Chinese Nationalist Mustang: Part II

In my last posting about this Mustang I had gotten it ready for painting.

The Chinese Nationalist Air Force kept their Mustangs in its original natural metal finish and if it wasn’t for their national markings the Mustangs would look pretty identical to USAF aircraft.

Until this project I’d never applied a metal finish to an aircraft and I was apprehensive about doing so because I’ve read, in many places, that metal finishes show up every little flaw and scratch. I was also unsure how a metal finish would apply by hand but it turns out that it is actually rather easy.

I don’t have a lot of in progress pictures to be honest but here is the Mustang painted with a gloss coat applied. I’ll start with some of the building details first though. Between the grey shell of a Mustang from the last update to this Mustang I’ll added all three, the propeller and the exhausts.

The exhausts are probably the worst feature of this kit, they’ve got really awkward seam lines that are almost impossible to remove. I did try but I pulled off a pipe in the process and just left them as is. The exhausts are painted in Vallejo Gunmetal Grey and washed with Citadel Badab Black to darken them up. The six .50 calibre machine guns are painted the same way.  

 
The propellers and nosecone were all painted separately, you’ll notice from the last update that a section of the nosecone was already fitted to the fuselage. I painted both that section and the cone section with Revell Aluminium and painted over it with Vallejo Flat Red. The reason I did this is because I’ve assumed this is how it was done on the real aircraft and it gives a slight metallic look to the red.

The propeller blades were painted with Revell Tar Black and then the propeller assembly was closed up. The fit of the cone wasn’t perfect to be honest and I painted in some thinned PVA glue to try close up the gaps. With that done I took out a pot of Revell Yellow and free-handed the yellow tips on very carefully. They turned out quite well to be honest.

 
The canopy came together perfectly. I started with the windshield painting it first in Revell Aluminium and then painting on Vallejo Black Grey which is the same colour as the nose stripe. The nose stripe took a bit of work to get right as I wanted to get lines straight. I followed a panel line to do and although I had to touch it up several times it came together pretty well.

The rear canopy received several coats of Aluminium and was fitted onto the fuselage once the gloss coat went down. Originally I wanted to pose the canopy open but it was too wide the further I took it back so I left it closed.

The wheels caused me no problems whatsoever although I wonder if the tail wheel is sitting to low as the tail is a incredibly close to the ground. I painted the strut with a mixture of Aluminium and Gunmetal Grey to give a bit of colour variation although it isn’t much of a variation looking at it now. The centre of the wheels was painted with the same mixture. The tyres were given a couple of coats of Revell Anthracite which is a nice shade of off-black good for tyres and such.

The entire Mustang was painted with Revell Aluminium over Halfords Grey. The trick to painting a metal coat by hand is to do at least two coats. The first coat should be painted in the direction of nose to tail and will look streaky at first. The second coat should be painted in the opposite direction, tail to nose, this should eliminate the streaks but if it doesn’t you can always apply more coats repeating the directions.

Using a wide flat brush is also advisable as it’ll help spread the paint better and avoid lines forming in the wet paint. I found that Revell Aluminium is pretty thin from the pot but always best to test out your paint first, especially when hand painting.

With the painting finished and the gloss coat applied I moved onto the decaling and then the weathering. Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures between the clean decaled Mustang and the weathered finish so I’ll just continue on with the pictures and talk about both.

The decals are from a Taiwanese company called PMA and they’re very nice but a little thick. The roundels were especially thick and unfortunately out of register, each one had a slight white rim at the bottom. The decals are available from here from Luckymodel by the way.

Here are some of those decals at work. Now I made a big mistake with ‘069’ because when I was applying another decal my finger landed right on this one, pulled it off and crumpled it. I spent ten panicked minutes fixing it and fitting it back in place and a lot longer trying to get it to smooth out and not look so damaged. It came out alright in the end but I was kicking myself for the mistake.

I’ve no idea what the two decals under the cockpit say but I really like them. They went on without any problems and bring the aircraft to life. I just had to make sure I was placing them the right side up as it isn’t easy to tell and I didn’t want someone coming up to me someday and telling me they were all messed up.

This Mustang also marks the first time I’ve used aftermarket weathering sets. After all of the decals had been applied and glossed I broke out a bottle of Flory Models (previously known as Promodellers) wash, in this case ‘Dark Dirt’ and gave the entire aircraft a wash in it. I let it set for twenty minutes and then I took out a tissue, licked it, and in a circular motion I began gently rubbing some of the wash away so that it would be pulled into the panel lines. Finally I rubbed the tissue in the direction of airflow to get some streaks going. I reckon the intense nature of the Chinese Civil War and rapid loss of territory for the Nationalists would have lead to a dirty aircraft.

The dirty exhausts were achieved with two Tamiya Weathering Kits; B which includes Snow, Soot and Rust and D which includes Burnt Red, Burnt Blue and Oil Stain. In order to achieve a good stain with colour variation around the exhaust I first applied a mixture of Rust and Burnt Red, followed by Oil Stain and then Soot. I’m really happy with how it turned out and the Tamiya Weathering Kits are really easy to work with as is the Flory Models Wash, I’d recommend both to anyone wishing to improve their weathering.

The streaks of gun smoke were achieved with Soot and applied both above and below the wing. For the ‘069’ and for all of the roundels I had to apply multiple coats of Vallejo’s decal softener in order to get them to bed down into the panel lines. It worked with the ‘069’ but the roundels were very resistant. Whilst all this was going on I was working on the external fuel tanks separately. PMA provide decals for both the 75 gallon and the 100 gallon fuel tanks that Mustangs can carry which is a nice touch.

The decal set also provides several different number codes for the nose with matching codes for the tail. The painting guide that comes with the decal set shows the tail with blue and white stripes along its ribbed self. I tried about three times to paint in the stripes using the ribbing on the tail as a guide but it involved too many straight lines and white is never easy to work with. Instead I just did a split colour tail with Revell White and Vallejo Blue.

I mentioned the thick roundels were out of register with a white rim on the bottom of each. Delicately I painted over the the rim with Aluminium with a flat brush to try and hide them and it has worked for the most part. The picture above is also a good indication of how effective a Flory Models was is at highlighting panel lines and rivets.

The wing roundels caused me a bit of trouble because, following the decal and painting guide of the decal set, their placement overlapped two protrusions from the wing. I wish I could tell you what do protrusion are for but I’m clueless. In order to get the decals to fit over them I brushed on several coats of Vallejo decal softener and then, very carefully, with a pair of tweezers and a craft knife I cut a notch of decal out around the protrusion. It worked but one of the roundels slipped in the process which is why they’re not even on both sides of the wing. As long as the aircraft was operational I don’t think the Nationalists would’ve minded though.

I should say that all of the decals, including those black and red circles, came from the aftermarket decal set. I didn’t use the kit decals at all.

Academy provide you the option of positioning the flaps and I wanted to position them down. I added them after the weathering had been finished so they were painted and weathered separately to the rest of the Mustang. Little bit of a wrestle getting them into place but the finished model wouldn’t have look as good without them.

So there it is, one P-51D Mustang of the Chinese Nationalist Air Force and the best model I’ve finished to date. I’m very happy with the metal finish and exceptionally happy with the weathering.

I’m hopefully going to enter this into a few competitions next year and see how it does. In the meantime I’ve started a metal coat MiG-15 of the North Korean Air Force but posts on that will have to wait until after Christmas I think.

 

Chinese Nationalist Mustang: Part I

As I am writing this I am currently working on a P-51D Mustang. Rather than finish it in the usual RAF or USAF markings I have markings for the Chinese Nationalist Air Force (CNAF) which is the precursor to the modern air force of Taiwan.

Before Japan invaded China the country was rife with civil war as the Nationalists and Communists battled for control of the country. In fact even during the war with Japan the Nationalists and Communists continued to attack one another so bitter was their rivalry. Before the Japanese invasion the Nationalists were at the clear advantage with superior equipment and better trained infantry but the war with Japan proved costly as the Nationalists gave it their all trying to repel the invasion.

The Communists, on the other hand, preferred fighting in smaller units harassing the Japanese behind their own lines. In the truth it would seem the Communists were holding back and reserving their strength for after the war with Japan. When Japan was defeated the Communists came out of the war very strong and acquired a huge inventory of Japanese equipment.

As soon as Japan surrendered its forces in China the civil war kicked off again in earnest. The Communists quickly found the Soviet Union willing to supply ‘advisors’ and equipment covertly to help in the war effort. The Nationalists had been receiving assistance during the war with Japan from the United States and this assistance continued for a time afterwards. Some of the aircraft supplied to the Nationalists included the P-51 Mustang, the P-47 Thunderbolt and B-25 Mitchell bombers.

 Although the Nationalists put up a staunch resistance they ultimately could not hold back the Communists forces and were eventually pushed back to the larger island of Taiwan and some of the smaller islands surrounding it. Mainland China was declared the People’s Republic of China by the Communists who were now firmly in control while the Nationalists formed the Republic of China on Taiwan. The civil war in China has never officially ended and the two sides remain tense to this day with the threat of all-out war always on the horizon.

I picked up this kit second hand at the IPMS Ireland Nationals during October. From the look of the box I was expecting the kit to be old and, honestly, a bit of a dog; how wrong I was! The kit has finely engraved panel lines and rivet detail, it includes a nicely detailed cockpit and also includes two different types of external fuel tank as well as two different canopy styles.

I started work on the cockpit as usual and immediately ran into a question, what colour is the cockpit of a Mustang? I know that can be a controversial subject at times, although perhaps more-so with other aircraft like Irish Hurricanes (*cough*), so I looked up an article on IPMS Stockholm and found a distinct lack on consistency with the Mustang and its interior colour. It would appear that the U.S government wasn’t to concerned with the exact shade of a particular paint and most paints were sourced as close to the manufacturing plant as possible resulting in various shades of paint being used, even those with the same name.

Possible paint shades for the Mustang include Chromate Green, Interior Green and Bronze Green. Towards the end of WWII and during the Korean War another option was Flat Black. Although the kit instructions advised Flat Black I thought Chromate Green would make for a more interesting look. I used Citadel Camo Green to represent the Chromate Green and I think it works well, it may be bit light in the picture above but after a gloss and matt coat it should darken down.

The cockpit in this kit is pretty well detailed; the front console is busy with raised detail as are the side consoles, the cockpit seat features defined seatbelts with buckles and behind the seat is what I presume to be a radio rack.

From what I’ve read the floor of the cockpit was made with plywood and may, or may not, have been painted black. I decided against painting it black in order to add a splash of colour variation to the cockpit although, in truth, with the canopy fitted it probably wouldn’t be visible. Anyway, the cockpit floor was painted with Revell Africa Brown which provides a light wooden look to the floor. The rest of the cockpit was painted in Camo Green except for the consoles which were painted black and picked out with two metallic paints, one light and one dark. The detail on the front console was picked out in various reds, yellows, whites and greens.
 

The radio rack is a tricky piece of work because it is both stepped, as intended, but also has a nasty seam running the entire way around its body. Intensive sanding would cause a fair bit of detail to be lost so I only cleaned it up a little and painted it black hoping to hide the seam.

After I had finished the cockpit I gave it two washes of Citadel Badab Black and one of Flory Models Dark Dirt to give it a heavily used appearance. These Mustangs would’ve been involved in heavy fighting and opportunities for maintenance would’ve been sparse.

If you look at the last few pictures above you’ll notice the front console might be sitting a bit to far forward. I think it is to far forward because when I closed the fuselage halves the cockpit leaned off to one side. The lean was nothing dramatic but something like that is the sort of thing that causes perspective issues when sighting down the length of the fuselage to ensure everything is aligned properly.

As it turns out that little lean would be the least of my problems when it came to perspective and alignment.

I don’t know if it was a problem with the production run of this kit or just this particular kit but the join of the fuselage didn’t go very well because from the large intake, under the Mustang, back to the tail the alignment of the kit halves was terribly off. Furthermore sighting down the length of the fuselage several times made apparent that the tail was twisted off to one side.

There wasn’t much I could do about a twisted tail so I focused on sanding down the seam lines left over from the fuselage joining. I had five to deal with including one above and below the nose, behind the cockpit, behind the belly intake and behind the tail wheel well. I wanted to be careful sanding these down as this kit had intricate rivet and panel line detail on both sides of the nose so I went out and purchased a packet of Emery boards. I used the fine side of the boards throughout the build which doesn’t leave lines and grooves in the plastic and in order to protect the detail further I wrapped key areas in masking tape. The boards will wear the tape down over time but better the tape wearing down than the detail in the kit. While working on the seams I occasionally painted on some thinned down grey in order to highlight them, the paint will seep into the seam and make it more defined giving you a better view of it.

I spent quite a while working on the seams in order to get them perfect and I can happily state that I succeeded with four out of the fives seams; one seam leading from the mouth of the intake to the front of the tail wheel well follows a curve but also crosses two large protrusions and so was difficult to remove. 

Next I joined the wing halves, without issues, and dry fitted the wings to the fuselage; this involved slotting the wings under the fuselage and above the belly intake where it meets with a buttress wall. Now because of the warping of the fuselage rear that buttress wall had formed a bad step in it which would’ve left a gap on one side of the wing to fuselage join. In order to fix it I cut out a small piece of plasticard and slotted it in into the step to form a straight wall. A bit of filler and a little filing later and it was perfect.

The join between the wings and fuselage, however, was not at all perfect. On one side of the wing, the one in the picture above, there was just the usual wing root to fill but on the other side the wing root was wider and the towards the rear of the wing there was a step that couldn’t really be filled. Working on some advice I took a round file and gently filed down the step and filled the rest of the wing roots.

Again, I can’t say if it is a problem with this particular kit but the tail wings didn’t line up properly either. I followed the locating tabs but it’s obvious on the kit, from the detail around the locating tabs, that each side is out of alignment with on another.

I didn’t bother trying to fix this issue. It might seem by now that this kit isn’t worth the trouble what with warping and alignment issues but I can assure you that this kit is beautifully detailed and will turn out a great finish with some work. If I found this kit again I’d definitely pick it up.

With all the main components added to the fuselage I primed it in Halfords Grey which goes on really fine and comes out in a great shade of grey. I believe there are two types of Halfords primer, one which states it is for plastic and one that doesn’t. Well this is the one that doesn’t and it doesn’t damage the plastic at all.

I did have an accident where the spray went on to thickly on one wing, my mistake not the primers, and I had to sand down some clumps of built up stuff while it was soft and then ‘rescribe’ the panel lines which was less like rescribing and more like clearing gunk gently with a knife.

All in all I would definitely recommend Halfords to anyone, it makes for a fine primer and is much better than the Humbrol spray I was using before. It also leaves you a good surface for applying a metalcoat which will be coming up in Part II.