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Marek Halas
28 articles

Tamiya 1/48 Grumman F4F-4 Wildcat

March 21, 2013 · in Aviation · · 8 · 3.3K

Seeing as we're having a bit of a theme going on here I thought I'd post my efforts as well.

As has been written before the Wildcat is a great kit to build.

Pretty straightforward in construction, the only fiddly bit I found was the joint between the underside of the fuselage & the one piece wing moulding - & that was more due to my own inexperience rather than the fault of the kit.

I wasn't particularly happy with the kit supplied decals so I opted for the Super Scale set, but still wanted to depict a VF-41 machine from USS Ranger that sported the "meatball" inside the star & the bright red & white striped rudder.

The other additions were metal tubes for the guns & a vac-formed canopy hood since Tamiya's one wasn't crash hot in the open position being that just bit too thick.

The kit itself had a long & protracted build period of pushing thirteen years or so (top that anyone?). I started this back in the mid nineties when the kit first came out, got as far as completing the build & first base coat. Then it got put on the shelf of doom as work & life in London, marriage & the eventual birth of my daughter took my model making into an extended hiatus. I only really picked up the kit again back in 2010 & decided to gently sand back the original paint job which was a bit rough in places & get it finished.

I'm now trying to speed up my builds & keep them under a decade!

Reader reactions:
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8 responses

  1. ...and the winner is!

  2. Nice build. I totally understand the part about trying to keep your builds under a decade. The older you get, the faster time flies by.

    Love the early markings, BTW.

    -d-

    • Thanks David, & yes what happened to the nineties? Surely it wasn't that long ago? On the subject of markings, it's interesting how the US Navy progressively changed theirs over a relatively short period of time. I'm planning to eventually build a few more US carrier types with that in mind.

  3. Very nice work Marek.

  4. Thanks Tom, I also have a Hobby Boss Martlet up my modelling sleeve, so I guess watch this space...& it's not their 1/48 offerings either, it's their 1/72 "Fast Assembly Authentic Kit" Hmmmmm...more on that later...

  5. said on May 25, 2013

    Marek .. really like your attention to details .. the cock-pit is GREAT ..and as Tom says ... very nice work ..

  6. Thanks Ray, It's been a while since I last checked in to iModeler, so it's good to see comments from folks still viewing stuff that was posted a while back!

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