Hobby Boss 1/32 B-24J - Initial Observations

[easixpedro 162]

Hey folks,

 

Have been thinking about pulling the trigger, because I'd love to build my uncle's a/c. He was a RTO/Waist Gunner in the 461st BG, 15th AF.  Not too concerned about the kit as I'll have to modify it to an L variant anyway.  My question though, is what are the little fairings underneath the fuselage? Seems to be at least 4 aerodynamic fairings covering some sort of antenna? At least that's my guess... What say the crowd? Iain, Am loving what you're doing, as it'll allow me to build one that I've wanted to for years!

-Peter

 

[zerosystem 57]

34 minutes ago, easixpedro said:

Hey folks,

 

Have been thinking about pulling the trigger, because I'd love to build my uncle's a/c. He was a RTO/Waist Gunner in the 461st BG, 15th AF.  Not too concerned about the kit as I'll have to modify it to an L variant anyway.  My question though, is what are the little fairings underneath the fuselage? Seems to be at least 4 aerodynamic fairings covering some sort of antenna? At least that's my guess... What say the crowd? Iain, Am loving what you're doing, as it'll allow me to build one that I've wanted to for years!

-Peter

 

 

Those look like the same fairings you'd see on the Navy PB4Y-2s

[titan 166]

4 hours ago, easixpedro said:

Hey folks,

 

Have been thinking about pulling the trigger, because I'd love to build my uncle's a/c. He was a RTO/Waist Gunner in the 461st BG, 15th AF.  Not too concerned about the kit as I'll have to modify it to an L variant anyway.  My question though, is what are the little fairings underneath the fuselage? Seems to be at least 4 aerodynamic fairings covering some sort of antenna? At least that's my guess... What say the crowd? Iain, Am loving what you're doing, as it'll allow me to build one that I've wanted to for years!

-Peter

 

It's part of an Electronic warfare system called Carpet. A few B-24s in each group were fitted with it to disrupt German flak radars. Unfortunately the flak could still get lucky and Miss Lace was actually shot down by flak as the last combat loss of the 461st BG.  Carpet had three fishhook antennas in clear domes near the front of the plane and an additional antenna towards the rear.  More on Carpet and other countermeasures here: http://www.cdvandt.org/rcm_vs_wurzburg.htm

[easixpedro 162]

4 hours ago, titan said:

It's part of an Electronic warfare system called Carpet. A few B-24s in each group were fitted with it to disrupt German flak radars. Unfortunately the flak could still get lucky and Miss Lace was actually shot down by flak as the last combat loss of the 461st BG.  Carpet had three fishhook antennas in clear domes near the front of the plane and an additional antenna towards the rear.  More on Carpet and other countermeasures here: http://www.cdvandt.org/rcm_vs_wurzburg.htm

Ah yes. Cool, thank you! Have read about it, just never seen the install!

 

Funny thing about this a/c. My uncle said that his waist window was blown out and never replaced in the rest of his 35 missions. When they finally did, it was lost on the very next mission. He came home and never got in an airplane again! Literally drove all over the country for vacations etc, but never flew....

 

thanks again

-Peter

[ScottsGT 3,065]

4 hours ago, easixpedro said:

Ah yes. Cool, thank you! Have read about it, just never seen the install!

 

Funny thing about this a/c. My uncle said that his waist window was blown out and never replaced in the rest of his 35 missions. When they finally did, it was lost on the very next mission. He came home and never got in an airplane again! Literally drove all over the country for vacations etc, but never flew....

 

thanks again

-Peter

Growing up my next door neighbor was a pilot during WWII on a B-17.  He was the same way.  Never flew again after the war.  He was even offered the job of flying the President around. Refused.

[Rowen 175]

41 pages of commentary on this beast - yet no one has mentioned how much weight (and where to put it) the model will need so it will not be a tail sitter (unless I missed it?)???

 

 

-Ro

Edited January 4 by Rowen

[Kagemusha 6,362]

The instructions say 300 grams, in the forward fuselage.

[Iain 9,757]

I haven't got as far as doing the weight and balance sheets on my build - yet! 

 

Iain

[RonGUSA 64]

Yeah and finding a place for it will not be easy. 300g = 12oz thats 3/4 of a pound! Hold on frt landing gear 

[109ace 309]

I just got back from my resin casting supplier and have found a water clear resin that may fit the bill for my needs for one piece clear resin turret domes. The stuff has a pot life of 9 minutes, and full cure in 90 minutes. Much better then the next lower level products with a 24 hour cure. But is safer to use.

This new stuff will require me to invest in a expensive cartridge dust mask, vented hood, and a pressure pot. I plan on making this investment within the month. And until somebody who offered to send me his turrets so I could mold up some resin dies to make these sets follows though on his commitment, I'm pretty much dead in the water. But the guys with Monogram Liberators will be thrilled. I will remaster new turrets for them and scrap the vacuformed ones I currently sell.

[Pup7309 275]

Great!

 Well at 43 pages I think this post has now trumped the Lancaster post! 

[easixpedro 162]

20 hours ago, titan said:

It's part of an Electronic warfare system called Carpet. A few B-24s in each group were fitted with it to disrupt German flak radars. Unfortunately the flak could still get lucky and Miss Lace was actually shot down by flak as the last combat loss of the 461st BG.  Carpet had three fishhook antennas in clear domes near the front of the plane and an additional antenna towards the rear.  More on Carpet and other countermeasures here: http://www.cdvandt.org/rcm_vs_wurzburg.htm

Following up on this...did some more digging on APT-2 Carpet Jammers. (I'm an old EA-6B ECMO, so I might have nerded out a bit). Found a couple of links that may be of interest for folks.

 

http://www.rkk-museum.ru/documents/archives/images/52b-45-01.pdf (it's a pdf scan of a wartime document called "Radio and Radar equipment used by the USAAF" shows all the black box and antenna locations)

http://aafradio.org/ is a goldmine. Check out "Old Crows Corner" and "Docs" He's got pictures of the equipment, plus tons of photos of PBY-2s for those so inclined.  

 

Also, if you haven't read Alfred Price's "Instruments of Darkness" I can't recommend it enough. It's the EW history of WWII.

-Peter

[LSP_Ron 11,760]

7 hours ago, RonGUSA said:

Yeah and finding a place for it will not be easy. 300g = 12oz thats 3/4 of a pound! Hold on frt landing gear 

 

Well not really,  the main gear has to hold the majority of the weight.The nose gear would only hold the weight that is keeping it from tail sitting.

 

 

[EvilCarrot 736]

Mine just arrived, what a beast! Even with the aforementioned flaws there's a lot of value for money in this kit! Shame they didn't include seat belts on the PE fret.

[nmayhew 865]

I have exchanged a few messages with Profimodeller about replacement turrets for the Lib.

 

I got the idea on seeing their H-22 (V-1) conversion for the Heinkel He111 H-6, which includes a new dorsal turret.

 

They didn't know about the B-24 turret but seemed receptive, depending on demand etc

 

So, feel free to message them on Facebook and chime in asking for turrets!