I know, I should finish my Focke-Wulfs but this doesn't seem to happen and it is better that I build a Mustang than nothing, isn't it? I picked up the new Airfix 1/72 Mustang last Friday and I intend to build it as a Swedish J 26. "Blue N" was one of a pair of D-Mustangs that were painted in traditional Swedish green and grey as an experiment, the rest of them (150+) remained in natural metal.

According to legend, "Blue N" was among the fastest Mustangs in the Air Force. The experimental paint scheme weathered badly and the aircraft soon got a quite beat-up appearance. Its regular pilot carefully kept it that way so that higher rank pilots should keep their hands off it!

Boxart: one marking alternative from "Tuskegee Airmen".

Plastic is very nice without being exceptional. This is not Hasegawa or Tamiya but it is still good and I am quite content with that!

A bit of glueing and fitting: parts fit well! There are two sets of flaps, one up and one down - and both of them fit very well! Something Hasegawa never has managed...

After a bit of painting...

Wings snapped into place with a beautiful clicking sound! I would however advise potential builders to wait with the flaps until the wing is glued to the fuselage: it did need a bit of force to snap in place and I doubt I would have been able to remove it again if I had needed to adjust the fit...

/Magnus

I am pretty fast when I finally get around to building...

After a coat of Tamiya Fine White the other day it got a coat of rattle-can Silver Leaf today...

...followed by a mix of Gunze clear and H309 green...

...with some zinc chromate (H58?) added to give a bit of a variation! Before the green coat I had added dots of Maskol to give the impression of flaking paint. A bit over the top in some areas, this will be corrected tonight - as will the walkway painted on the wrong wing root...

New blast tubes from Albion Alloys brass tubing.

Regards

Magnus

Finished! Looks a bit different from my usual style, I am not sure what I think about it myself...

The Airfix kit is an easy build and it fits well. I think however that I rather pay a bit of extra money and go for a Tamiya Mustang next time, the main reason for that would be the sharper detail of the Tamiya kit. But still: an enjoyable build and I am very glad that Airfix aim for the skies!

I have always been rather generous to my pilots when it comes to equipment: a K-14 "Ace Maker" sight from Quickboost was installed instead of the Airfix original...

The way the windscreen is installed makes it very hard to get a nice seam. I would be a liar if I told you that it looks better in real life...

The main canopy isn't done in the most clever of ways either: a separate lower frame (I HATE IT!). It was however possible to get a quite good joint using thinned white glue (thanks for the idea goes to Saxofon-Uffe, shipbuilder (and sax player!) par excellence!). If it had a pressure cabin I would be a bit worried though...

What I can say looks different in real life is the chipping: it looks a lot more restrained than in the photos!

Regards

Magnus

Geoff! Regarding the flap setting: I use what my flying instructor, mr Airfix, has told me 🙂 . There were two sturdy plastic lips deciding the angle for me so I didn't even think about checking it. They might be wrong, though, on the other hand, on my earlier Mustang build I managed to mount the landing gear outside-in so no matter what is right or wrong this its definitely an improvement 🙂 !

Those landing gear were fixed later but the engineer in me still thinks it is odd to sandwich the wheel between the gearleg and the cover. I would have done it my way. if I had been working at NAA. I wonder if they used Pro/E then?

Glad you like it!

Magnus