Salty Beau – a sea going u-boat killer

A Coastal Command Beaufighter – 1/48th Tamiya Beaufighter

Fresh from an excursion to the laundry to gently tap the water cylinder in the vain hope that some physical abuse may elicit hot water for a shower, I happened to look out across the harbour and caught sight of what looked for all the world like a periscope. . .

Now, the modern Royal New Zealand Navy has nine (err make that eight now that the big logistical support one went to the bottom on a reef) ships and no submarines, and it’s been a few years since the boom between Days Bay and Ward Island was removed to stop those dastardly axis types from skulking around the harbour.

The threat was real: the Japanese Government minted currency intended for use in New Zealand once it was captured. German ships laid mines and sank three ships in New Zealand waters during the war, killing 46 people. Japanese and German submarines cruised around the country in 1942, 1943 and 1945, and the Germans tried to torpedo a steamship near Napier but missed.

The fake periscope episode got me thinking. I remembered I had a rocket-toting anti-sub Beaufighter lurking in the box of doom which I’d squirrelled away a couple of years ago after I had my last ‘falling out’ with the hobby.

Maybe time to dig it out, see what’s what and even take some new photos? The story so far . . .

Any colour you like (as long as it’s white)

Ahhh . . . There is a lot to be said for a good reference image – and this isn’t it. As far as I know, it’s pretty much all there is of a white Coastal Command TF Mk X.

Factoid: the observer chaps were not happy about the TF torpedo fit as it effectively stopped them from making a hasty exit out of their belly hatch and jettisoning the blister involved negotiating the tail on the way out.

Anyway – The original caption says its grey/white but to my eye there is a definite dual tonal value to the wings and nacelles suggesting ocean grey and dark green. The port nacelle is definitely darker but that’s a personal conjecture and may be shadow.

Coastal Command 101: A valuable source of info on this subject is Russ Marven’s Modelling Page which has some great information on colours, demarkations and various applications.

Gallery

The images are smartphone shots taken with an iPhone 12 Mini – single point modelling desk ring lamp and a simple A2 (420 x 594 mm) dark green artists 180gsm card background ‘scoop’. See my other posts for a walk through of how to use the workbench as an ad-hoc photo studio.

The white is a touch warm in these images and will form the basis of a future blog post about fine tuning white balance – A “gets your whites whiter than white or your money back” sort of thing.

The real white paint would possibly have been applied over existing factory camouflage (sources say the white scheme was short lived and reverted back to the grey/sky ) and the chalky look was achieved with a can of Citadel Corax White primer decanted into an airbrush and thinned with isopropyl alcohol.

The chalky effect from the isopropyl looks quite convincing even though the Air Min directive (via Ross Marven’s site) say this should be gloss white, the reference image doesn’t seem to be glossy (there are no apparent reflections or ‘shine’ in the poor ref image) so I’m sticking with my distemper effect.

The white on the model was applied over a mid grey/dark grey underpainting primer – a bit like a reverse black base mottle with closer tonal value. Its given the white a slight random grubby effect.

The normally unpainted copper collector rings are overpainted white as per Air Min. directives as are the prop hubs and leading edges. I think they were after that ocean going seagull look. . .

The salt spray streaking is artists oils (titanium, paynes grey) and prisma colour silver pencil and graphite 3B chipping. Panel line wash is not uniform, I don’t go in for that ‘sloshing ground up pastels into every nook and cranny’ and then rubbing away approach. Too uniform to my eye, so some lines get a bit of a wash and others are left alone. Details: 99.9% out of the Tamiya box with additional exhaust intakes made from old Slater’s tube. The rocket rails need to be added and I also need to fabricate a ‘yagi’ nose arial and a couple of side whiskers plus paint the tailwheel again which seems to have copped a bit of Corax white. Sheesh.