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Pacific Corsair

Painting and Decals

I chose to paint my model in the early scheme, again it is difficult to interpret the true colours from the painting guide as, again, they are given as Tamiya paint mixes. The colours I used were by Xtracolor (Hannants own) for the undersurfaces X137 FS16440 USN Light Gull Grey, for the uppersurfaces X126 FS15237 Dark Blue/Grey. Xtracolor are gloss paints and therefor decal ready. These paints are enamel and are very good but have one big drawback; they take an age to dry. That is if you follow the manufacturer's instructions and use white spirit. I use cellulose thinner, which makes them dry very much quicker, within a day. Using cellulose thinner also tends to take some of the gloss off. As I would always use Klear anyway that's not a problem to me. One other little snippet, I have heard that a couple of drops of Rustins paint dryer, makes the paint dry quicker than acrylics. When I have had a chance to find some I'll report back.

I followed my normal practice of masking the canopy with Parafilm-M and using tape and damp tissue to mask the cockpit and wheel wells. I then sprayed on Halfords (auto store in the UK) plastic primer. This was smoothed out with 0000 grade wire wool. I then pre-shaded with matt black.

The undersurface colour was sprayed then the demarcation was masked using Tamiya masking tape and White tack.

The metal areas, around the fabric parts were masked; even the screw/rivet heads and inspection covers. The fabric areas were then sprayed a lighter colour, by adding white to the original colours. Something you might want to try.

The identification lamps, under the starboard wing have a base coat of antique bronze (Humbrol) then, when dry, are coated with the relevant Tamiya clear colour. It looks far better than using silver. The landing light under the port wing has a disc of Bare Metal Foil shaped into the light reflector.

The Stars and Bars kit decals are, I believe, the wrong shade of blue. So I used Aeromaster decals for "Marines Dream" (I do like scantily clad young ladies on my aircraft) an aircraft of VMF-222 on Bougainville, 1943. Prior to applying the decals I brushed on 2 coats of Klear. I used Micro set/sol, the decals conformed nicely. When the decals were dry I wiped off any residue with clean water and applied 2 more brushed coats of Klear.