I’m looking for a Boulton Paul type E tail turret for an upcoming project. The only kits that I know that would have one are the Fonder Miniature Halifax or the Vac Form from Sanger. Anyone know of another option?
Thanks.
Hi AK4444,
I have a British Liberator in the queue so I have been thinking about this for a while. I haven’t got the Fonder or Sanger kits because I’ve seen a lot of reviews that say to avoid them. 109ACE on Scalemates was doing a nice turret a while ago but hasn’t made them in a few years because of some pretty significant medical issues. Kotare is making a 1/48 Halifax and I have signed up for one. I’ve tried asking if I can get an extra turret made for me that I could buy but haven’t received a reply after a couple of requests. I’ve also asked a few other aftermarket producers if they were interested in making a turret, but so far no luck as the effort is high and the payback is minimal. I’m near Trenton where they have a Halifax on display and I have lots of photos. I’m currently looking at scratch-building my own. I believe the width is 21mm and is nearly spherical. I haven’t found a canopy that I can adapt or a clear blister-pack (think toothbrush package) that would work. I found that someone did a refit on a full size turret to replace a broken side blister; that is the hardest part to form and is quite unique and characteristic of the turret. Unfortunately they don’t have the 3D data to share so I could scale it down. I have 20mm clear spheres that I might adapt. I also have the regular Tamiya Lancaster rear turret that might be a part donor as well as the stock 1/48 Revell Liberator rear turret to work with but they wouldn’t be easy. My current thinking is to make a mould for the side blisters and draw some acetate over that. The turret frames I could 3D print at home something close enough for 1/48 scale. I did find the guns made by Quickboost (48756) that look good.