Para-Martin A-26P Reduaram

Old Matchbox kit from a flea market sacrificed for this. Fuselage halves are not glued.

Cutting lines marked with tape.

The back of the fuselage is now the front of the fuselage. New front landing gear bay doors are sawn.

Wing area reinforced before sawing it off.

Wing root is sawn off and the front of the fuselage is now the back.

Wings and other things done meanwhile.

This tiny part between the wing and the engine cowling is awful design.

Low-effort pilot (3 figures total).

The back cockpit inside and the wing root glued back.

The front fuselage has its pilot and gun turret +new floor for the front landing gear.

The fuselage needs to be extended 40mm for artistic reasons.

Not so easy to get the fuselage straight.

Quick decision to extend the elevator... I mean canard!

New panel lines and glued back together.

Sprues added to add strength.

Closing gaps with 1mm thick styrene strips.

Fully enclosed.

Lastly 0.4mm styrene sheet wrapped around. Unfortunately it was too thin.

Rudder added and huge gap filled with Tamiya epoxy.

Lots of sanding and fixing...

Some gaps were too too big and on the way of panel lines, so I just added some "patches".

Some visual progress by adding the front wing.

I was puttying the rudder in a wrong way with surfacers.

I'm forcing this project to progress. Now the wings are in place and cockpit canopy ready.

"3-inch antitank gun" is from 1:100 IS-3. Here just test fitting.

All painted with Surfacer 1000.

I played with Revell rivet maker.

I accidentally pushed one window inside a bit, so I fixed it quick gluing a stick on it, pulling it outwards and adding more glue.

Starting with engines. Again awful design with casting channels.

Experimenting with pre-shading method that @podkon used with his Silverbird.

First layer of Vallejo Aluminium. Preshading looks to work.

Engines are left simple.

Engines are in place. The propellers will be added lastly before landing gears.

More colors! This will look like cannibalised or heavily modified individual. Chipping of the green areas is maybe too excessive. I used chipping fluid for the green areas.

So I used the original stribe decals.

All decals added. Next is weathering, propellers and landing gear. Maybe also antenna wire.

Weathering done. Landing gear doors are hold in place with blue tack. Exhaust smoke dirt done with airbrushing brown and black.

Vallejo Metal Varnish applied, masks taken off and propellers installed. Left propeller got too much glue and doesn't turn, but the right one does turn.

Kommentare

35 13 March 2022, 20:48

Robin (WhiteGlint)
Watching 👀
Interesting project. 👍

14 March 2022, 07:38

S M
Thanks, WhiteGlint! 🙂

14 March 2022, 11:30

David R. Meizoso
Can't wait to see where you're going! Looks great already.

14 March 2022, 15:34

Alex K
This project didn't catch my eye at first... but that's because I got it all backwards... Following...

14 March 2022, 19:25

S M
Thanks for following, David and Alex!

14 March 2022, 20:18

Neil
Me too 👍🙂👀

15 March 2022, 23:30

S M
This is progressing slower than I hoped. Too much puttying and sanding.

14 April 2022, 20:04

Kyle DeHart
Jumping in here to watch with some encouraging words to stick with it!!

14 April 2022, 20:22

S M
Thanks, DeHart and welcome aboard!😄

14 April 2022, 20:33

Alex K
It certainly has character! 👍

30 April 2022, 15:36

S M
Well said, Alex 😄

30 April 2022, 15:47

Torsten
Now only seen, exciting project, do you have more info on the background of the aircraft, the design is already the eye-catcher 😎

30 April 2022, 16:24

S M
Thanks, TWN! This aircraft is from alternative history, where Prof. Fritz Paraman helps Glenn L. Martin Company to design a fast ground attack aircraft for the USAAF. Paraman's cost-effective and fast solution was to turn B-26 Marauder around to make it have canard-type wing configuration and mounted with 3-inch antitank gun. One prototype was built and it turned out to have awfully poor performance. This didn't bothered Prof. Paraman because he already had his consulting fee.
But actual background is that when I saw a Marauder-model my brother made, the tail gunner site looked like a cockpit to me so I have wanted to try turn Marauder around.

30 April 2022, 16:56

William Joel
Very unusual project. Looking good.

30 April 2022, 17:09

Ben M
Fun project!

30 April 2022, 18:10

Lochsa River
this is fun.....

30 April 2022, 18:30

Robin (WhiteGlint)
This is so cool 😄 👍

30 April 2022, 19:54

Robert Podkoński
So cool idea! How have I missed that? Watching with interest!

30 April 2022, 20:18

Dieter Bihlmaier
Great idea! Like it.

30 April 2022, 20:52

S M
Thanks, guys! 😄

30 April 2022, 21:26

Ben M
Super fun!

24 May 2022, 21:06

Jay Dubya
62-B Mr SM ???
Love your work thus far and keen to see how it all comes together.

25 May 2022, 04:41

Robin (WhiteGlint)
Looks real good with the colour applied. 👍

25 May 2022, 05:55

Neil
Very COOL and LOTS of hard work gone on here - shaping up very nicely 👍

25 May 2022, 08:14

Francky
Magnificent project!!

25 May 2022, 10:25

S M
Thank you all! I have been pretty busy lately with little time with models, so it's nice to get this progress. @Dubya 62-B could have been better name XD

25 May 2022, 15:02

Robert Podkoński
Thank you for mentioning me, S M, you're too kind. I "borrowed" this method from some Polish modeller's article printed in some Polish modellers' magazine, frankly speaking...

25 May 2022, 15:51

S M
you're welcome! 🙂 Now all the decals are added.

31 May 2022, 17:34

Robin (WhiteGlint)
This thing looks great 👍

31 May 2022, 18:06