The F4F depicted here is from a picture of a Wildcat taken aboard the Enterprise (CV-6) while providing escort cover for the Hornet (CV-8) en route to Japan for the Doolittle raid.

My original plan was to just build a quick model to display on one of my Yorktown class bases. Before it was completed I had detailed the engine with push rods, magnetos and an ignition ring and built a complete cockpit from scratch. The model was one that had been bought by my oldest son who, decided he didn’t have the patience to build models. I asked him if he minded me building it and he gladly said yes go ahead. Once I got started it became a labor of love because I had decided to give it to him as a graduation gift. The fun part was that as the model progressed he saw all the little things I put into it and never realized it was for him.
The engine was rather simple in that I drilled holes in the crankcase and inserted wire for the push rods. The magnetos and the ignition ring were fabricated with styrene.
The more complex part was the cockpit. The kit had no cockpit, only a seat and a pilot mounted in an open void. To make and fit the cockpit I decided to assemble the fuselage and then cut the nose off just behind the windscreen. This allowed me two things. One, to make and mount the instrument panel under the dash without any interference and second to custom fit the cockpit tub into the fuselage. To reconnect the nose to the main fuselage I had to add a .030” spacer to make up for the lost material in the cutting process. Once reassembled I puttied and sanded everything back to shape, pre-shaded the panel lines, painted the plane and then finished it off with some weathering.

There were no decals used on this plane. The kit decals were for an Atlantic theater version and my son liked the paint scheme from the Pacific theater. I probably could have gone and found after market decals to use but I wanted to try my hand at painting all the markings. I drew up masks in AutoCAD for the numbers and the national insignia, cut them out and painted away. When I was done I noticed I had some slight miss-registration with the white from the star and the blue background but that was the only problem that really jumped out. I figured it gave it character and also showed that it had been hand painted so I left it alone. It was actually quite fun doing all the markings myself and found that it was something I enjoyed more then I thought I would.

The base is the 1:72 scale Yorktown class kit from Flattops & More Hobbies. This depicts the early Enterprise with the cross deck tie downs on four-foot centers. The kit includes an 8” x 8” x ½” wood base, and photo etch tie downs. For additional information check out www.flattopsandmore.com or contact me at rusty@flattopsandmore.com

It seams that there is no such thing as the simple project. No matter how hard I try, that “simple” project always ends up turning into something more.

This model features the following products available at our sponsors Click on the item to see availability!
Essex Class Kit	Essex

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Photos and text © 2005 by Rusty Keeler

June 14, 2005

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