VMF-214 "Blacksheep" Capt. Ashmun F4U-1 Corsair, Bu.No 02723 Tamiya 1/48

Started by Louis Gardner · 32 · 1 year ago · 1/48, Blacksheep, Corsair, Tamiya, VMF-214
  • Profile Photo
    Louis Gardner said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    Here is a plane that I have been wanting to build for several years now. My plan is to hopefully get it done in time to post a tribute build on 03 January, 2023. I have to wait on the Molotow chrome to completely dry on my "LOU IV" Mustang, so there' no better time than the present to build a model of my favorite plane, the Corsair.

    On January 3rd, 1944, Captain George Ashmun was shot down in flames and killed while flying as Major "Pappy" Boyington's wingman. This is also the same day the Boyington was shot down and captured, becoming a POW for the rest of the War.

    For some reason or another, this project always gets pushed back further in the building plans.


    Several months ago, I started a Kindergarten for 9 various 1/48 Tamiya F4U's.

    In my usual Iron Werkes style of building, this works out well for me. After doing some research on this particular Corsair based on it's Bureau Number of 02723, I realized that it was possible this particular Corsair might have had the cockpit areas painted in a color that resembles "Candy Apple Green". I'll explain this later on in this build journal.


    Since I already have painted the cockpit and fuselage side walls in the other 9 Corsairs, it was simply easier to start building yet another Corsair, making the new total at 10. This also helps to thin out the herd of Corsairs in the stash a little more.

    I assembled the wings, fuselage side window inserts, and the cockpit for Corsair #10.

    Then I painted the cockpit areas in an aluminum base color. At this same time I painted the cockpit parts too. I was in the zone so I didn't take the time to snap a few pictures of these parts when they were painted aluminum.

    Next I sprayed on some Tamiya clear. This is a mix I made up several years ago using Clear Blue and Clear Yellow. It will get a little darker with each coat of Clear that is sprayed on top of the Aluminum base. This is something I learned at a House of Kolor painting seminar, where I learned how to professionally spray custom motorcycle gas tanks and fenders. I met and talked with John Kozmoski who is the owner of (and he started) the "House of Kolor" paints. This custom painting system is based on this principle of adding different clear colors on top of the various metallic bases.

    Turns out it works on models too.


    Once I painted the cockpit parts and internal sidewalls I changed colors and sprayed on my custom mix for Vought "Indian Red" otherwise known as Salmon. I painted this color on the tail wheel well areas on all of the Corsairs in the Kindergarten at the same time. It's one less thing to do in the future on the others.




    It turns out the "Birdcage" Corsair that Ashmun was flying this fateful day was not equipped with a head rest when it left the Vought factory. Ironically, only two aircraft later it became a standard feature. It is possible the headrest could have been added later on in the field. I don't have any pictures to show it was there or not, so I'm going to go this route and not have one. I carefully shaved it off, and filled in the hole with LQS.





    I'm headed back to the work bench now to continue on with this Corsair. I want to get it done and photos taken of it so I can post it up in the headlines section on 03 January, 2023.

    I will be building up two of these 10 Corsairs as part of the Pacific group.

    As always, comments are encouraged. Thanks for stopping by.

  • Profile Photo
    John vd Biggelaar said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    That would indeed be a great tribute, Louis @lgardner.
    10 ! Corsairs in one go, now that is impressive.
    Interior looks great already.

  • Profile Photo
    Louis Gardner said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    John vd Biggelaar (@johnb)
    Thank you John ! I have these 10 Corsairs started, but for now I only have plans to build two of them up for the Pacific group. Right now I'm pressed for time with this one since I want to get it done in time to post it in the headlines section.

    In time, I can always come back and finish up more of them, starting another build journal (or more) for them when the time comes.

    There will definitely be at least one more Corsair build posted with a new Pacific build journal once I finish up this one here from the Blacksheep.

    It too will also be a early "Birdcage", and also built as another tribute, for a Corsair pilot who flew with VMF-123. He was USMC 1st LT Walter Mayberry, who was executed by the Japanese on 05 March, 1944. His plane will be the next tribute build I do. He was from my home town, and we have a street named in his honor here today.

    Thanks for checking in, I do sincerely appreciate this. Happy New Year !

  • Profile Photo
    Spiros Pendedekas said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    Once again, we stand in awe by watching your bench, my friend @lgardner! What a great project! And what a great tribute! Looking forward to see this Corsair progressing!
    Happy New Year!

  • Profile Photo
    Louis Gardner said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    John vd Biggelaar (@johnb)
    Spiros Pendedekas (@fiveten)
    Once again I thank you for checking in on the Corsair build and for the kind words. You will not have to wait much longer, as I have another update coming right up next.

  • Profile Photo
    Louis Gardner said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    Here is what I got done today.

    Around 6 years ago when I first joined Imodeler, I had a group of 3 Corsairs underway. It's hard to believe these years have flown by so quickly, but they have.

    At the time, I did a lot of digging into various Corsair books I have, and other online sources, and I made a decent "Guesstimation" on the approximate time the Candy Apple Green color could have been implemented into the Vought assembly line. This approximate Bureau Number was made by taking the production figures and the known airframes they had completed by the time the US Navy allowed Vought to use the Aluminum paste into the paint mix to designate when a second coat of protective paint had been applied to the interior.

    Dana Bell has written several outstanding books on the early Corsairs. This happens to be the very first one he wrote on the subject.




    This is what is stated in this book. It clearly mentions the use of the so called "Candy Apple Green". I wanted to build one or two of these Corsairs that could have been painted in this manor. My first one was a Corsair named "Daphne C" which was flown on occasion by Captain James Cupp.
    1/48 Tamiya F4U-1 Birdcage Corsair “Daphne C” Bureau number 03829, VMF-213, Captain James Cupp
    Here's a link to the build.

    1/48 Tamiya F4U-1 Birdcage Corsair “Daphne C” Bureau number 03829, VMF-213, Captain James Cupp
    I carefully picked out the black boxes and other small details using a very fine brush and some Flat Black paint. I decided to go ahead and paint the interior bits on the Corsair that I will finish up as the one that 1st LT Walter Mayberry was shot down in. This one has a Dull Dark Green interior, which is more typical of the Corsairs we usually see. I used the kit supplied decals on the seat harnesses and the instrument panels. Once this was done and had dried sufficiently, I glued the front and rear cockpit parts together. Then it was only a matter of gluing the correct cockpit into the correct fuselage. This one is for Walter Mayberry. And this one is for Captain Ashmun. I was on a roll now, so I glued the fuselage halves together. This one is for Captain Ashmun. The same was done for the other Corsair which will end up being the one for Lt. Mayberry. This last Corsair with the Dull Dark Green interior will get it's own dedicated build journal as part of the Pacific group, once I finish up the Ashmun Corsair. As always, thanks for stopping by, and comments are welcomed. Take care.
  • Profile Photo
    George R Blair Jr said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    Interior looks great, Louis (@lgardner). I have trouble keeping track of one model on my bench, so 10 models makes me think about crowd control. Interesting info on the interior colors. Looking forward to the rest of the build(s).

  • Profile Photo
    Louis Gardner said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    George R Blair Jr (@gblair)
    I hear you as far as having these all going at the same time. That would be a lot of chaos. I'm not planning on building all 10 of the Corsairs at once. Instead, I'm trying to paint like colors on the parts at the same time. I have assembled them as far as I want to go for now. It's sort of like what Erik calls his Bf-109 "Kindergarten".

    I have notes written down on the inside of each box, to keep things in order. This is for things like the options of head rest / no head rest, wing stall strip or none, and so on. It helps me to keep the Corsairs in order, because they had changes that were made during the production run, based on the Bureau Number or photos of changes that were made in the field.

    This will probably be the last time we see the Mayberry Corsair, until I start it's very own dedicated journal to finish it up.

    Thank you for the compliments. I hope that tomorrow I can get the wings glued on Ashmun's Corsair. If time permits, I might even start doing some painting. Time will tell. I'm still waiting for the Molotow to completely dry before I start working on "LOU IV" again. I have set a deadline for this "Ashmun" Corsair to be completed and photographed so I can post it in the headlines section on January 3rd.

    That's my goal anyhow.

    Thanks again buddy ! 🙂

  • Profile Photo
    Spiros Pendedekas said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    Great progress on both, my friend @lgardner! Great info on the Vandy Apple Green!

  • Profile Photo
    John vd Biggelaar said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    Impressive work on those interiors, Louis @lgardner

  • Profile Photo
    capt. R said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    Impressive build! You has all flight in one build!

  • Profile Photo
    Stephen W Towle said 1 year, 11 months ago:

    Lou,

    First impression when seeing ten corsair models, who put orange juice in my orange juice. My glasses where on and I know what day it is. Some of us are playing model checkers while others are play 3-D chess. Your painting technique was practiced by Rembrandt. Only, it was called Glazing. Spreading transparent paint with either a brush or a palette knife to build up layers of thin transparent paint to get warm colors or your candy apple green.
    Looking forward to seeing the two sisters and the horse get finished.

  • Profile Photo
    Louis Gardner said 1 year, 10 months ago:

    Spiros Pendedekas (@fiveten)
    John vd Biggelaar (@johnb)
    Lis (@lis)
    Stephen W Towle (@stephen-w-towle)

    Thanks gentlemen for the kind words. Please accept my apologies for not posting anything during this last month. Today is the very first time I have felt good enough to try posting again. Both my wife and I got sick with Covid. We were vaccinated, because she had a compromised immune system after she went through 8 rounds of chemotherapy during her battle with cancer. So we thought it would be best to take the jab.

    It might have helped some, but I was sick in bed for 3 days and I didn't feel good enough to do anything much more than sleep. Thanks to some medicine and a lot of rest I am much better now. I still feel tired but other than a few sniffles I'm OK now. My sense of smell is gone though. Too bad, as I once had a nose like a blood hound... Oh well. Maybe in time it will come back. We shall see. My darling wife is bulletproof. She's running around like nothing happened, and I'm happy for her that she has dodged yet another bullet that life has sent our way.

    So... on with this Corsair. I thought about calling it my "Covid Corsair" as a bit of a joke. I have been feeling a little better each day, and as time permitted and I felt like it, I did some work on some models I have underway.

    There's a lot of ground to cover, so here are the Cliff Notes on this one:

  • Profile Photo
    Louis Gardner said 1 year, 10 months ago:

    This is what I did on the Ashmun / Covid Corsair recently. This was done a little at a time. I kept plugging away at it.

    I'll post up more later, and hopefully give a decent description on what is going on. I'm calling it a day for now. As always, comments are encouraged. Thanks ! 🙂

    11 attached images. Click to enlarge.

  • Profile Photo
    Spiros Pendedekas said 1 year, 10 months ago:

    Hope you fully recover, my friend @lgardner and get your sense of smell back soon!
    Your Corsair looks wonderful and a significant progress has been made. Looking forward to it!