Guerre d'Indochine...1/48 Bell P-63C Kingcobra, Armée de l’Air
7/2022
And my dad´s next addition to the French at war theme.
AMG kit which is somewhere between shortrun and mainstream. Dryfitting is important
Painted with Tamiya X-32 Titanium Silver. Plastic rods used for the missing nose gun barrels. Also used rods to replace the badly molded gondola barrels. The kit comes only with a spinner that has the external starter adapter stub. Therefore used a spinner from an Eduard P-39 kit, also exhausts are from an Eduard P-39 (molded more nicely). As seen on pics, all French P-63 had the front wheel hub covers removed, kit wheel is covered. Aftermarket P-63 wheels from Reskit and True Details also have only covered front wheels. Bought Eduard Brassin P-39 late wheels. The tire of the front wheel was too narrow, thin and square, but the rim looked perfect. So my dad sanded away the tire, drilled out the hub cover of the kit wheel and inserted the Eduard rim into the AMG tire.
Added 20g nose weight. EZ line for the antenna wire.
Build thread here
https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235105690-guerre-dindochine148-bell-p-63c-kingcobra-arm%C3%A9e-de-l%E2%80%99air/
In 1945 France received 114 P-63Cs. Initially stationed in North Africa, they were sent to Indochina in 1948/49. Due to lack of spare parts (the USA didn´t send any because they wanted to end the French imperialism) only about 60 aircraft were servicable. In 1951 the Kingcobras were replaced by Bearcats.
Model shows an aircraft of GC II/5 "Ile-de-France"
Yet another amazing Spreitzhofer result!
Very nice work, again, Reini! ? Kudos to your Dad's modeling skills! ?
Great work on that!
Your did created another amazing build, Reinhard@grimreaper
Beautiful metal painting and weathering.
That kit is a good basis to start with, but it takes some real skill to bring it up to this level. Great result.
Very lovely - what is that underside bulge?
Thanks Greg!
The bulge was a fuel tank.