Allyn / Microscale's 1/60 scale
YF-102

by Patrick Hawkey

Tamiya's 1/48 scale P-51D Mustang is available online from Squadron

Here's one you won't see finished up too often. I present, in the ever popular 1/60th scale...

The assignment was to take the old Allyn/Microscale kit and make it reasonably presentable. These Allyn kits were never meant to be more than simple desk models. A total of six pieces make up the airplane, plus a two piece stand to plug into its belly. Surface detail consists of fine raised lines indicating rudder and elevons.They don't come much simpler. Included is a decent-fitting (if very thick) clear canopy, so we wanted a pilot in there. Fortunately, Revell made a 1/60th X-3 which came with a pilot figure, so I stole him, put an oxygen mask of epoxy putty on his face, drilled a hole for an oxygen hose (just a bent wire), and I had a reasonable Dagger pilot. Not that you were going to see a lot of him.

Modifications to the model were primarily replacing rounded wingtips and fin tip with more angular pieces, new wing fences from sheet styrene, slightly reshaped/enlarged air intake openings, scribed control surfaces, and a pitot tube from Evergreen rod stock.

The silver finish is enamel out of a hardware store rattle can (Valspar 65052 Silver) decanted, and airbrushed with about 20 percent lacquer retarder added. It dries very smooth with the retarder. Panel lines were suggested with random post-shaded lines.

When Microscale released this kit in the early/mid 1970s, a major selling point was the nice decal sheet included. Two sheets, actually. Sadly, almost 40 years later, the decal sheet I had to work with hadn't held up very well. In fact not at all. Tiny cracks were visible before I started, so I first put three good coats of gloss coat on the Convair logos. Those would be hard to replace. They went on reasonably well, though not perfectly. Everything else I replaced with other commercial decals and made my own buzz numbers and tail numbers with the USAF/Amarillo font in my computer.

Gear door outlines are included on the decal sheet. I used these at templates to cut silver decal stock to the correct shape. So much for the undersurfaces.

The stand is my own manufacture and the data on it is computer generated as well.

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

• 

Thumbnail panels:

Model, Images and Text Copyright © 2012 by Patrick Hawkey
Page Created 3 October, 2012
Last Updated 8 October, 2012

Back to HyperScale Main Page