“Rice or Beans?”

Here in the USA when we order an entrée at a Mexican restaurant, we are typically asked, “would you like rice or beans with that?”  On a play of that phrase, our challenge was to build a subject representing either Japan or Mexico. Kudos for anyone who could do a subject that represented both, or finish two and represent both that way.

So in my chosen scale of 1/72, I could meet the challenge with a P-47D, and possibly add to it a representative Japanese aircraft from a unit in the Philippines or Formosa.

Mexico entered World War II after German u-boats sank two Mexican Tankers in May 1942.  In 1944 President Roosevelt offered President Comacho of Mexico the opportunity to fight alongside the US in the Pacific theater.  That Spring, Mexico created the 201st Squadron and it was equipped with the P-47D.  

The 201st Squadron served in the Philippines and over Formosa until the end of the war.  Her aircraft wore standard USAAF markings for the theater over a natural metal finish, but uniquely with green/white/red rudder stripes.

After the war the 201st was temporarily disbanded, however her P-47’s were kept and operated through to 1950 when they were put in storage.  Three were reactivated for the Mexican-Guatemala conflict in 1958.  According to my decal sheet, the Thunderbolts were P-47D-35-RA.

Serial Number 1016 survives today as a gate guard at 1st Military Air Base (Santa Lucia, State of Mexico).  I decided to model 1016 as she would have appeared in 1950…well because I could get decals for her!

Since this was to be a fun build I didn’t want to tackle a natural metal finish on one of my Revell or Tamiya kits.  I also have a Hasegawa P-47D as well as the Academy.  I did a bit of research (okay, I tried to make sense from my two Squadron In-Action books, my decals and the web) of the variations of the P-47D.  I believe, but am not certain, the Hobby Boss P-47D bubble top kit to represent a P-47D-25, and to be a copy of the Tamiya kit.

Since it seems none of my kits represented a P-47D-35 I decided to punt and just use the Hobby Boss kit.

I have no idea of the accuracy of the Hobby Boss kit.  It is only my third P-47D model actually built, ever.  (Okay, I remember a Lindberg P-47C I made in the ’70’s, but it’s a distant memory.)  The first two are Hasegawa kits I made back in the late ’80’s.  It looks appropriate sitting next to them, actually a bit heftier and to my very untrained Thunderbolt eye, the Hobby Boss looks better.  Probably because I believe it to be based on the Tamiya kit.

It was built out-of-the-box but the wing-fuselage joint along the rear of the fuselage was a bit off.  I attempted to fill/sand but after 3 attempts and with some fine sanding and silver sprayed as a primer, I could still see the scratches and filler from the attempt.  I kept polishing and eventually got it to a point that I found acceptable, but really it’s not.  My fun build had become tedious…

I set it aside for a few weeks and made a final attempt.  Again not quite right but I decided to finish anyway.  I painted the maroon on using Tamiya XF-9 Hull Red and then masked it off.  I then painted the anti-glare panel Model Master Acryl 4728 Olive Drab and masked that off.  

I then painted the entire model Floquil Old Silver.  Old Silver is my goto paint for natural metal finishes.  I’m no where near ready to mask panels and polish metalizers to attempt a realistic metal finish, but Old Silver gets mighty close for me out of the bottle.

After it had all cured for a couple of days I then painted the interiors Tamiya XF-4 Yellow Green, and the cockpit sides Tamiya XF-27 Black Green (a close bronze green or dull dark green).  I painted the instrument panel black and then masked the cowling and painted the forward panel white.  The rudder stripes are Tamiya XF-5 Green and X-7 Red over a white base.

The entire plane was then sprayed with future to seal it for decals.

I used Aztec Models “Juicy Jugs I” decal sheet, 72-044.  Most of my information for this build came from that sheet, it was very informative and from that I looked up other information on the web.

The decals are very easy to use.  I only dipped them in water for 5 seconds, let them sit on a paper towel for another 30 seconds and they were ready to slide onto the model.  Micro-Set (blue label) is all that was needed for them to settle nicely into the fine panel lines.

Weathering — I’m nearly ready to swear off attempting to weather.  I tried a wash of black water color to accent the panel lines but it just looked dirty.  No matter how much I tried it looked wrong…so I wiped off as much as could.  It appears some of the wash got through the Future to the decals below.  Oh well, maybe on the next kit I’ll try oils instead of watercolors.

Overall it was a fun build and a good diversion from my usual Spitfires, Hurricanes and other European  Theater subjects.  The decal sheet offers 4 other Mexican subjects, plus 2 Columbian, 2 Venezuelan, 3 Cuban and 1 Chilean.  All are colorful and rather unique so I’ll probably do another Latin Jug at some point.

Will I build another Hobby Boss P-47?  The Hobby Boss looks better than my Hasegawa Thunderbolts I completed over 20 years ago; while my skills are better now, the shape of the Hasegawa looks “off” in comparison.  But I have to say, while the prop on the Hobby Boss is obviously better, it’s cowl looks anemic.  I will wait to do another Hobby Boss until after I build a Tamiya, Academy and Revell P-47 as a reference.  If those others are better I’ll complete my shelf of Thunderbolts with those; if the Hobby Boss stands up I may get another; price-wise it’s about the same as Academy and Revell, and much less expensive than Tamiya.  

Thanks for reading…