Trumpeter 1/32 F4U-4 Corsair build

[richdlc]

Hi guys - as I keep threatening to post up pics of my F4U-4 build I thought I would bite the bullet & do so! So here we are. I have decided to build a Korean War era machine as I just couldn't find enough pics of late WWII colour schemes. I had originally intended to portray a machine on Okinawa in mid 1945 buy hey ho.

Firstly, I gathered together detail sets and reference material:

 

 

there's more resin bits than you can shake a stick at so I started by cleaning some of these up:

 

Aires wheel bay cleaned up - note damage to some parts due to brittle resin - I'll repair these later with plastic card

 

 

then I removed some panels....I am going to show a scratchbuilt fuel tank bay, with the fuel cell displayed outside the aircraft. I'm going to build a diorama showing field maintenance, which was often done under the crudest conditions in Korea....I'm thinking a nice PSP plating base and some mechanic figures, but more on that at a later date....this pic is of the fuel tank bay panel / cowl removed. There's also a little access panel on the side

 

 

...and the other fuselage half - I am also going to scratchbuild / detail the oil tank / engine mounting bay forward of the fuel bay. The Vector engine includes a complete rear, but I'll have to make the oil tank and other detail from scratch

 

 

next up is the cockpit - I'm using the Grand Phoenix set which is about 90% accurate but warrants some extra details and modifications. The white piece below the R/H side instrument panel is a chart board that pops up out of the floor

 

 

the L/H instrument panel needed the most work...

 

 

this is the L/H cockpit wall panel - there was a prominent and overscale hose/wirethat had to be removed, damaging the fine ribbing in the process - I replaced this with fine plastic rod from my parts bin. The wiring is plastic rod. The round thing sticking up is the Diluter-demand oxygen regulator, which is is the wrong place. I later removed this and re-attatched it where it should be, on top of the L/H instrument panel

 

Edited November 5, 2011 by richdlc

[richdlc]

here it is, with extra detail, where it should be. In this pic you can see a few more details added. I also attatched the rudder bar, slightly offset as I want the rudder offset in that direction!

 

 

Here's the L/H cockpit wall panel with the throttle quadrant detailed - I also had to trim some excess resin off as I was having fitting trouble. The other cockpit wall fits fine though, for some contrary reason.

 

 

cockpit tub taking shape with the backing panel attatched...

 

 

rather than use the cockpit set's front cockpit tub panel, I used it as a template to create a cross-sectional piece that would serve both as the front panel & also the back panel for the fuel tank bay - I then made a corresponding, slightly larger version of this to serve as the fuel tank bay front panel / engine mount panel - got it?

 

 

here's what I mean...this is the fuel tank bay back panel with the cockpit tub dry-fitted

 

 

I made a start using plastic card scrap and a couple of copies of the cockpit tub front panel duplicated in thinner plastic card

 

 

and another view

 

 

I'll make a thin sheet plastic half-pipe affair and join the rear fuel tank bay panel to the front one to give me the actual 'bay' I need

Edited August 7, 2011 by richdlc

[richdlc]

next up I decided to add the Aires wheel wells - I had to sand them down to near wafer thinness, and the same for the kit's wing halves. In some places I went right through the resin & had to replace with plastic card, and even then it was tight....the wing halves will go together though with superglue and a little persuasion....

 

 

you can see here where I sanded nearly through to Australia by the time I'd finished - the fit of these parts isn't great!

 

 

the Aires set is a big improvement over the kit parts & is worth the effort...

 

that's it for now, more pics as I make more progress :-)

Edited August 7, 2011 by richdlc

[98Wrangler]

This will be one to really watch; You're a brave lad to carve up a bird like that. Will be very intersted in the stuffing that follows. Does look good so far.

[Guest Nigelr32]

Looks great so far!! I really look forward to this build, and wait patiently to see how you get around the awful folding wing joint??

[richdlc]

Hi - thanks for the kind words

 

I decided not to do the folded wings on this one - I don't like the look of them when folded TBH...I was considering doing one up one down but then decided against it

[LSP_Kevin]

Great work on an ambitious project mate.

 

you can see here where I sanded nearly through to Australia by the time I'd finished

 

Ah, I thought I felt a bit of a breeze...

 

Kev

[Guest Nigelr32]

Hi - thanks for the kind words

 

I decided not to do the folded wings on this one - I don't like the look of them when folded TBH...I was considering doing one up one down but then decided against it

 

Hi Rich,

 

That's what I was hoping. I believe the joint is difficult to deal with if you go for wings down??

[Derek B]

Looks like you're really going to town on this one Rich...Good man!

 

Fantastic work so far from what I can see. I think that this particular Corsair will be lacking for nothing by the time you finish it - Keep up the great work

 

Derek

[Phantastic]

Great looking build you've got going!! Looks like you'll have pleanty to do for awhile!! LOL!

[richdlc]

cheers everyone

 

 

Hi Rich,

 

That's what I was hoping. I believe the joint is difficult to deal with if you go for wings down??

 

well it may be I haven't checked yet. If necessary I'll just discard the kit parts or get rid of any unwanted excess plastic - all that's needed really is a strengthener between the top & bottom wing halves. Once I put in the gun bays that will strengthen the outer wing, and the wheel wells will do the same for the inner wing...I can always make spars or something out of plastic rod

 

more pics in a few days!

[big matt]

Looks good so far Rich. I was curious as to how much you had to remove for the Aires parts. Wow.

[levier]

Rich,

 

Where did you source the photo the forward tank bay (Lulubelle)?

 

Brian

[richdlc]

hi mate - I found it on www.flickr.com-it's the conneticut corsair restoration project. In fact, it has made my reference books largely redundant, a great resource for sure - there are thousands of pics of corsairs to choose from. I did have to do a screengrab on some pics as the owner had disabled downloading/copying for some reason. I guess it's ok as they are online to look at anyway

[richdlc]

*update*

 

OK - so I have added some more detail to the fuel tank bay. I started with the backer panel - in real life the entire bay was lined with plasticine panels - well, according to my sources anyway.

 

after peering intently at the pics I could see that there was rivet detail on the middle and bottom 'sections' of the backer panel, and the top panel was one of those plasticine lining panels - I decided the best way to replicate this was to use thin sheet metal & a riveting tool - I added further details with thin gauge wire & plastic card / rod - I used a little artistic licence with some of the rivet detail but I think it's pretty close:

 

 

I then had to make the forward fuel tank bay panel out of plastic card. This will also serve as the engine mounting panel in the oil tank bay - I also made a half pipe of thin plastic card. This will serve as the actual 'bay' - it took three attempts to get it approximately correct, and I'll trim it down later. All the interior detail will be attatched to this piece..

 

 

I could now mock up how things were going to look with a dry-fit. I think the bay itself might be a bit too deep, but I'll wait and see how I feel about that later...I'll probably fit everythin together & trim to fit before I glue the fuselage halves together...

 

 

that's it for now, stay tuned!

Edited August 7, 2011 by richdlc