New products from Hawaiian Air Depot: 1/32 TBD Midway Paint Mask Downloadable Files and 1/24 Spitfire Mk. IX Styrene Cockpit Parts Downloadable Files

[Hawaiian Air Depot]

We're excited to announce our first set of downloadable digital designs for the new Trumpeter 1/32 TBD-1 Devastator. My Dad worked for TWA, and as a kid I got to meet George Gay, so we have to start with the Devastators from Torpedo 8. We're also cinema fans, so we based our designs on the TBD markings visible in John Ford's Midway footage.

 

The set features markings for Gay's T-14, Waldron's T-16, as well as T-3, T-5, T-7, and T-13: all the TBDs we can identify in Ford's footage. The download includes all the various insignia, all the plane numbers, prop tips, wing walkways, and masks for the bomb aiming and fuselage windows, which somehow Trumpeter doesn't include on their canopy mask sheet.

 

Stay tuned for more Devastator mask sets-- Coral Sea/Wake TBDs, and masks to paint up whichever Yellow Wing you want. After that, we'll do a TBD Styrene Sheet Metal set that will let you cut your own parts to update the bomb aiming doors to the later design seen on Midway TBDs. Also featured are unique plywood torpedo fins clear in Ford's footage.

 

The other new release is our next Styrene Sheet Metal set: downloadable files to sweeten up the cockpit of the 1/24 Airfix Spitfire Mk. IX . The highlights of this set are laminated assemblies to create a much finer throttle (real scale slots for the throttle levers) and a center pylon release lever. Our understanding is all wartime Spitfires with a center bomb/fuel tank pylon (Mk. V and later) had the lever, but the Airfix kit doesn't include one. In addition, parts to detail the gunsight mount, compass mount, floor, and sidewall details are also included.

 

Visit hawaiianairdepot.com for details. Thanks!

 

Edited August 19, 2023 by Hawaiian Air Depot
fix typos

[Rod Bettencourt]

Very cool stuff! Would it be possible to make masks for VT-3 and 6 at Midway also? It seems the other two TBD squadrons do not get as much acknowledgement for their sacrifice.

 

Rod  

[Hawaiian Air Depot]

On 8/20/2023 at 3:26 PM, Rod Bettencourt said:

Very cool stuff! Would it be possible to make masks for VT-3 and 6 at Midway also? It seems the other two TBD squadrons do not get as much acknowledgement for their sacrifice.

 

Rod  

Great idea, Rod; we've released two designs to compliment our Torpedo 8 offering, one for VT-3 and one for VT-6. The addendum sets include plane numbers and fuselage insignia arrangements to model several VT-3 and VT-6 Devastators. Add them to the complete masking set for Torpedo 8 and you can model at least 10 Midway TBDs.

 

Thanks for your input!