Early War RAF Pt.2

Blackbird Models, 1/72 scale

Reviewed by Graham Carter

This sheet from Blackbird  Models covers markings for four RAF aircraft in the early part of WWII as follows:

• Hampden I, L4192 , ZN-K of 106 Sqn at Finningly in 1940,

• Whitley II , K7229 , OF-A of 97 Sqn at Abingdon, 

• Hurricane I TM-J of 504 Sqn at Digby in 1939 and

• Hurricane I NQ-M of 42 Sqn in 1939. 

The Hurricanes have no serials as they were over-painted for security reasons at that time. An explanation of the missing Hurricane serials would probably have been useful here.

The decals are densely printed on a mid-blue backing paper, with a semi-matte finish and minimal carrier film except around the codes. These will demand some careful trimming. 

I do have to raise a few issues with this sheet, a disappointment for me as all other Blackbird sheets I have used have been great. I also acknowledge that my comments could prove to be incorrect so I stand to be corrected.

Firstly, the items are poorly distributed around the sheet despite a heading given above each set and would benefit from some dotted separation lines to help when sorting them out, especially for a novice modeller.

Secondly, the codes for the second Hurricane are printed as NO-M rather than NQ-M, an error rectified with a correction sheet, which is all well and good except that the replacement letters NQ are printed in a slightly different, pinker grey than on the main sheet! This is exacerbated by the fact that the M has to be used from the original sheet and so will produce a colour conflict. I’m hoping that this is just in error on the sample I was sent. Furthermore, the instructions show that these should be larger than those printed, around 36” rather than the 30” codes which TM-J is provided with. 

Thirdly, the instructions for the Hampden show a thicker style of code while the decals are much narrower.

Fourthly, the medium grey codes for the Whitley might be a larger size (48”?) than shown on the drawings, which also appear to be closer to white in the drawing (36”). Interestingly, a check of the ‘Aircraft in Detail' article Scale Aircraft Modelling magazine for March 1993 by Alan W Hall shows this very aircraft , K7229, on page 248 with smaller, 36”,  white codes. Michael J F Bowyer’s article in Airfix Magazine in October 1970 ( see, there was a reason for hoarding these magazines for decades!!) only mentions that the codes were 48’’ and mid-grey, although some he saw had white codes instead, and some had them in pale blue. 

A general criticism is that we are only presented with one view of each aircraft, starboard elevation for the bombers and port for the fighters. It would have been nicer to have extra drawings of the other side of each fuselage and the plan view as well. I would not expect all purchasers of this sheet to have access to the camouflage schemes for all aircraft. It is also a point to note that at this early stage of the war, there was still confusion among those given the task of painting up their charges as to the ‘correct’ layout of squadron and individual code letters. This is noticed with the Hampden which has them incorrectly arranged - was it the same on the port side? It was an official RAF direction that the squadron letters should be towards the front of the aircraft and the individual aircraft letter towards the rear. 

Look, this may all be petty nit-picking on my behalf and many modellers would be just happy to use the decals as presented and so they are probably a useful set to decorate your early war models.

Thanks to Blackbird Models for the review sample

Review Text Copyright © 2025 by Graham Carter
Images Copyright © 2025 by Brett Green
This Page Created on 7 October, 2025
Last updated 7 October, 2025

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