The paint in that photo @fiveten posted almost looks like it was originally OD/NG and then some "tan" or "middle stone" was over done on the OD. that could make sense since the OD used on the early A-20/Boston would have been OD 41, the "green" OD that is the same shade as RAF Dark Green. Which also goes "brownish" when sun faded. Also that underside color looks like "Mediterranean blue" not "Azure blue."

As to your painting @eb801 - this looks very nice. Just prepare to "mess it up" after the decals are on with chipping and exhaust stain, etc.

AMT A-20 family has also been reboxed by Italeri (and once by Revell), roughly form the mid-2000s onwards, my friend @ij001 , with very nice decals! Looks like Italeri has acquired those AMT molds. So, maybe you will have some better chances to find one near you at a sensible price.

TC @tcinla: I was wondering about that Azure blue if that was correct. Most of the modeling paint call outs online specified this color but I should know better than to trust them. I do plan to “mess this up” and give it that “baked in the sun”. Any tips in that department?

@fiveten: the words "sensible prices" and "Italeri" cannot be used in the same sentence. 🙂

@tcinla and @fiveten: after 8 full days being totally off the grid, I’m back at it. I plan on giving the gloss coat a mist spray of ultra thinned tan or khaki (no white please) to give the paint a “baked in the desert” look.

Any suggestions?

Speaking of sensible prices, I scored this Boston kit for free from an out of work real estate aerial photographer/pilot during 2007 recession who was a member of our short lived LHS model club. The guy got behind in his mortgage payments and was downsizing his kit stash getting rid of duplicates. He got totally desperate for cash and then made a huge blunder. He agreed to fly a load of weed from CA out to Michigan only to be met on the tarmac by the DEA. Off he went to prison. But I scored Trimaster/DML’s Ta-152C and H kits, an AM Stormovik, this Ertl A20, an Otaki Hellcat and a terrible Italeri Spit, all gratis thanks to this guy before he disappeared, never to be heard from again.

The tan/khaki misting sounds interesting, but I am not sure of the outcome, my friend @eb801. I would suggest to spray on a sort of "test area" first and evaluate the result.
Oh , my! What a story!

Back on the Job Again!

Hey there Tom @tcinla, John @johnb, Spiros @fiveten and George @gblair and other lookers: here's some new progress:

Yeah...it's been over three weeks since I last worked on this guy. Part of the delay was a complete lack of red RAF squadron letters and black serial number decals (12”) in my decal dungeon to replicate those as seen in this undated IWM photo of an early model DB7-C/Boston III circa early 1942 in North Africa. A quick order over to Hannants and a week of shipping time solved this. This particular plane Serial Z2162 is getting the "once over" prior to its next mission and belonged to the 24th Squadron of the SAAF. These are the markings I have chosen for this build.

Note that this Boston that I am building has cut out cooling vents in the cowls, but the one in this photo doesn’t . All initial early DB7-A/Havoc/Boston III models featured them and were delivered as such to the RAF in the first round of shipments. Shortly afterwards the vents were eliminated, most likely due to sand intake. The remaining vented cowl Bostons in service had them fared over in the field. But no matter how much online and book research I did (along with lots of much valued help from Spiros @fiveten), neither of us could find an image of an African desert Boston with tropical vents. I guess the RAAF took them all as you can find many photos of Aussie Boston III’s with these very vents used in the early days of the South Pacific Theater.

However, during my descent into this Havoc/Boston rabbit hole, I did find one photo below of a DB-7A with fared over vents undergoing servicing by SAAF ground crews in North Africa, circa early 1942, so they must have been used in the early days of the North Africa campaign.

All this fact finding aside, I now present my “fantasy” SAAF DB-7A with vented cowls, fully decaled and glossy ready for weathering. I believe this plane lacked the red vertical prop warning markings or maybe they just wore off. Another note: those props in the first b&w photo look unpainted to me, which isn’t going to happen on my version as I have already painted them black.

After all the decaling was done, I ran this Boston thru a brutal "sand storm" using mists of super thinned tan and light grey in combination with Testor's Dullcote to give it that baked desert - worn out look. I then "sanded" the top surfaces with a couple of Kim Tech wipes to knock back the grittiness of the paint. More desert dirt, “’chipping” and stains are now in progress.

I can see the finish line up ahead now even without glasses!

Very good work on weathering the paint here @eb801. I like this a lot.