Thanks obiwan, appreciate your comments.

Shark, The Mustang profile you refer to was, I believe, a P-51B named "Bald Eagle". Many modelers copied the profile as published, which showed the upper Invasion Stripes over-painted in a medium/dark blue. Later researchers determined that it was actually OD. As you say, a whole generation of modelers got it wrong.

Regards, Rick

Wow ,what a gorgeous build!
Love the spinner ,love the white walls and good photography too.

Most grateful, 91. I wonder, Vintage, if that's the real "Stars Look Down"? Almost every group or squadron had a plane known as the "squadron hack," which was anything from a requisitioned O-1 to a Mustang or T-bolt that was too war-weary to fly operational missions. The hacks were used strictly for transportation, beer runs, pilot proficiency, etc, and they were very often modified into two-seaters. Late in the war, I have even seen photos of enemy (in this case a FW-190 painted red) a/c used as hacks. Later, as the jet age came along, squadrons often had T-birds for that role. And one ANG unit I once went to William Tell weapons meet with carried ground crew in their hack, a T-29 (an old Convair about the size and almost the age of a C-47). I returned in this plane, dubbed "Miss Piggie," because I was told it would be an honor, since the plane was going to the D-M boneyard as soon as we got back. It was flown by an old Lt. Col. who was retiring with the plane. I have never been so frightened in an aircraft in my life as when that old flyboy whipped this dinosaur up on one wing and forced it to very reluctantly put on a couple of G's to perform a perfect 360 overhead landing pattern. The plane shook and shimmied and I swear I could hear the rivets popping out. I say, give me a good, armed ejection seat to plop my butt on any day.
And there ends the un-asked-for lesson on squadron hacks.
P.S. That's still one beautiful model at the top of this thread. BTW, does anyone remember when a well-known aviation artist got the colors wrong in a big two-page profile of a 'Stang in the OD over N/M scheme, and a whole generation of modelers replaced the OD with blue, and some still do, as I've seen in hobby shops.

Tom

July 1998 ? Jeez how time flies. I thought it was a little more recent. Thanks for the reference, I always wanted to do that AC "someday".

Regards, Rick

Sharkskin - The FSM issue that ran the conversion build article on "The Stars Look Down" was the July 1998 issue. It's a detailed article converting the Tamiya P-51B to a two seat version for General Eisenhower to look over the D-Day beaches. It's not a bad article and would make an excellent build.

Steve

MIke, Vintage Aircraft, 9x19mm, Adam, cirikili, bdelov, Thanks for all the very kind words.

Masking & painting the spinner was one of the hardest tasks on this build.

I build most of my birds "clean", just a matter of personal preference for shelf sitters. In this case, I just didn't have the heart to dirty up those painfully applied Invasion Stripes.

Regards, Rick

Looks great! Thansk for sharing.
B.

she's a beaut, Rick....
a little too clean for me but, a beauty none-the-less.....
love the white side walled tires.....

Awesome, awesome build... I can only echo what the others have already stated. That is one great looking mount. You did a great job on the paint... especially that immaculet spinner... and I can say from experience that's one of the most frustrating and madening masking tasks ever. Well done Rick... very well done.

Very nice build, I really like it.

That is the most beutiful mustange model I have ever seen, the most eycatching thing about it is the olive drab uppersurfaces with the bare metal sides and bottom surfaces. And the invasions stripes just pull it all together. And the neat thing about it is the fact that it is a B model, you never see that paint scheme on a B model. Candy for the eyes...candy for the eyes.

Vintage Aircraft

QUOTE: Originally posted by sharkskin I swore off them Hawses (along with Bf 109s, FW 190s and A6M-anything) ten years ago, but after seeing this latest one from Rick, along with Pix's A-36, somehow I just can't wait to dive into one (pun accidental, Pix). But it would have to be something totally weird. I wonder how I could get plans and do the mods needed to build "The Stars Look Down"? For those who haven't seen it, it was a specially modified two-seat B-model made specifically so Gen. Eisenhower could look over the Normandy beaches following the invasion. I wonder whatever happened to the real airplane after the war. Anybody know a source of photos of this unique bird? BTW: The offer's still good for any of you who are building 357th FG Mustangs. I have one of those Pro-Modeler sheets which are amazingly well done, and have uncommon subjects on them, not to mention the fact that when they are on sale, they practically give them away, so I buy them all whether I'll ever use them or not. Anyhoo, this sheet -- by Scale-Master/Detail & Scale, has three of the lesser known ships (P-51B's), and is in perfect register, very fine and thin printing. It has Capt. J. Storch's "The Shillelagh," (OD over NM), 1st Lt. A.J. Roberson's "Passion Wagon," (OD over NG with full invasion stripes) and "Pregnant Polecat," the mount of Capt. Glendon V. Davis (OD over NG, eight kill markings, no invastion stripes). The makers are to be commended for doing what other decal companies (some of them, anyway) don't do: they point out that the famous red and yellow checks were far from being uniform from plane to plane, and that each plane had slightly different sizes and numbers of checks. Also, the red and yellow bands of each plane's spinner was a little different. So, for all three planes they provide separate checks and spinner stripes. I could have saved all this verbage and simply said: If you are one of those who's building this group, and is serious about it, I'll gladly donate the sheet. Just drop me an e-mail and they is your'n. TOM

That two seater P-51B, I saw it at the Oshkosh airshow and I got pics of it, I thought it was a simple trainer, but apparently its not, It is still flying ans in great shape. I can try to scan some pics of her but I cant get it done until sunday becasue opn saturday I have an interview with my local news paper about my model aircraft and what I do.

See ya

Vintage Aircraft

I'll say again as well Rick-- love, love, love that Pony. The mix between NMF and OD is phenomenal...and no easy feat to pull off-- awesome job!

Joe, Steve, Keyworth Thanks guys, real glad you liked it.

Regards, rick

Great looking Mustang, Rick! Super sharp bird.

I like it, guy. Looks dang sharp...


Fade to Black...

Thanks Shark. I can't recall the Issue date but FSM ran a very good conversion build article on Ike's bird a while back that I think had a pic or 2 of the real bird. If you can't find the article, maybe David Voss or Lawrence could help out.

Regards, Rick

I swore off them Hawses (along with Bf 109s, FW 190s and A6M-anything) ten years ago, but after seeing this latest one from Rick, along with Pix's A-36, somehow I just can't wait to dive into one (pun accidental, Pix). But it would have to be something totally weird. I wonder how I could get plans and do the mods needed to build "The Stars Look Down"? For those who haven't seen it, it was a specially modified two-seat B-model made specifically so Gen. Eisenhower could look over the Normandy beaches following the invasion. I wonder whatever happened to the real airplane after the war. Anybody know a source of photos of this unique bird?

BTW: The offer's still good for any of you who are building 357th FG Mustangs. I have one of those Pro-Modeler sheets which are amazingly well done, and have uncommon subjects on them, not to mention the fact that when they are on sale, they practically give them away, so I buy them all whether I'll ever use them or not. Anyhoo, this sheet -- by Scale-Master/Detail & Scale, has three of the lesser known ships (P-51B's), and is in perfect register, very fine and thin printing. It has Capt. J. Storch's "The Shillelagh," (OD over NM), 1st Lt. A.J. Roberson's "Passion Wagon," (OD over NG with full invasion stripes) and "Pregnant Polecat," the mount of Capt. Glendon V. Davis (OD over NG, eight kill markings, no invastion stripes). The makers are to be commended for doing what other decal companies (some of them, anyway) don't do: they point out that the famous red and yellow checks were far from being uniform from plane to plane, and that each plane had slightly different sizes and numbers of checks. Also, the red and yellow bands of each plane's spinner was a little different. So, for all three planes they provide separate checks and spinner stripes.
I could have saved all this verbage and simply said: If you are one of those who's building this group, and is serious about it, I'll gladly donate the sheet. Just drop me an e-mail and they is your'n.
TOM