Williams Bros' 1/32 Scale
Hall Bulldog Racer

by Patrick Chung
 

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It is probably fair to say that no other brand in plastic modeling history has ever produced such a line of Golden Age aircraft as Williams Brothers. I always have some kind of special interests in building models of those flying F1 in the exciting years.

The Hall Bulldog Racer appears as today's subject. This aircraft appeared in the 1932 Cleveland National Air Race. The GeeBee R-1 won that year’s Thompson Trophy with Jimmy Doolittle at controls. Hall’s innovative design concept seemed like a loser as his Bulldog placed only next to the last (7th).

My Williams Brothers' GeeBee Racer may be found elsewhere on HyperScale

The kit features typical WB molding: translucent soft white plastic with raised panel lines and soft details plus heavy flash, sinkholes and dents here and there. Thick clear parts have rough texture on the inner surface.

Other than re-scribing the panel lines and adding rivets where appropriate, most of the assembly time went in dry fitting, filling and sanding.

To achieve high gloss finish, Gunze’s super white, super Italian red, super clear II and leveling thinner (all lacquer paints) were used through out the painting session. White is used both as undercoat and final coat to guarantee brilliant red color.

After the clear paint dried completely, Gunze Rubbing compound was used for polishing, followed by Tamiya’s modeling wax as a final touch.

It is worthwhile mentioning that though the molding technology of WB’s kits released back in 1970s is not able to compare to that of TAMIGAWA standard today, the drawings/instructions of these kits are really something a gem, and the outline of the kit parts are generally very accurate.

Click the thumbnails below to view larger images:

Model, Images and Text Copyright © 2006 by Patrick Chung
Page Created 17 October, 2006
Last Updated 24 December, 2007

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