Excellent entry, my friend @gwfabian! With your superb skills an awesome result will emerge from this elderly mold. Looking forward to it!

Hoo boy! Why not pick a difficult project?! 🙂

@fiveten I appreciate the confidence, Spiros, but we shall see if I've bitten of more than I can chew.

I am in the same boat with you, Greg (@gwfabian). I love the Beaufighter and I have a couple of the Revell 1/32 editions. One of the kits was a special edition with extra parts to build other versions of the plane. I didn't realize how much would need to be done to improve this kit, especially the interior, till I started doing some research online. I looked into the various resin updates there are for this kit, but many of them would require a bank loan. I am hoping at some point to gather the needed design skills so I can design and print my own parts on my 3D printer, but the skill to do that is still way down the road. I haven't shelved my desire to build and update this kit, but it has moved farther down the build queue. Looking forward to see what you do.

Let’s see what I’ve gotten myself into with this project.

As with most airplane model kits of this vintage, this one has raised panel lines. I’ve seen some discussion on the merits of raised versus recessed panel lines and how it’s possible to still achieve a good result with the former. However, I foresee liberal use of filler to cover-up poor joints, so the raised panel lines just aren’t going to hack it. The next decision is should I score new panel lines and, if so, to what extent?

Looking at videos and pictures of actual Beaufighter walk-arounds, it appears these planes did not have prominent joints where aluminum panels met. Except for wing and, perhaps, empennage fillets, here appears to be few, if any, overlap joints as well. There certainly are joints around hatches and other access ports (wing gun bays, etc.) that will require carving lines into the plastic and, perhaps, some panel line wash or chipping to accentuate usage around these openings. But I don’t see going “crazy” with highlighting every single joint in the airframe skin.

A similar situation exists with rivets. The walkarounds show that rivets are not a prominent feature of the Beaufighter’s skin. There are areas that do have rather prominent rivets, such as the pilot and observer canopy framing, around the cannon openings, and some fillets. I should get by with adding rivets sparingly where they’re seen in the walk-arounds. Like many planes of its era, the Beaufighter’s skin is festooned with rivets, but it they’ve been ground down to the point where they appear as dimples when the angle of illumination is just right. Furthermore, the flat paint cuts down on reflection that would otherwise accentuate the presence of rivets. So, I think I can get by with a reasonable amount of riveting.

My strategy for handling the Beaufighter’s skin is to first determine where all (or, at least, as many as possible) access ports/hatches/covers and overlapping joints are located and etch them into the plastic. Next, I’ll sand down all the existing molded raised panel lines. Depending upon which direction I’m taking, I may cut out some panels. For example, if I decide to display the breeches and ammo belts of the .30 cal wing guns, I’ll cut away that panel from the upper wing surface. Unless I can get my hands on an affordable 1/32 scale copy of a Hispano Suiza 20 mm cannon, I don’t think I will be doing the same for the belly of the beast.

Getting back to the kit itself, this is a limited production Beaufighter Mk 1F Revell/Lodela run that, according to ScaleMates, was released in the 1990s. Included in the kit are additional parts to build a Mk TF.X Costal Command “Torbeau” or a Mk VIF night fighter flown in Italy by the USAAF. Decals are provided for any one of these versions.

Also included are vacuum-formed parts for:
-Replacement horizontal stabilizers with the appropriate dihedral for the later Beau models. Note that these parts have recessed panel lines that would probably be 4-5 inches wide on the actual aircraft.

• Replacement supercharger scoops (tropical?)
• Parts for the distinctive “thimble” radome
• Parts for a torpedo. Note that the kit does not include a propeller, stabilizing fins, mounting brackets, nor the plywood contraption that was found attached to the aft end of the torpedo that ensured it hit the water correctly when dropped and then broke off. That’s left up to the modeler to supply.

There are also replacement clear parts for the pilot and observer/gunner’s canopies. Neither has much, if any, surface detailing. However, it may be possible to create the necessary canopy framing with some thin styrene sheet. Note that the observer’s canopy is shaped like the ones sporting the .30 caliber rear-facing gun.

Also included in the kit are photo-etched parts for upgrading the rather pathetic OOB (out of the box) cockpit (but nothing for the observer’s station). The PE sheet indicates it was made by Eduard. There’s also printed instrument panel sheet to use with the PE.

It looks like I have some relatively decent material to work with.

Since the kit has come out, there has been a few additional aftermarket parts that are now available to enhance the model. These include:

• Model Monkey pilot’s cockpit
• Model Monkey observer’s station
• Porcupine exhausts
• Replacement Bristol Hercules engines
• Torpedo (resin, looks better than the vacu-formed torpedo)
• HVAR rockets
• 3D printed horizontal stabilizers
• Decals, since I would really like to build a RNZAF Costal Command Torbeau or Rockbeau

The cost of all these parts could easily pay for a 1/32 Tamiya Mosquito model, so I’m going to have to be judicious in my purchases. My strategy is the following:

I’m going all in on the Model Monkey pilot’s cockpit.

I would really like to display the model with the pilot access open, which nixes the torpedo. As I understand it, Costal Command Beaus (Beaux?) were equipped with either rockets or a torpedo and they did not mix these weapons on individual aircraft. This will save me time in trying to fabricate the missing torpedo parts (or, if I goof that up, having to spring for an aftermarket torpedo).

I’m also going all-in on the porcupine exhausts. I don’t think the drinking straw approach is going to yield a good result this time (as if it did the first time).

Vector makes replacement Hercules engines, but they are 1) very expensive, and 2) manufactured by a Russian company. I think the existing engines in the kit are good enough for my purposes, so I’ll stick with them.

I’ll by a set of aftermarket HVAR rockets since it looks like I’ll be making a Rockbeau.

I’m going to wait and see about the Model Monkey observer’s station. It looks great, but most of it will probably be invisible once the fuselage goes together. Maybe if I display the model with the observer canopy open, more of the interior will be seen and it will be worth it. Otherwise, it could be a matter of leaving the observer's canopy closed and fabricating a seat and some details around it and calling it a day.

So there you have it for now.

A great amount aof extras, my friend @gwfabian! Will definitely enhance the model looks!

My first instinct in dealing with this project was to dive and start gluing pieces together. Fortunately, I didn't succumb to that and have spent time doing research on the subject at hand - the Beaufighter - and looking at build logs of other modelers. One build log in particular looked promising only to have faded away after about a year. So I suppose that Beaufighter model is sitting on a shelf in an incomplete state or has already been heaved into the trash and incinerated.

I decided to use my experience as a project manager to formulate a plan for this effort before applying any glue to plastic. To that end, I test fitted the nine main parts of the kit that form the fuselage and the wings using painter's tape. The goal was to see just how much trouble I'm getting myself into.

I remember this kit having fitment issues when I built it back in '74, and I wasn't disappointed with my new copy. For the most part, the fuselage halves fit together ok, but will require some work. However, it was practically impossible to fit the center section of the wings (which includes the Bristol Hercules engine pods, or, in Beaufighter lingo, the "power eggs") following the order specified in the instructions. After several minutes of test fitting, I was able to fit everything together by first snapping the upper inner wings onto the fuselage, then fitting on the lower center section, and then snapping on the outer wings after taping their upper and lower halves together.

A close examination of the gun ports for the 20mm cannons shows they will need work. In addition, the model lacks the ejector ports for the 20mms, so I'll have to cut those out.

I would like to build the model with gear down and the pilot entry hatch (on the belly) open. This would eliminate the need to build a torpedo (unless I go the extra mile and build some sort of cart for the torpedo) since the torpedo blocks the pilot entry hatch. Presumably the pilot enters the plane through the observer's entry hatch (also on the belly) when the torpedo is present, so that could be another pose if I decide to sling a torpedo under the Beau.

Another area of concern is the wheel wells. Revell dropped the ball on this and overly simplified the wheel wells, so some detailing is in order if I want to build the model with wheels down. Also, the main gear doors lack any detail on the inside surface. I have found some pictures of the real deal that should be invaluable in detailing this aspect of the model.

I'm in the process of completing a materials list (plastic stock, paint, tools, aftermarket decals, and such) and hope to send an order off in the next week or so.