The Defiant IV, the scourge of the Panzers.

[PR19_Kit]

I think I've figured out why I can't get my turret to fit, I've got the whole cockpit and turret baseplate installed too far aft. 



You can see there that the inner turret ring is some distance aft of the upper turret ring, but there's no way I can correct it now the fuselage is fully assembled and primed etc. I'll just have to file flats on the turret edge itself and when it's glued in place you won't be able to see the misalignment anyway. 

Here's the nose with all its bits and pieces on. The exhaust stubs are the ones from the Defiant kit, but with the fishtails filed off the later exhausts so they all look the same, and the tube thing running forward from the carb intake is a desert filter of course..... 



It needs a little tidying up round there but it's not too bad.

The cooling gills are almost invisible in the raw pic so I enhanced them a bit so you can see them, and there's another small one underneath as well as one on the other side.

[Scotaidh]

You could always carefully apply a dremel tool or the like to make the required clearance.

[Knightflyer]

I do like the different look of that engine Kit 

[NARSES2]

I think I've figured out why I can't get my turret to fit, I've got the whole cockpit and turret baseplate installed too far aft. 

Well at least you know now 

[KiwiZac]

Now that is a neat idea!

[PR19_Kit]

The cockpit moulding's DEFINITELY installed too far aft. 

It's come time to glue on the canopy, as I've done painting the cockpit, and it won't fit. The retracted forward turret fairing fouls the pilot's armour plate behind the seat as it's all too far aft, so I've had to trim the plate down some.

Almost ready to get the first colour coat on once the canopy's masked up, but I may fit the big underwing cannon first. Those looooong barrels look pretty vulnerable though...........

[PR19_Kit]

I've managed to fit the canopy with a small slice off the sides and top of the pilot's armour plate, not that you can see it anyway. I've also solved the problem of the turret not fitting by cutting everything off the bottom of it, even the raised parts that locate it in the turret well. You can't see most of that detail stuff either, so why bother with it?

I'll have to fit some fuse wire guns, but otherwise that's the fuselage problems sorted.

I've painted the underside Sky Blue, a light shade that some of the Hurricane IIDs carried, mainly because I can mix that and I don't have any Azure Blue.

[PR19_Kit]

Now the canopy is masked off (what a fiddly job THAT is! Loads of small window panes to cover up, nothing like a Spitfire!) and I've got two coats of mid-stone on the upper surfaces. The 40 mm cannon are glued in place now too, and it certainly looks a MEAN machine like that!

[PR19_Kit]

The Defiant's fully camo'd now and almost ready for its decals, and the Venom just needs its landing gear. LOTS of progress during the last few days.

[Old Wombat]

 

[PR19_Kit]

All the decals are one now, at least all the ones I'm going to apply. Those zillions of tiny ones all over the upper and lower sides can stay on the sheet, life's too short for that.

I've upgraded the turret to twin 0.5s from the four 0.303s because all four of the smaller ones snapped off and it's almost impossible to drill holes at an angle in what's left of the 0.303 breeches for fuse wire guns. 0.5s I can locate on the flat bit in the middle.  That's waiting to be installed once I've painted the turret struts.



Top side in Mid Stone and Dark Earth, with a mix of Defiant I, Hurricane IID and self printed decals.



The somewhat shocking Sky Blue undersides, but some of 6 Sqdn's Hurricanes really were painted in that scheme.

[NARSES2]

Canopy has the look of an armoured one, similar to an IL-2, but then the Soviets wouldn't of wasted a turret on the air-gunner 

[PR19_Kit]

Yes, the Defiant isn't exactly stylish in any of its various parts.

Even compared to the almost 'thuggish' Hurricane it's a bit crude, and a Spitfire's from a different planet!

Getting the Hurricane size codes and roundels to fit was a problem as the Hurricane is about 1.5 times as high, across the fuselage, as a Defiant and I had to print a smaller version of the 'U' codes in order find enough space for them!

[PR19_Kit]

I'm trying to put the landing gear together on this Defiant.......

What an unbelievably complex, and plain ugly, set of landing gear it is! Despite Airfix's 'foolproof' assembly method one leg is now at a different angle to the other and there's no way it can be changed once it's glued in place. 

This is quite definitely the only one of these Defiants I'm ever going to build, give me a big, bruising beefy Hurricane any day!

[PR19_Kit]

...and because the main wheels are handed, keyed and have flats moulded into them, the one which goes on the main leg which is at the wrong angle DOESN'T sit flat on the ground! Grrrrrrrrrr............ 

So I'll have to file a flat on it while it's glued onto a very fragile landing gear leg........