1:48 P-47D Bubbletop

Eight barrels in the leading edge of the wing

The Thunderbolt was among the heaviest single-engine fighters of the war and its armament matched that. In the wings it carried eight heavy Browning machine guns of 12.7 millimeters caliber, on the late machines with a supply of around four hundred rounds per barrel. Together that made over three thousand rounds and nearly half a minute of continuous fire, which was a considerable advantage over European fighters with twenty to thirty seconds.

The weapons were not lined up in a straight row in the wing. The individual machine guns were staggered to the rear so that the ammunition boxes and belts would fit into the section, so the muzzles project from the leading edge each at a different distance from the fuselage and from one another. A model that has eight open tubes in the correct stagger will show this characteristic line; eight blind plastic stubs, by contrast, wipe it out.

The package therefore contains the whole set of eight turned parts, plus a decal sheet and two sets of masks for spraying the national insignia, that is the stars with bars on both wings and on the sides of the fuselage.

With the masking of the canopy, notice one difference from the other sets: the film is intended for the outer side only. The teardrop canopy of this version is a single molded piece with no inner framing, so there is nothing to mask from inside.

Large American marking has one more practical advantage when sprayed. A decal of such an area settles with difficulty over riveting and parting lines, and even after a softener is used its edge tends to show, whereas paint applied through film follows the surface without a single step.

The dimensions correspond to the Tamiya kit in 1:48 scale, which has to be obtained separately.