From DaveD - 9th Airforce P47S & blast markers (34 points)

Another bit of progress for my 15mm Normandy 44 project. This time the introduction of air power for my US forces. - well JamesM needs something for his  Flak Korps  to shoot at other than Shermans

JamesMs lads need to get used to this view of the Jabo's - dakka,dakka , dakka...

These are P47 Thunderbolts made by Battlefront - two of which were fine. One of them had lot of problems with bent wings. Even with the persuasive powers of hot water and the  hair dryer the resin won't fully comply. I have made contact re getting a replacement - but for now its doing flying duties - it can be turned into a terrain piece when its been replaced.

I need to get hold of some of the taller flights stands as these are hedge hopping at the moment!

I had a mare with the supplied decals as they they were incredibly brittle and just fell apart - even with at the application of decal solutions etc - in the end I popped down to Pendraken Miniatures HQ (8 miles away) and picked up some from the I94 range they sell - they worked just fine!

hand painted invasion stripes - a fun job! I also want to add some propellor spinners - however I will wait until I have some more aircraft sorted (there are some on the way ) and order them up in a job lot. 

despite the hassles - I think these have come out pretty good - need more!

I have added a thinned satin varnish to the main panels which gives a very slight shine to the bare metal look . 

I couldn't pass up the chance to make up some blast markers from battery operated flashing tea lights - I got a box of 24 from china for a relative pittance. The casings of the lights were painted black , then I hot glued on some cushion filler and teased it into shape - a couple of sprays of grey and black and they are good to go. They are large markers for 15mm but for bombs I think they will be fine, They will also of course do duty in other games and genres. I have been looking at cutting the light casing down to make smaller markers and this is perfectly do-able so perhaps later in the challenge I  will get them done. In terms of size they take up about 1/2 a 6 inch cube box.

we do like a good KABOOM!

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Guest minion Byron here again, wow these are great looking planes Dave!  I am not much of a plane buff, but when I first looked at these they remind me of the US T-28 Trojan, maybe simply because of the low wing layout.  I wonder if the T-28 was derived from this earlier design.

The paint job is tremendous especially the hand painted stripes!  Steady hands there and a stunning result.  

I also really like the blast markers, very simple and easy to do but oh so effective.

Great work and I really hope to see more in the future.