1:32 B-24D Canopy, Windows And Wheels Liberator Paint Mask Set

The glazing and wheels of the Liberator in 1:32 scale

The Consolidated B-24D was the first Liberator built in large batches and became a mainstay type of the American bomber force. The slender Davis wing gave it the range the Flying Fortress lacked, four Twin Wasp radial engines carried it to altitude and the twin vertical tail made it an unmistakable machine. The best known action of these machines was the low-level attack on the refineries at Ploiesti in Romania on 1 August 1943.

A model in 1:32 means an enormous amount of glazing: the glazed nose, the pilots' cockpit, the turrets and the side gun windows. Cutting tape by hand would take hours and on the rounded surfaces of the nose it would end up imprecise. Pre-cut stencils respect the shape of every frame including the places where it narrows or breaks.

Circular stencils for the wheels, which separate the tire from the hub, are included. The main landing gear of the Liberator retracted into nacelles outboard of the inner engines and the wheels are clearly visible on a finished model, so a crisp boundary between the rubber and the hub really does pay off.

The raid on the Romanian refineries cost the crews heavy losses and to this day it is among the most frequently built subjects linked with this type. The machines then flew at low altitude over burning installations and the smoke printed itself into their finish as well, which gives a finished model room for honest work with weathering.

The film is stuck onto clean and degreased glazing, never onto a part rubbed with polish. Spray the interior shade first, then the primer and finally the top coat; each layer has to be thin, otherwise it will peel off along with the edge during removal. Remove the stencils before the varnish has cured fully, and level any bleeding with a toothpick cut to a wedge.