Anzo

That is really close. Are you member of Mad City Modelers? We have a club meeting every 3rd Saturday of the month at the Last Square hobby store. Welcome to join us.

Thanks, Paul and Daywalker. Daywalker, I am in Madison. How about you?

Thanks, Joe. There is an interesting thing for commission build which is you ALWAYS fall in love with the model you build, even you never notice or like the subject before... This happens many times on me. I am glad more people notice the P-39 now. Hope you enjoy This build too.

Thanks Dave. I hope so...

Thanks, everyone. I am glad to hear all your comments. You comments always encourage me. Very appreciate. New in progress. Finally began to paint the fuselage. Airbrushed the cockpit color on canopy again. Then I airbrushed white on these places of shark mouth, national insignia, and serials. Client asked me to build this P-400 as the BW-146. He also provided a Montex super mask set for it, but the super mask set only had BW-167. Therefore, I tried to find a clear drawing of BW-146, and resized the drawing as same as this model. Cut the “Whistlin Britches” and big “20” on masking tape carefully and put on fuselage. Also put the masks of star of national insignia on fuselage and wing. The nose of fuselage had white already. Put the masks of eyes and white teeth, prepared to paint black. Airbrushed black on shark mouth and Gunze Hobby Color 326 blue on national insignia. Airbrushed red on shark mouth. Then I masked the sharl mouth and national insignia again.

Hi guys, thanks for your support. Because the inner wheels have different color, I only dry fit the inner wheels to the gear struts and checked the position of break lines. If the inner wheels have same color with gear struts, I will leave them on the gear struts for painting together just like you said.

New in progress. Thanks for watching. Assembled the nose landing gear. I also added some screws on landing gear by 0.5mm hexagon styrene rod. Assembled the main landing gears. Besides added screws, I made two break lines by 0.25mm metal wire and 0.5mm Ni.Silv tube. Assembled these complicated PE wheel doors. Some steps from the Eduard instruction were not clear, it would be easier if compare with real wheel doors. The bomb and fuel tank had some PEs too.

Updated. Thanks for watching. Finally assembled the fuselage and wing together. Before this step, the fitting was fine for everything. But I was kind of surprised about these gaps. They were not small. Used styrene sheets and Tamiya putty to fill these gaps. After sanded the surface smooth, re-scribed the panel lines again. Also airbrushed Mr. Surfacer 1200 to make sure having a smooth surface. Put rudder, stabilizers, and elevators on fuselage. Made sure that they were level and straight. This kit included resin exhausts also. Adjusted these exhausts to appropriate position. To avoid the situation of tail touchdown, I put approximately 2 oz. fishing leads on nose. This P-400 became kind of heavy. Put the cover of nose on. The fuselage was ready for painting.

Thank you, Nick. I think Matt answers your first question. Thanks, Matt. Most of this kit are looked accurate for me. I compare the fuselage with some drawings, the kit fits most of drawings. Also this kit is rich in surface details on fuselage and wing, such as panel lines and rivets. Of course, few panel lines and rivets are not in correct shape or position. Otherwise, the kit includes PE and resin parts for cockpit and exhausts, a plus. The resin exhausts are looked great. PEs can make the cockpit more detailed. But when you look at the cockpit, some components of cockpit are not accurate if you compare with real cockpit, such as dimension and position. They needs some amendments if you want to have an accurate cockpit. Thanks for sharing the information, Matt. Wow~~saving this entire thread to Word is a big effort… I am glad that you like this thread. I just want to show these steps for my client to understand what I have done for him. And actually, I skip many simple and bored steps, that may be the reason why you think it “so effectively and effortless”. Ha…ha… Yes, the resin barrels are from Quickbbost set for the P-38. This P-400 has one 20mm cannon and two .50 MGs on nose. The P-38 has same cannon and four .50 MGs. It would be nice to have this set for P-400.

Ha..ha..I guess I am digging a hole for some people to jump. Thanks, efrick.

Dave J, I am glad that you enjoy this build, I enjoy too. Hope the WIP helps in some way.

Updated. Thanks for watching. Client provided several aftermarket kits to replace original barrels. Even though there were some small details missing on this resin muzzle brake of 20mm cannon, it was still nice looking when I put it on this P-400. I added a 1.55mm brass rod to extend the barrel. Prepared the propeller. Each blade got a concave place, needed to fill with Tamiya putty. When assembled the propeller hub, I found that the gaps were too big under the holes of blade. Filled them and re-scribed these lines. Dry fitted the propeller. There were two .50 machine guns on the nose of P-400, but there was no hole on the machine gun port. Drilled two holes and dry fitted with resin .50 MG muzzles. P-400 had two .30 MG in each side of wing. When I replaced original barrels by metal barrels, I put two pieces of styrene strip and drilled a hole in each styrene piece with measuring appropriate angle and direction for fixing metal barrels. Looked ok. These barrels were straight and kept level with wing. Before I assembled the wing, needed to paint the air intakes of oil radiator and added some weathering. Assembled the wing. Prepared for seamless work. I always love to scratch build the pitot tube. Used 1mm brass rod and sanded the front part flat as a blade with electronic tool. Then I cut a piece of 0.12mm brass sheet and welded the piece on the rod. It was better looking than original pitot tube. Client also provided a SAC metal landing gear set for this P-400. The quality of this set was not very good. The mold lines were visible and not small. I tried to clean these mold lines and surface of landing gears very carefully. The piston parts needed to be sanded from 2000 to 12000 grit sandpaper for having a smooth surface. And were ready to paint the chrome color.

Thanks for your comment.

Thank you, Jamme.

Guys, thanks for your kindly words. Very appreciate. New work in progress. Thanks for watching. I applied the Tamiya putty and super glue to do the seamless of fuselage. Also airbrushed Mr. Surfacer 1200 to make sure having a smooth surface. Put the gun sight into the cockpit. I cut a piece of clear sheet to replace original clear part on the gun sight. Glued the canopy on fuselage. Even though I adjusted and glued the canopy very carefully, I still found some gaps there. Applied Tamiya putty on these gaps and sanded they smooth with fuselage. Additional, there was a steel plate armor overlapping the windscreen. I put a 0.1mm styrene sheet over there and made some rivets on it. Assembled the ailerons, rudder, stabilizers, and elevators. Also did the seamless work for them. Put PE parts into the main landing bay. Dry fitted PE parts with radiator air outlets. The air intake for oil radiator was kind of short. Put two styrene sheets to cover the end.

Thanks, harvey boyer.

Updated. Thanks for watching. Airbrushed the cockpit color on doors, also added PEs and painted the details. Made a little bit weathering on doors. Finished the rear deck of cockpit as well. Airbrushed the cockpit color on inner of canopy. After washed the inner of canopy, added chip effect. Additionally, put a mirror sticker on the mirror PE. I made the partition by 0.1mm styrene sheet instead of original piece in the turbo air intake behind the cockpit. Original piece was too thick. Adjusted the position of cockpit carefully, then put both fuselages together.

Thanks for your nice words and welcomes.

Thank you to all of you. I am glad that you like the cockpit.

Thank you, Matt_ and mikester. Updates here. Before painting the cockpit, needed to assemble nose wheel bay and dry fit with fuselage. I also added pipes and hoses instead of PE parts. This time, I mixed Gunze Hobby Color 48 field gray, 405 olive green and 61 gray for the color of cockpit. Airbrushed the seat. Glued PE seatbelts on the seat. Used small knife to remove some paint for chip effect. Then I washed the seat with gray oil paint. Additionally, used soft pastel to make light tone on the seat. Airbrushed the cockpit. Painted colors on details. Washed the cockpit with gray oil paint. Next, I painted silver on floor for chip effect, also used white color pencil to raise the edge of each component. Same, use soft pastel to make light tone and dust effect. Same steps for right inner wall. Same steps for left inner wall. Airbrushed black on instrument panel. Then painted the details of bottom panel. Washed these PE instrument panels, and painted the switches and buttons on them. Additionally, I cut several pieces of clear sheet and put them behind these PE instrument panels. It would look like glass of gauge on instrument panel. All of gauges were printed on same piece of PE. I cut them due to real instrument panels were separate. Put every component of instrument panel together finally. Painted the machine guns and finish the front wall. Also made weathering on pedals. Put everything of cockpit together.

Wow~~this is amazing. Looks just like real!

Hi guys. Thanks for all your warm welcomes and kindly comments. Hope you enjoy my WIP. I am painting the cockpit now. Will share update soon.

Thanks Martin. I am glad to join everyone here.

The instrument panels of PE were painted, but still looked flat. Therefore, I added some buttons on them by varied wires and styrene rods. Added switches on left and right instrument panels as well. I amended original pieces of instrument panel by styrene sheets to make them more close to P-400 cockpit, also added some wires in the back. Due to back of instrument panel was visible, needed to add varied wires and meters over there. Assembled machine guns and pedals. Eduard PE set provided many details for cockpit, but some of them were too thin or too small. Therefore, I used styrene rods and varied brass rods to rebuild them. I found there was no radio sending unit in the most photos of P-400, decided to leave the rear deck of cockpit empty. Besides drilled all rivets on rear deck, needed to amend the two small holes at the end of rear deck. Only added few metal wires on right inner well. Besides added metal wires on left inner well, I also added several components from scratch to replace some Eduard PEs, because the size of these Eduard PEs just looked not right. There was an air scoop on each side of fuselage. It would be looked more real if the air scoop had a hole. Tried to make two air scoops from scratch. Cut a slot on 7mm styrene sheet. Used 0.003 brass sheet for the material of air scoops. I took a round head engrave tip and pressed the brass sheet on styrene sheet slowly. A nice bump showed up then. Sawed the bump into half. And ground the half bumps slowly and became two air scoops. Put new air scoops on each side of fuselage. P-400 usually opened right door only and closed left door. Therefore, next was dry fitting for left door with canopy. Tried to dry fit and amend both without any gap. After cleaned these clear parts, polished these clear parts with coarse, fine, finish compounds and modeling wax. One of aftermarket sets was Montex Super Mask. This set included masks for inside and outside of the canopy. It was very convenient. I also added canopy frame bar by 0.6mm styrene rods and 0.5mm styrene strips. Screws on frame bar were made by stretched sprue. Put PEs on both doors. Other small PE parts would put together after painting color.

This is a commission to build a P-400 Airacobra. Kit is Special Hobby 1:32 Airacobra Mk.I/P-39F, but I need to build her as a 67th Fighter Squadron P-400 Airacobra BW-146 “Whistlin Britches". Thanks for your watching. Special Hobby 1:32 Airacobra Mk.I/P-39F. I am going to build her as a P-400 Airacobra. Client provided lots of aftermarket sets for the P-400, including Eduard PE sets, mask set, resin gun barrels, metal gun barrels and metal landing gear. Some panel lines and rivets were shallow, even disappeared. For better result after wash, I re-engraved all panel lines and rivets on wings and fuselages. Finished panel lines and rivets on fuselages. Finished panel lines and rivets on wings. The seat of original kit was simple and bare. I replaced it by Eduard PE seat. This PE seat looked detailed and nice. Total was 14 parts. I also added two 0.5mm brass rods at both sides of seat for seatbelt attachments. Completed these complicated seatbelts. Dry fitted seatbelts with seat. http://www.deepbluemodel.com/