This is my third Hurricane and the most historically significant of the three. The reason is that this aircraft was flown by the first Commonwealth ace of World war II, New Zealander Edgar James "Cobber" Kain DFC.
Before his tragic death in a flying accident in 1940 Kain had accumulated a tally of 14 kills, although many believe it may have been as high as 20. Many of his victories were over the superior ME-109E. He was killed on the 6 June 1940 when his aircraft crashed whilst performing a slow roll over Bois Airfield in France. He was supposed to be returning that war weary aircraft to the UK for repair.
The Build
I used the Classic Airframes Fabric Wing Mk-1 Hurricane. The boxing had markings for several non RAF users, some of which are quite attractive.. However I wanted the kit not the decals.
Unlike the Hasegawa hurricane, the cockpit this one is average at best. It has really soft plastic and heaps and heaps of flash. The first 2 pictures show the flash typical on the Classic Airframes bits, the 2nd 2 pictures show the Hasegawa bits. A lot of time (but not enough) was spent cleaning this flash up. This is time well spent because it's a real pain to have to clean that off when you are about to paint it. Trust me know,
When I built my Hurricane IIC I used a resin cockpit. I used the IIC's cockpit for this one. All the instruments where punched out with my Waldron Punch set and attached individually. I like this technique as it gives a much better panel than I could ever hope to paint.
The kit went together without to many issues although it needed a fair bit of dry fitting (to be expected). I cut off the wing tips and fitted some clear sprue for the wing tips. This was sanded to fit.
Painting and Finishing
Here's the aircraft with the paint on. I used the blu-tac sausage method for the camouflage. Usually I free hand all my camouflage and I tried that first with this kit. But after I was so impressed with the results of the blu-tac sausage method on my Hurricane IID I re-painted this one using the same technique. As is becoming my custom I used model master enamels for the upper surfaces. this aircraft had an usual paint scheme in that the underside had white and black wings (ok, not so unusual) and aluminium dope for the forward and aft under fuselage. For the underside I used model masters metaliser aluminium, Tamiya white and scale black. Scale black was a 50/50 mixture of Tamiya Red Brown and Flat Black, this idea stolen from Brett Green at Hyperscale. In my opinion scale black looks appropriate for the scale of kit. As usual though I had heaps of trouble painting the white. One day I master white paint.
After a coat of Polly Scale Gloss the markings Aeromaster Decal sheet (Early hurricane Aces of WW II) were applied. These went down well with no real problems. All except for the tail flash. They were to big (designed for a Hasegawa kit) and had some large lumps to conform to. I decided to paint the rudder. I removed it from the model and painted it gloss white. I used Xtracolour post office red for the red. For the blue I originally used RAF roundel blue. But this was way to light, especially over a white undercoat. I then mixed a batch of about 2/3's Xtracolour roundel blue to 1/3 Humbrol Gloss black. This looked better to my eyes so on it went.
Another coat of Polly scale gloss then a wash of Flory Models Weathering Sludge Wash. This was sealed with Gunze Flat and then some chalks were sued for some weathering. Paint chipping was done with a silver pencil and mud was dry brushed Humbrol 117.
At this stage I busted the canopy off. When I tried to remove the masking tape all the paint came off, including the bits I didn't want to come off. I had a spare so I masked it out, also masked out the rear canopy. This really is a pain, al those small windows and it a vacu form canopy as well. I hate vacu form canopies. Finally I removed the landing light covers, in the process I stuffed one of those, to the point where I had to scratch build a replacement. This turned out better the original IMHO.
A few touch ups and a final coat of Gunze flat in certain spots and its done.
Conclusions
Classic Airframes kits are for experienced modelers and they have a rather fanatical bunch of fans. In fact to criticise them is seen as heresy by some. IMHO this kit was nowhere near as good as the Hasegawa offering, if it wasn't for the fact it was a rag wing I wouldn't have bothered with it. The reviews I read on the net which praised this kit were not reflected in what I found. It wasn't that hard to build but I found the instructions vague at times and as mentioned earlier the amount of flash was extreme. I reckon if this was a Trumpeter kit it would have been classified as unbuildable by some . This is an earlier CA kit and this particular example could have been from the end of the line. Perhaps that explains the flash.
On the plus side the rendition of the fabric on the wings is very nice, the fuselage fabric is good as well. Some consider the fuselage fabric superior to the Hasegawa kit but to me it's much of a muchness. The Hasegawa kit is more forgiving if like me you can be heavy handed with the sanding stick and paint. The little detailed parts are nicer (and there's more of them) on the Hasegawa kit. The CA kit doesn't have the annoying join at the rear of the wing like the Hasegawa kit does, that certainly is a plus for the CA kit.
Still it turned out OK and they do some great subjects. I have other Classic Airframes kits and intend to get a few more.
The Photos
