F4U-1A Corsair by DocRob - FINISHED - Tamiya - 1/32

[DocRob]

Buenos dias señhoras y señhores, 

 

At the moment my Duchess of Kingston build is halted temporally due to having not enough coherent time for starting the rigging, this will be a winter job.

Much more, than I'm at home with building wooden ships, is plastic modelling to me, which I do a lot since re-entering the hobby maybe 15 years ago. This log was started at LSM too, where I'm at home for all purpose modelling since years, but wanted to share a log about a plastic kit here too.
 
I will bore you with another build of Tamiya's well famed Corsair. You think easy peasy, but no, having maybe the closest to perfection plastic kit at hands, I'm not allowed to fail here. Subpar kits are where you can shine, but with this one, it's expected. Being like it is, I just felt the urge to build another Corsair, after having built the Birdcage one as my first plane kit, re-entering the hobby, when it came out. 

I had so much fun with the F4U-1 by the time, that I knew, there had to be another. The Birdcage was enhanced with Brassin cockpit engine and wheels, lots of PE, SAC undercarriage and Maketar masks for the markings.
The F4U-1A will be mostly oob, with the exception of HGW belts, Brassin wheels and maybe a Yahu dashboard. I will use AK real colors and markings and stencils masked with 1ManArmy masks.
 

Cheers Rob

 

[DocRob]

Like with most of the airplane builds, everything starts with cockpit and engine, so I cleaned all the cockpit and tail section parts, prepared them for painting and got the first interior colors on. I used interior green from AK's Real Color range and added Tamiya LP semi gloss black. Now it's about detail painting all the tiny bits, knobs and levers.

I bought a Yahu IP, but will build up the kit version too and will compare, which one I will use.

I thought the magnifying effect of the clear part is a bit to strong and therefore sanded down the bulged front side of the clear parts with 2000, 4000 and 8000 grid sand paper.
 

 

And then used the Tamiya polishing pastes to get the glass nice and shiny. After painting the IP itself, I will show you the comparison between this and the Yahu IP.

 

 

Cheers Rob

 

[DocRob]

You have to hand it to Tamiya, the breakdown of the complicate cockpit is a masterpiece and I don't know, why I used the Brassin substitute on my last Corsair build. This incarnation is well detailed and broke down, that it's easy to paint.
 

That's exactly what I did, painting. All the cockpit parts were sprayed in their base colors, mainly AK's interior green and Tamiya's LP semi gloss black and then detail painted, mostly by brush. There are tons of little knobs and switches, where my sable brushes worked very well. All black parts received a treatment with iron pigment, applied with a large dry brush and then rubbed with pigments on the fingers, followed be AK dark aluminum True wax, applied with a toothpick for a light chipping.
 

The IP looks now like this and I will use my painted one, because it integrates better and I found no yellow bezels on my reference pics. Sanding and polishing the clear part, helped to reduce the magnifying effect to an acceptable level. Below is the Yahu IP for comparison.
 

 

 

Parts airbrushed in interior green got a brown panel liner treatment, followed by highlighting with a brush and then some of Uschi van der Rosten's iron pigments. Again the last step was to apply some scratches and tear with True Metal wax, rubbed in by hand or cotton swab.

 

 

On to the consoles with lots of masking and then detail painting, These multi part affairs are designed utterly genius by Tamiya.

 

 

 

Cheers Rob

 

[DocRob]

The cockpit is almost ready with only the leather headrest and messenger bag to add and of course the HGW seatbelts. Everything fits into the fuselage, where I had to do a lot of grinding with my last Corsair and the Brassin cockpit. With the supplied detail, there is no real need for resin substitutes. I'm actually considering, adding some lead wire, but I have to check how much can be seen afterwards.

 

 

 

 

Cheers Rob

[yvesvidal]

Superb. 

[Old Collingwood]

So much detail  - and  like Yves   said   - Superb.

 

OC.

[DocRob]

4 hours ago, yvesvidal said:

Superb.

 

1 hour ago, Old Collingwood said:

So much detail  - and  like Yves   said   - Superb.

Thank you gentlemen, the detail is all there, provided by Tamiya, and it needs only a little care with a sable brush and toothpick to bring to live. The Corsair is one of these mojo restore kits, complex, but so well engineered, it's a pleasure to work on.

The build is only secondary to me with this project, it's about painting and weathering. I want to learn new stuff through all my builds, some I start only for learning new techniques. With the Corsair, it's about achieving a blended in look with markings and stencils painted and to achieve a worn but not wrecked look.

 

Cheers Rob

[ccoyle]

44 minutes ago, DocRob said:

it's about painting and weathering

 

Which looks great so far!

[king derelict]

That cockpit is absolutely beautiful

Alan

[DocRob]

12 hours ago, ccoyle said:

Which looks great so far!

 

8 hours ago, king derelict said:

That cockpit is absolutely beautiful

 

Thank you Chris and Allan, this part of the build is routine, only creating the canvas for the painting stage, but it's fun anyway, having such a great kit at hand. It's the first time, I build a similar kit twice, albeit there is more than a decade between the two.

 

Cheers Rob

[Egilman]

It certainly puts the older kits to shame... Looks like it just falls together...

 

A Marine Corps corsair, (the dirty ones) any particular pilot?

[DocRob]

23 minutes ago, Egilman said:

It certainly puts the older kits to shame... Looks like it just falls together...

 

A Marine Corps corsair, (the dirty ones) any particular pilot?

I'm a bit limited with the choice of plane by my urge to try out the 1ManArmy masks for markings and stencils. There are only three planes provided in the set. Mine will depict Pappy Boyington's VMF-214 F4U-1A #883. As I understand, it was a shared plane with him being one of the pilots.
Some of the original photos show a well worn Corsair and some even sport battle damage.
I'm not so much a rivet counter. When I start a project, I mostly have a detailed fixed picture in my head, pre-showing the end result. That's what I'm going for. 

 

Cheers Rob

[DocRob]

I finished the other side of the tub. The HGW belts were a bit fiddly, but nowhere near the Luftwaffe seat belts. Like always, I assembled the parts with the buckles still on the PE fret. The decal silvered and there was nothing I could do about it. Luckily I use masks for the stencils .

 

Cheers Rob

 

 

[DocRob]

I closed the fuselage, after inserting the finalized cockpit and rear framing. For better alignment of the front structural parts, I glued them to one side of the fuselage and dry fitted the other half and let the glue cure over night, perfect alignment.
I know, the headrest should be black, but I preferred brown, at least for the moment.

 

 

Cheers Rob

[DocRob]

I cleaned all the engine and exhaust parts and try to figure how to paint them best. there will be a lot of masking necessary. I built the Brassin engine many moons ago and there were single cylinders to add to the core. I would have preferred that from the Tamiya kit too. I also noticed, that Tamiya skipped the black metal fairings around the cylinders, which can be seen on the pic of the real thing. The Brassin engine had the fairings present.
I'm planning to add ignition wiring and spark plugs from Anyz.

Generally, I tend to build the Corsair with one wing folded and the other in flight position, what do you think about that?
 

Cheers Rob
 

All is unglued, it's only a mockup picture. Level of detail is great for a non-resin engine.

 

 

Here is the real thing with the black fairings visible.

 

 

 

[DocRob]

Still in checking mode . I like to be prepared, when it comes to detailing, so I made a test with the Anyz spark plug and Anyz braided line. The thread is a bit on the thick side and the plugs seem a bit oversized too, but I may use them anyway, as many pictures of the real thing show the braided ignition wiring in rust color.
The butt ends of the resin spark plugs have a diameter of 1mm, too big to drill into the spots onto the cylinders, so I cut it flush and glued it on with CA.

 

Cheers Rob

 

[Edwardkenway]

I got to follow, it makes the 1/32 revell kit I'm working on look very basic😁😊.

It's  looking amazing so far. 

[Egilman]

45 minutes ago, DocRob said:

I cleaned all the engine and exhaust parts and try to figure how to paint them best. there will be a lot of masking necessary. I built the Brassin engine many moons ago and there were single cylinders to add to the core. I would have preferred that from the Tamiya kit too. I also noticed, that Tamiya skipped the black metal fairings around the cylinders, which can be seen on the pic of the real thing. The Brassin engine had the fairings present.
I'm planning to add ignition wiring and spark plugs from Anyz.

Generally, I tend to build the Corsair with one wing folded and the other in flight position, what do you think about that?
 

Cheers Rob
 

All is unglued, it's only a mockup picture. Level of detail is great for a non-resin engine.

Your adding 36 sparkplugs to the engine? that's a seldom seen level of detail my friend... MAD SKILLZ!!! (each cylinder had 2 sparkplugs) so yes the thread for the plug wires are 2x too large... The air ducting around the cylinders is a nice touch shame it's not there as well... Good looking casting though, maybe they thought the ducts were too much....

 

As far as the wings? the only time they were folded is when they were on a carrier deck either being spotted after landing or just before launch.... Marine birds on a land base were never folded....

The whole one wing up and one out is a modelers presentation, I imagine to show the detail of the fold mechanism and preserve space in a display... VMF units on a carrier would have the benefit of the Navy's hanger deck personnel and procedures, they would never be allowed to get grungy.... The Marines on Guadalcanal, their first corsairs were hand me downs from the Navy after the Navy decided they weren't good carrier aircraft... (too difficult to successfully land consistently, it was actually the British in 1944 who devised a landing pattern to allow the Corsair to successfully land on a carrier deck consistently) The US Navy changed their landing ops approach  patterns after being advised by the Royal Navy on it, it became a great carrier based aircraft after that...

 

On a carrier deck they were always folded, on land, never folded.... The wing folding mechanism was compound, when activated, both sides folded at the same time.... You would never see one up and one down on a real aircraft...

 

Not being a rivet counter brother, just advising on the actual practice... One up/one down is a good presentation for limited space displays... Go with it if the muse tells you to.... It won't detract at all from the build..

Edited October 27, 2022 by Egilman

[Egilman]

33 minutes ago, Edwardkenway said:

I got to follow, it makes the 1/32 revell kit I'm working on look very basic😁😊.

It's  looking amazing so far. 

Oh yeah, the Revell kit requires a lot of work to bring it up to today's offerings... You can buy a dozen old revell corsairs for the price of the required aftermarket.....

[DocRob]

14 hours ago, Egilman said:

Your adding 36 sparkplugs to the engine? that's a seldom seen level of detail my friend... MAD SKILLZ!!! (each cylinder had 2 sparkplugs) so yes the thread for the plug wires are 2x too large... The air ducting around the cylinders is a nice touch shame it's not there as well... Good looking casting though, maybe they thought the ducts were too much....

 

As far as the wings? the only time they were folded is when they were on a carrier deck either being spotted after landing or just before launch.... Marine birds on a land base were never folded....

The whole one wing up and one out is a modelers presentation, I imagine to show the detail of the fold mechanism and preserve space in a display... VMF units on a carrier would have the benefit of the Navy's hanger deck personnel and procedures, they would never be allowed to get grungy.... The Marines on Guadalcanal, their first corsairs were hand me downs from the Navy after the Navy decided they weren't good carrier aircraft... (too difficult to successfully land consistently, it was actually the British in 1944 who devised a landing pattern to allow the Corsair to successfully land on a carrier deck consistently) The US Navy changed their landing ops approach  patterns after being advised by the Royal Navy on it, it became a great carrier based aircraft after that...

 

On a carrier deck they were always folded, on land, never folded.... The wing folding mechanism was compound, when activated, both sides folded at the same time.... You would never see one up and one down on a real aircraft...

 

Not being a rivet counter brother, just advising on the actual practice... One up/one down is a good presentation for limited space displays... Go with it if the muse tells you to.... It won't detract at all from the build..

Thank you for your detailed informations Egilman,
luckily I'm only quarter mad as I plan to apply the nine spark plugs for the front cylinders front and the wiring for the back side. The plane will be build with closed cowlings, so only the front of the engine will remain visible.
When I built the Birdcage Corsair almost 15 years ago, I used the very detailed Brassin engine with added wiring and planned to have removable cowlings. I tried three different versions of cowlings, the kit ones , resin ones from the Brassin set and some made from Eduard PE, soldered together. All three attempts failed with easy and secure dismountability. A lot of time and effort were wasted and finally I glued the cowlings on.

I did not know, that the wings couldn't be folded separately. I may not be a rivet counter, but that information puts my plans on a stop. I considered folded up for a moment, but yes, these birds mainly operated from land bases, so it will be wings in flying position. 
I may have to build another Corsair, maybe a 1D version with folded wings and overall gloss sea blue, which will be a challenge to weather.

I knew, that the British were the first to develop a more or less save procedure to land early Corsairs on carriers. These Birdcage Corsairs had long Landing gear struts, which tended to hop while touching ground and the cockpit position was low and way back in the fuselage.
They were approaching the carrier in a tight curve, to maintain eyesight as long as possible.
The F4U-1A was modified in different aspects to make carrier landings easier. Most prominent is the raising of the pilots position by 8 inches.

 

Cheers Rob

[Canute]

Rob, nice work with your Corsair.👍  I'm a big fan of bent-wing birds. EG is an excellent source and has a little experience building models. 😉

[DocRob]

15 minutes ago, Canute said:

Rob, nice work with your Corsair.👍  I'm a big fan of bent-wing birds. EG is an excellent source and has a little experience building models. 😉

Thank you Ken, I start to notice the expertise of EG, which is very welcome. The Corsair is one of my favorites too, one of the reasons, it's the second I build, albeit I normally detest redundance.

 

Cheers Rob

[Danstream]

Great work on painting the cockpit,

greetings,

Dan

[DocRob]

4 hours ago, Danstream said:

Great work on painting the cockpit,

 

Thank you Dan, meanwhile I finalized the last preparations, before painting the engine. I glued on the spark plugs, cut flush from the resin sprue and added the oil? tubing on the top front of each cylinder. These are made from folded pe, which were left from my Corsair build 15 years ago. To let them appear more tube like, I applied CA glue with a toothpick to the folded front sides, to prevent a visible gap.

 

 

 

Cheers Rob

[Canute]

Detailing is coming along nicely, Rob. 👍

[Egilman]

On 10/28/2022 at 2:06 AM, DocRob said:

Thank you for your detailed informations Egilman,

My pleasure Rob, You'll find that what info on models and modeling we have around here is freely shared, it's the best modeling site on the net...

On 10/28/2022 at 5:58 AM, Canute said:

Rob, nice work with your Corsair.👍  I'm a big fan of bent-wing birds. EG is an excellent source and has a little experience building models. 😉

Thanks Ken....

On 10/28/2022 at 6:16 AM, DocRob said:

Thank you Ken, I start to notice the expertise of EG, which is very welcome. The Corsair is one of my favorites too, one of the reasons, it's the second I build, albeit I normally detest redundance.

 

Cheers Rob

Thank you brother, I have a 1/32 Revell in the stash as well, still in that brittle blue styrene... (ancient) it is a beautiful airplane as well... Like a Phantom II, you can't build just one....

 

One more piece of info, the interior color on the 1's and 1A's was salmon, the cockpit was interior green, but the rest was pink... Except for the inside of the Gear Doors, they were shiny white, the navy didn't start painting the wheel well interiors white until late late '43, early '44 so for an early 1A Guadalcanal build, the wheel wells & cowl interiors would be salmon colored... There's pics up on the site here in Edwards build showing it...

Edited October 29, 2022 by Egilman

[DocRob]

21 hours ago, Canute said:

Detailing is coming along nicely, Rob. 👍

Thank you Ken, it's a lot of fun detailing these Corsair kits. no shaky resin and unfitting PE needed. There are some areas which profit from a bit extra effort, but oob you can achieve a great result.

 

Cheers Rob 

[DocRob]

20 hours ago, Egilman said:

My pleasure Rob, You'll find that what info on models and modeling we have around here is freely shared, it's the best modeling site on the net...

Thank you Egilman, as a long time member at Large Scale Modeler, I really like both sides. Lots of expertise and friendly members around here and there.

 

20 hours ago, Egilman said:

Thank you brother, I have a 1/32 Revell in the stash as well, still in that brittle blue styrene... (ancient) it is a beautiful airplane as well... Like a Phantom II, you can't build just one....

 

One more piece of info, the interior color on the 1's and 1A's was salmon, the cockpit was interior green, but the rest was pink... Except for the inside of the Gear Doors, they were shiny white, the navy didn't start painting the wheel well interiors white until late late '43, early '44 so for an early 1A Guadalcanal build, the wheel wells & cowl interiors would be salmon colored... There's pics up on the site here in Edwards build showing it...

 
Uh oh, the Revell kit. The good thing about it, if you manage to build a masterpiece out of this one everybody is applauding. Working on the great Tamiya kit makes success inevitable .

 

Thanks for mentioning the salmon thing, I feared it . I have to dig a little deeper into that, but I'm willing to conclude with a non-salmon result at all cost. In fact, the rear inside of the fuselage was painted interior green by me and I will not change that. It's not too late for the wheel wells though.

I will read the mentioned thread by Edwardkenway, right?

 

Cheers Rob 

[DocRob]

I continued with engine painting and assembly. 
All metallic tones are from AK's Extreme Metallic range, matte aluminum for the cylinders, polished aluminum for the ignition ring, stainless steel for the propeller shaft.
The only exception is Alclads Exhaust manifold, which was used exactly for these parts. It's my go to base for prop plane exhausts.
The black fairings were sprayed with Tamiya's semi-gloss lacquer black and then rubbed with steel pigments from Uschi van der Rosten by hand. The same treatment received the gear casing, which was sprayed gray and then got some pigments rubbed in, which enhances the casting appearance. Details like nuts and bolts and spark plugs were picked up by brush, using different LP metallic colors, black and racing white.
 

The first pic shows the usefulness of panel liner, left side with, right side without.




And this is where I am now. I'm still undecided, whether I use the braided line, which on top of the size issues darkens through sucking the CA up. Maybe I switch to lead wire. 

 

 

 

 

Cheers Rob

 

[Edwardkenway]

8 minutes ago, DocRob said:

It's not too late for the wheel wells though.

Yep, that's what I'm going to do, I'd already painted all interior green but, same as you, will repaint the wheel wells.

Your engine looks superb btw

 

 

Edited October 30, 2022 by Edwardkenway