1/72 B25 C/D "worth fighting for"

[Peter s]

Hi All, This is my first attempt at posting a new topic. I bought the B25 C/D kit when it first came out but it immediately went into my stash and started gathering dust. I'm making a concerted effort to reduce the stash a bit and thought I'd better do some "big builds" before summer gets in the way.

Another poster invited me to post updates after I'd built the kit but before I really started painting so there's little in the way of "build" pics. All I can say is that its a very straight forward build. A little more complex than a Beaufighter or Blenheim but easier than a Lanc or B17. I found the airfix DO-17 harder to do well. 

The only thing I'd highlight is that its potentially a really bad tail sitter. There's a small void space for weight in the nose and this void needs to be totally filled with lead or else. I spent about 20 mins with a pair of side cutters, hammer and 20Z lead fishing weight shaping a lump to fit. If I was going to make another I'd stick two further lumps on the back of the cockpit bulkhead either side of the open door. You won't see weight there and it'll help. The props and glass in the nose are heavier than the turrets so I found it improved as I went along.

Initially I fancied doing this as an Italian campaign aircraft. A bit of a "catch 22" themed plane. The Italian campaign is a bit forgotten and there are some great commonwealth projects associated with that theatre. Unfortunately by that stage in the war you really need a late model B25 and there's no way you can adapt a C/D into a J. I did find this aircraft "worth fighting for" which fought in Op Torch then later over Italy. It was hit by flak and ditched near Palermo in August 1943. Fortunately all crew survived. I found some aftermarket decals which included Torch stars with yellow outline. I wanted later war (like the real photo) so used stars without yellow but kept some touches from the Torch scheme, mainly the yellow tail bars and yellow cowlings. Maybe it flew like this between the end of Torch and the real photo. Probably not but its my model! 

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There's a few odd features on the real pic. De-icing boots on the tail but not obviously on the wings stand out

Here's the kit base coated with Tamiya  Olive Drab. I brush painted obvious internal areas with Tamiya cockpit green. I favour adding the glass at the latest point I can so was prepared to touch up the cockpit again as I went along.

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Then an overspray of Vallejo. I like their "Air wars" sets. Slow drying and at times a bit dubious colour shades but If you touch up by brush you rarely see the difference between brush and airbrushed.

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Then masked off for the grey

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and sprayed grey

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[Peter s]

Part 2:

First cowls are masked off with 5mm tamiya tape & gently sprayed with tamiya matt white. Bright yellow over any "combat colour" doesn't work as most bright yellow paints are semi-opaque.

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Tape off and its come out really well. I've included an Airfix Spit 1 I was working on at the same time to give an idea of the size of the B25. For a complex kit it doesn't need too much shelf room.

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Here's some close ups of the turrets and nose gun. I added an ammo belt to the bomb aimers gun but TBH once the glass was all fitted you couldn't really see it. This kit allows you to fit all the glass from the outside which saves a lot of masking. The bevels in the plastic are really well cast so the windows fit in really easily. The turrets are extremely detailed. What I really noticed was how clear the glass is. Its absolutely crystal clear.

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Next up some weathering and decals.

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One pilot is provided but there's loads of space for 2 more so I raided my parts box.

I looked for real pics of B25s with exhaust staining and couldn't find much. Unlike say a lancaster the exhaust arrangement seems to make for a clean plane. I limited myself to some pin washes with oil paint around the cowling and some subtle staining over the wing. I use water colour pencils to pick out the panel lines and do some subtle detail work. More info in post 3. You need a hard matt surface and well cured paint to make the most of pencils but they have the advantage over pastel or pigment that if you don't like the effect you can wipe it away with damp paper. A sharp black water colour pencil can really pull out panel lines. In my case I used a darker olive pencil and shaded over the top of each panel line. This added highlight without looking too unrealistic.

[Peter s]

Post 3:

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This is a none-airfix (sorry, I don't have any pale grey airfix to hand at the moment) but it shows what you can do with the pencils clearer than on the B25. I used a mix of burnt umber (dark brown) and various darker greys shaded broadly over panel lines then gently blotted with a damp cotton bud to soften the effect. I used some light greys in front to back strokes , especially over the wings , to make a streaking effect. Black pencil where the red on the wings is exposed highlights those panels nicely.

[Peter s]

And finally... post 4:

The finished article. Crew installed, glass fitted and the small bits that are easily broken fitted at the very end. The crew, glass and props add more weight to the front that the turrets add to the rear so the balance improves. I hand painted the canopy lines then tidied them up with a sharpened cocktail stick. The antenna wire is 0.2mm brass rod. Dead easy to fix at the end with superglue. The jeep is fitted with an old B17 decal applied to oven foil as a sort of "follow me" flag. 

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I like to play with photoshop filters. "Vintage" gives a faded old photo effect.

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Overall I can thoroughly recommend this kit. There's enough spares in the box that I think you can back date to an A/B quite reasonably. The tail sitting is a problem but one you can defeat if you know about it from the start. I made a few minor mistakes... I painted a small window on the left side due to the flap getting in the way of the masking. If I do another I'll leave the flaps off until later in the build. The starboard nose art set hard on the matt surface too quickly & isn't quite the right angle. I got some paint on the bombs and had to repaint them in situ which meant I lost the bomb decals. If I was doing another I don't think I'd fit the bombs. The bomb bay is really detailed and with bombs in place you can't appreciate this. My paint scheme is pretty conservative but Hannants do a decal set for C/D B25 which has some really unusual variants. Everything from 2-tone desert to RAF versions in Burma in PRU Blue. One post war Canadian aircraft comes in silver with bright red-orange tail and wing tips and the nose glass overpainted black. This kit has far more potential than you may think.

[John Symmons]

Hi Peter.

That's alovely build and your write-up has plenty of tricks, techniques and tips and I've learnt something new with the pencils , although the use of ordinary lead pencils was a old trick used many used years ago, but it seems to have fallen out of favour these days. Really liked your "vintage" photos, anyone could be forgiven in thinking they were the real thing.

 

Thanks for showing your Mitchel and looking forward to seeing and hearing more.

 

Remember we do this for fun                                   John the Pom

[Peter s]

Hi john, thanks! I used to use lead pencils for doing wear and tear on tanks (hatch edges especially) and sometimes ground up graphite for tracks. I got the water colour pencil too from Diego Quijano. Encyclopedia of aircraft modelling techniques vol 4 weathering (a mig/Sin / ammo publications). Very expensive for a book of photos but that tip was worth it's price.

You can buy individual watercolour pencils from art stores or eBay very cheaply. Full sets are available but for models you mainly need black browns greens and greys so no point buying bright reds and yellows.

[T2B]

A very good build Peter s. Airfix usually plan for a couple of versions in their moulds with a separate box issue to follow, and an early B-25B is awaiting release later this year, hopefully in the Doolittle Raid scheme which I'll certainly get! 

 

And like JS I like your vintage filter, might try that technique sometime? 

[Peter s]

A very good build Peter s. Airfix usually plan for a couple of versions in their moulds with a separate box issue to follow, and an early B-25B is awaiting release later this year, hopefully in the Doolittle Raid scheme which I'll certainly get! 

 

And like JS I like your vintage filter, might try that technique sometime? 

Thanks. It's pretty obvious from the box contents that there are "plans" for more variants. The huge clear side panels which are almost all painted on this version are really curious. They scream waist gunner positions which makes me wonder if there's also plans for a different fuselage and a much later version as well as the Doolittle version.

[stm1954]

As an Australian can I put in a plea for Airfix to do the late model B25D with waist and tail guns.  This was the B25D model used by the RAAF in the Pacific and I would love to see this model come out.

[Peter s]

As an Australian can I put in a plea for Airfix to do the late model B25D with waist and tail guns.  This was the B25D model used by the RAAF in the Pacific and I would love to see this model come out.

If you can post a real pic I can tell you if a conversation is possible. Mine has the potential for a tail gun like the Doolittle raiders and the perspex side panels were huge. They look like Airfix have factored in waist gunners for the future