The B-25D was
manufactured at the Kansas City North American plant with deliveries beginning
in January of 1942. “C” and “D” variants were the same, the dash
model numbers and letter only designating the place of manufacture.
Autopilot, R-2600-13
Holly Carb engines, de-icer system, 24 volt electrical system, larger wing tanks
and removable bomb bay tank became standard features. The bomb bay was enlarged;
fittings to carry underwing bombs, and short belly torpedo were included. A .50
caliber nose gun replaced the previous .30 caliber, also added was an astrodome
for the navigator to take star/sun fixes.
2690 “C” models
and 2290 “D” models were built. 67 “C” and “D” models went to
the British as “Mitchell II’s”, 162 to the Netherlands, 4 to Canada and 29
to Brazil. 10 “D” models were converted to the F-10 photo recon’s.
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After locating the
Albatross “Dragons and tigers and girls…oh my!” 6 years ago, I have now
built three and determining which “G” version to build next.
This is aircraft #2
on the sheet and is a B-25D-1 (s/n 41-30026) of the 345th BG / 498th BS P.T.O.,
located at Port Moresby in October 1943. Note the all white tails designating
this squadron. This aircraft does not carry the lower turret and is capped over.
It also carries field modified four .50 cal’s in the bombardier nose
compartment and twin 50’s on each fuselage side.
Painting: Used the
Testors Flat White Spray, Testors Olive Drab Spray, Testors Green Spray, Tamiya
PS-19 Camel Yellow spray and Tamiya AS-7 USAAF Neutral Gray. Painted the
aircraft nose yellow and green and cut out the nose art from original full nose
decals, was easier to spray paint then fiddle with the large decals.
Information for this
article came from decal sheet, Squadron Signal Publications #34 and Accurate
Miniatures instruction sheet.
Mark L. Rossmann
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