PK-03 Boeing P-12E *** "Finished" ***

[Crashpilot]

It´s crazy how they loved to paint their planes as colourful like that, they didn´t care about camouflage!
Hard to believe those are military planes!
(...and the Peashooters even went more bright than that - maybe the prohibition that was in place in the States then
made them use other stuff then alcohol?? ....and sparked their "creativity" )

[JohnRatzenberger]

Not at all -- and look at the RAF "Silver Wings" with their colorful squadron markings.

Remember, 'tween wars, especially in the 20's, the primary mission of any air force was to get funding, not go fight somewhere except with the other services in the halls of government for whatever few dollars were available given the post-WW1 drawdown and the global recession. Funding comes from government, government is influenced by public support, public support is gained by colorful, exciting air shows, air races, record-setting, and the like. Air forces were nothing if not one big PR machine.


Anyway, we all woke this morning and agreed to cooperate without much drama. The engines slid into the cowls & were glued. That was glued on to the fuselage. The last bit of decal striping was carefully applied and things are drying before we start to erect the top wing.



I have a dinner engagement this evening -- if I can get the top wings up before then, it'll have been a good day.

[iggie]

Lovely work John! I hope your dinner engagement is enjoyable!

[JohnRatzenberger]

If, when I get back, the top wings haven't sprung off it will be wonderful

[DavidWomby]

Those look great!!

David

[Crashpilot]

Seems like, with their shiny looks, they´re about to get ready for the next airshow, to get in some dollars from the gov for the starving USAAC! Very nice work!
Think my ideas about them painting their planes brightly, were a bit "esoteric".....
Who knows when I get ready to start on my P-12s?

[gbrwn56]

Great work John, thanks for sharing.

[JohnRatzenberger]

They behaved themselves while I was at dinner ...



Rigging today ... and maybe the rest of the pieces if all goes well ...

[Gregers]

Those are looking superb. Seeing your builds is tempting me to dig out mine to build. Very nice work.

All the best

Greg

[fredk]

They look stunning

[ShaunW]

Those look proper good John and are fabulous schemes!

[JohnRatzenberger]

With Fred's permission, I am going to call these done for GB purposes.

Yes, they are un-rigged, haven't got windscreens installed, have a few decal flaws to fix, and need a finishing coat of Future overall, but I am running out of time and would rather put on the finishing touches at my leisure so they look good at SMW and not screw them up.











I'm pretty happy with these. You guys twisted my arm to leave these in their original 2-colors and Thank You !! It's been a very long time since I tried that. I did learn that Future is a great way to cover up some small construction flaws, but I spent more time on construction knowing I couldn't just slop filler & paint on to cover things up.

This is another great Matchbox kit, fits well and all that. The Starfighter decal sets are probably for the Monogram kit and the cowl decals fought me, but the rest were fine. As I mentioned before, they kit yellow is a bit translucent and dark stuff on the other side of a thin area can be seen, but that's OK. If I had opted to paint them, I would have taken down some of the fuselage detail to make decal application easier.

The rigging is double wire. I have the Starfighter PE rigging set for the Monogram kit and it sorta fits OK, but I think the wires are a bit too broad and I am seriously thinking of double-rigging with elastic thread, probably EZ-line Fine. Fortunately there aren't many wires and they are easy to get at, because I don't want to be slopping CA all over now.

Once I get them ready for their trip to Telford, I'll do real final photos.

Thank you all for your support & encouragement during this build and most all for talking me in to using the two-colors as they were meant to.

[rob_van_riel]

With or without the remaining touches, these look great.
Clearly, on this particular kit the plastic colours were chosen correctly, and mostly unpainted with highlights is a very real option. That won't work for all of them, but I'll be keeping an eye open for such opportunities when I get to work on my own collection.

[ShaunW]

They really do look great John and, all being well, I hope to see them in all their glory at SMW!

[DavidWomby]

Beautiful result. Great that they are in the original 'raw' plastic!

David