The Official F4U Corsair Group Build 4/01/08 - rolling end date

Gigatron wrote:

Does anyone have any color pictures of an open gunbay?  All the pics I've seen, are in black and white.

hey!  I can help with this one.  Here's a couple of pics I scanned from a book of mine.  They're not the best quality due to my ancient scanner, but they're that I have.  HTH!

Does anyone have any color pictures of an open gunbay?  All the pics I've seen, are in black and white.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Fred

Jeaton -- I was most interested to read that you scored the flaps free to pose them on the Tamiya kit, as I'm faced with something similar on the Hobbycraft -1D.

The kit comes with two sets of flaps, one raised, one dropped, but the kit is engineered to use the dropped flaps. To fit the raised ones needs some plastic surgery to the locating tabs. So, where's the problem? The raised flaps are provided with surface detail, recessed panel lines and raised stiffening ribs. The dropped flaps are completely smooth! Why can't anything ever be easy?!

Well, I can scribe the missing lines, but the ribs would call for half-round microrod at about .010" diameter, and I don't know if anybody even makes it that small (I can check Plastruct and Evergreen), plus I just had to buy two Plastruct packs for missing details on my Tiger. GRRR.

The other option is to use the detailed flaps, cut them apart and then modify them to fit the locator tabs for the dropped flap option, which would mean building the rounded forward side of the flaps from styrene, including the notch to match the tabs... Oh, fun! But possibly less fiddly than the alternative.

Any thoughts on color for the normally-hidden portion of the flaps? In the 50s the Navy was using dark red for hidden areas, like airbrake bays, but a 1969 photo of Ferdinand Soto's plane, Honduras's last combat Corsair (a -5), shows no color change on the flap edges at all. The plane was also in an advanced state of weathering, with control surfaces swapped in from other planes, so she was a patchwork quilt of finishes (sounds like a great subject to add to my 'Football War' lineup!)

Cheers,

TB379

Great looking bird, John.  A nice clean build, with some great paint.  A little too clean for my preferences, but that's just personal taste.

Greg, I'm building the tammy -1D.  The instructions say to paint over the window in exterior color.  What I'm doing is a little bit different, though.  I dipped the glass in blue-tinted Future.  Then I used a little bit of dark sea blue (my final color) and painted a little bit over the glass.  What I'm going for is an early -1D that had the window, but then specs called for it to be painted over.  It'll look like a field-applied paintjob (I hope ).

-Fred

gzt wrote:

I can see John's Corsair picts. Question for the experts of FAA Corsairs. I am building a Mk II and techmod decals show no bottom "window". Is it simply a clear part painted over or should I use a different approach ?

I must admit that I have little knowledge of Royal Corsairs.  However, I do know that early Corsairs, bird-cage and some -1A's, were built with underfusalage windows to aid with bombing.  It was quickly realized that these windows were worthless and they were simply painted over in squadron use.  I believe the windows were history before the -1D made its debut, but I could be wrong about that. 

If you can't find the appropriate reference pics, it would be a good assumption that the window was there, but painted over. 

Semper Fi,

Chris   

Ahhh, there they are!

Great finish, John. Came out really well!

Hmmm. For some reason I can't see John's pics...are they still showing up for everyone else?

Still plugging away on my bird - hope to fire some paint tonight or tomorrow.

Great work John,

Congradulations. 

The overall colors look great, especially with the borders between colors.  The relaxed elevators look great, and I love the look of the engine.

Semper Fi,

Chris

kbuzz01 wrote:

Great job, John!!    The paint scheme is outstanding and not "overweathered."  Did you cut out the elevators or did the kit come that way? Ken

Thanks for all the nice comments, guys.   It's appreciated.  Made me brave (or silly) enough to start today on another corrugated beast, the Junkers G-38.

The elevators are molded together on the kit, but the plastic is soft enough and the lines are well enough defined to make it fairly easy to separate them by dragging a new #11 blade backwards down the separation areas until they separate.  Takes some care where the fore and aft line is, but there is always superglue or Milliput for goofs.  I got lucky on this one and just had to sand the contours as needed. 

Great job, John!!    The paint scheme is outstanding and not "overweathered."  Did you cut out the elevators or did the kit come that way?

Ken 

Jeaton -- very nice build! I must have one like it some day, I hope to have a whole line of Corsairs, just like for Spits and Mustangs and Bf 109s and Phantoms...

Richie -- I shot over 700 frames at Avalon '97, I used to work with two Pentax K1000 round my neck, one with slide, one with print, one with a zoom lens, the other for close-ups, both with polarisers. Ah, the pre-digital days...

TB379

Another nice build John !  Nice pictures showing this great build ! I like the way you present them.

Mike I have some pics of Avalon '07.

John that looks perfect mate!!!!! The color looks just right!!!! Don't know about what you said about the gear color but, the whole enchilada is near perfection!!!! AWESOME!!! WELL DONE!!!

Cheers, Richie

This one can be called complete, I guess, though it seems like nothing I build ever really feels completely complete.  Don't copy my landing gear color, I think it should be a dull silver.  Maybe I'll fix that later by rubbing some silver over most of the white.  The step on the left flap was filled, -1 (all before the -1A) didn't have a step in the flap.  However, it seems that on -1Ato -1D Corsairs the flap on the right should have the step, not the left one, unless all my photos are reversed.  I also removed the little fairings from the tail wheel doors that are behind the opening for the tailwheel, that's another -1 specific change and Tamiya's instructions don't mention that.  I did a little wear and weathering with aluminum powder and Tamiya smoke, but not too much.  The decals went down nicely and there was only one major scare.  When I put Micro Sol on the insignia they wrinkled up like my face looks in harsh morning light.  After 4 or 5 hours they went down and snuggled in very nicely.  Surprised me, as I've always heard that Tamiya decals were resistant to the stuff.  Maybe it was the warm day or something. 

Oh, how I'd have loved to be there...! I was a photographer at Avalon '97-'05, and just wallowed in the rumble of Merlins and the thunder of jets. Missed the last event, still hoping to be there next year.

Cheers,

TB379

I have heard the Wasp Majors at full throttle at Reno in '85. Dreadnoght and the Super-Corsair were duelling it out at over 450 mph!!!! A most awesome display of horsepower!!!

Cheers, Richie

Hi ridleusmc,

Future isn't pat of the S C Johnson range here -- there was something said about a similar product here a while back, but the Johnson website for Australia listed no floor glossing products at all, as of a few months ago. "Kleer" is the UK name for Future, I might be able to source some from there...

Thanks for the link, that's a fabulous photo resource, I LOVE the Super Corsairs! I've been fascinated by them ever since I first heard a Wasp Major had been grafted to the bent-wing bird!

Cheers,

TB379

Thank you very much ridle!!!! That slide show is great on the link!!!!!

Cheers, Richie 

I have no idea what One-Go is, and I agree with you about rattle cans.  I tried finding the Australian name of Future in my back issues of FSM.  I'm sure I saw it in the magazine somewhere, but I just couldn't find it.  

I did find something cool over on the aircraft forum posted by oscarduece.  The website has a cool photo section showing Goodyear Corsairs under construction in Akron, OH during WWII.  

http://www.wingsoverakron.org/photos.html 

It's a good thing for Corsair fans.

Semper Fi,

Chris 

G'day, Richie cobber!

One-Go is something similar to Future, isn't it? I've not spotted any floor polish at all on shelves in Adelaide yet, and all I get is static from Johnsons when I bug them about bringing in Future!

Just my personal preference, but I've never trusted rattlecans, it's a question of control. I always feel I'll wreck an AB finish with frosty thin bits here and drippy globs there, so I've always gravitated to something I can put through the AB for precision -- not that I've ever got up the guts to try it very often...

I like the technique outlined a few posts back, using a flat coat for body then misting on a dilute glosscoat of the same colour to achieve lustre. I must try that!

Cheers,

TB379/Mike

You guys are right.  My decals have silvered because the surface was irregular.  I have a Testors "Blue Max" AB compressor without a regulator.  I believe the pressure is pretty high, and to high for Future.  Little particles of Future dry before it hits the model.  I no longer need an excuse to get a better AB compressor.  

Semper Fi,

Chris 

Thunderbolt379 wrote:

... We can't get Future in this backward land, either!

T,bolt I've used the 'Long Life' self shining floor polish on my Stringbag I'm doing at the moment. Works quite well, however, I've noticed it has a slight yellowing and microscopic cracking. A mate of mine uses 'Pledge One Go' and says it works quite well. When I was visiting mum and dad in the states I was going to get some future and #^##$@#! forgot. Whilst I was living at home I always used testors glosscote and dullcote in rattlecans. Never had any problems with them. Hope that helps some. Live in just outside of Geelong btw.

Cheers, Richie

Chris:

What I do to get a high gloss finish is to put on a color coat, then sand it with a fine sandpaper to get rid of any embedded dust and other imperfections.  I don't try to get a high gloss finish when spraying the color coats, I find that leads to too much paint being applied.  When I'm satisfied, which may be after touching up a few spots, I apply a highly thinned coat of the gloss finish, and that will lay down nicely, so you will have very little orange peel or surface roughness.  Just get the light right and put only enough of the last coat on to see the gloss appear.  If the gloss doesn't appear while you are spraying, it won't be there later either.  I don't find this process so necessary with flat paints, but that's the way I do it with gloss finishes.  If I'm trying to end up with a gloss white, I usually put on flat white for the color coats because it applies much easier and covers better, then use gloss white for only the final gloss coat.  I give the thin gloss coat at least two days to cure hard in most cases before any more work.  If I am patient enough.

Hi ridleusmc,

The silvering may be the result of the underlying paint finish -- the surface isn't a very high gloss, and most decals specify these days they work best on a hard gloss.  That said, I was amazed that the Echelon decals I just used on a StuG III, printed by Microscale, went on with no argument at all over a matt finish, and didn't silver in the process!

A technique I've used to bring up the finish (a proper polishing kit isn't available down here in Stone Age Australia) is to use automotive 2000-grit sandpaper, lubricated with pure liquid soap, and gently buff the surface. Of course, surface projections give you dead spots in the gloss and lose paint off themselves, so it's not perfect by any means. But it creates islands of higher gloss where decals can go, followed by a clearcoat to obtain an overall lustre. Clearcoat? Ahem! I guess I'll have to actually use one, one day... We can't get Future in this backward land, either!

Cheers,

TB379