Tamiya's F4U-1 CORSAIR

[DMurph]

Looking good mate, nice progress.

 

Cheers Murph...

[TheScaleWorkshop]

Thanks guys - she's coming along... desperately want to get the fuselage halves together but don't want to rush or skimp on the detail either.... it's all about balance.

 

Thanks again for stopping by

 

pL

[TheScaleWorkshop]

Looking good so far, but be aware the the birdcage Corsair's cockpit was painted in Dull Dark Green, not Green Zinc Chromate. Color photos of unrestored Bircages confirm this.

 

Hope it's not too late!

 

Happy modelling! Roy.

 

PS. Work slowly and carefully with our cockpit stencil and placard decals, they are pretty teeny!

 

Looking forward to seeing this come together.

Hello mr.Sutherland,

 

Good to hear from you! And you're right - I double checked my references and the F4U-1A had zinc chromate painted cockpit - best not to do research late at night. I managed to respray the cockpit with the right color this afternoon. I would like to think I'm not a rivet counter but I don't think I could live the plane's office being the wrong color - thanks for letting me know.

 

And I started to apply the Barracuda cockpit decal set. Tiny is right! But they do on very well and Cartograf did a wonderful job - you need a magnifying glass to be able to read anything but it's all there! The metallic ones are a bit tricky and I lost no.10 after a battle with it folding over itself, got it to finally settle only to have it swivel up when I applied MicroSet. Otherwise, they work and look fantastic and really bring the cockpit to life but patience is key as there are a good number of them. I will definitely be sharing photos once they're all on.

 

pL

[DMurph]

Hello mr.Sutherland,

 

Good to hear from you! And you're right - I double checked my references and the F4U-1A had zinc chromate painted cockpit - best not to do research late at night. I managed to respray the cockpit with the right color this afternoon. I would like to think I'm not a rivet counter but I don't think I could live the plane's office being the wrong color - thanks for letting me know.

 

And I started to apply the Barracuda cockpit decal set. Tiny is right! But they do on very well and Cartograf did a wonderful job - you need a magnifying glass to be able to read anything but it's all there! The metallic ones are a bit tricky and I lost no.10 after a battle with it folding over itself, got it to finally settle only to have it swivel up when I applied MicroSet. Otherwise, they work and look fantastic and really bring the cockpit to life but patience is key as there are a good number of them. I will definitely be sharing photos once they're all on.

 

pL

 

You know sometimes in war things do progress, And field depot overhuals happen , from my 32 years in the Air Force I saw thia all the time but hope this info Helps you and all others wanting to be somewhat accurate.

 

Vought F4U Corsair

Sorting out the interior colours of the Corsair is particularly tricky. For the F4U-1 Birdcage Corsairs, photos taken at the time show the cockpits being a very dark colour, most probably black. Analysis of some crashed examples of F4U-1s indicates black, while the factory Erection & Maintenance Instructions called for Dull Dark Green.

As mentioned before, early production Corsairs had their interior surfaces in areas other than the cockpit covered with Salmon primer. This colour mixture was used relatively long into Corsair production. It would seem that all F4U-1s and a number of early F4U-1As were finished this way.

Somewhere during the production of F4U-1A model Vought discontinued the use of Salmon primers and switched to Zinc Chromate Yellow with cockpits in Interior Green.

In the engine cowling area, Vought adhered to the practice of painting its inner surface the same colour as the underside, ANA 602 Sky Gray on early F4U-1s, ANA 601 Insignia White on F4U-1As.

The wheel wells of early model Corsairs deserve closer inspection. Like the cowlings, the main wheel wells, undercarriage legs and boths ides of well covers were painted in the underside camouflage colour, ANA 602 Non-specular Sky Gray. Wheel hubs were silver. However, the smaller forward area of the wheel to which the leg itself retracted was left in the factory primer finish, Salmon. Some aircraft had also Salmon inner surfaces of the small covers attached to the undercarriage legs.

The canvas covers in the wells were probably drab -coloured.

With the advent of the tri-colour camouflage on F4U-1A the same principle was applied with white replacing the Sky Gray with ANA 601 Non-specular Insignia White, and the However, the undercarriage legs remained grey throughout the production of this model, possibly due to the failure or indifference to notify a subcontractor about changed colour specifications. For the record, some photos of -1As seem to show silver undercarriage legs, but it could not be established to what extent such finish was applied. One theory is that Aluminium lacquer was applied on these assemblies during field depot overhauls.

In October 1944 the new factory instructions for the F4U production called for application of Interior Green on all internal surfaces including the cockpit. As an anti-glare measure, all cockpit panels above the lower edge of the instrument panel were to be painted matt black. Curiously, the new directive did not explicitly state what was to happen with the cowling's inner surface. Thus, subsequent machines showed either Zinc Chromate or Interior Green cowlings, until the last standardisation of colour post-war whereupon black was introduced in this area.

During that period, the wheel wells were also painted Interior Green. Undercarriage legs were initially still finished in light grey, but as existing stocks of parts were used up at the factory, the overall Glossy Sea Blue finish was carried over to the undercarriage legs and wheel hubs.

[IJ001]

More wonderful skills on display, more following closely !!

 

Ian

[dodgem37]

Very smooth.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[TheScaleWorkshop]

You know sometimes in war things do progress, And field depot overhuals happen , from my 32 years in the Air Force I saw thia all the time but hope this info Helps you and all others wanting to be somewhat accurate.

 

Vought F4U Corsair

Sorting out the interior colours of the Corsair is particularly tricky. For the F4U-1 Birdcage Corsairs, photos taken at the time show the cockpits being a very dark colour, most probably black. Analysis of some crashed examples of F4U-1s indicates black, while the factory Erection & Maintenance Instructions called for Dull Dark Green.

As mentioned before, early production Corsairs had their interior surfaces in areas other than the cockpit covered with Salmon primer. This colour mixture was used relatively long into Corsair production. It would seem that all F4U-1s and a number of early F4U-1As were finished this way.

Somewhere during the production of F4U-1A model Vought discontinued the use of Salmon primers and switched to Zinc Chromate Yellow with cockpits in Interior Green.

In the engine cowling area, Vought adhered to the practice of painting its inner surface the same colour as the underside, ANA 602 Sky Gray on early F4U-1s, ANA 601 Insignia White on F4U-1As.

The wheel wells of early model Corsairs deserve closer inspection. Like the cowlings, the main wheel wells, undercarriage legs and boths ides of well covers were painted in the underside camouflage colour, ANA 602 Non-specular Sky Gray. Wheel hubs were silver. However, the smaller forward area of the wheel to which the leg itself retracted was left in the factory primer finish, Salmon. Some aircraft had also Salmon inner surfaces of the small covers attached to the undercarriage legs.

The canvas covers in the wells were probably drab -coloured.

With the advent of the tri-colour camouflage on F4U-1A the same principle was applied with white replacing the Sky Gray with ANA 601 Non-specular Insignia White, and the However, the undercarriage legs remained grey throughout the production of this model, possibly due to the failure or indifference to notify a subcontractor about changed colour specifications. For the record, some photos of -1As seem to show silver undercarriage legs, but it could not be established to what extent such finish was applied. One theory is that Aluminium lacquer was applied on these assemblies during field depot overhauls.

In October 1944 the new factory instructions for the F4U production called for application of Interior Green on all internal surfaces including the cockpit. As an anti-glare measure, all cockpit panels above the lower edge of the instrument panel were to be painted matt black. Curiously, the new directive did not explicitly state what was to happen with the cowling's inner surface. Thus, subsequent machines showed either Zinc Chromate or Interior Green cowlings, until the last standardisation of colour post-war whereupon black was introduced in this area.

During that period, the wheel wells were also painted Interior Green. Undercarriage legs were initially still finished in light grey, but as existing stocks of parts were used up at the factory, the overall Glossy Sea Blue finish was carried over to the undercarriage legs and wheel hubs.

 

Hiya Murph,

 

Thanks for this... ironic thing is what you provided above was my main reference when it came to painting the interior. Balancing accuracy while keeping the build enjoyable is something I'm trying to maintain as I don't want to lose any steam on this build. Safe to say there's no sign of this I layed down some interior green in the cockpit and I'm over halfway through the cockpit decals. Really looking forward to closing her up and getting some paint on the exterior like you have!

 

pL

[TheScaleWorkshop]

Ian and Mark,

 

Thanks for stopping by! Yeah, this is a fantastic kit to build and I recommend it to anyone who's built a few planes before. Hoping to have an update this week showing progress on the cockpit.

 

pL

[eagledocf15]

Looking forward to the Update

[Roy Sutherland]

Hi Murph.

 

While the color information is generally good, the part about black cockpits is outdated.

 

The Birdcage that came out of the lake (Michigan?) and is being restored had a Dull Dark Green cockpit, and Dana Bell, noted US aviation author and researcher, has stated that Birdcages were painted as such. I don't think there is any hard evidence for black cockpits in F4U-1s. Not to say that there might have been an exception or two to prove the rule, but it was not the standard.

 

Hope this helps.  Roy

Edited September 28, 2013 by Roy Sutherland

[LSP_Kevin]

The Birdcage that came out of the lake (Michigan?) and is being restored had a Dull Dark Green cockpit [...]

 

Thanks to LSP member Jay Cochrane, we have a Walkaround of this bird on the website, taken the day she was pulled out of the lake:

 

http://www.largescaleplanes.com/walkaround/wk.php?wid=119

 

Kev

[TheScaleWorkshop]

Thanks to LSP member Jay Cochrane, we have a Walkaround of this bird on the website, taken the day she was pulled out of the lake:

 

http://www.largescaleplanes.com/walkaround/wk.php?wid=119

 

Kev

Hiya Kev,

 

Thanks for sharing this reference (and sorry it's taken so long to respond) - invaluable source of info!

 

pL

[TheScaleWorkshop]

Hello all,

 

It has been far, far too long. The last six weeks have been spent job hunting but with the Missus away this past weekend I decided to take a bit of a break and get a serious fix of plastic, while watching old episodes of Top Gear, eating sandwiches and sipping on frothy cold ones.

 

I am happy to say that mr.Cockpit is finally complete. Barracudacals decals, though numerous, went on without fuss and really compliments Tamiya's beautifully detailed cockpit. I spent an evening putting the stock seatbelts together and painting them. But sadly even after annealing the PE fret, I couldn't get them to sit properly and decided not to use them at all. I've left the seat off and will order a set of paper belts w PE buckles when I can afford it. Regardless, the build must go on!

 

Here are some pics of the finished sub-assemblies followed by a few shots of everything together. I'm really proud of my re-built throttle levers as I found the stock kit part a tad chunky, as well as fitting the cables that run to it.

 

Sub-assemblies...

 

...All assembled...

 

 

...and one last shot before the fuselage halves are joined together.

 

At this point I have closed up the fuselage. It went together pretty well, though the rear tail wheel assembly was a tricky fit, it just didn't

want to sit for some reason. I have a handful of pieces left to glue before she's all together and then she'll be ready for paint. Then onto that gem of an engine.

 

It has to be said that I am still enjoying this build like nothing else, a fantastic production by Tamiya.

 

Thanks for looking!

 

pL

[LSP_Kevin]

Crikey, that looks amazing! Great work.

 

Kev

[Guest Peterpools]

Totally enjoying your progress with the Corsairs front office .. looks simply stellar. Thaks for posting the comparison photos of the gray primer+ green zinc chromate as compared to the green zinc chromate over bare plastic - quite an effective way of starting the weathering procedure.

Keep 'em coming

Peter

:popcorn: