She’s all done. I’m quite happy with how she turned out. My original goal was to build this completely in three weeks.  Well, it took 7 weeks and 1 day, but considering I had a week in Los Angeles and Las Vegas in there, and some other work commitments, I’m happy with the turn-around time.  I haven’t built a model this fast since I was in high school! Continue reading →

I’m at my favorite part of a build with the Corsair: the last minute touches and weathering that make everything come alive. I’ve been at it most of the day today, swapping between airbrushes — one set up to spray acrylic, the other to spray lacquer — and jumping back and forth between final items as they present themselves. For instance, I have photos below of masking and painting the lower colored ID lights. I finished those, only to remember that I also needed to do the wingtip formation lights in the same manner, so I went back to masking and shooting the base silver coat and then the clear red and green paint on top of that.

As I work on the propeller, I dug through my paint supplies and found out that I have absolutely no model paints in insignia yellow, for the blade tips. I have some artists acrylic tube paints that have a close match, so I guess I’ll try my luck at thinning that stuff and shooting it through an airbrush.

The next steps are to put on the landing gear and associated doors, do some dry brushing to bring out some details, any final clear coats, rig the radio antenna, and then call her done. This is the final build post, the next time I show this model she’ll be done and ready to go.

I’ve been away for the past couple of week; a trip to Los Angeles and Las Vegas ate up some of the time, writing figured in as a heavy time drain, and building a new website for a client took the rest. But now, back to the build.

Because I just can’t make things easy on myself, I decided to not use decals for the markings on this bird, but rather to paint them. Actually, the decision wasn’t based solely on making my life more difficult. Markings that are painted on look, well, painted on, like the real ones. The paint is thinner than decals, there’s no clear film around the edges of the markings, and it’s easier to weather them.

The photos below tell the process. Hover over each one to read the description, and then click on it to see the full-sized picture.

At this point I’m done with painting. Next is a clear coat so I can weather and apply the few decals I will use (the nose art and the three-digit numbers on the fuselage), and then it’s final assembly time.

I’m building this as a Marine Corps bird. Before, and during the early parts of, WWII, Marine squadrons would be made up of old aircraft that the Navy had already used to death, or aircraft that the Navy didn’t want. After the Corsair had difficulties with carrier qualifications — stiff landing gear, bad visibility over the nose, and it’s just a HUGE aircraft — they sent them on to the Jar Heads. The aircraft’s issues didn’t affect shore-based use at all, and the Marines proved them to be such an excellent plane that the Navy resolved the carrier handling issues and eventually began to ship Corsair squadrons on carriers.

This model is painted in a two-tone scheme. The specific aircraft is “Marine’s Dream” named after the nose art that will be on the cowling. The colors are US Navy Blue Gray, and Light Ghost Gray. The more I think about it, the less sure I am about that gray color, but it looks okay in person, so I’m sticking with it. I used Model Masters Acrylic paint. I sprayed the Gray Continue reading →