Beautiful work on one of my favorite kits.  Skills of a master builder being shown here.

Joe

Exceptional and superb!

Toshi

Just when I think you've done all you can to detail this kit up, you go and add more. Amazing work!!

Thanks everyone!  I'm so glad to finally call this one complete.  So here's what we've done with Kenneth Taylor's P-40B:

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Fixing the intakes for the oil cooler and radiator, goes a long way to dressing up this hawk.  The landing gear/bay and landing light are also nice additions.  Both of these are fairly simple and can be done by anyone with enough patience for it.  The rest are really your run of the mill add ons to polish an already nicer build.  =]

I apologize if this is too photo heavy.  I wanted to give a once around and a couple of details of what's going on.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Detail of the spring and tie down for the aerials

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Detail of flap interior

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Detail of cockpit

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Detail of exhaust, .30 machine guns, static pitot tube, and rivet detail and weathering

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

She's a beautiful thing! I love the lines on this plane and I could stare at her for hours.  =]  I hope others out there try some of these tricks.  I'm already happier with this one knowing I went the distance.  It's really not so bad.

Untitled by Britt Vallot, on Flickr

Comments, questions, critiques are all welcome.  

Many have said it before, and many more will say it, but it bears repeating a LOT - FANTASTIC WORK!

I've really been amazed watching this one come together. I remember building this kit as a kid, and what I'm looking at here is really this kit taken to its full potential by someone who really knows how to spin straw into gold, as it were.

Very, very well done!

-BD-

You really poured your heart into this one and it shows. Fantastic build. 

Outstanding!  Very nice job all around.  Love how you rigged the antennae.

Mike

That turned out really well. You give me hope for the one I'm working on. Well done!

Thanks guys.  =]  I hope to see some more P-40's out there in the forum over the summer ;)  This is so fun to build! =D

Buckeye:  I'm sorry I forgot to add a quick explanation of how I rigged the aerials.  It's pretty simple really.  EZ line makes up the actually radio line (it's the smaller of the two options 0.3mm I think), 0.6mm aluminum tube for the attachment points on the wings.  The wire is from the TINIEST brass wire I could find.  I'll look for it and update this.  I've wrapped it around a slightly larger brass rod as tight as I could. Removed the rod and viola.  Primed it lightly, and painted it with a fine brush with thinned Tamiya paint so as not to clump.  A small, thin strip of plastic was cut into a rectangle to represent the (what I presume is a lead weight of sorts) as a tie down spot.  I drilled two holes with a sharp exacto blade No. 11 to keep them tiny.  Passed my easy line through them and a drop of CA and you're done.  A tiny sliver of a small plastic rod makes up the attachement to teh fuselage were the radio equipment would have been stored.  A second, shorter line is attached with a drop of CA at both ends to complete that portion.  Easy.  I kit-bashed a Corsair for the pitot tube.  Easy.

Hope you've all enjoyed this thread.  =]

Wow! That is really somethin'!

Thanks for that rigging info!  That really came out great.

Mike

Beautiful work Britt!   What a job you've done on that old warbird!!

Gary

Thanks everyone!  Buckeye, your welcome of course.  =]  It really was a lot of fun building and fixing but in all honesty, I'm glad to put it behind me.  I just realized the other day that I've been working on P-40Bs for the last 16 months.  I'm absolutely ready to move onto something simpler.  Something that almost builds itself... =D

Stunning....thanks for taking us along for the ride.  I'm going to dive into the Hasegawa P-40 E in the next couple of days.  Still trying to decide on a scheme...

Joe

Thanks Joe! You were right about the grass being a piece of cake to put together.  I just needed the right tools for the job.  =]  I know Osprey has a couple of books out that could point you in the right direction.  I always see some in my LHS, but I'm sure you could find one cheap on Ebay.  Looking forward to seeing what you come up with.  Now I'm finally ready to start that Dauntless.  lol.

Silver

The trumpeter 1:32 scale P-40B is perfect for you.

Silver:  I'm sorry, I'm just seeing this.  My email only just alerted me to it a moment ago but it's dated to yesterday.  Curious?   I've never attempted anything that monumental as of yet.  Mostly on account of space! =D  I have seen others out there that people have built and it looks enticing.  I'm sure I'd have an easier time adding the little extras I enjoy seeing come together.  Maybe one day...

Have you built it before?

Super cool, I love the weathered chipped off paint-off walk-on section of the wings.

Then again I can't say much bad about a P-40!

This is really an awesome build.  Thanks for sharing all of your upgrades to the kit!

Groot

Gamera

Super cool, I love the weathered chipped off paint-off walk-on section of the wings.

Then again I can't say much bad about a P-40!

Thanks y'all. =]  If I recall I believe it was GAF who mentioned the weathering as well, and I meant to say something about it.  I haven't really taken the time to comment about what I had in mind so I'll share a little here.  I didn't want a P-40 totally beaten to hell.  I did hope to include some of the characteristics of the OD Green paint that weathered and baked in the sun.  The colors varied in their weathering going into browns and some into greens.  So I taped off certain places like the cowl panels that would get removed and often laid down if not stacked on a cart.  I allowed these panels to appear a little lighter and towards the brown.  The same went for some places along the top of the spine of the fuselage.  I went over my insignia on the wing with extremely diluted Tamiya Buff to lighten up the color and I did the same to the top of the fuselage insignias too.  As for the wings, the riveted surface would get a little beaten up when walked over and it would collect sand and dust.  I left a big squared off spot on the left wing alone where mats would often go to protect the surface from tools when servicing the engine and such.  And for the paint scuffing and chipping...I kept it simple and limited it the wing roots for normal traffic. It's done by thinning down Tamiya Flat Aluminum with a fine brush and moving it around patterned after photos.  Tamiya Olive Drab was thinned and dabbed over this on a couple of spots where I felt it was needed   =]  A little oil spillage underneath and that about sums it up.