Canadian Corsair

Corsair Mk II JT565 7-S, No. 1834 Squadron, HMS Victorious, 1945

Ok, technically only the pilot was Canadian. This is a recently finished build that never saw an airbrush. The primer, paint, and clear coats are all brushed on — old school.

The Subject

JT565 is part of a group of F4U-1A Corsairs delivered to the UK as part of Lend-Lease. The British accepted the F4U-1 as the Corsair Mk I, F4U-1A/D as the Corsair Mk II, Brewster made F3A-1A/D as the Corsair Mk III, and Goodyear made FG-1A/D as the Corsair Mk IV. This particular aircraft served on VICTORIOUS in late 1944 and into 1945 as part of No. 1834 Squadron with the Eastern Fleet. An interesting history can be found here.

This aircraft was the personal mount of Sub-Lieutenant Shepard, RCN who happens to be the only Canadian Corsair Ace with 5 kills, all in the Corsair.

The Model

I acquired a set of Tech Mod decals that had this interesting subject many years ago when I also collected a few Hasegawa and Academy Corsairs quite inexpensively at a local show. I think I paid on average $2 each for the kits which allows me the opportunity to make a collection of all paint schemes, all variants, and a few aces as well. Great for honing modeling skills.

 

My primary reference was the excellent Aircraft Pictorial by Dana Bell on the F4U-1 Corsair.

 

After cleaning the sprues (just to be sure there was no residue) I mixed yellow with a tiny bit of black and painted the interiors either a yellow chromate color (less black) or Interior Green for the cockpit (more black).

 

Construction was straightforward. I did add some detail to the cockpit, mainly just paint but also a Sutton Harness from masking tape, which were installed by the British Maintenance Unit upon receipt of the Corsair along with British radios. While at it I brushed on some Vallejo Primer just so I could check seams.

 

 

 

Initially my plan was to use Vallejo acrylics for the majority of the painting. Then I realized I had some better ”paint ready” colors in my old Pollyscale Acrylics, specifically the Sky shade that was more blue than green as used by Vought. So I switched at about the time I started painting the exterior.

 

There is something oddly soothing about painting with a brush. Clean up is easy, getting the paint prepped and thinned properly is less hassle than my airbrush (which is likely why I like to pre-thin and pre-mix paint for my airbrush into dropper bottles for each project).

The sharp eyed reader will note that by the time the 2nd coat of Vallejo primer was applied, I had trimmed the wingtips. British Corsairs could not quite fit into the hangar bays of their carriers, so about 3 inches from each tip had to be removed. The British accomplished this by replacing the tip cap with a smaller cap as part of the acceptance process at the Maintenance Unit.

 

For the exterior colors I used Pollyscale 505396 Light Blue, which is actually a shade of Sky that is slightly bluer, lighter, and less green. In other words, closer to the shade of DuPont Sky used by Vought; Pollyscale 506322 RLM80 Olive Green; and Pollyscale 505382 Gunship Gray. While I know getting Pollyscale paints are near impossible today, I’m providing the stock numbers as a reference in case you come across a few.

 

Once the major painting was completed I applied a coat of Vallejo Gloss clear.

 

Decals were not very impressive. The Tech Mod decals barely held together and the Academy decals took quite a long time to come off the paper. Neither would settle down completely but a lot of solvent and pressure from a cotton bud got them to a point of acceptable

 

Once decals were done I applied Vallejo Matte Clear. I almost called it done at this point but I wanted to try some wash and weathering. I broke out my oils and quickly realized my cheapo set was useless. Since I had a couple of tubes of Windsor and Newton Paynes Grey and Burnt Sienna I set about adding oil stains as well as panel line washes. I also added some ochre and white to create an exhaust stain that all worked well. To dilute and wipe away excess I used lighter fluid as suggested by the Model Geeks on their podcast.

Once it dried I touched up in a couple of places, then added the radio aerial using Uschi fine thread.

 

 

Summary

I enjoyed this build. It only took 2 weeks start to finish and I tried a new technique (using lighter fluid to dilute oils on a matte surface). Brush painting takes me back to my early days before I could afford an airbrush, except now I use acrylics not enamels.