REVELL 1:48 BELL P-39 AIRACOBRA
The old but gold kit depicting one of the aircraft flown by Alexander Ivanovich Pokryshkin. He scored 48 victories while flying P-39's including this one. Bio here...http://aircrewremembered.com/pokryshkin-aleksandr.html Can't say enough about the fit of the aircraft, a bit of filler along the left wing root and at the lower fuselage wing join. Even the three inserts on the right fuselage were a good fit. To represent the interior Dull Dark Green, the closest I had was Tamiya XF-11, J.N. Green. Good enough for me.
While looking at more reference photos, I noticed there was a flange around the cannon as well as a shroud...
I got out my trusty circle cutter and cut a 3mm disc from plastic card
I also got some plastic tube and thinned the front and later cut down to size
Camouflage was done using Tamiya XF-62 Olive Drab/XF-53 Neutral Grey. Now we get into some non-kit issues. Lots of discussion about whether the Russian star were place directly over the USA stars leaving the blue surround. Almost every other build I've seen of this kit does it this way but a great thread on Massimo Tessitori's site convinced me to go with green. Eagle Strike, whose decals I used provided the size templates and once again my trusty circle cutter came into play
Every other build of this kite has a whack of victory stars on the nose on this kite but in reality, Pokryshkin is posing on a different aircraft, so I only used the six stars I could make out. Eagle Strike also give you red stars with red/white borders but these can't be seen in the photo so I used red stars with black trim from spares.
Note the landing gear looks photoshopped in
Great looking P-39 !
Thank you
Nice looking result with this old kit. It really holds up here.
A suggestion for further work. Tamiya XF-61 is not an OD shade that was ever used with USAAF aircraft. However, if you cut it with about 20% Tamiya Flat Earth and 10% Tamiya Desert Yellow, you will be "cooking with gas" as they say.
Thanks Tom. Good to know about the O.D.
Very nice George !
Thanks Paul
Wonderful, George! Thanks for kit details (loved the spinner cannon flange!).
Thanks Spiros and you're very welcome
Great job on an old favorite. And a salute to your perfect fabrication work. All good.
Thank you
Sharp looking '39 George.
Thank you very much, Dale
Nice work, George!
Thanks Gary
Well done - looks very nice!
Thanks
Nice work, George! That’s one of those Monogram kits that still works well.
Thanks John. I was going to get another for one more oddball scheme I have but I decided to give the Eduard kit a go
Excellent build, George @blackadder57
Great scratch build work on the spinner cannon.
Thanks a lot John
Very nice Sov Cobra model.
I should look into getting one of those circle cutters. I could have used one several times over in several of my recent model builds.
Thanks Dan. The one I have can cut about 1mm circles.
George, @blackadder57
This is a remarkable looking model. I remember building this kit way back in the mid 1970's as a kid. I was amazed with all of the details it had back then... and I still am today. Sadly this is also the ONLY P-39 that I have ever built. I have not had much time for our hobby lately, but maybe when I get back to the bench I will build one of these. Your work is inspiring and it definitely warrants a click on the "like" button. I also like the research you do with your builds. This takes it up a notch or two in my book. That circle cutter is something else... 🙂
Maybe for Christmas I can get one. Two thumbs up buddy. Well done. 🙂
Thank you Louis and looking forward to your return to building
Awesome work George, really nicely done with the cannon. Cool to learn a bit more about the plane.
Thank you very much Anthony
Great job, that’s one heck of a nice looking P-39. These old Monogram kits, especially this one are great kits!
Much appreciated Bob