Hawker Hurricane Mk.I
Comments
12 June 2016, 15:45
Christian BruerNext to a De Havilland Tiger Moth and a Harrier GR.1 I start Airfix Hawker Hurricane Mk. I. I use Eduard PE for cockpit and exterior. I do not use the side panels because I guess the kit parts are quite nice and hard to remove to fit the PE. I use some of the bits and pieces next to the excellent pre painted dash board.
The wheel well is nicely detailed and just need a few PE for additional details. I want to build the Hurricane with extended flaps. The Eduard PE is very nice and sharp in detail. Cutting out the wings soft plastic flaps was quite easy. I sand down the wings trailing edge before I glue the parts together. Fit is not so nice, because the lower wing is larger than the upper wing. Some filling and sanding is required to get a good fit and shape. I do not fit the PE for the laps until the shape of the wing is ok, but the pre fit shows how it will look – I'm quite confident with it so far.
Cheers, Christian
12 June 2016, 16:07
Hanno KleineckeGreat Start Christian. Apart from the fit problem on the winghalves, the kit makes a very good impression ? How do you cope with these "gigantic " dimensions, compared to your usual "housescale"1/144 ?😉 Is you bench wide enough ?
12 June 2016, 21:36
Christian BruerThank you Hanno and Guido🙂 @Hanno, about the size of the bench, I was wise enough to plan for my old age when eyes and fingers need much larger scales😄
Just a small update. I sand down the fuselage aft of the cabin to make sure the kit sliding hood fit well when open. I guess you will not see the difference when finished, because it was covered by the sliding hood.
Cheers, Christian
13 June 2016, 18:48
Bart Goesaertnice, I thought these had their flaps mostly up at the ground. Read somewhere that pilots were fined when the flaps were left open. Could be that this was for Spitfires instead.. (memory fail at the moment)
15 June 2016, 06:52
Holger KranichOh, mal was anderes von Dir. Na da bin ich doch dabei! Aber ist das vom Maßstab nicht fast schon grobschlächtig für Dich?😢
15 June 2016, 07:39
Christian BruerThank you very much mates for looking at it🙂
Well Bart, I do not find any photo with lowered flaps too, but I found it is a quite nice detail. Let us guess the plane crew prepared the Hurricane for some maintenance work and is off for lunch at the moment 😉
Höhö Holger, man wird älter. Irgendwie habe ich gerade Spaß an dem Maßstab und an den neuen Airfix kits. Mal sehen wie es wird und der Spaß ist ja das wichtige, auch bzw. gerade beim Hobby 😄
Cheers, Christian
15 June 2016, 19:30
Bernhard Pethe...ja, entweder eine neue Brille oder einen größeren Maßstab😉
Tolle Sache, ich schaue Dir zu. 🙂
15 June 2016, 20:10
Christian Bruerhehe, habe nun beides Bernhard😄
Schön das es Dir gefällt und Du zu schaust. Habe heute den Tragflügel versäubert. Die untere Tragflügel Hälfte ist etwas zu groß, daher viel einige Schleifarbeite an. An den Flügelenden habe ich ausreichend Sekundenkleber auf die überstehende Materialkante verlaufen lassen. Nach einigen Tagen Trockenzeit ließ sich das jetzt schön bei schleifen. Der weiche Kunststoff ist dabei auch recht dankbar. Ist mal was anderes und macht richtig Freude🙂
16 June 2016, 19:36
Christian BruerThere is just a small, but time consuming update today. I pre fit the clear parts for the landing lights. The part on the port wing does not fit well. First I thought to make it completely new, but that would take much time and extra work, so I decide to sand the wing leading edge down until the part fit well. That worked quite well at the end. Luckily the starboard landing light fit was much better. Now I only need a small plastic strip on one side to make the fit perfect.
I also cut out the wing tip lights and start replacing them with clear plastic from one of the sprues.
Last but not least I start with the rest of the parts, propeller, radiator etc. They are pre assembled and some scratches and seams are filled with putty.
Cheers, Christian
19 June 2016, 15:27
MICHAEL WOODHOUSEI like and its not a ship!! Very nice as always - I havn't checked out your full inventory but Seaplanes seems might be a good subject - thats where I am heading!
22 June 2016, 19:16
Christian BruerThank you Michael and Clifford. Indeed, seaplanes are a fascinating subject. I build two scale 1/350 Catalina's and have some seaplanes in scale 144 in my stash. Certainly I will build one someday. Yes my current builds are much bigger than my usual ones, slowly but surely I get accustomed to this scale😄
23 June 2016, 19:13
Cesar MunizHi Christian, very nice Bird! I have done the Revell offer but this looks much, much better! the interior is very nice and the wheel well is very detailed, specialy with this PE upgrades! good job!
30 June 2016, 20:09
Christian BruerHi Cesar, thx for your kind comment, glad you like it🙂
There are some pros and cons with the Airfix kit, but all in all the kit is very nice. Unfortunately I have less time so there is no further progress at the moment🙁
By the way, I wonder why Airfix do not work on later versions ons of the Hurricane?!
Cheers, Christian
1 July 2016, 16:36
Martien LourensYou start with another giant. 🙂 It is a pleasure to build kit, I think. I will follow.
2 July 2016, 05:33
Christian BruerThank you Clifford and Martien. For sure it is a pleasure to build the kit. Some minor problems here and there but this is modelmaking. Hope to have some time and patience to make some progress soon.
Cheers, Christian
2 July 2016, 17:12
Christian BruerThe Interior is painted by airbrush, I use Vallejo Model Air No. 71.126 for the Interior Green. All the small parts are hand painted with different shades of brown and gray. The compass, dashboard and some small bits and pieces are already fixed.
The seat is completed with the harness. I was not really confident with the pre painted PE because you have to be much carful bending the parts not to break the printed colour. I more like belts just made of brass to paint for my own.
But anyhow, the interior need some final drying time before the next step – washing and highlighting the surfaces and details.
Cheers, Christian
15 October 2016, 16:58
Christian BruerThe interior parts got a wash with highly thinned oils. The paint looks dry, but I will give the wash some days drying time before I start cleaning the wash and highlighting the surface and details.
Cheers, Christian
23 October 2016, 18:45
Cesar MunizHi Christian, tons of details in this model! I love it, one tecnical question: I'm not specialist in Hurricanes, but I can see that the wing in the Airfix model is representing like almost completly covered in fabric, I did the Revel one that have just pannel lines, the pictures I could find in internet seems that it has metal cover with rivets, so I rivetted mine, the early hurricanes had different wing than the later ones?
24 October 2016, 08:20
Holger KranichHey Cesar, in 1939 they changed from fabrik to metal wings. But that went step by step.
24 October 2016, 08:43
Christian BruerThank You all for the very kind comments🙂
Yep Cesar, as Holy mentioned the first series of Mk. I Hurricane have fabric wings. Airfix start with the early version and included two and three blade propellers, but they still missed to make a late Mk. I with metal wings so far. Don't know why?! There is a conversion set from Alley Cat made of resin with metal wings, but it is hard to get.
Cheers, Christian
25 October 2016, 18:33
Erik De SmetChristian, did you notice the Airfix inside joke at the instructions stage 20 ( the pilot with the modern glasses) ...
29 October 2016, 15:49
Christian BruerEric, I did not notice it so far, thx for the hint. Funny thing, I guess the one who worked on this has a good portion and sense of humor😄
Once the wash completely dry I add a coat of basic paint brightened with some white to highlight the surface and set lights to the details. I try to hold the balance between dark and bright areas not to overdo the effect. So far I'm really confident with the final result.
Next step is to assemble the fuselage halves and the wing section.
Cheers, Christian
30 October 2016, 11:38
Christian BruerLong time ago that I made progress on any of my builds. I nearly finish the basic assembly of the Mk. I and now I'm close to start the paintwork.
Finally I decide to build a fabric wing Mk. I with three blade Rotol propeller, N2319 / VY-P of No. 85 Sqn. flown by Sgt. G. "Sammy" Allard on 10th May 1040, when he shot down 2 He-111 over France.
Even the fit of the kit is good, there is some filling and sanding necessary to get the wings leading and rear edges clean and smooth. Most attention is needed at the leading edge, to make sure to keep the look correct. I still have to check the result adding a first coat of primer.
I cut of the casted foot step frame and replaced it with a more prominent styrene part. This has to sand down a little bit, what is still to do. I cut out the upper hand hold, because it was open until the foot step was lowered, what I will show on my Hurricane.
Flaps will be displayed down, so I add the Eduard PE. I will display the Hurricane in a small maintenance scenery to make sure it is correct to show her with lowered flaps.
Last but not least I add a armour plate at the rear cockpit bulkhead.
More will come sooner or later – stay tuned
Cheers, Christian
3 December 2016, 10:03
Spanjaarddo not worry about speed, i am probably slower, working in my phantom since July for example 😛
i think i can learn a lot from what you are doing, it looks really fantastic 🙂
3 December 2016, 10:19
Erik De SmetDid this early Hurricane have armour plate in the cockpit in May 1940 ?
3 December 2016, 15:15
Martyn FoxJust caught up with this one Christian. Wonderful intricate detail work as usual. Mind you this must be classed as a large build for you.????
3 December 2016, 16:00
Christian BruerThank you all for your very kind comments🙂
Well Erik, I'm not that expert, but according to my references some of the early fabric wing Mk. I underwent an upgrade during early stage of the war. Armour at the rear of the cockpit and a de Havilland – sorry not a Rotol as I wrote before - three blade variable pitch propeller helped the early Mk. I, to gain a better performance. Most of the Hurricanes served in France and the Low Countries in early 1940.
Yep Martyn, it is a little bit unusual to work with the big parts, but I love the details of that scale, and wonder about myself not to go back early to scale 1/72?!
Cheers, Christian
3 December 2016, 16:59
Clifford KeeslerYou are welcome sir. It is nice to see you building "some bigger things" LOL. although 1/72 is still to small for an old blind man like me!.
6 December 2016, 18:43
Christian BruerHehe, yep, but I still like the small things😄 Scale 1/72 is large for me but without my magnifier I have to change to scale 1/24😎
6 December 2016, 19:08
Christian BruerI add some more parts and details.
Landing gear and landing gear door are assembled and prepared to add the PE brake pipe.
The support for the foot step was drilled out as well as the upper hand hold.
The carburettor intake need a small horizontal lamella, this was made using a piece of scale 1/350 ship railing.
The Landing light frame was filled with a piece of styrene. The plan is to add a scratch build light with a class made of transparent tape. I never did this before but I will give it a try.
Antenna masts are all made of brass rod. I used a part of a brass mast from ship model accessories in scale 1/350 for the main antenna mast and 0,3mm brass rod for the rear one.
All control surfaces are fixed with a light deflection.
Well so far a quite nice and easy build. Hope to have time and patience during my Christmas vacation to start the paintwork.
Cheers, Christian
17 December 2016, 09:37
Christian BruerI hope you had nice Christmas and enjoy your holiday.
Before starting the paintwork there was a slightly work to do. The assembly of the outer flaps (still forgot it till date), adding some small bits and pieces like lower foot step, pitot tube and one strut on each landing gear.
Now there are two more things missing, positioning and landing lights. For the landing lights I will add pieces of clear plastic and sand them to fit the wing tips.
Just like the landing lights I have never done this before. I'm not sure if it will proper work, because of the compatibility of acrylic paint and glue. I try to paint the background in dark grey and glue the pieces of clear sprue with superglue. I hope that will be stiff clear but stiff enough for the later sanding work?!
Cheers, Christian
27 December 2016, 11:01
Stefan SchachtHi Chris, nice progress. I'm curious how you paint the pilots. Cheers Stefan
27 December 2016, 11:16
Cesar MunizI have done this in my Ka 14 project, I cutted off the navigation lights and drilled a hole on it to simulate the bulb, than I painted it from inside and used tamiya glue, because of the scale it is dificult to see the color in the back ground, after I sanded and polished it to shape, I masked a tid bit smaller with liquid mask Maskol, The pictures I took doesn´t seem to show it in details, I took the tecnic from here: ratomodeling.com/articles/headlights1/ also you can see one hurricane full build of the revell one: ratomodeling.com/finished/fleet_defender/ , hope you enjoy it! viel spass!
27 December 2016, 12:31
Christian BruerThank you very much for your interest and kind comments mates🙂
Stefan, I don't know at the moment how to paint the figures, but I will use acrylics and the same technique I used to paint my civil war figures.
Cesar, thank you very much for the hint and link. I've tried it on a sample this afternoon. It worked quite well with liquid cement even on an acrylic painted background. I sealed the edges with superglue. Just one hour later I start sanding the part. Hope it will work that well on the real thing.
Gorbygould, normally I build scale 1/350 and 1/144, so this is a bit large one for me😉
But anyhow, it took me a long time to add all the small bits, even I usually work in smaller scales, this is a challenge to me. Work is not going well at the moment, not the serenity and patience at the moment🙁
Cheers, Christian
27 December 2016, 19:34
Christian BruerThank you Clifford, your comment is much appreciated 🙂
Attached some photos of the positioning light sample I made yesterday. It worked quite well, but I'm not really sure if the background colour was partially dissolved by the liquid glue?!
I will try another one and add some black paint to the liquid glue – curious if this will work?!
Landing lights are made of styrene. I cut of a thin piece from 1,5mm diameter rod and shaped it using a head of a fixing pin and careful pressure. Guess it will look ok when finished.
I start painting the canopy and front window. I do not like to mask and paint them, because of the pealing of the acrylic colour I use when removing the mask. So I used a small brush and carefully paint the stringers. It worked quite well; some overlapping paint can easily remove with a toothpick.
Cheers, Christian
28 December 2016, 19:21
Christian BruerWell Bart, my resource is Modellers Datafile No. 2, The Hawker Hurricane.
Details are on page 92, picture no. 3 and 5. Both photos show a dark wingtip light background. Photo no. 3 was taken at a Mk. XI on display at the Museum of Flying in Santa Monica USA, photo no. 5 at a Mk. XII displayed at The Fighter Collection in Duxford UK.
It would be fine you share your resources if you have any other resource or information – TIA 🙂
Cheers, Christian
29 December 2016, 12:27
Christian BruerMy last attempt fixing the wing tip light was successful now. I used Tamiya superglue to fix the part. The background was already pre painted dark grey before I add the superglue. I sealed then the whole frame with Tamiya extra thin cement. Because of the superglue the Tamiya cement does not affect the pre painted background. No I will give it a try on the real thing.
Cheers, Christian
6 January 2017, 20:01
Christian BruerThx Bart, but I leave it dark grey. Today I glued the clear parts. It seems to be all ok. I will give it a day to dry completely before I start the sanding.
Cheers, Christian
7 January 2017, 19:23
Christian BruerThank you Clifford, I much appreciate your interest and kind comments 🙂
Today I have sanded and polished the clear parts on the real model. It worked very well and my first thoughts of less stability of the glue line and dissolving paint were causeless. I'm really satisfied with the result. I will add some photos later.
Cheers, Christian
9 January 2017, 19:13
Album info
Hawker Hurricane Mk. I. N2319 / VY-P of No. 85 Sqn. flown by Sgt. G. "Sammy" Allard on 10th May 1040, when he shot down 2 He-111 over France.
The aircraft will be displayed in a small scenery using the stuffand bits and pieces added to this project.
