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1/48 Tamiya P-47D Bubbletop |
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This is my Tamiya 1/48 P-47D Bubbletop depicting a P-47D RE-30 of the Turkish Air Force during 1951. It was converted to a P-47D RE-30 with a fin fillet from the Hasegawa kit, and minor modifications. When Tamiya announced their new P-47D razorback early this year, I knew that a Bubbletop version would be following, and this could only mean one thing: a new Turkish Air Force P-47D on my shelf. Early rumors and test shots indicated that the kit would not include the fin fillet, so I posted a "help wanted" ad on Hyperscale, which was quickly replied by a fellow modeler: Many thanks go to Mr. Stephen Prior (of Glasgow, Scotland), who very kindly sent me a Hasegawa P-47D fin fillet part from his spares box. I quickly gathered reference material, and started waiting for the kit with bated breath....
P-47D
in the Turkish Air Force:
I wasn't disappointed when I received the kit from HLJ: This had to be the best 1/48 aircraft kit I have seen so far, and it was a pleasure to build, too! The kit is exquisitely molded with excellent detail. The
cockpit was built out of the box, with the addition of Eduard colored seat
belts. I used RAAF Foliage Green for the distinctive Dark Dull Gray interior of
the P-47D. The cockpit of the RE-30 variant had a flat floor, but I used the
corrugated kit floor as is, reasoning that the cockpit floor is not really
visible on my shelf. In retrospect, I probably might have fitted a True Details
or BB resin cockpit floor.. The conversion was a very easy affair: The Hasegawa fin fillet fit very well with minimal use of Testors' Red Acryl Putty and CA glue. I scratchbuilt compressibility flaps from Evergreen styrene sheets, and relocated the landing light on the wing. I
used SNJ for the aluminum finish, and Floquil Reefer White for the white part of
the cowling, typical of P-47D's of the 8.Alay. I weathered the model with a subtle sludge wash of dark grey acrylic paint. The Turkish insignia are made from Tauro's solid red and white decal sheets, and the flags are from Kedi Decals.
The finished model depicts "DE-39", a P-47D of the 8.Alay of the Turkish Air Force based at Erzincan during 1951. The "DE" stands for "Deprem" (Earthquake), the official name of the 8.Alay during the 1950-1952 period, when units of the Turkish Air Force were assigned names.Kursad
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Photos and text © by Kursad Albayraktar
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Republic Day in Turkey 2003 
