The latest MPM News update contains some new releases coming from Special Hobby and Azur.


Link to Item

If you have comments or questions please post them here.

Thanks!

Hi Chuck

Wow! A 1/48 scale Potez 631!!! Jean-Luc and I will be fighting over who adds that one to our stashes first! :-) :-)

All the best

Rowan

Hi Rowan,
That was my thought when I saw it. :-)

Myself , I'll have to get the "Black Bullet".

Hi Rowan!

Let's the "Duel" begin then! :-)

I think there will be three versions... well I hope so!



I would love to make the first decoration. It's a Potez 630 but the difference is minor (air intake on the top of the cowling). The second is a Potez 63.11, the "reconnaissance" version with a different forward fuselage design. The second aircarft was shot down by "Martlets" over Madagascar in 1942. a French machine shot down by an American plane piloted by a British pilot... that was also WW2!?
The decoration of the boxart depicts a Potez 631 from ECN (Escadron de Chasse de Nuit) 1/13 at Nîmes-Garrons wich was the only Nightfighter unit still based in Vichy France. All the others were send in the "colonies".

Jean-Luc

I only have a Dewoitine 250 in my French collection, at the moment, so I definately want one of these. I do like the first profile you have there Jean-Luc
Mal

Hi Mal!

Yes, it's a nice decoration! The story behind it is the following:

Before 1938, a lot of French planes weren't camouflaged and had an aluminium finish. After the Munich Crisis, the French thought it would be wiser to apply a more discrete color. They ordered that the planes should receive a Dark Green (sometimes glossy) color on the uppersurfaces, the underside remaining bare metal. This is an "artistic" interpretation of that order! :-)



On the picture above, you can note each aircraft has a different decoration. The first has "flames", the second a straight demarcation, the third waves etc...



Here's a close up with undercarriage and engine details of a Potez 630 with Hispano engines (the 631 had Gnôme and Rhone ones, hence the difference).



Finally look att that example of French "artistic" interpretation of orders! This is the "camouflage" of a Dewoitine D. 501 shortly after the Munich Crisis. It looks way better than the boring A and B scheme of the British. No wonder the French lost the war!

N.B. By the way, you have a D 520 and not a D 250 in your collection. You made the same "mistake" than SAMI on the cover of the July edition.

Jean-Luc

A 1/32 scale Buffalo with yellow wings, looks like a possible candidate for me. Large enough for me to see, small enough for me to display.