So a little history first. This Midwest P40 was the first 'Large' model I built as a kid some 40 years ago, and I always wanted to have another. Of course it had to be done up with the same colors and graphics too! As luck would have it in June of 2012 I found an original kit for sale by a gentleman named James W Hall Jr. To make a long story short he gave me the kit for free. After my wife expressed interest in flying I thought this would be cool if this was her 1st plane too. So, I will be posting this Midwest P40 Warhawk build here from start to finish as time permits.

Some pics of the real '77' I found.

       Great job!!!

       I have had the Midwest P-63 and the Me 109 and both flew better than I did.  I have a P-51 kit that I have been wanting to build for a the last 30 years.  Perhaps someday. Lol  The P-40 has always been a favourite of mine.

                                                                                                                                           All of the best.

                                                                                                                                           Frank McCune

Thanks Frank!

Kevin,

Your P-40 makes my P-40 look like an ARF from Walmart.

You're effort with that model really paid off.

Charles

This photo shows the stock configuration. Those short engine mounts would have been fine for the fox 35, but after I decided to use a Randy Smith B&B OS LA 46, I would lengthen them.

The motor mounts I had were slightly undersized so I used hard 1/16th inch balsa to fill the gap. Also I cant stand the thought or look of zip ties or rubber bands holding on a gas tank. Its all good till the tank fly's off and hits somebody in the head, and I guess that's why we have insurance . I prefer having my tanks solidly mounted with 2/56 socket head bolts and blind nuts. The real benefit is being able to make small adjustments to your upright and inverted engine run and it will keep it that way, as opposed to having a motor run that changes every time you bump the tank.

The kit was missing its canopy so I had to make one. After drinking ten 2 litre bottles of Pepsi I had one I could use. The process is simple though, just cut the bottom off the bottle, put your balsa plug inside and shrink it with a heat gun.

Some P40 pics...

⬇️Oh would ya look at this! ⬇️Just look at it!⬇️

Line slider.

Wing tip weight box detail.

  Rosalie adding extra coats of dope on edges only, to prevent sanding into the covering when its time to cut, buff and polish the dope.

Rosalie putting on her lipstick...while flying her P40. She is such a good sport for putting up with the likes of me.

Mr King,

I appreciate the inside wing shot of your control system. I hope to replicate this on the smaller 1/2A builds I do. This looks like it will allow for CG trimming while still maintaining the appropriate leadout position changes for a given CG.

My 1960-kitted Scientific profile P-40 wound up a bit nose heavy. I plan on using my current build as a scratch plane...and incorporating adjustable lead-outs, weight boxes, and building lighter overall for the next one. Oh, and definitely plan in putting in a pilot!

Thanks!

Laying out the paint scheme. I used windows Paint to make a reverse image of the plan, then printed off a few copies. Who would have thought all that coloring you did in kindergarten would be useful?

Applying the blue. Bottom of wing, fuse and control surfaces. Shark mouth template used to mask off the the shape of the blue paint line.

The decal sheet that came with the kit was so degraded it made them unusable (see first picture). I didn't feel like  painting them all on, so I decided to  make new ones. Last time I used decals on a stunt plane it was 40 years ago on this very model. Making  your own was quite the learning process. It took a lot of trial and error to master the process until I got them the way I wanted. PFFFT.. .the original P40 decal sheet didn't even include a shark mouth decal on the engine side of the nose! Images of the roundels and the Flying Tiger logo were easy to find online. If you're new to the decal making process like I was, be prepared to spend a lot of money on ink cartridges, decal paper and a lot of wasted copy paper. Decals have some pretty big pitfalls, the biggest (To me anyway) is THE RATE THEY FADE IN THE SUNLIGHT. The benefit of using decals is (in my opinion), that you can quickly make smaller, high detail multiple color graphics that would be very hard to paint, (like the Flying Tiger motif). The 2nd picture is one of two  final decal sheets I made and used on the model. The color of the roundels is off a bit, but everything else was good. Since I wanted the roundels on the top and bottom of the wing, I just put the 2 that matched on the top, and the two that matched (but were a different shade) on the bottom.

Those teeth are typical.

You have the absolute best teeth I've ever seen?

No kidding there.

 

Thanks Avaiojet. You must be referring to my Spitfire's teeth. But for this P40, its more of a "trip down memory lane" build.  I wanted to keep the kit's look as close as I could to the original. Including the teeth.

Combat!

...

 

To get the yellow as bright as possible I spayed that area white first...

...then the yellow over the white.

...then the black. The roundel decals were applied later, after the camo was sealed with clear.