Hurricane Mk I, “3”, Royal Rumanian Air Force, 1940

I chose this scheme simply because it was colorful.

The Subject

This was one of 12 Hurricane Mk I’s delivered to Rumania just at the war started in September 1939, out of a total order for 50. Given the timing of the deliveries I decided to put these decals on a fabric winged Mk I instead of a metal winged one. I haven’t found definitive information to say one way or the other, other than strong opinions.

Admittedly I followed the decal manufacturer’s instructions, always a dangerous option. I’ve seen alternative profiles for this aircraft that shows the “3” as either yellow or red on a camouflaged fin and with Mickey Mouse art on the fuselage sides. I certainly would like that added art, but alas no decals exist, that I am aware of.

If one is to believe the story behind “3”, it’s that Horia Agarici, top Rumanian ace flew this aircraft in the opening stages of the war with Russia. He downed 2 bombers with a third probable before attrition removed the Hurricanes from the battles. He of course moved on to the IAR-80.

The Model

Another of my Hurricane Season builds, this is the new tooling of the Airfix Hurricane Mk I, early configuration with the fabric wing. An absolutely easy build with no vices whatsoever. I added 5-spoke Freightdog wheels to replace the kit’s inaccurate 4-spoke wheels; everthing else is kit provided.

Painting is all acrylics; Vallejo 70.921 for Dark Earth, Tamiya XF-81 for Dark Green, XF-69 for Night, XF-2 for White, XF-16 for Aluminum, and XF-3 for the Yellow. I applied a coat of Future (Klear) to provide a good surface for the decals.

Decals are from an old Aeromaster sheet, 72-024 “Foreign Hurricanes”. The decals went on with just water, but I did apply some DACO soft formula decal setting solution to ensure no silvering. I sealed the decals with Testor’s acryl Flat Clear.

Summary

This is a nice subject on my shelf. If the decals for the Mickey Mouse logo show up somewhere I will consider doing this subject again, but with a metal wing so that it’s different.

Thanks for looking…