1/72 MPM Curtiss XP-55 Ascender

Gallery Article by Radim Schimmer on Sept 25 2003

 

The XP-55 was one of the most unorthodox aircraft of WWII. It was designed to fulfill the US Army 1939 specification for new fighter allowing uncommon designs. After rather successful tests with full-size flying model, the Army ordered construction of three prototypes on July 1942. Flight test began on July 1943. Tests resulted to several necessary modifications. Ascender showed satisfactory handling characteristics during normal flight, but at low speeds it became overly sensitive. Engine cooling was insufficient and even after modifications some stability problems remained. The Army therefore decided this fighter wouldn‘t be an effective weapon and whole project was cancelled. One XP-55 is now stored in Smithsonian Institution.

 

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XP-55 had 10,6m length, 14.9m wingspan, powered with Allison V-1710-F16 engine. Top speed was 628km/h. Armament consisted of four 0.5in guns.

The kit 
This is a typical older MPM short run kit with thick sprue gates, medium amount of flash, nice recessed panel lines, photoetch sheet with fine parts, vacformed canopy and nice Propagteam decals. I built it almost OOB, only added seatbelts and ceiling to main wheel wells to avoid view inside fuselage. Fit was quite good, I only used little CA glue to fill seams. The biggest problem was blending the vacformed canopy to the fuselage, but with some filler colored Interior Green it was successful. I also had to replace the fin under the back because the original PE didn‘t fit at all. Model was airbrushed with Agama alcohol based colors and Humbrol emamels (black and silver). Canopy framing was done with decal stripes. The whole model was then brush coated with future and future was also used for setting decals. Panel lines were emphasized with future tinted brown and as final coat was used Humbrol satin varnish.

Pictures were taken with Canon Powershot A60 digital camera.

Happy modelling.

Radim Schimmer, Brno, Czech Republic

      

Photos and text © by Radim Schimmer