DONE@p.4 +++ 1:72 Douglas P-70C "NightHawk", USAAF, England, late 1944

[Dizzyfugu]

Early post, but I have settled upon the second submission to this GB in the form of an evolved variant of a rather overlooked WWII aircraft, the quite elegant A-20. In this case it will be a highly upgraded version of its P-70 night fighter derivative for the European theatre of operations, while the P-61 was in the making and delayed (around 1944).
Basis will be the Matchbox Havoc/Boston kit, upgraded with new engines (R-2800s instead of the original R-2600s), a new radar nose, modified armament, and other small mods.

[Wardukw]

Mate that list of mods is damn near exactly what I'm going to do with my A-20 ..ive got the AMT 48th scale one 

[Dizzyfugu]

It's an obvious choice! My aim is a kind of F7F night fighter for the Air Force. The Matchbox A-20's "benefit" for this conversion is that the engines and their nacelles are totally oversized! Using R-2800s (probably from a Matchbox Marauder) will be a relatively simple grfat.on job, even though I will have to bash parts from two B-26 kits. In fact, the A-20's R-2600 cowlings have a bigger(!) diameter than an R-2800's! WTF?

Another serious downer: the Havoc/Boston lacks the complete sprue with clear parts!     I was fortunate to find the cockpit glazing of my first Matchbox A-20 (built 40 years ago!) in the donor bank, but it has to be stripped off of paint and might have some blind glue stains, I hope I can reveive it - finding a replacement will certainly be difficult... Other clear parts have to be improvised, anyway. But the nose will be solid, I just have to find a clear cover for the gunner station and might add small side windows (filled with ClearFix, though). This build will be not as easy as it sounds, due to the missing parts. 

[PR19_Kit]

How about a vacform A-20 canopy?

I'm pretty sure I have the Falcon US Bombers set somewhere in The Loft, and as I've NEVER built an A-20 that canopy is bound to be surplus.

[Dizzyfugu]

It's a valid offer, thanks a lot for the offer, Kit. I was not aware of potential vacu parts, because the hood is heavily framed. But' I'll check first if I can save/use the vintage original piece. It's currently in an oven cleaner foam bath.

[PR19_Kit]

OK, I'll look out the Falcon canopy, just in case.

[Wardukw]

Luckily the opening have is a G variant so it's already got the solid nose but it's definitely getting that engine upgrade..im gonnanuse the engines from the Tigercat but I am gonna compare the props from the Tigercat and the Boston..just see which looks better.
Colour wise I have no idea at this point..OD is possible as it does look quite good or I might go a completely different direction and go Coastal Command white ..

[Dizzyfugu]

Mine will receive 4-blade props from a P-47 (found a matching pair, probably left over from Academy kits), but I think that the tips will have to be clipped to fit. I will give "my" P-70 a scratched radome, based on the glass nose (since the clear parts are lacking, anyway), probably on the basis of a radar nose from a Matchbox Gloster Meteor night fighter, above the lower machine guns, which will be retained.

Paint scheme is also already settled - there are only minimal options, either OD/NG or all-black. Both boring, but I found a picture of an early P-61 that took part in D-Day, and it carried Invasion Stripes on an all-black airframe. Looks interesting, and I will adopt this idea (because it fits the model's time frame well), even though with a design twist rooted in real life, which will hopefully make the aircraft look more juicy.

BTW, I really like your idea of a Coastal Command aircraft with white undersides and flanks and Sea Grey/Slate Grey uppers, a submarine strafer! 

[DogfighterZen]

I've been eyeing up the Special hobby 1/72 A-20G for something similar so i'll be following this for sure!

[Wardukw]

See there ya go again Thomas ..taking my thoughts again   
I was thinking of a 4 bladed props for mine ..the Hasegawa P-47s come with 2 blade options..so it leaves me with 2 complete sets ..just no hubs so I'd have to try and make those..that's gonna be interesting 
I agree..that CC paint scheme would be cool and my first attempt at a Coastal Command aircraft..funny thing and annoying..I brought the Vallejo FAA paint set for the Griffon Tigercat only to discover it didn't include the colours for the Cat 
But I'm sure it's got em for this build .

[perttime]

Would a canopy from anything else work?

[Dizzyfugu]

I've been eyeing up the Special hobby 1/72 A-20G for something similar so i'll be following this for sure!

It's definitively the better kit. I have one or two of them in The Stash, too, but the old Matchbox kit lent itself to a thorough conversion - even more so as it turned out to be incomplete. 

BTW, work has slowly started, with the minimalistic cockpit and the radar nose, which will be cramped with lead (the Matchbox A-20 is a serious tail sitter, I rmember that from my former build 40 years or so ago). The nose looks more streamlined than expected, the Meteor's radome is just a tad wider than the A-20's narrow fuselage, but blending it into the bomb aimer's glazed position will be serious PSR.
Good news from the canopy front: two days in the oven cleaner not only removed most of the old paint, it also crept under the glue and turned most of it loose. There's just a single brlind spot left on one of the side window panels, and I can live with that. I also considered requesting a new clear sprue from Special Hobby, since there's no way to get a Matchbox replacement. Revell never re-issied the kit, just their own P-70, one or two Special Hobby kits and IIRC the FROG kit, too.


1:72 Douglas P-70C 'Nighthawk' (What-if/modified Matchbox kit) WiP by Dizzyfugu, on Flickr


1:72 Douglas P-70C 'Nighthawk' (What-if/modified Matchbox kit) WiP by Dizzyfugu, on Flickr

[PR19_Kit]

Didn't Airfix do one too?

[Dizzyfugu]

Yes, an early Boston with the bombardier nose only.

[NARSES2]

Didn't Airfix do one too?

Yup a kit I was quite fond of. One of my first "conversions" as a kid, I converted it to a solid nose version by painting over the clear one