Tamiya Corsair Mk.II, 1/48. The Fleet Air Arm.
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Greetings folks,
After getting more into the hobby and posting on a few other places, I've decided to make an account here and post my most recent builds. Critique is always important, and keeping confined to one forum or social media can limit the opinions available. I normally build aircraft in pairs or small groups with a central theme, this time the theme was simply 3 different Corsairs, one of which I found a huge amount of inspiration from a post on this forum.
To start things off, here is a Tamiya 1/48 Corsair. This is the F4U-1D kit, but halfway through I had a change of heart and built it as a 1A. The aircraft represents the Corsair Mk.II JT383, flown by Fleet Air Arm ace Leslie Durno sometime towards the end of 1944/beginning of 1945.
What can really be said about the Tamyia kit that hasn't been said already? Not much. It's a great kit, a good price, and in my opinion is the best F4U-1 kit on the market in 1/48, though it is starting to show it's age as it turns 25 years old this year. This kit was built with a few additions, firstly it received Ares Quickboost control surfaces for the rudder and ailerons (the elevator included in the pack went towards another Corsair), and Montex paint masks were used to achieve the FAA British Pacific Fleet markings. Notable is the roundel on the underside, Montex suggests this to have a red middle ring which makes little sense to me as red was banned from being used in markings due to issues with friendly fire, also if the Corsair did have red roundels why not just keep the standard roundel? Looking at the one photograph of the aircraft I deemed this to likely be white, overpainted with the standard insignia blue, I tried this and the effect came out too subtle (as visible on the upper wing roundel), so I repainted it in a colour roughly similar to the SEAC 'Indian Blue'. Finally to finish things off an Aeroboost RAF North African Campaign pilot was acquired and suffered a removal of legs to force him to sit rather than stand, this naturally isn't the correct uniform for a FAA pilot but I was inspired by that classic coloured photograph of a rather bearded Hellcat pilot with his sleeves rolled up. In hindsight, I should have added some PE seatbelts to go over him.
Other than that, everything else was built out of box. The tailhook received a small cut before being bent and the gap filled with 'sprue glue' (literally bits of sprue melted into an almost empty tamiya cement), the flaps were also bought down to a full 70' down angle which required some cutting, and some plasti-card was inserted to form some missing details on the flaps. The aircraft was painted with Tamiya paints, essentially XF-21 Sky, XF-62 Olive Drab and a combination of Tamiya greys to produce something similar to ANA 603, it's worth remembering that whilst the lend-lease aircraft had Fleet Air Arm colours, they were painted in America with equivalent colours so they should look different to a Seafire, the biggest example of this is US aircraft just using Olive Drab instead of Dark Slate Grey.
The stand was build using an 3mm x 150mm acrylic rod and inserted into an acrylic disc, the rod was then bent after heating with a hairdryer to create a slightly more interesting pose to mimic a landing approach.
This was my 4th Tamiya Corsair (my 5th, an F4U-2 was build alongside and finished a few days after) and I plan on building many more.
Really beautiful work and a quality build. I love the display idea, and with the pilot leaning forward for visibility you can almost feel the tension of trying to land the plane on a pitching and rolling carrier deck. I love the weathering, looks incredible and adds so much interest to the overall kit.
Thank you! It's partially because he has a lopsided backside, but I felt like it looked great for that exact reason of someone straining to see over the long nose of the Corsair and felt it looked better left as it was than trying to 'fix' it.
Harvey, @ScaleRambush
First off, welcome to Imodeler ! This is a friendly place, and I think you will enjoy it here.
You really caught my attention with your FAA Corsair. The F4U happens to be my favorite aircraft. Your article was very interesting, and informative.
I really like what you have done here, especially with the display stand. I have posted several Corsair "work in progress" builds here on Imodeler. Here's the latest one, being a Tamiya kit in 1/48 scale.
and I still have a few small things to do on the Goodyear test plane, then both of them will hit the headlines section.
Thank you for the welcome! I really like the look of that Corsair, don't often see Birdcages in that scheme and it looks very interesting. I also have a Goodyear Super Corsair in the stash and was originally going to build it at the beginning of the year, but to be honest it looked like far too much of a pig for me to have the motivation to do! I'll get round to it one day I'm sure..
Welcome Harvey. Great work. I love pose and action you implied and the finish is awesome.
Thank you! I tested this pose quickly on a little 1/144 Corsair and felt it was worth repeating it in a larger scale, it definitely stands out in the cabinet!
Nice! I’m a fan of all things Eastern Fleet and BPF. Welcome to the site, Harvey.
Thank you for the welcome! The I've always found the Royal Navy's involvement in the war outside of the Atlantic to be largely overlooked and forgotten about, I definitely don't claim to really know much about it either but it was definitely a good excuse to do some digging when building this one.
You might want to pick this up. It’s a well written and comprehensive history of the subject.
1 attached image. Click to enlarge.
Very god! Love the hard Weathering, the fluids leak are nice!
Love the Far East schemes, and this is one great-looking corsair! Well done.
I'll also say welcome to the best model club on the planet.
I particularly like that you got that the Olive Drab used in the FAA-equivalent paint was the earlier green-base OD-41 - a minor but important point many miss. (FWIW, I have found that the best Tamiya representation of this color is XF-74 "OD (JGDSF)")
Positioning the pilot as you did is excellent - given the FAA manner of the "circling approach," you've got him on short final, looking for the "cut" from the batsman, the most high-tension moment of the event.
This is one of the best-looking FAA Corsairs I've seen in a long time.
Thank you, that's some extremely high praise and I appreciate it. I found http://www.theworldwars.net/resources/ to be invaluable for finding information like that out, things I otherwise wouldn't have even thought of checking. I'll be sure to pick up a bottle of XF-74 as I'm sure some project will end up with OD on it at some point.
This is a wonderful Corsair, Harvey @ScaleRambush! A lot of quality work is put in there.
Love the painting, weathering and stand idea, too.
Read about your underside roundel coloring with great interest, your approach definitely makes sense!
Looking forward to see more of your amazing builds.
Welcome aboard!
Great looking build and paintwork!
Welcome to this great community, Harvey.
A fantastic entry with this F4U.
It looks awesome, and the pose makes it look very realistic.
Looking forward to your future builds.
Welcome, Harvey! Love the FAA Corsair and the “down and dirty” pose. Nice colors and weathering, too.
Purty good! Great model, well displayed. I like the scratched wing walk areas. The key to this is randomness, and you got it.
Like the other friendly folks said, this is a great place.
Thank you! Definitely seems like a great environment to share in the hobby, looks like I made the right choice in making an account.
Welcome to iModeler, Harvey, and great to see a variation on the classic Tamiya kit as good as this, definitely liked.
Love the coming in for a landing configuration, everything is down, and as Walt mentioned pilot leaning a bit forward. Oil and fuel leaks a plenty, grime and the chipping is well done. In the middle of a Tam F4U-1D in which will be finished in New Zealand markings. And yes they are a joy to build and yikes 25 years already. Good work, thanks for sharing.
Thank you! The Montex masks used come with markings for this and that popular RNZAF Corsair with the front half Semi-Gloss blue and rear half in three-colour scheme. Would hate for those masks to go to waste so I'm sure I'll end up doing a RNZAF Corsair sooner rather than later.
Welcome to site. Great to see a Corsair in FAA colours.
Welcome aboard Harvey and your first post is a fine representation of a Corsair on final. Really like what you've done here and I can also echo your comments about the Tamiya kit. Build my first Tamiya Corsair not long ago and Jim Sullivan was of invaluable help in researching my subject. Again, welcome and I'm sure you'll enjoy it here.
Really well-done all around, from fit to finish to weathering. Great work on a great kit.
Welcome, and may I say what a beautiful Corsair you built & shared with us! Fantastic photography, too!
@ScaleRambush
I'm fairly new here too but welcome! This is just so cool.
You've come in with a real bang here.
Very dynamic photos, just great.
🙂 ... Greetings ... 🙂 :
Welcome to the forum, I do trust you will have a very good time here.
That is a very impressive model Harvey, it really stands out.
Your painting as well as the camouflage scheme is well applied and the subtle weathering
is very convincing. A very impacting first post, hope to see more of your work.
Thank you for sharing these images.
Thank you for the kind words and support, definitely a very welcoming forum!
Thank you all for the kind words and support, I appreciate it very much. I definitely made the right choice in making an account here, I'll likely post something more in a next few days.
You mentioned recent builds but don't be shy to post your older builds as well, they need love too.
Will do John! That being said, I don't want to spam the board too much and turn it into Corsair after Corsair after Corsair, I'll give a few days between each.
Another option is to combine some with a common theme into one posting. So far I've done that with my 1/35 and 1/72 models, one post per scale thus far. Most of mine are 1/48 and I'll attempt to do all those together too somehow but if I can't there'll be themes and as few postings as possible or practical.
If I must I'll split them into subject matter or kit manufacturers, something like that. It's just a thought. I too am afraid of wearing out my welcome here.