1/32 Revell Hawker Hurricane Mk IIC

by Steve Negley

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This is one of those old Revell kits you probably have sitting in a box somewhere.  You opened it up but for some reason you never found the interest to put it together, at least that's what happened with mine, because I always seemed to find something else to work on.  Once I started working on it though I couldn't seem to stop, probably because the Hurricane is just a neat looking airplane.  My favorite variants of the Hurricane are the early Mk I's(circa Battle of Britain) and the Hispano cannon armed Mk II's.  I decided to model the Mk IIC right from the box.  I did do some scratch-building to enhance the detail of the kit.  There isn't much in the way of detail in the cockpit so I decided to scratch build most of it.  I would find out after all this was done that a complete cockpit interior is available aftermarket from a company in England, and had I known, I certainly would have gone this route.  But I'm pretty happy with the way the cockpit came out anyway.  The other detailing I did was I cut out the plastic around the radiator intake and added some scale brass screen to better simulate the radiator.  The effect turned out nicely as you will see in the pictures.  The kit cannons were replaced with some made from scale aluminum tubing.  To better simulate the re-coil springs on the cannons I wrapped some small gauge copper wire around the tubing and used CA glue to set it in place.

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I chose to model one of the first Hurricane Mk IIC's produced. This particular Hurricane was painted in an early "A" scheme of British Camouflage Green and Dark Earth over a Sky type "S" underside.  Very few MK II Hurricanes came off the line in this scheme as Hawker started painting the Hurricanes with the camouflage green and gray over a light gray underside.  You will also notice that this aircraft retains the older style roundels like those flown during the Battle of Britain which made this particular Mk IIC a more interesting subject.  This Hurricane flew with No.3 Squadron circa 1941.
Some of these older 1/32 scale Revell kits I think have gotten a bad rap, this is certainly one of them and with some of the resin parts available for it out there, much can be done to make this kit a real outstanding model.  I did little to it and I have a very nice addition to my 1/32 scale fighter collection. 
  

Many ARC readers have e-mailed me about how I do my Camouflage patterns.  All my camouflaging is done free hand with an airbrush.  I use a Binks model Wren A for alI my painting.  I try to use a 3 view drawing whenever possible and these usually aren't to hard to come by.  I line up the patterns by using panel lines and/or control surfaces on the subject.  Using this method it never seems to fail that the colors all fall into place.  To make the finish uniform I apply a generous amount of clear gloss to the entire aircraft.  This is good for two reasons, it will show all the sins in the camouflaging and it seriously diminishes the chances of decal silvering.  If you notice any light spots in the camouflaging or any other flaws apply the proper color over the gloss...DON"T PANIC!.  When the flaws are fixed just re-spray the entire model again with the gloss..all the color will blend in.  After I have applied all the decals I spray the entire model again with clear gloss, and after that has dried, I finish it with a clear flat.  This seals and protects the decal work and leaves a good base to do any weathering over.

Steve 

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Photos and text © by Steve Negley