AIRCRAFT - Latinamerican Air Forces

Even if it's a bad picture, it shows some progress of my Draken.

cool ... thanks for the pics Mick! from what I can see it is looking good!!!!

I closed the fuselage on the P-47 tonight and begin working on the engine tomorrow... I am picking up a little momentum as this kit is soooo nice to build!!! (Tamiya's P-47 Bubbletop)

I have some pre pics of the cockpit before I finished -- here is one:

what colors did you use? nice work. I will use this as reference for when I build mine.

your P-47 or Draken?

I was talking about your 'pit Tom. But nice work on the draken to swedish mick. (I think. can't really see much)

Thanks! I will try to get better pictures next time ...

Tanky - on the interior I used MM Forest Green with a tiny drop of black, that got me the closest to the paint chip I could get... the brown is MM flat dark tan (harnesses and control stick boot) red acrylic for the nobs, a silver art pencil did all the IP and radio knob detail... I used the kit decal for the IP dials and actually it went down pretty good... this is the first one I have seen that I actually was somewhat satisfied how it looked...

I did a light wash of paynes grey and in some places added a light wash of burnt umber.. both water soluable oils...

--edit--

there are some knobs and levers not painted in the pic that got painted after I took it... all in all a very nice OOB cockpit! I plan on adding another of these to my list.. done in escuadron 201 colors as well.

I am donating the next one to an elementary library near me. The school is about 85% Mexican children from migrant families and none of them had heard the story of escuadron 201... I want to build another one with a pamphlet with their story in it for display in the library there...

ok ... the P-47 is nearing completion... I have the fuselage closed, the winges ready to cement on and the body sanded and ready to polish.. I should be able to prime it tomorrow and use the Alclad on sunday... after that I expect about a week of putting the exterior pieces on and I will be ready for decals next weekend...

This has been a very nice build, I really like this Tamiya P-47 Bubbletop kit!!! I'll try to take pre-painting pics tomorrow...

Great jobs, everyone!! I am getting kinda antsy for my stuff to get here from Japan. I bought a P-51 off Evilbay but it hasn't got to me, either. I hope Monday it will get to my shop so I can start something!! LOL - Calvin

I know the feeling Calvin - I hate waiting for things...

Well sprayed the Alclad black primer last night and it went on smooth as glass... I did notice a spot on one wing I need to touch up. I might even use the alclad gloss black primer as a subsitute for any gloss black subjects I am spraying... it look sbetter than ordinary enamel. I also bought the Alclad airbrush cleaner and I highly recommend it... it cuts through Alcladlike water! The inside of my pipette was black where I drew up the paint to put in the airbrush, when I drew up some of the airbrush cleaner into it the black just ran off the walls of it and settle into the tip. no shaking or anything to get it to dissolve like enamels and such. It's basically Acetone and toluene. Might see if I can make a home brewed batch of it one day as it was a bit expensive (like $5.00 for 3 ounces)

ok everything is all nice and black now... waiting on the primer to dry then I am hoping to have time to start with the alclad tomorrow... Unfortunately I went to the ultracast wite today and I did not realize the extent of resin available for the P-47, and had I realized this kit was as nice as it is I would have bought more resin as the Ultracast really sets things off...

As far as the stabilizer fillet, I found several photos of Es. 201 aircraft without them, taken in June 1945 so I am going to model this one as is... I will try to model it corrected on the next one which I will be making for the local elementary.

The mexican navy had a few of these up to the 80's. This is the Monogram Kit in 1/72 scale made OOB.

very nice SAWI!!

Well my P-47 is on hold... the alclad black laqcuer primer still feels a bit "sticky" although a lot dryer than the other day.. I think I sprayed it too think the second time. I will wait and see what tomorrow is like, I might even spray it anyway as I have a second P-47 kit, and extra Ultracast seat and the tires arent mounted yet. If the paint messes up I can always do a second one in time for the build.

This time I think I will use MM Gloss black like someone in another GB recommended to me... the Alclad primer seems to not want to dry in this humidity.

Nice pics, SAWI !! Not much to report here. I did get my household goods from Japan finally on Friday. And I've been up to my eyeballs (quite literally!) in boxes! LOL There's like 50 mid-sized boxes in my barracks room now. Hope there's no inspections anytime soon! - Calvin

Thanks to balta1, who has extended the building time in the Chinook GB, I can continue my work on the Cuban MiG-23 and other builds without feeling the panic.

The MiG-23 is now assembled and halfway painted. Thanks to the replacement services of Airfix, I have a new canopy, and thanks to Janne Holmqvist, I now has some Cuban decals and tailflags.

The Managuayan Draken is also under progress and undercarriage is to be attached next.

@ cote1995:
Is there a final building day decided? I don't seem to find it anywhere. If it is sometime in Sep-Oct put me down for a 1/72 Revell 4381 as a Saab 35GT Draken in FAV markings and camo scheme, circa 1971. It's a "Could have been" ...

I finished my last two P-47's mexican air force to join the trainner I showwed earlier; both are Hasegawa kits in 1/48 scale OOB, with Aztec decals.

Dear firends:

Thanks SAWI for the Mexican Navy and the P-47 pictures, there are very nice, and about the Swedish Mick comment on a final building day I dont kown, but any suggestions? Or maybe a time period, I mean six months or so? I dont want to say something becuase I dont have some much time for models, maybe three or four models a year is my production rate and I just use five or seven hours a week to modeling so I spend some months for a model, but if some want to add dates to this GB, please go ahead.

Best regards

Manuel

Manuel - I am fine with the dates as they are (none!) I am limited in my modeling time until this summer as well so I think it would work well for all of us. If we see we are coming to a point where we all might finish soon we can set a date. As there are only a few people I don't think this will cause a problem. Does anyone else feel different?

P.d. - I am almost ready to spray the P-47 with the Alclad. I used the Alclad black primer and it has taken several weeks until it doesnt feel "sticky" to the touch.. I used a 2000 girt sanepaper over it and will go back and polish it some more but now it feels ok.

Hopefully this weekend I will show some results!

Hi,
I think I could be tempted to do a Uruguayan Hellcat in 1/72. I'll hae to use spares box decals as I don't think this subject is covered, but I'd be delighted to stand corrected. When is the closing date for this GB ?
Cheers
Tony Mollica

Tony - as of yet there is no end date, as there are only a few of us and a lot of us are tied up with other GB's we decided it best to keep it open.

I'd love to see the Uruguyan Hellcat... (I dated a Uruguayan girl once... special connection) have you checked aztecmodels.com and decalscarpena.com? they both have a good selection of Latin American decals... if not for the specific plane I am sure you can find something comparable in scale and do the codes and such on your own...

Welcome!!!

I did have a look at Carpena and Aztec last night, but didn't see anything. Microscale had some national markings on a sheet for T-33s or something, which I have. I'll pinch them and source the codes from somewhere else, as the few photos I have don't show any particular decorative markings.
Cheers
Tony Mollica

I have included a link to some photos of Uruguayan Hellcats. I hope you find them interesting. I also have a few others. It's also got lots of other stuff re Uruguayan aviation.

http://www.pilotoviejo.com/

Cheers
Tony Mollica

Cool... thanks Tony!

Great link, Tony! I may do an Uruguayan T-33 w/ those nice reference pics! - Calvin

Calvin,
Superscale sheet 72-409 has decals for a Uruguayan T-33. I have it but I need to pinch the national insignia for my Hellcat.
Cheers

I've been contemplating doing a Colombian AT-6 and Colombian or Venezuelan Dragonfly lately. www.aztecmodels.com has the set for them both. My wife is from Colombia and her sister in law from Venezuela so I could do them for them!

Dear friends:

Let me show you: a real P-47 from the FAM's, a very nice color picture:



weel, is a 1/6 scale RC model airplane from my friend Jesus Castro from Tuczon, AZ, I hope do you liked.

Best regards

Manuel

thanks Manuel! I would love to see that in person. There was an airshow here in Texas a few weeks ago and an original member of the 201 escuadron was there. I was not able to make it but I would have loved to have been there and met him!!!!!

I will be working on my P-47 soon. Work is very busy and I am behind on my current kit of a Martlet Mk.III from the North African battles in WWII.

ok, I am back from the dead! Big news is as soon as I finish the FW-190 I am building I am starting on the SECOND P-47... the first I used the Alclad black primer on and it never cured correctly, well I think it finally did but the model is dusty now and I don't trust the primer.

I will prime this one with Model Master Gloss black or even Tamiya plastic primer as Alclad suggests...

I want to do this one for a classroom for recent immigrants at a school near here. I went there to fix a computer there recently and none of them, and none of their parents had heard of escuadron 201... I need to fix that!!! (not even the teacher had heard of them!!!)

Dear tho9900:

It's hard to beleived how so much people unknow his own history, in this case, the Mexican people have litlle know about his WWII heroes...Mexican historians like Santiago Flores, Mardonio Islas, the fine America Vuela magazine and so on, keep busy searching about the 201's Mexican pilots -and other aviation histories- to know more and more about the great Latinamerican pilots.

Thank you tho9900, because you are doing your contribution overseas from Mexico.

Best regards.

Manuel