1/48 Eduard Curtiss P-40E Warhawk - 16th FS, 23rd FG - USAAF

Depicted as aircraft 41-36402 flown by Lt. Dallas A. Clinger of the 16th Fighter Squadron, 23rd Fighter Group, United States Army Air Force based in Kweilin China in January 1943.

 I like the early P-40E as it seems to have a bigger variety of paint schemes than the later N variant.  So when Eduard announced their Royal class boxing I was always going to grab one.

The P-40 looks great with a shark mouth and the cool tail art on 16 FS. aircraft really attracted me to this option.  And it seems it wasn't just me, this scheme appears to have been hugely popular with modellers as I have seen it done many times online already.

The Kit

•  1/48 P-40E Warhawk - Royal Class (Kit No. R0023)

Aftermarket

The Royal Class boxing came with 2 sets of the 3D printed extras which I used on this build.  They were: 

• Round and Squared topped Seats . I used the squared topped seat on this build.
• Wheels
• Tubular exhausts 

I also designed and printed antenna attachments for the wings, tail and fuselage. 

The Build

Over all the kit builds up easily and fit is generally good.  Cockpit details is excellent out of the box. The 3D printed seats are beautiful.

 

Cockpit Detail is excellent

 The two areas I had issues were

• The rounded covers (Parts F14/F15) on the leading edge of the wings for the undercarriage bays. The instructions for the Royal Class boxing have these fitted after the wings are joined to the fuselage. After assembling 2 kits I concluded that these would be better fitted to the wing assembly before it was mated to the fuselage assembly.  Looking at the instructions for the Pacific Star boxing it seems Eduard agrees as this is what is now called out.
  
  

  

  The Rounded fronts of the undercarriage bays needed a bit of work

  
  
•  The underside light (Part A18) doesn't fit. It's too big for the hole.  Don't leave it until after painting like I did.  Fit it as per the instructions or even earlier. But definitely before painting.

My other minor criticisms of the kit are:

• The undercarriage axle stubs are too long for the resin wheels. Sure, it's a simple task to shorten these but the instructions don't call it out.  I've seen a lot of builds where the modellers haven't  realised this and their model ends up looking like something from the Wacky Races. 
  
  
• The holes in the resin main wheels are too large for the kit axle.  This really is inexcusable. Eduard are the designers of both parts so surely they can get the diameters to match.  This seems to be a common issue with Eduard resin wheels however.
  
  
• The attachment of the propeller is extremely sloppy. At first I thought I'd done something wrong. Surely this could be made a press fit using a poly cap or similar.
  
  
• The Plastic Tubular exhausts are pretty naff. The 3D printed ones are lovely.
  
  
• The kit supplied PE brake lines don't really reflect the way the brake line was routed on the real aircraft. That said this is a super minor thing and to be honest most people won't even use the PE part as it's a pain to fit.

Apart from those mentioned above the kit is a pretty trouble free build experience.

Paint

Most of the paint used was per the instructions.  The main colours used were as follows:

• Dark Green - Mr Color C330 Modern RAF Dark Green
  
  
• Dark Earth  -  Mr Color C369 Dark earth, some yellow, and some radome tan
  
  
• Olive Drab - Mr Color C12 Olive Drab
  
  
• Underside Sky - Mr Color C368 Sky
  
  
•  Red - Custom mix to match the decals.
  
  
•  Interior Green - Mr Color Interior Green C58 with some yellow mixed to match a reference photo. In the end I think I could have used Mr Color C351 Dark Green.

Part of my normal painting process is the extensive use of splatter masks to break up the colours.  Thinned darker and lighter shades of the base colours are used to add variation to the finish. 

Underside prior to decalling

Topside prior to decalling

Decals

Decals were from the kit. Eduard's in-house printed decals are still quite polarising. People either love or hate them.  I tend towards the "love them" side. 

The only issues I have struck with them is the registration of any small decal with red text or lines.  They never seem in register. I have seen this on the Fw-190 walkways as well.  

Decals were applied over a gloss coat and after an initial wash with oil paints. Gunze Mr Marker Setter and Mr Softer were used to help the decals conform. After leaving overnight they looked good and I could have left them as is.  But I decided to remove the film anyway.

On the stencils I used a cotton bud and odourless thinners to remove the carrier film.  On the larger decals I started with thinners but found that rubbing with a cotton bud and thinners over areas of raised detail tends to damage the remaining decal, so  once the film could be lifted it was easier and quicker to use tweezers to remove the film in large pieces.

There were a couple of areas where I lost tiny pieces of decals. One was on the first piece of tail art I tackled,  this was due to me rubbing too vigorously.  The other was under the spinner where I'd layered  the front sharks mouth pieces over the side pieces. These were easily touched up with my new favourite things, AK Marker pens.

Lastly, after peeling the carrier film a white ring is visible around the national markings on the wings. This was removed in the weathering process.

Registration issues on the small red decals

White ring around the edge of the national markings

Decals on

 

Under nose shark mouth touch up

Weathering

Weathering was done primarily with  oil paints The main colours used were Sepia, Raw Umber, Industrial Earth, Buff, Faded Grey and Faded White. 

Wing root chipping was done using a sponge and Vallejo Model Air Aluminium. Silver and coloured pencils were used for other chipping/marks.

Side weathering

Top weathering

Underside weathering

Finishing Touches

Fitment of the undercarriage and other small parts is time consuming but relatively simple. I chose to add brake lines to the undercarriage legs after looking at references from lead wire rather than use the supplied PE.

The one exception is fitting the 3D printed wheels to the axle.  That the holes in the wheels are larger than the axle diameter doesn't help. Slow setting CA glue or Epoxy is your friend here. 

The 3D printed exhausts are a bit fiddly to fit. Make sure you don't cut off the attaching points otherwise alignment can be a chore (Yes I did that on some).

Eduard helpfully give you some spares of the tiny navigation lights, I needed them, Because, well..... Hamfisted!

Fitment of the antenna wires to my 3D printed parts was surprisingly simple.  I used Infini 0.0082" rigging thread for antenna and a piece of 0.5mm (OD) / 0.3mm(ID) bras tube for the insulator. The method I used was as follows:

• Firstly feed a piece of thread through the tube, then through the hole on the tail attachment, then back through the tube.  This piece of thread will form the antenna wires attached to each wing. 
   
• Next feed another piece of thread through the tube. This will be the piece for Tail to fuselage antenna.
  
  
• Glue one end of the wing antenna to its wing attachment.
  
  
• Glue the end of the antenna to the fuselage attachment.  I tape the tail end to the tail at this point
  
  
• Position the tube as centrally on the tail as possible then glue the unattached antenna thread to other wing attachment point.
  
  
• If the tube isn't central you can still carefully slide it along the thread to get it central.  Having the
  fuselage to tail antenna taped to the tail helps.
  
  
• Once the tube is aligned to your satisfaction place a bit of CA at the end of the tube to secure everything in place.  I also put a tiny blob at the front of the tube.  

Fuselage Attachment

Tail attachment. The insulator is 0.5mm (OD) / 0.3mm (ID) tube

Wing Attachment

Conclusion

This is the best Eduard kit I have built to date. I enjoyed it so much I built another at the same time. Detail is excellent from the box.  The only disappointment detail wise are the kits plastic tubular exhausts.  I would always replace them with Eduards 3D printed ones. Of course YMMV.

Fit wise it is pretty good, noting the exceptions (wing lights, undercarriage covers and wheel) described above.  These are pretty minor that even Bruce's Scale Models could handle them.

I am looking forward to building the other variants.

The Pictures