Buzz Boy Mustang – 1:48 Tamiya P-51D

-51 MUSTANG BUILD 2 – P

‘Buzz Boy’ Mustang

Nik Wielbo builds a 1:48 P-51D using the Tamiya kit

his is the second Tamiya Mustang kit I’ve built, the

Tfirst being their P-51B Mustang III in the markings of No.315 (Polish) Squadron RAF, so I knew before I started that this should be a relatively quick, simple build. Tamiya’s P-51D kit first appeared in 1995 and until very recently was undoubtedly one of the best Mustang kits available in this scale. The levels of detail out of the box are overall very good, although there are a couple of well-known issues such as the boxed-in wheel wells, the Hamilton Propellers supplied have cuffs that are too broad, and the join between the clear plastic element of the canopy and the canopy frame leave a very noticeable gap. These issues can be corrected if one desires with after-market products, except for an Eduard Zoom set for the cockpit and some replacement decals, my plan was for this to be a quick, straight-from-the-box build.

NORTH AMERICAN P-51D MUSTANG

MANUFACTURER: TAMIYA SCALE: 1:48 KIT T YPE: PL ASTIC INJEC TION MOULDED KIT NUMBER: 40

Construction began with the cockpit, and having decided to use the Eduard set, I began by sanding and scraping off most of the raised details to prepare the parts for the etched brass replacements. I don’t often use pre-painted etch for kits, but the level of detail available with these is light-years ahead of my ability with a brush, so I was happy to let this one slide. The interior was painted Interior Green, and washed with some heavily thinned Black oil paint to give the aircraft a more worn appearance, rather than being factory fresh. The remaining instrument boxes I hadn’t scraped away were painted in Tamiya’s NATO Black, and highlighted with varying shades of Grey to make them pop a bit more. The etched seatbelts and detailing parts were all then added, and the fuselage closed. Although this model is over twenty years old the fit is superb as is typical of most Tamiya kits. The fuselage required hardly any clean-up of seam lines and the wing to fuselage joint which on a lot of kits can be problematic was as near to perfect as I’ve ever encountered. The wheel wells were sprayed a custom mix of ZincChromate Green, based on reference images I found online, and after another heavily thinned Black oil wash added more depth to the colour, the appropriate details were picked out with Tamiya Aluminium. Before I knew it, the main construction was complete, and it was time for painting. I’d decided by this point that I’d build Captain William G Burlingame’s ‘Buzz Boy IV’ from a Superscale Decal sheet, with the full-colour post-war roundels and a green and white nose as worn by the 41st Fighter Squadron, 35th Fighter Group, based in Japan in 1947. So, I primed the model with Alclad Gloss Black Primer in preparation for the natural metal finish. The wings were then sprayed Alclad Aluminium to represent a lacquered finish, and then masked-off so I could focus on the bare metal finish found on wartime Mustangs. A base coat of Alclad Airframe Aluminium provided the base,

painted. As luck would have it though Superscale have used a green which is practically identical to Citadel paints ‘Warpstone Glow’ and in my eyes at least I can’t see a difference. The decals were sealed under a coat of Alclad Aqua Gloss, which had the added benefit of sealing and protecting the high shine, which although stunning are somewhat fragile and susceptible to finger marks. Weathering on this model was kept to a minimum as although they were well-worked machines, they were also well looked after. Exhaust staining was applied with Lifecolor Tensocrom Smoke and White Oxide through my airbrush, along with some extra smoke around the gun-barrels. The undersides of the wing around the main undercarriage and fuel tanks along with the walkway area on the port wing were stippled using an old brush and a very dilute mixture of Tamiya Acrylic Thinners and Ammo by MiG Europe Dust pigments to simulate the dirt that accumulated in these areas. At this point, I thought I’d finished the model and proudly posted some images on a Facebook forum. The most interesting response came from one ‘Burl’ Burlingame – the son of Captain William Burlingame.

After the exchange of a few emails, Burl incredibly kindly agreed to send me high-quality scans of the images he had of his father from his time in Japan and Korea immediately after the war. Captain Burlingame’s squadron had been rotated to Japan late in 1945 to become part of the American occupying forces, but at weekends they would take four aircraft to Korea to be the ‘Korean Air Force’ for a few days at a time!

These images highlighted a couple of small issues for me. Firstly, the Superscale decal instructions had missed off the green trim around the bottom of the canopy frame. This was easily fixed as the paint was straight from the pot. There was also another issue which cropped up because of Burl’s images, as the green which Superscale used on their decals is quite vivid in comparison to the green in the photographs. Unfortunately, as the decals were already on the model at this stage I had no option but to accept the difference. The final issue being the dual wooden aerials behind the cockpit. I debated whether to address this, but as I’d already achieved a natural metal finish I was happy with I was too scared I’d ruin it in trying to correct the aerials, so this is one inaccuracy I’m happy to live with. The most rewarding part of this build though for me was being able to make contact with the son of Captain Burlingame, and to make my model far more representative of the real aircraft. Special thanks go to Burl Burlingame for very kindly giving me permission to use his father’s pictures along with my own.

-51 MUSTANG BUILD 2 – P