Kendzior

Yeah, I'm watching your Storch tread very carefully, a lot of inspiration for my build. In general I'm going to follow mainly the drawings and photos in the old Militaria monograph. It's a little old, but still very good. However, it's not going to be a super-detailed build. Thanks for comments Hubert

Using this: I'm going to make that one: A nice simple kit, by the way. Several modifications to the a'la D-1 version are required (Storchs that were captured in crates after the war in Poznań were not fully assembled according to the manufacturer's specifications). I will make the variant for one patient. So, I will have to lengthen the floor, add new doors on both sides, additional windows, the interior structure, a stretcher ... . First tweaks: the additional windows cut out, removed the doors for the C-1 version on the starboard side:

That's just superb, and great photos too, thanks for sharing with us Hubert

Thanks Kev!

Many thanks for your comments! Well, the kit itself is a challenge. I think if it wasn't a short run kit, we'd see more of them built. Definitely, it's time for the mainstream molds. Eduard announced one in 1:48. Maybe someone, sometime... Hobby Boss? Trumpeter? Even with all their common mistakes and less than perfect accuracy. But for now I'm trying to make some space in my busy workshop for the French Hawk from Azur/SH kit. Best regards Hubert

Many thanks Kev, sure you can Best, Hubert

Done! Many thanks for all your comments and support, very much appreciated Best regards and Happy New Year for all of you! Hubert

The September 1939 campaign in Poland made it clear to the Dutch that they are completely unprepared for the conditions of modern war. They needed fighters. However, the queue with orders for the fighter aircraft was already long. France, Great Britain did not have much to offer for sale, they were in need themselves and bought them in emergency mode. The United States became the natural direction, where at the last moment Dutch managed to buy 24 Curtiss H-75 in the A7 version, for which the base was the A4, equipped with a powerful and light, yet capricious, Wright Cyclone engine - but also the fastest version of the P-36. They were produced in parallel with machines for France. However, before they reached their destination - the Netherlands fell under the attack of the Third Reich. The Hawks was therefore sent to the Dutch East Indies, to Andir (near Bandung), where they arrived in May 1940. After being assembled, flown and painted, they were sent to Madiun (East Java), where they were to defend the Surabaya naval base. The Dutch Hawks' service was short and lacking in success. After the Japanese attack on December 7, 1941, the aircraft were sent to Sumatra. They were flown from there without successes, but with victims, one of which was the pilot of the plane that you see in the gallery. On December 21, 1941, two Hawks collided during the take-off to the combat action over Western Malaya. Sergeant Paulus Casper van Breen, then a 24-year-old ML-KNIL pilot, sat behind the controls of one of them, with the serial number C329. He died on the spot. Source: https://oorlogsgravenstichting.nl/persoon/20084/paulus-casper-van-breen After the fall of Sumatra, at the beginning of February 1942, the aircraft were re-directed to Madiun, where they unsuccessfully tried to stop the Japanese air raids on Surabaya, which, however, in fights with the Zeros only resulted in the loss of five more machines and further casualties. Other planes were grounded due to defective engines and lack of spare parts, and after the Japanese invasion of Java, destroyed by the Dutch in early March 1942. The Special Hobby's kit is well worth the manufacturer's brand. Special in every aspect: quality of the molds, fit, level of details, accuracy. And isn't our hobby (inter alia) a struggle against the efforts of producers, how to do something wrong, if it could be good. So everything is all right. If you are interested in details and have strong nerves, please look for the workshop thread. The construction process was marked by numerous problems, caused by myself. First the fuselage broke twice where it was connected to the engine cowling, then after assembling the airframe and painting, I dropped it on the desk and the instrument panel inside fell off ... reinstalling it perfectly did not succeed, poor access, but I didn't want to make such a large step back and brake the fuselage into halves. Decals were too transparent, had to overpaint them. I broke one leg of the landing gear, lost one gear leg cover (the one in the front of the gear nacelle, finally I made them both of an aluminium sheet obtained from a tin of Felix peanuts), I lost the fuel filler cap too, replaced with a scratch-built one. At the end I unfortunately grabbed it with dirty fingers and the marks had to be removed ... But finally, here it is. Here it is and it proves that even with medium abilities and skills in the use of putty and file, this model can be put together. And this is probably the most important thing. Few things added: rivets, missing panel lines, modification of armament in the wings, antenna mountings on the wings, vertical stabilizer and fuselage, 0.2 mm Uschi van der Rosten antenna cables with insulators made of hygienic stick stretched over fire (does anyone use them for any other purpose, btw?), wheel well covers from CMK resin, barrels from Master. The rest - straight from the box. Painted with MRP Paints. Colors according to the AJ-Press monograph: old leaves - early US Olive Drab, young leaves - early US Medium Green, underside of wings and horizontal fins painted silver, with upper surface color over the leading edge. In combination with the orange markings - it looks very nice and different, I think. Hope you like it :). Best regards and Happy New Year! Hubert

Fantastic work, keep it up! That epoxy resin seems to work fine, I'd probably just use the inserts made of the HIPS sheets and never come to this idea. Worth trying. BTW. Seems all our cats like to keep a sleepy eye on us

Some more progress. Almost done. There is a mysterious story associated with today's session. I was about to paint the landing gear covers, those covering the front of the gondolas in the wings. I arranged everything on the desk, glued these covers to sticks with blutac, mixed the paint, turned on the compressor, connected the airbrush, poured the MRP OD 41, as a test sprayed it once or twice onto the paper towel, I reached for the sticks and ... there was only one cover. The other disappeared. Peeled off the stick. The air took it somewhere . Stay calm I thought. It must be here. But ... I have not found it. On the desk, behind the desk, under the desk. No trace of it. It is a kind of paranoia, I thought to myself. This would probably be the fourth such situation this year. Two parts from Curtiss P-40. Superstructure of a Chinese cruiser (!). Now this. Finally I made them on the basis of the saved one of the Felix nuts tin cover. Managed to shape it with the tip of the Excel knife holder, cut to shape. I can live with it. These are even more in scale. Happy end :D.

The propeller. Stencils borrowed from the Trumpeter's P-40B, logos from the TLH32-007 Tomahawk in the Sky decal set.

That's just spectacular! Great work, keep it up.

Added the wheels, and most of the the gear covers, the lights. Time to think about the weathering, probably will use some light earth pigments, also to emphasize the rivets just as they look at the photo in my earlier post, maybe some oils for the belly. The propeller is not turning, if anyone asked ;).

Source: Avions, No 34 Janvier 96, only for discussion This is a photo of this particular Hawk, C-329. Why does it look like that? I have no idea. Maybe Mr P.C. van Breen wanted to have something different and asked the servicemen to over-paint the edge of the walkway in this wavy style? Other Dutch Hawks seem to have a straight line there. It was one of two reasons why I chose this scheme (the white stripe on the fuselage was the second one). Prachtig dank u!

The landing gear legs installed, there was some trouble to have them in correct angles, but I think it's OK now. Some shadows added, some exhaust stains.

Applied some washes, this time I tried the new ones (for me) from Modelers World. Worked very well. The propeller, landing gear - also received some attention, their time is coming. The photos without any enhancements, so the colors close to the reality.

Many thanks for your comment, very much appreciated. That medium green... well, it is just green, indeed. I think that when it is dusted a bit, this color will be toned down. On the other hand, one can see the camouflage quite well at the photos, two colors are clearly visible. But it may also be due to the photographic material, filters... so much that at the photos the lighter colour (medium green) is darker than the dark olive drab ... Will see. Hubert

Thanks Kev The colors look strange indeed; however, it is just according to the most probable version of how the "old leaves" / "young leaves" camouflage scheme might have been looking like. According to the AJ Press monograph, as well as the good old IPMS Stockholm site, the Dutch used US Medium Green as "young leaf"/Jongblad , and US Dark Olive Drab as "old leaf"/Oudblad. So here it is. The question of how well these MRP paints match the original may be raised, however, after the weathering, the final shade of colors will be slightly different, duller. By the way, the longer I look at these colors, the more I like it how they look on this Hawk, combined with the silver underside and orange markings. Hubert

Fantasy Printshop decals worked very well, nicely responded to Micro Sol. The only problem was the white stripe showing through the orange marking on the fuselage. Sprayed LP-51 Pure Orange after careful masking the black outline of the triangle. Stay tuned Hubert

Actually, it was most probably painted silver. Thanks for comment Hubert

Starring: MRP paints. Some profiles show greens and browns for the upper camo, and neutral gray for the bottom. I followed the AJ Press. That looks quite strange, but maybe it's how it is supposed to be. Next the gloss and decals. Stay tuned, Hubert

Black Weekend I also added the antenna wire attachment on the vertical stabilizer. Small thing, but necessary in this scale.

Thanks, Anthony - very glad that you like it. I have primed the model - first with the grey MRP primer, which gives very thin coverage - enough to show the places needing attention, but no risk to lose any rivet detail. It did revealed some issues, mostly at the front of the engine cowling and at the lower half of the wing to fuselage joint - probably the worst place of the whole kit. Did some additional efforts to make it almost flush. Next I sprayed a thin layer of Vallejo's MECHA COLOR PRIMER Grey, thinned in a 50/50 ratio. Now I think it looks pretty well. Not perfect (wouldn't be me if it was perfect) but well enough to start mixing the paints - going to use MRP colors here. Stay tuned Hubert

The guns and the tail wheel unit installed, the windshield glued in place and the cockpit secured - time to remove the dust and wash it up so that I can spray some primer to reveal if there are any problems to address.

Meanwhile, fate sometimes solves problems by itself. Somehow clumsily I grabbed the wing, having forgotten about those damn bomb racks so that two of them had ripped off and fell somewhere ... well, an area of about two meters by two, a thick carpet ... I don't delude myself that I can find them. So I ripped off the rest. Anyway, I can not see these bombs racks in any pictures of Dutch H-75s, so I will not cry for them. I also undercut a bit the engine hood, it doesn't look especially well, but I hope that from a distance it will resemble the original better than SH provided. The Thai H-75N: Source: http://archiwum.plastikowe.pl/galerie/curtiss-hawk-75n - only for discussion purpose MRP Interior Green applied inside the clear parts: