Built the Revell P-38J (Marge)

Could you be a bit more specific on the details of your kit?

If it came out under the Revell label, it could be one of two kits.

It could be one that came out a few years back under Revell-Monogram's "Promodeler" label. If that is the case, then the moldings are originated from Hasegawa stock. As I havent seen that kit, I'm only guessing "Marge" was an option in it.

On the other hand, you could be dealing with a reissue of a late 1960s Monogram monstrosity. If your kit had options for a standard fighter version, glass nosed bomber version and two seat nightfighter version, then I'm guessing thats what you're working with.

I tried the old Monogram kit once, it gave me fits and eventually became a testing ground for airbrush techniques rather than seeing completion.

If you can give a few more details on your kit itself, it may be easier to help you out.

Well, lucky me, I'm building the "monstrosity" version you mention with the fighter, nightfighter, bomber alternatives. I had no idea there was a good kit and a bad kit. Ah well. On the up side, I had a trial-by-fire introduction to puttying and even built it with the landing gear up as i plan to display the plane in flight. Didnt do a half bad job on the closed landing gear either considering it's my very first plane ever. At the moment, I have it built and primed. The painting, detailing, weathering, etc. loom on the horizon.

Well, you can give yourself a pat on the back for building it gears up.

The Landing gears were the absolute worst part of that kit (unless of course you were a total idiot like me and tried to build the nightfighter, in which case that second cockpit is a masochist's delight). The landing gear are just totally out to lunch on the accuracy front, oversized tires just being the most noticeable part of that.

It already sounds like your having better luck with it than I did so I wish you good luck in getting it to the finish line.

Post a picture on RonUSMC's free photo posting site when you're done. All the instructions to do that are in his posting near the top of the General Modeling Discussion forum.

P-38J "Marge" was Maj. Richard Bong's airplane. He was the American Ace of Aces with 40 kills and was awarded the Medal of Honor. The human Marge was his sweetheart and later his wife. Maj. Bong was killed test-flying a P-80 after the war.

Your Monogram kit is one of the oldies but goodies. Its a tough kit to do well but it builds up into a pretty good looking P-38. You picked a real challenge for your first model but it sounds like you've got it under control. If you enter "Monogram P-38J" or something similar into your search engine you'll get several reviews and pics of finished models.