Bell P-63 Kingcobra "Easter Egg" racer - 1/72nd Dora Wings + Draw Decals

(Photos from the SDASM photostream)

 (The completed model is here: https://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2024/01/easter-egg-kingcobra-racer-1949.html

Still having fun converting readily available kits into dashing racers. In this case a Dora Wings P-63 (I have built one before) an interesting kit with nice surface detail and detailed to great extent, with some accuracy issues and far from perfect instructions. Still, excited about doing some research and devising the engineering for the modifications needed to obtain the desired plane. It all begins of course by demilitarizing the kit (including not installing the armor plate for the pilot’s seat or the boxes behind the pilot –radio and such) and checking against photos of the racer to spot the many details, big and small, that need to be tackled. As mentioned, I have built one of these kits and by now already know which part of the instructions are misguiding, which part numbers are wrong, and how to tackle the assembly sequence in a more practical way. Fair kit, though, and it can be made into a nice replica with care. The first trap: weight needs to be added to the nose cavity to avoid a tail-sitter, something completely ignored in the instructions, quite inexplicably. The kit has beautiful surface detail, fair fit in general, and a couple of parts that could have benefited from more subtlety (for example, the tiny front cover for the front landing gear leg and the leg’s scissor,  plus the too thick main gear doors). The interior is complex and well detailed, and there is equipment even under the seat, where it will never be seen, and detail on the back of the seat, that goes against the bulkhead. Both cockpit doors can be posed open if desired.

I used Dora's "Double feature" kit (C/E) and for this model I removed the ventral fin. The other complete kit in the box is being converted in parallel to yet another racer:

https://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2024/01/red-flying-horse-chuk-tucker-bendix-p.html

I got a Draw Decals sheet to cover Easter Egg race #30 (N63231) that requires the span be shortened and new wingtips fabricated, the wing landing light deleted, the nose gun throughs filled up, and to ignore the horizontal tail depicted in the decals instructions, that is replaced by the inset elevator horizontal tail –provided in the kit as alternate parts-, following photos of the original:

The kit includes a small P.E. fret and the dreaded vinyl masks, only useful for the flat surfaces, and complete crap for the curved ones. Why some manufacturers insist on providing vinyl masks for curved surfaces -again ok for flat ones- I don’t understand. They tend to detach all the time, and when they manage to somehow stay put, the solvents in primers and paints and the slight contraction as they dry, start to detach them. A complete mess. PLEASE USE PAPER MASKS for curved surfaces.

Even for their racers, Dora Wings provides the spinner with an inaccurate cannon that has to be removed, as well as the guns in the upper nose (here I inserted styrene rod to be later sanded down to surface): 

Chopping the wings to racer span:

I needed to blank off the wing light (deleted on the racer) so I had to extract the transparency from the clear sprue. Like many inane plastic sleeves provided by some manufacturers, it is (completely unnecessarily) too tight, and makes it difficult to put the remaining parts back in the pouch. Can't figure out why so many manufacturers do this nonsense thing, instead of providing a sleeve with a few millimeters to spare on each side:

The wings are molded with a defect, a sort of small lip at the leading edge (exaggerated in the sketch below) that creates a thin gap. One solution is to scrape from inside, the other (that I chose in this case) is to fill the gap once the wing halves are glued together:

The wing leading edge gap is filled with Mr Surfacer, the tip is restored carving a styrene stick (then as you reach the sanding stage to blend it with the wing, tape is used to protect the surface detail:

Almost ready:

First airbrushing session:

The interior provided is nice, there are a few P.E. parts to add detail:

The insert that allows several versions is not really a good fit:

I reinforced the joints just in case:

The awful vinyl masks. In spite the doors can be posed open (and therefore have to be painted on both sides) only masks for one side are provided. Sigh...

I used the vinyl masks as a pattern to create in paper the other two window masks needed, and to replace those that go on curved surfaces, as the vinyl is useless for that. Some manufacturers refuse to learn that vinyl masks on curved surfaces create problems:

Now ready to close the fuselage. The throttle's location is completely wrong on the instructions. In reality it goes on the fore frame of the door, half hanging out. There is a minute notch molded that indicates the real position. I wouldn't glue it until the last moment, as it's too exposed and easily knocked off:

The fuselage halves are glued together. If you were careful so far, the fit will be good:

The wing goes in now, fair fit, only needs a wee-wiggle and some touch-ups:

DO NOT add the upper nose small part until you have squeezed the right ballast (I will use 1mm dia. steel ball bearings). 

The Draw Decals sheet:

This model didn't need the carb intake extension, as the alternate parts provided in the kit and featured in the photos above are already a fit.

The horizontal tail is glued. Now work on the seams can start. The flaps are kept separated as they will be posed deflected to match pictures, and their leading edge has to be painted metal :

Delete this bump:

Both Kingcobra in the works. "Easter Egg" had its nose weight already added::

The kit has some little bump molded in front of the nose bay that also needs to go (the kit's drawing depicts the spinner cannon that needs deletion too):

After a coat of primer and correcting some blemishes, gloss white is airbrushed as a base for the final color:

And the final color:

Masks are applied to paint the anti-glare area on the nose:

Black applied (it's still wet, but matt black was applied). Notice the difference in tone between the photos above and bellow, under different lighting:

Masks off:

Now for the touch-ups, addition of remaining parts, and decaling:

The prop axle doesn't fit in any position, be the one given in the instructions or any alternatives. The front part of the nose LG well has a divot in it seemingly designed to hold a prop axle, but it doesn't work that way either. Not sure what Dora intended here, as the plan shows in other sub-assemblies different parts occasionally too, may be for 1/48th version? Whatever the case the parts don't fit together so a home-made axle will be inserted as in previous builds of the same kit:

Decaling in progress:

 (The completed model is here: https://wingsofintent.blogspot.com/2024/01/easter-egg-kingcobra-racer-1949.html