1/48 Promodeller Curtiss P-40E

Gallery Article by Ian T.M. Holahan on July 4 2011

  United States of America Independence Day

 

This is a 1/48th scale Curtiss P-40E that I just completed utilising the Promodeller kit that came out in the mid-90's. I have always had alot of respect for the P-40 because this airplane really held the line against the Axis until the newer fighters were introduced in WWII. Construction went well and there were no real issues during the build. I used True Details resin wheels to replace the kit wheels and a Squadron vacuform canopy replaced the kit windscreen and hood. The Squadron parts fit well with the kit.

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I made a new pitot tube from styrene tubing because the one in the kit was a little big. The kit was painted using Model Master paints and I used the colors that matched the Dupont colors utilized by Curtiss at the time. The colors are FS30219, FS36622 and a mix of FS34092 and FS34079. These recommendations came from a very informative article about P-40 camo by Rato Marczak, who backed up his P-40 data with a wealth of photos, documents and digital matches of photos and paint chips. When I had painted the model, the camo matched about perfectly to a color photo of a P-40E in Mr. Marczak's article.  

The model was weathered heavily to show the wear-and-tear inflicted in the Chinese theater of operations. The exhausts were treated with MIG pigments and the wheels were as well to show the build up of the red clay from the Chinese air strips. Lead foil bullet hole patches were added on the left wing as well. Eagle Strike decals were used to depict a P-40E flown by Ed Rector in China during the summer of 1942. All in all, this was a fun project and the kit builds into a great replica of a Curtiss P-40E.  

Best wishes,

Ian T.M. Holahan

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Photos and text © by Ian T.M. Holahan