HISTORICAL MINIATURES BY GEORGE GRASSE
CLASSIC AIRCRAFT BETWEEN THE WARS

CURTISS BFC-2 (9277), 3-B-13 of VB-3, USS SARATOGA c. 1937

by George Grasse

CLASSIC AIRFRAMES CA4032 1:48 SCALE INJECTION KIT OF THE CURTISS BFC-2

CLASSIC AIRFRAMES BOEING F4B-4 BOX ART

 

 CURTISS BFC-2 THREE-VIEW PLAN
Image credit:   Curtiss Aircraft by Peter Bowers (see also bibliography) 

 

MODEL TO BE BUILT -  Curtiss BFC-2 BuNo. 9277, 3-B-13, USS Saratoga c. 1937
Photo credit:  Curtiss Navy Hawks by Peter M. Bowers, Squadron/Signal 1995 (see also bibliography).

 

CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #1


FUSELAGE GETTING STARTED: Not much to report here.  I forgot to take a detail photo of the cockpit buildup but so far so good. 

 

 CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #2
 
RADIAL ENGINE IN PLACE:  As standard practice, the Classic Airframe's kit is plastic with resin components.  In this case, the individual engine cylinders had to be glued in place. 

 

 CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #3
BOTTOM WING ALIGNMENT:  There are no location holes or pins for the bottom wing attachment to the fuselage.  This photo shows how I made my own attachments.  First, I mated the fuselage to the wing.  Second, on the underside I marked two places for the position of the brass rods.  Third, I drilled out the corresponding holes using a hand drill.  Fourth, I test fit the  brass pins.  Fifth, I glued the brass pins to the wing root.

 

 CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #4
BOTTOM WING ALIGNMENT:  This top down view shows the fit of the brass pins.   Not mentioned earlier are the two halves of the circular exhaust ring.  These were the most difficult part of construction.  The fit was not good and gluing was tenuous and fell apart several times especially when pre-fitting the cowling.

 

 CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #5
TAIL UNIT:  The first step was to glue the horizontal and vertical parts to the end of the fuselage.  I did not use pins but relied on plastic cement and appropriate supports to hold the parts in place overnight to thoroughly dry.  The underside tail struts are brass rod used in place of the kit's flimsy plastic struts.  The tail wheel unit as problem because the kit's plastic vertical shock absorber did not seem to have enough strength to stabilize the tail wheel.  I drilled a hole into the fuselage and used a brass rod surmounted by a short length of brass tubing to replicate the kit's part.

 

 CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #6
LANDING GEAR:  Each leg consists of a leg, two halves of the wheel cover (spats), and the wheel.  Each leg glues directly onto the fuselage and does not have holes and pins for support.  I carefully drilled out holes at the top of each leg and its corresponding location on the fuselage.  Then, I drilled holes at the bottom of each leg and into assembled spat with wheel.  I used brass pins to make the connections and, to my surprise, everything fit perfectly and now the model has a well-supported landing gear system.

 

 CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #7
FUSELAGE ADDITIONS & PAINTING:  The two-piece cowling was installed over the radial engine.  It was a tight fit so only a couple of supper glue dots were added to secure it in place.  The underside fuel tank had slight casting marks for each of the four supports.  These were drilled out and brass rod was inserted.  The tank was positioned to the underside and slight pencil marks were made for the brass rod attachment points which were drilled out.  The brass rods were oversized and this made for an easy fit as each one could be lowered or raised to the correct position. 

The fuselage, which had already been painted with one coat of Vallejo's VC0989 Sky Grey, now received a second coat.  The tires were painted using Vallejo's VC0995 Black Grey.  The cowling was painted in Model Master 2028 Willow Green.  The tail unit was painted in Vallejo VC0951 Flat White.  The cowling exhaust ring was painted with a mix of Vallejo VC0999 Copper and VC0950 Flat Black.  At this point prior to the application of fuselage decals, the model was oversprayed with satin polyurethane.

 

 CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #8
FUSELAGE DECALS:  The tail unit designation and BuNo were taken from the kit's decal sheet.  The 'U. S. NAVY' decals from the kit fell apart and wee replaced by Yellow Wings decals.  The 'Willow Green' section leader band was hand painted to replace the kit's decal that also fell apart.  Yellow Wings pinstripes were used to outline the band.  Both the 'C' and 'Top Hat' insignia came from the kit's decal sheet.  The propeller warning stripes (red, yellow, blue) were hand painted.  The back of the propeller was painted using Vallejo VC0814 Burnt Cadmium Red.

 

 CONSTRUCTION PHOTO #9
TOP WING AND STRUTS:  All of the struts shown were made from brass rod and tubing individually made to fit and secured with super glue.  The outer wing struts were made from 1.6mm OD tubing, the inner struts 1.3mm OD tubing, and aileron struts from 1.1mm OD tubing (all by Albion Alloys).   In this photo, the struts are unprimed at this point.

 

 FINISHED PHOTO #10
LEFT SIDE

 

 FINISHED PHOTO #11
RIGHT SIDE

 

 FINISHED PHOTO #12
LEFT FRONT

 

 FINISHED PHOTO #13
RIGHT FRONT

 

 FINISHED PHOTO #14
LEFT REAR

 

 FINISHED PHOTO #15
RIGHT REAR

 

COLOR TABLE

Naval Gray Vallejo VC0989 Sky Grey Fuselage and Struts
Aluminum Vallejo VC0997 Silver Flying Surfaces except Upper Surface Top Wing
Willow Green Model Master 2028 Willow Green Section Color (5th of VB-3)
White Vallejo VC0951 Flat White Tail Color (USS Saratoga)
Orange Yellow Tamiya 8034 Camel Yellow 1 Upper Surface Top Wing Only

1 Sprayed over two light coats of  Tamiya 8046 Light Sand
   

 

--------------------------------------------   C'EST FINIS  --------------------------------------------

MODELING REFERENCES

Bowers, Peter M.  Curtiss Aircraft 1907 -1947.  Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1979.

Bowers, Peter M.  Curtiss Navy Hawks in Action (Aircraft Number 156).  Carrollton, TX: Squadron/Signal Publications, Inc, 1995.

Doyle, David.  USS Saratoga, Squadron at Sea Series.  Carrollton, TX: Squadron/Signal Publications, Inc., 2013.

Johnson, E. R.  United States Naval Aviation, 1919-1941.  Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2011.

Listemann, Phil H.  USN Aircraft 1922-1962, Volume 4: Type Designation Letters 'BF', 'BT', & 'F' (Part 1). Philedition, 2016.   

Robertson, Bruce, Editor.  United States Navy and Marine Corps Fighters 1918-1962.  Fallbrook, CA: Aero Publishers, 1962.

  

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