Building and detailing the old Revell P-47 Razorback (Part II)
by Chris Sherland

More construction...

We left our hero with a pile of scratchbuilt stuff and highly abused kit parts. It's amazing that he survived, but we found him under the dremel tool and a pile of styrene shavings. He's ok, and ready to get back in the ring. Thinking that part two of this article would cover painting and finishing was a fantasy for sure... Refer to part I for a refresher on initial construction.

Fin correction

One of the tasks that I was dreading was the fin correction for this kit. The fin and rudder are both misshapen (long known flaws in the Revell T-bolt), and require some heavy attention. Until I saw the discrepancy I was on the fence about doing the correction at all, but once I did see it, it bugged me so bad that I finally relented. Scott Murphy emailed me a great guide for the correction. I have no idea of it's origin, but looking at my references it's right on. (Right click on the link and "save target as" for this correction diagram.)

The correction is not hard to do. I used Milliput and I believe that this is the best route to take. After a bit of scarring and scratching was done to prep the leading and trailing edge of the fin and rudder, Milliput was rolled into long strings and applied along the prepped edges (see drawing below). Pressing and molding the string of Milliput to the edges it was worked with water and fingers until there was no bulging seam or drastic changes where the kit fin surface and Milliput met. Water helped here a LOT. I was able to smooth the Milliput out enough that initial filing was minimal.

The jpg Scott Murphy sent me and how I applied the Milliput initially(rudder shown)


The fin and rudder corrected and awaiting final detail and mounting.
Wings

The wings were by far the most abused parts in this build, from the initial sawing off of the surfaces, to the grinding out of the bays, and finally the replacement of the guns, there wasn't much left of 'em, but they held up OK. Assembly was a bit tricky as the gear bays require a bit of deep penetration into the fuselage, prefitting and sanding were the call of the day(s). John Formon supplied yet another great tip on wing strengthening, and by golly by this time they NEEDED it!

Landing and signal lights were done before the wing halves were mated, as were the shell and link ejection chute panels.

The lights were a lot of fun to do. MV products were used (Model Railroad Accessories) and fit the bill nicely. Proper holes were drilled and finished, then "dished" from behind with the Dremel to accommodate the convex lenses. The lenses were placed from the back, then CA was beaded around the edges and accelerated with Zip Kicker. All told the desired effect was achieved.


Holes drilled and finished.

Beveled from the back, holes are ready for the lenses.

CA beaded around the seams and kicked.

Final product from the "good side."
The shell ejector holes on the Revell kit are too big, and the link ejector holes do not exist. The entire panel was removed and a new panel was measured, fabricated from .020 sheet and installed. The holes were measured off and outlined into the new panels with a scriber. Then they were drilled out with a pin vise, squared off with an exacto knife, and finally trued with a small jeweler's file.


Kit panels ditched.

New panels mounted and holes done.
Merging the wing halves was a pretty sketchy job, they had been so mangled by this time that there was not much hope of getting them true without a plan for additional support. Holes were drilled through the merged wings, styrene rods were inserted and their ends snipped and sanded flush.
The gun barrels on the '47 are set up parallel to the ground, but the kit's guns are aligned along the leading edge of the wing. I removed the gun-section of the leading edge entirely, filled it with Milliput and shaped it with the Dremel and hand sanding.


Leading edge removed


Filled and ready for new holes..I knew those empty baby food jars would come in handy!!

New holes were drilled with the correct alignment and prepped for replacement barrels made from aluminum tubing.

I made a template out of soda can aluminum and taped it over the leading edge of the wing to get accurate spacing and orientation. With the template in place I used a pin vise to drill the holes. The template helps not only insure proper alignment, but assists in steadying the pin vise and keeping the holes true.

The gun alignment template made from a soda can.
Template taped over edge and new holes started.

Final holes ready for aluminum tubing "point fifties"!
At this point I mounted the wings on. What a shock to see the size of this beast. It was all together livable when it was a heap of parts, but mating the wings set a new tone for the build and got me pumped.


"Honey?...I think we're gonna need a bigger house!" ...the T-bolt begins to take real shape.
There was no avoiding the flap bays at this point. I began by prepping the bays to allow for accurate final construction of the flaps themselves. First the sides were addressed by grinding and shaping, then I fabricated the bay walls with thin sheet and some tricky "bending".

Inboard flap bay wall needed clearing out and reshaping.

Outboard needed structure and shaping too.

Flap bay installed and ready for final detail. Note the gear bays from last installment getting beaten into submission.
I then puttied the wing roots and prepped them for final sanding and detail. The kit wings fit fairly well even after all the abuse, and there was not much trouble here.

The Rutman Cowling

The P-47 cowling offered by Jerry Rutman provides the correct outline and shape where the kit cowling falls short. I was very pleased with this piece from JR, it's very well cast and requires only a minimal amount of shaping to bring it some better scale. I thinned the walls a bit, reshaped the cowling lip a bit, and had to do some minor modifications to mount the cooling flaps. I used the kit's "chin" piece slightly modified. A bit of internal ribbing was added as it would be visible through the opening, simple thin sheet here, nothing fancy.

Dsus fasteners are not represented on the Rutman cowling, and being highly used on a combat aircraft I decided to model them. John Formon slipped me a great tip on these and I took his advice. I scribed the fasteners out of .005 sheet and glued them onto the cowling. Then I scribed their outline and sanded them down to "almost flush". This gives them a bit more relief than a simple scribing job, and allows for a better look.

The Dsus fasteners glued in place prior to scribing and sanding down. Note some internal ribbing to flesh out the cowl interior and the kit chin piece.

Dsus fasteners scribed and sanded down "almost flush."
I decided to model the cowl flaps in the closed position, and the resin cowling had to be modified in a few areas to make all the measurements come out right. The center cooling flap seam on each side lines up with a long horizontal fuselage panel line that runs all the way back to the tail. Getting those to match up just right required ditching the template that is included in the Rutman set and fashioning my own flaps. Some simple bracing on the inside of the cowling was added, then the flaps themselves, then additional bracing on the backside of the flaps to "true" them to each other

These shots show the flaps and bracing inside the cowling. Gotta measure these carefully and check your references to match any panel lines on the fuselage.

I thought that I'd be done with this beast many months ago. But then again this is my first scratch and detail job...so I was acting without the proper information <grin>. Looks like I'll have to bore you with another installment before this thing is done.

The good news is that I've got a 1/32 Revell Ki61 "Tony" on deck, and it's starting to sing to me from inside the box. Gotta get this beast off the bench soon to respond to the Japanese muse so I'll be accelerating now that the major stuff is done on the Jug and I can get to a point to start the Tony.

Part 3...more to come.

References

  • Mustang and Thunderbolt Aces of the Pacific and CBI (Osprey) ISBN 1-85532-780-5
  • America's Hundred Thousand (Dean) ISBN 0-76430072-5 (This is simply a MUST HAVE for USAAF and USN WWII fighter reference!!)
  • Aero Detail #14: Republic P-47 Thunderbolt ISBN 4-499-22648-1
  • Warbird Tech #23: Republic P-47 Thunderbolt ISBN 1-58007-018-3
  • Squadron/Signal Walk Around #11: P-47 Thunderbolt (Drendel) ISBN 0-89747-375-2
  • Squadron/Signal In Action #67: P-47 Thunderbolt (Davis) ISBN0-89747-161-X
  • Warbird History: P47 Thunderbolt (Hess) ISBN 0-87938-899-4
  • Pilot's Manual for P-47 Thunderbolt ISBN 0-87994-026-0
© Chris "Mo" Sherland
 
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