Small Scale Military Headquarters

Just got the BBI P-51 and it is great, could sit and look at it all day. Question, is the BBI Corsair as nice as the P-51 and was the P-51 used very much in the Pacific?

The BBI Corsair is a very nice model. I really like the paint work on it, and the cockpit is well detailed. If you are thinking of getting one, you will really like it. Yes the Mustang was used quite a bit in the Pacific. Towards the end of the war, they would escort B-29s on long range missions.

Sabrefan wrote:The BBI Corsair is a very nice model. I really like the paint work on it, and the cockpit is well detailed. If you are thinking of getting one, you will really like it. Yes the Mustang was used quite a bit in the Pacific. Towards the end of the war, they would escort B-29s on long range missions.

Thanks for the info, very helfful.

The BBI Corsair is probably even more detailed than the P-51 in some respects, which says alot. Both are very nice aircraft

The new 21c P-51 "The Flying Undertaker" is a Pacific Theater P-51 paintscheme, should you be wanting a 1:18 version...

The BBI Corsair (Marine Dream) is my second favorite aircraft, a close distance behind my Admiral Toys F-86 Sabre, in my book, the best 1:18 scale aircraft to date!

I stopped by TRU this afternoon, and they had five of the "Killer" versions of the BBI P-51D Mustang. I didn't have this one so got one. It is a great looking model. I have it parked right next to my new 21st Century "The Flying Undertaker" P-51D.

Sorry guys but I don't see what all the fuss is about the BBi corsair. The engine is pure fantasy. The canopy plastic is cloudy. The joystick is down around the pilot’s ankles. Tires on a 1/18 scale bicycle are fatter then the main gear tires. The plate with the number in front of the strut does not stay on. The tail wheel is supposed to be a solid rubber wheel but they painted it silver. The tail hook…. What the heck is that supposed to be? Looks like something from the gong show. I love the fact that they added flaps but forget about using them. They are fully up or flopping down at 90 degrees. The antenna wire is a scale 3” diameter rope. Yes I understand they are “toys” and a lot of this can be fixed but I don’t believe it is 1/18th’s Best showing.

Sorry STV9000----It sounds like you got ripped off--- my BBI Corsair kicks ass!!! I have a 21ST C P51 that looks like crap --bad paint,cloudy canopy,and what looks to be a flat tire!!!---but my friend got the same P51 and it looks great--not a problem anywhere!! So I think we might have gotten one's that was made on a Friday around 4:30pm...

lablksmith wrote:Just got the BBI P-51 and it is great, could sit and look at it all day. Question, is the BBI Corsair as nice as the P-51 and was the P-51 used very much in the Pacific?

Make sure to relocate the external tanks and glue them in the correct position. Check out my mod in the miscellanious folder on my Webshots account below!

-Ski

BBI should be congratulated for their effort on the P-51 - but the F4U is better as it is more complex. Observations on "KIller":
P-51 is good out of the box BUT needs a few touches to make it "look" like a P-51. Reconfigured 2 prop blades. Removed, replaced and lengthened the tail wheel strut. Shortened length -wise the tail wheel doors. Canted them 30 degrees from vertical - still retracts. REmoved the "antenna" Removed and replaced main gear strut doors. Shortened the gear struts. Canted the main gear forward. Replaced tires. Split the wheel hubs and put the "dish" in the outer wheel half. Redid oleo control arms. Gear retracts BUT not into the wells.
BUT - it still didn't quite look like a P-51.
Reason - no crew chief for an ace would let the bird get that dirty. The only "dirty" P-51s were crashed or on the flights to Russia from England or had to track through the "acid rain" of 500 B-17s on a 6 hour mission but were cleaned up as soon as possible.

HOWEVER - BBI did an fantastic job in picking the paint mixture. Using lacquer thinner, an old tee shirt and patience, the grunge can be removed and what is just outstanding, is that the end result is subtle and provides great tonal effects (used to spend hours masking, mixing and spraying to get these types of effects - so very glad somebody did it for me - that's the reason "silver birds" weren't too popular). Got so stoked - went out and bought another "Killer" and "Cripes a Mighty" (will have to remove the fin strake).

You should feel proud of the bird cause MRC and Hasegawa ain't gonna do it.

Course that's just the opinion of an Old Man.

How did you "cant" the landing gear struts??

_ski

The canopy plastic is cloudy

I noticed that too, on both the Old Crow P-51, and the Vinson Corsair. On the other hand I have not taken either out of the box, and looking through the plastic window on the box, it sort of appears that there might be some type of protective film over the canopy glass, like the kind you see on some digital displays on consumer electronics. I can't really tell for sure, can anybody confirm this?? At any rate, if the canopy glass is indeed hazy like that, then it is disappointing for sure, but I have a little trick from my scale modeling days that may help this situation: Basically, what you do is use a small to medium size model paint brush and apply a coat of acrylic floor wax, like "Future", you can buy it at just about any grocery store and it works great, the key is not to over apply the stuff, because it tends to run and get on areas where you don't want it. A couple of thin coats is usually sufficient, but allow the stuff to dry thoroughly between coats, avoid multiple heavy coats.

I will have to try that.

How did you "cant" the landing gear struts??

Pop the gear strut door off - save it cause it forms the basis to enhance the door.

Use a vise grip to grasp the rivet holding on the wheel. Turn about 10 times then pull out the rivet, remove wheel.

With the gear strut down at the vertical, use a wide bladed razor saw - line up the blade at the same angle as the edge of the wing at the strut attachment - saw them off.
Shorten the gear strut by cutting the gear strut at 2 points. One right at the bottem of the oleo and the second at the top of the oleo. Throw away the oleo.
Use a slow rpm drill, with a drill bit the same size as the coat hanger wire you're going to use (used to use piano wire but that stuff is so difficult to deal with), drill a hole vertically through the lower gear (where the wheel goes), and through the upper strut. Since I had made a template of the angle of the gear, lined up the drill with the template, and drilled into the remainder of the strut as far as the depth of the axle (pivot shaft).
Reshape the wheel attachment part of the strut. Cut the coat hanger wire about an half an inch longer than needed. Slide the wire into the wheel strut hole. Use extra thin Super glue. Seek out the size of plastic tubing that you want for the oleo. Cut to length and slide onto the coat hanger wire, center it and use gap filling glue. Slide the upper strut down the coat hanger wire to the oleo. Use Extra thin super glue. If it is all correct, both gears will be straight, centered and the same lenght. Use thin tape to mask all the wonderful stencils, then spray with whatever color you like.

Start trimming the coat hanger wire to the same length as the hole in the pivot shaft in the wing. If your razor saw cut was good - and the drill hole was right, its the same angle - if you were spastic as an old man who didn't take his meds, then you can bend the wire to the angle of the template. If it looks good, glue the gear in. After about a day to let every dry, exercise the gear - BUT they will not retract into the gear wells - however if a really good engineer could determine the combined angle to allow the cant and the retraction - however, that ain't me.

That help ?

As with all the BBI and 21st, they are a great place to start (except the original 21st P-51 and the 21st Tiger).

Wow, that sounds like some pretty serious brain surgery! Thanks for sharing your secret. Any pics?

-Ski

I will have to try that.

OK STV....but if you do, I would suggest you try it out first on a small inconspicuous area, for example the lower corner of the front windshield, and see how it looks. The reason I'm saying this is because I've never tried this on a "pre-made" model, only on 1/48 scale kit models, and it works wonderfully on those, and it produces a tough, hard, crystal clear finish, and I see no reason why it should not work on a BBI or 21C 1/18th aircraft canopy, but I don't want anybody to accidently ruin a canopy because of a suggestion I made, although I am reasonably certain you will be quite pleased with the results, so good luck, and let us know how it turns out if you decide to give it a try. Cheers,

Scott

hi
i just hang from ceiling or sit on shelf with my 1/18 planes
so what i did for BBi P-51s gear cant was take a jewellers saw and tiny file and made a notch in front of strut, (like when you cut down a tree)bent them forward and glued them with Zap-a-Gap.
for tires i used some 1/18 car tires.
also found that 1/18 old truck tires off 1951/53 ford PU found at KB toys for 16.99 really look good on BBi Corsair wheels with a little modifing.

Think we're going down an interesting road. But do I know.
The use of coat hanger wire is overkill but that's how I do things - plus I shortened the gear so there has to be a strong connection between the parts. The rest of the kit may destruct but never what I added. Tires -
P-51s I use Klett 1 and a half inch diameter tailwheels - throw away the wheel. For F4Us and P-47s use 1 and three quarter inch diameter tailwheel - throw away the wheel. On all the aircraft, cut or pop the kit wheel in half, on the F-4Us sand the wheels to bring out the spokes.
P-51s, heat the outer wheel and press in the center and the wheel acquires a "dish". On the "frosting" of the canopy, this might be the type of thing that used to occur in new cars - the plastic used on the interior "cooked" out and coats the inside glass. Two things - good cleaning with Windex or there are 3 grades on plastic polish. Maybe a rubout is all that's needed - course if you have some old - really old - Creast toothpaste, it works great.

What's neat about the use of Future, you can convince everyone that you're polishing the floor and do both at the same time. Use of Future can give various "tones" to paint.

Believe or not, these are great times for 1/18th.

stv9000's observations on the bbi Corsair are right on the money. bbi does not make good aircraft landing gear...period. However, having a 21st Century Kepford Corsair and bbi's latest "Marine 22" sitting side-by-side, I can see that the detail on the bbi is more elaborate. Details like translucent marker lights, cockpit belly window, antennae, cockpit detail, exhaust pipes, and wing folding mechanism are outstanding. Then again, the useless positional control surfaces and that rear wheel support strut (also see the front landing gear of bbi's F-16 with its 50 gal. drum hub) are below the general standard of the model on the whole.
The canopy plastic is hazy but not totally unacceptable. Just imagine it as oil residue.
Control surfaces can be made tighter by removing the flap and folding a piece of adhesive tape on the tabs and reinserting.
The fact that the rear wheel on the bbi Corsair does not steer is a disappointment.
I did not buy the first 21st Century P-51 or any of the bbi P-51s because of the landing gear. I "shelf-display" so landing gear and wing folding mechanisms are important to me.
I would swap the landing gear on the bbi with the 21st Century Corsair, to make the bbi better, but for right now, it's good to have competing companies. Competition is good. When more sources are available for us, a critical eye for detail will eventually make or break the competition.

did try allot of things on the BBI mustang canopy. I used Crest to 3M automotive plastic polish (my miracle worker). I saw some improvement but the plastic is hazy to the core. Looks great when wet, which is probably why the future polish may work. I don't see the need for having to go through all this. 21st canopy's are great. I use the 3m polish on them they become so clear you only see the reflection of any light source. I also use "the final detail" on them. It is for plastic display cases and coats the plastic, makes it slippery to keep the dust off.

STV, something else that might be worth a try is "Armor All", it sure can't hurt anything and it might be a bit easier than the Future acrylic floor wax, which could possibly be a pain to remove if you were unsatisfied with the results. I have a Vinson Corsair and an Old Crow P-51 still in their boxes, so I would be very interested to hear how you make out with your experiments. Cheers,

Scott

stv9000 wrote:

I don't see the need for having to go through all this. 21st canopy's are great. I use the 3m polish on them they become so clear you only see the reflection of any light source.

I have both the Killer and old crow and my canopies are spot on. Sounds like you just got a bum plane... Take it back. TRU will let you trade it out.

I have both the Killer and old crow and my canopies are spot on. Sounds like you just got a bum plane... Take it back. TRU will let you trade it out.

Consider yourself lucky because I have two examples of each, of both the P-51 and Corsair, all are mint in box and the canopies are all somewhat hazy looking, especially compared to 21C planes. I was in TRU again today and they had several more of Old Crow P-51 and Vinson Corsairs on the shelves and I did a real close inspection of all of them, and they all had the same slightly hazy looking canopy plastic, not horrible mind you, but definitely noticeable. Frankly, I don't think this is an anomaly, I believe it is charachteristic of the production techniques and/or materials BBI is using for their canopies. Just my 2 centavos. Cheers,

Scott

Every one I have seen from BBI is the same. Don't get me wrong, you can see through them fine, they are just not clear. It may be just the plastic they are using, which is Ironic because the cockpits are so detailed.

ostketten wrote:

Consider yourself lucky

I am always lucky

My problem with the P-51 isn’t the canopy but the rake of the landing gear. My right gear looks a bit too proud. It’s the same on both P-51s. My 21c version has more reach to it. Still, I prefer the bbi one simply because I can’t stand the limp props on the 21c version.

You know what, maybe i should have another look at my canopies. I just never noticed an issue with them. I have the Corsair as well. I'll check on it.