1/72 Armahobby Hawker Hurricane MkI

[Elve1984]

After reading some good stuf about Armahobby's Hawker Hurricane kits i took the plunge and am going to build one myself. I am going to build the Armahobby Expert kit of the Hawker Hurricane mkI. Most people on here know the Hawker Hurricane so i am not going to write a whole story about the history of this plane, if you wanna know more info then visit the Wikipedia page.

Straight from the box you have the option to build 4 different Hurricane mkI's. 3 versions that saw action with RAF during the Battle of Britain and flown by Polish pilots and 1 option for a Hurricane mkI trop as it flew with the SAAF in Kenia in 1941.

I have chosen to build Hurricane R4175/RF-R of 303 Polish RAF squadron, flown by pilot sgt. Josef Frantisek. During the Battle of Britain he scored 7 of his 17 victory's. Unfortunatly he passed away on the 8 of October 1940 when he crashed during a patrol.

The box it's self is pretty simpel with a nice boxart of a scrambling Hurricane. I didnt take any pictures of the box content but besides the well detailed plastic it also contains some PE, masks and decals.


This build doesnt start with the cockpit but with the wheelbay, there is some PE included to detail the wheelbay.




The landinggear parts where cleaned and glued togheter.


Everything prepaired for a layer of paint.




I added some lead wire in the wheelbay to function as a hydraulic line, wich was verry prominent on reference photo's.


Everything was primed with a layer of black Mr.Surfacer 1500.


When that was dry everything recieved a coat of Alclad II Aluminium.


This is where i am at at the moment, i will be back with an update soon.

[Garion77]

I'll follow for sure as I have bought the same kit (and a second one from them). I would love to add their new 1/48 hurricane to my stash. One of my favorite planes !

[Elve1984]

I got some more work done on the Hurricane, have to say it is a lovely kit to build.

The wheelbays where glued into the fuselage and the last details where painted by hand with a brush.


Followed by a brown wash to make all the small details a bit more pronounced.


Next up was the construction of the cockpit. Work started on the seat, all the parts where cut from the sprues and cleaned up.


After that everything was glued togheter, the kits parts themself are already nicely detailed


But the kit supplied PE adds even more detail.


After finishing the seat i went on with the rest of the cockpit. The fuselage parts have some nice detail aswell.


But Armahobby wants you to remove it all, so i have been a good boy and followed there instructions.


After that i installed the PE fuselage parts.


The same had to be done for the other cockpit parts.




All the PE does bring something extra to the kit.


With all the construction complete i gave everything a primer coat of Mr. Surfacer 1500.






Next up will be painting the cockpit.

[digger303]

Watching this carefully. I bought the ARMA Hurricane too as a tropical version and the Revell 1/32
A under appreciated aircraft amongst the under interested population. The Spitfire grabbed all the glory.

[Stokesy44]

Watching this carefully. I bought the ARMA Hurricane too as a tropical version and the Revell 1/32
A under appreciated aircraft amongst the under interested population. The Spitfire grabbed all the glory.

I've heard the 3 fighter aircraft that fought each other in 1940 described as follows, you decide which is which.

The Country Girl, the Lady and the Vamp.

[Stokesy44]

Beautiful work so far.

I've heard good things about Arma Hobby. The detail at 1/72 makes it look like 1/48. That instrument panel and seat harness are first class work Sir

[digger303]

Watching this carefully. I bought the ARMA Hurricane too as a tropical version and the Revell 1/32
A under appreciated aircraft amongst the under interested population. The Spitfire grabbed all the glory.

I've heard the 3 fighter aircraft that fought each other in 1940 described as follows, you decide which is which.

The Country Girl, the Lady and the Vamp.

I should imagine country girl would be the Hurricane, bit less sure about the others. Maybe Lady would be the spit and Vamp Me 109 ??

[Twokidsnosleep]

Yes have heard of this manufacturer too
Watching with interest

[Stokesy44]

I should imagine country girl would be the Hurricane, bit less sure about the others. Maybe Lady would be the spit and Vamp Me 109 ??

Correct Sir

Country Girl - a local beauty and not afraid of hard work. Forgiving by nature.

Lady - a cultured woman, insanely pretty, strong and fragile at the same time. Bewitching.

Vamp - Beautiful but full of vices and traps, a challenge for any would be suitor.

[Elve1984]

Thanks everybody for the positive feedback. Intresting story about the nicknames. Like i said before the kit is a real joy to build and definetly recommend it

[WordenB]

Lovely detailed little kit, the only problem I found was that the cockpit framing interfered slightly with the wing fit but that was more than likely my doing.

[Elve1984]

I made some progress on the Hurricane, Mainly working on the interior.

I started with giving the interior parts a Black primer coat of Mr Surfacer 1500.


Followed by a coat of Tamiya XF-71 Cockpit green.


When the cockpit green was dry i painted all the interior details with a brush.


After letting the paint dry i sealed everything with a gloss coat followed by a brown wash.


This was all sealed with a flat coat.






This is what it looks like with all the parts added to the fuselage.




There where some small PE handels wich needed to be added to the canopy, so i installed these before dipping the canopy in some AK Interactive Glass Coat Gauzy.


This is where she stands now, i hope i wont have any fit issues like @WordenB but ill keep you guys posted about that in the next update.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Great looking paintwork and cockpit detail

[digger303]

Going well the paint work is doing justice to the detail. Going to be a beauty.

[Elve1984]

Thanks a lot all!

[Garion77]

Nice progress and lovely paint work ! Love the seatbelt !

[Elve1984]

It's been a while but i made some more progress on the Hurricane.

I got the fuselage closed up


The wing was assembled aswell.




With the attachment of the wing to the fuselage i experianced some fit issues. I dont think this is because of a bad fitting of the kit but more due some errors from my side during the construction of the cockpit.


The tail wing and elevators where glued togheter, i glued the elevators in a slightly dropped position as most reference pictures i found show it like this.


Attached to the fuselage.


The horizontal stablizer is glued in place aswell.


I got the exhausts cleaned up and drilled out in preperation for painting.


The same was done to the air intake.


It's been a while but i hope you guys are still intrested, let me know what you think of my progress so far and if you have any tips or tricks please share them.

[digger303]

I'm not good enough to give any tips, but your going very well.
I might drill the exhausts out a little more is all.
I look forward to seeing more updates.

[Elve1984]

Thanks Digger, I tought about drilling out the exhausts a bit more but i am afraid they rupture and i damage them.

[digger303]

Thanks Digger, I tought about drilling out the exhausts a bit more but i am afraid they rupture and i damage them.

[Stokesy44]

Great to see you back at it. And its always nice to see that Hurricane shape emerge as the fuselage and tail come together.

[Elve1984]

Thanks a lot everyone!

[Elve1984]

It's been a while sinds the last update but i managed to make some progress on this kit.

After glueing all the parts togheter, i cut the plastic away where the navigation lights are. This will be replaced with some clear plastic parts.


The canopy parts are masked off with the use of the masking set that was supplied in the kit.


I prepared all the small parts for painting.


And the kit itself aswell.




First i applied a primer coat of Mr Surfacer 1500.




When the primer was dry it was time to start the real painting process, I started with spraying Mr Hobby H74 Sky on the underside.




After some drying time i masked the underside off.


In preparation for the painting of the camouflage i drew the patern on kit with a pencil.


In the next update i will show the rest of the painting process. I hope you guys like my work so far.

[Stokesy44]

Superb work so far. Looking forward to seeing that upper camo going on

[digger303]

[Elve1984]

Thanks alot everyone!

[Elve1984]

It's been a while sinds the last update, but i got a lot done. I got all the paint work finished, here are some pics of the entire process.

I started with the first camoflage color, in this case the brown color, for this i used Mr Hobby H72 Dart Earth.






With the first layer of Dark Earth down. I tried to add some highlights, i did this by adding some Mr Hobby H27 Tan to the base color. Altough the highlights are there its a bit difficult to see on the pictures.






After letting the brown dry, masked off the camoflage patern.




After wich i airbrushed the green camoflage color, for this i used Mr Hobby H330 Dark Green.






Here i added some highlights aswell, this time i added a couple of drops of Mr Hobby H4 yellow to the basecolor.






With all the painting done it was time to remove all the masking, this i what came out from underneath. In my opinion the brown is a bit light, i will try to give that a bit of a dark look with some fliters later on in the build.




I wanted to alter the colors of the fabric covered parts a bit and give the fabric a bit of a different color then the ribs. So i masked all the ribs with thin strips of masking tape and misted a thin coat of Tamiy X-19 Smoke over the control surfaces. To get some tonal variation.






I got some color on the wheels and prop parts aswell.




After letting all the paint dry properly i sprayed a layer of gloss varnish in preparation for decalling.




Let me know what you guys think of my work so far.

[Garion77]

Amazing job for the paint !

[barryf1fan]

That interior is fire!

And yes, the camo job is superb!!

[Elve1984]

Thanks a lot everyone!

[Stokesy44]

Really nice paintwork. The effects look very good

[tommy]

Amazing work there, good job!

[Elve1984]

Amazing work there, good job!

Thanks Tommy!

[Elve1984]

Some more work done on the Hurricane, she's finally nearing the end. I started with applying the decals. These where pretty thick and i had to use a lot of Microscale Set and Sol to make them conform into the panellines properly.






With the decals on i added a second layer of gloss varnish. Followed by a panelline wash, at the bottom side i applied a Abteilung 502 Paynes Grey panelline wash. made by thinning the oilpaint with some oderless thinner.




At the topside i applied a Abteilung 502 Shadow Brown panelline wash.




I tried to replicate the fabric part of the rear fuselage by adding some highlights to the ribs of the fuselage. I did this by drawing thin lines of Ammo Mig Light Dust nature effects, after these had dried a thinned them down tamponing them with a hard short bristles brush.


Shamefully the result isnt verry clear on the pictures, but atleast i know its there.


At the bottom side i tried adding some variation to some panels with the same technique.


Next up i started working on the exhaust stains. In the passed i always airbrushed these using Tamiya X-19 Smoke, this time i tried something different. I read that you could al so replicate the exhaust stains using pigment powders. So i applied a layer of flat varnish and went to work.


I started with a thin layer of Ammo Mig P022 Ashes White for the center of the exhaust stain.


Followed with Ammo Mig P023 Black Smoke on the outerside of the exhaust stain. With both colors applied i tried blending them togheter a bit.




I am curius what you guys think of the way i did the exhaust stains.

[bfrd]

Awesome work!. If I hadn't sworn off buying new kits, this one would be near the top of my wishlist. I do love a Hurricane. You are doing a fantastic job!

[digger303]

Awesome work!. If I hadn't sworn off buying new kits, this one would be near the top of my wishlist. I do love a Hurricane. You are doing a fantastic job!

There's a new Revell sea hurricane coming in about a month....looks very sweet

Some more work done on the Hurricane, she's finally nearing the end. I started with applying the decals. These where pretty thick and i had to use a lot of Microscale Set and Sol to make them conform into the panellines properly.


I am curius what you guys think of the way i did the exhaust stains.

I like the pigment technique it works well and I think possibly more controllable and easier than using a AB, but maybe that's just me.
Great job.

[Elve1984]

I got to the end of this build, a little update with the last things i did on the Hurricane.

I added some chipping effects with an AK Interactive weathering pencil.




The exhausts got a threatment with some rust colored pigments.


With those 2 steps done it was time to glue all the last bits in place.




I added an antenna wire with some EZ-line elastic wire.


And the canopy was glued in place.


This is what the end result looks like.


I am curius what you guys think of here and i will post some more finished pics in the future when i get my photo studio out.

[digger303]

Looks great, you've done really well....above my pay grade

[Elve1984]

Thanks a lot @digger303

[Stokesy44]

Really nice work, love the subtleties in the paintwork and a really skilfull overall build

Also, so nice to see someone make a good job of the RAF green brown paint scheme. Arguably the most boring mass produced scheme from the war.

[Elve1984]

Thank you @Stokesy44, i was having my doubts about the brown in the paint scheme if it maybe was a bit to light.

[Garion77]

Miss a few updates it seems ! lovely work. The exhaust is really good !

Being at the end, do you still like the fit and details of the kit ?

Nice job !

[Elve1984]

Thank you @Garion77 The kit is verry nice with verry good detail. the only fit issues i had where with the cockpit and closing the fuselage but this could also be my error instead of the kits.

[Kevthemodeller]

Very nice

[Elve1984]

Thanks @Kevthemodeller

[RangerNeil]

Lovely job!! The brown is, I think, spot on for a machine thats seen a lot of use as the sun faded the brown more than the green.

[Elve1984]

After finishing this kit a couple of weeks ago it was time to make some final pictures. So here they are.

























I enjoyed this build a lot, i have to say the Arma Hobby Hurricane is a lovely kit to build. The detail and fit is verry good. The only struggles i ran into was the closing of the fuselage. But i think this was due to an error on myside with the construction of the cockpit. I am curius what you guys think of the final result. Please let me know!

[cor]

Great work.

[Stokesy44]

Nice pics of a classy build

[digger303]

Nice pics of a classy build

Yep spot on