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A Separate Little War - Strike Wing Mosquito FB.VI


John1

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Thanks guys!   I'm making a bit of progress lately.  Expect to have the fuselage glued together later today.  Pretty big milestone, only took me how many months to get here?  Here's a last few views of the entire cockpit exposed.

 

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And the half-fuselage, ready to get glued together.

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Thanks for looking! 

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One thing I like about my subject is that the Strike Wings were pretty neglected during the war.  I'm not a big fan of ETO Mustangs, BOB Spitfires, etc, they are just too common for me. 

 

The Strike Wings didn't get anything close to the publicity of Bomber Command or the tactical aircraft fighting over Western Europe. Very much a "Separate Little War".   Maybe part of it was being stationed in Northern Scotland, a case of out of sight, out of mind perhaps?   Anyway, I've been reading up on them, both in print (see page one for a couple of good books on the subject) and online.   I'll be posting some additional pictures here and there during this build to add a bit of history.   Here is one of the few air to air pictures taken.  A Ju-88 is seconds from it's demise, shot down by one of the Outriders of 333 Squadron.

Junkers_Ju_88_shot_down_off_Norway

The Strike Wing aircraft didn't get a large number of air to air kills but on occasion they did come across patrolling Ju-88's, -188's and seaplanes.   Most of the time, if German aircraft were spotted, they were on the receiving end of the FW-190's of Jg.5, who took a pretty heavy toll on the British when they were fortunate enough to intercept them.   This Luftwaffe unit also fought a mostly overlooked war, maybe a nice subject for an upcoming build of mine?   

 

Interesting fact - the only aircraft in the RAF that could provide adequate escort services for the heavily laden Mosquitos and Beaufighters was the P-51D.   As such, the RAF assigned a couple of specialist Mustang squadrons to support the Strike Wings on their anti-shipping operations off of Norway. 

 

Anyway, getting back to the build, a quick update.  I glued the fuselage together, no issues encountered, typical Tamiya fit.   Just a small bit of putty to smooth the seam.   I also cleaned up the wiring to the wiper drive motor and finished the nose cone.   Tamiya provides a nice replica of the gun camera, all I did for this assembly was to add an electrical connection to the camera,  I also included a tiny light fixture in the very tip of the nose and it's electrical line.    Here are few shots. 

 

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That's all for now, thanks for looking! 

Edited by John1
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Fantastic John! I'm getting an itch to bust out my Airfix Mossie once I'm done with my 109 after following your and Anthony's inspirational builds. I've slowly been collecting AM for a Banff Coastal Command bird - was never going to be anything else!

 

Here's some cool video footage of strike wing mossies attacking shipping with cannons and RPs in a Norwegian fjord.

 

 

 

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Awesome John!  You really look like you have hit a milestone here.  Love your extra detailing, really makes a difference.

 

Thanks for the interesting background story on these squadrons, definitely very interesting!  Makes for an informative and inspiring thread

 

Cheers Anthony

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14 hours ago, turbo said:

Fantastic John! I'm getting an itch to bust out my Airfix Mossie once I'm done with my 109 after following your and Anthony's inspirational builds. I've slowly been collecting AM for a Banff Coastal Command bird - was never going to be anything else!

 

Here's some cool video footage of strike wing mossies attacking shipping with cannons and RPs in a Norwegian fjord.

 

Nice video..  some of those aircraft must have only been 20-30 over the ocean during their run-in to Norway!  

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Mini update - Horizontal stabs are completed.   No more of those silly PE hinges so you can have movable control surfaces (this was one of my major gripes regarding the Tamiya Mustang kit), you get the option to glue the elevators either in the neutral position or drooping.  I opted for drooping, just to add a bit of variety.   The horizontal stab also includes the tail wheel well.   It's nicely detailed, the only thing I added were a couple of control cables.   

 

For those interested in minutia, the fairing on the bottom of the tail cone was for an infra-red "flasher" lamp.  This was used on night fighters / night intruders as a form of identification to avoid friendly fire.   If you are interested in this subject, there is a discussion on it over on Brit Modeler.   https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235065576-dh-mosquito-tail-fairing-monica-or-signal-light/   Apparently, to simplify production,  the fairing was installed on all later-production Mosquitos, regardless if whether they would ever have a flasher device installed. 

 

Here a couple of pictures.  

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I think I'll do some touchups on the dried mud caked on the tailwheel guard.  Have a bit of putty/sanding work to do in this area as well. 

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Last up - started some preliminary work in the bomb bay.  Much more work to do in this area, as I'll have both the cannon bay covers and the aft bomb bay doors open.

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Thanks for looking!

 

Edited by John1
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Hi Grunticus (were you infantry by any chance?)

 

Never heard of it but I'll certainly try to find it.

 

Quick update, I've continued puttering around with the inner wing spar assembly.   The section at the top of the bomb bay was divided into two sections.   One held a pair of 25 gal fuel tanks, the forward section (which held additional fuel in the bomber version) was left open to leave room for the 20mm cannon ammo boxes.  This section also has the roofs of the two main landing gear bays.  

 

Here is the assembly so far.  Tamiya does a nice job on the fuel tanks and wheel wheel details (note that the roofs are pretty high up in the wells so they didn't have to go overboard with detailing).  

 

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I added a few details to the wheel well roofs (arrows show my additions).  Also did some shading to try to give the illusion of those cross-tubes being circular d(they are actually molded flat with the roof of the wheel well).  I think they came out ok.

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Here is the center section.  Arrows show the additions I added.  These include wiring for the interior lights (nice touch by DeHavilland, always thinking of those poor mechanics and armorers), brackets for the tank restraining clamps (the kit piece was just flat plastic) and wiring for the tank level gauge (I think that's what it is). 

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I also hit this area with pastels, one of my favorite weathering tools, to replicate built up grunge from the cannon gases, etc.    Not happy with the chipped white paint, I'm going to go back and touch this up.

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Anyway, that's it for now, thanks for looking! 

Edited by John1
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9 hours ago, Dpgsbody55 said:

Enjoying this build :thumbsup:.  You're making me think about getting my Tamiya kit out of the stash for my next build.  It's decades since my last Mossie build too!!

 

Cheers,

Michael

Go for it Michael.   The further I get into this build, the more I am stunned at how absolutely wonderful this kit is.   Granted I have a small sample size but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the Tamiya Mosquito is the best LSP produced to date.  Still wish someone would have offered up a resin NF conversion (at least for the earlier aircraft w/ single-stage engines) but that's water under the bridge at this point.

 

John

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