More Rising Decals

Recent transfer sheets from Rising Decals provide yet more options for Japanese aircraft modellers wishing to choose more unusual subjects.

RD72029 'Donated Birds' features four IJN subjects with "Houkoku" ("Patriotism") dedications for aircraft  purchased by public or corporate subscription.  'Houkoku-532' is an A6M2 Zero from Kaga with twin red fuselage stripes. The decal sheet provides basic stencilling and a very neatly printed data plate. 'Houkoku-1006' is a Mitsubishi G4M1 "Betty" during the Solomon Islands campaign. Hasegawa's early "Betty" from the 1960's is a bit dated now with chunky construction and heavy rivets but with some TLC a very nice model can still be achieved. 'Houkoku-525' is an Aichi D3A1 "Val" during the Pearl Harbour attack and is a command aircraft from the 1st wave dive-bombing attack. Finally, 'Houkoku-265' is a Nakajima B5N1 "Kate" of the Takuma Ku in 1944. This is one of the unusual aircraft with a white rectangular "flag" behind the fuselage Hinomaru and a white fin leading edge flash. The notes comment that it probably carried a practice torpedo.  This is an attractive and colourful set, especially for modellers who want classic IJN types but with something a little different to the standard presentation. The recommended colours are from the "Gunze" (GSI Creos) Mr Color range. Please refer to the Rising website for corrections to the captions on the decal sheet kindly provided by Mr. Daisuke Yasutake.

RD72031 'J-Birds' is a splendid set of colourful decals for Japanese aircraft in civil service. 'J-ABTQ' is a Ki-9 biplane trainer used by Japan's Ministry of Communications and the yellow trainer finish is sparked up by prominent black and white fuselage bands. A very good choice with the recent release of the kit. 'J-AJTR' a civil-operated Ki-27 "Nate" is my favourite in this set, as I have wanted to model it ever since seeing Hisao Saitoh's model with the insignia made using his own stencils. Now Rising have made this project a much easier proposition! The combination of civil registrations, school insignia, Hinomaru and black/white bands make this another colourful and unusual choice. 'J-BAWI' is a Hansa type floatplane perated by Sakai City Schoolchildren's Flying Association in 1932. This stunning aircraft has huge "cherry blossom" insignia and will make an impressive model. Rising thoughtfully provide two versions of the Japanese characters on the fuselage as the order of their presentation on the aircraft's starboard side is unknown. Finally, 'J-BAOI' is a cobalt blue painted Beechcraft C-17E used by Nihon Koku Yuso Kabushiki Kaisha with black and white registrations and red trim, all of which is included. This is a very colourful and imaginative decal sheet and hopefully will be followed by more Japanese civilian subjects.

Highly recommended.

Image credits: All ©2010 Rising Decals

John Wong's Airfix D3A1 'Val'

Back in December 2008 (was it really that long ago?) I waxed lyrical about the veteran Airfix 'Val' of 1964 and included a link to a much improved example built by John Wong of Toronto, Canada. Now John has very kindly sent some more photographs of this superb build (click on the images for the full-size versions). It's hard to believe that the Airfix 'Val' lurks under that stunning model but the result is a tribute both to the honesty of Airfix's basic kit and John's superlative modelling skills.

John also sent images of a Zero carrier shadowbox, created using the Jo-Han Zero kit of 1973. This was, I believe, based on the LS kit and included optional parts to build the floatplane 'Rufe'. John comments that the wingspan of the kit is too short for the A6M2 but that this proved to be an advantage in the limited space available. The shadowbox was built into a photo storage box that he had found in a camera store in Toronto.  

Thanks to John for sharing his photos of these excellent models.

Image credits: All ©2010 John Wong

Tsukuba Zero

Francesco Borraccino's superbly built, painted and photographed model is Hasegawa's 1/48th scale A6M2b. (Click on the pics for larger views).

Francesco corrected the machine-gun cowling panel (which is the wrong shape), modified the combination engine-cowling-propeller assembly, because the latter was designed in a way which renders it too prominent from the engine cowling. He also modified the landing gear, cutting the wheel covers and adding brake lines, and added the undercarriage down indicator bars on top of the wings

Eduard Photo-Etch was used for the cockpit. But the most impressive detail is that there are no decals anywhere on the model. All the markings, maintenance stencils, etc., were painted free hand - and Francesco reports that the name plate was a nightmare...

The entire aircraft was sprayed overall with Tamiya Bare Metal from a can, then the undersides were painted with a match to C2 tou-ou-shoku, mixing Tamiya XF-4 Yellow Green and X-6 Orange. The cowling and anti glare panel were painted with a mix of XF-1 Black and X-4 Blue. The so called upper surface "Nakajima green D1" is Tamiya XF-11, lightened a bit. Propeller color is XF-64 + XF-1 with a ratio of 2:1 and identification bands was painted with Gunze H-24. Note also the superb rendering of 'aotake' on the wheel wells and undercarriage doors.

Finally Francesco scratched the completed paint with sandpaper, steelwool, a toothpick and surgery knife, and after that weathered the model with oil paints, linseed oil and pastels. He also added a red primer-like shade with pastels, because at that time Zeros were still primed.

Simply wonderful. Thank you, Francesco for kindly sharing the images here.

All images: ©2010 Francesco Borraccino

Gilding the Lily Part Two ~ JAAF Air-to-Air Semaphore Signalling

An interesting detail on the airframe of the early Ki-48 (and also Ki-21) were the rubber-sleeved slots in the fuselage top for the "semaphore" signalling indicators. In the representational sketch above they are shown in the raised position. Maru Mechanic records the colours of the indicators as yellow, red and white, although an intelligence document describing these fittings on the Ki-21 records them as red, blue and yellow. The indicators were hinged like "trafficators" on an old style car and could be raised using a throttle-like control quadrant situated on the starboard side of the cockpit opposite the pilot's seat. Please note that the plan drawing in the Maru Mechanic on the Ki-48 shows the slots to the starboard side of the centreline, which is wrong. Photographs clearly reveal that they were situated to the port side of the centreline as shown in the sketch. The photograph below shows the indicators on a Ki-21.

According to the 1944 SEAC intelligence document reproduced below the indicators were illuminated at night and it appears that different units used them for different types of signals. The co-ordination from bombardier to pilot and between aircraft must have been carefully practiced but there is very little reference to them and they are seldom seen in photographs.

A study of photographs also reveals several different configurations and colours for the wooden radio aerial mast on the Ki-48 with an early variety depicted here finished in the red-brown primer, and with a pair of stabilising wires running forward to anchor the mast. Two wires run down from the main aerial to fittings on the starboard fuselage side from where they connect to radio equipment inside the fuselage. A later style had wires running down to attachments on the inner face of the engine fairings. Careful study of photographs will reveal the various configurations and it is apparent that some aircraft had the mast painted in the main airframe colour.

It is possible that including these details on the AZ Models 1/48th Ki-48 model may draw attention away from the supposedly incorrect nose shape - but I cannot guarantee it.

Aichi E13 "Jake" Interior Colour

The original IJN finishing specifications for the floatplane Aichi E13 "Jake" called for the interior to be painted with an undercoat of brown enamel and a top coat of light grey green enamel. The latter is presumed to be one of the "hairyokushoku" (ash green) colours in the 'M' series of that name in the IJN provisional paint colour standard known as Kariki 117. The closest Munsell value for this paint colour is 7.5 GY 5/2 with the closest FS 595b value being 24226 @ 2.35 (but which is a little too grey and not quite yellow/green enough). This interior colour also compares exactly to the Thorpe identified colour N4 'light grey green'.

Now some further confirmation of this interior colour has been provided by the appearance of the paint surface extant on Aichi "Jake" wreckage studied by Australian researcher Owen Veal (of the Australian Aviation Heritage Centre in Darwin) and shown here via the kind courtesy of Bob Alford (author of 'Darwin's Air War'). The graded scale presented with the images below shows proportional mixes of the Humbrol paint colours 86 'light olive' and 78 'cockpit green' (the latter paint is usually cited for the WWII RAF interior grey-green colour).

With thanks to Bob Alford for the account of the examination and images.

After I posted this blog Mark Smith kindly reminded me about Ichiro Hasegawa's notes on Aichi interior colours included in the Koku Fan magazine. In May, 1984 Hasegawa-san had reported that "One day a 3-seater Type Zero seaplane was salvaged from the bottom of the ocean off the coast of Kisarazu.  Through a friend of mine I have obtained a piece of metal skin from the salvaged seaplane to which anti-corrosive treatment was given to sustain the color scheme. ... Interior was covered in transparent blue with exception to the cockpit that were painted in yellowish-green."  

In May 1982 Hasegawa-san had referred to the interior of Aichi D3A1 AII-231 which he had illustrated in profile as follows:- "Inside of fuselage had been painted by anti-corrosion paint in bluish color... Inside the cockpit was covered in yellowish green."


There is a faint yellowish tone apparent in the 'M' series colours shown above but we cannot be sure that what Hasegawa-san saw was this paint or perhaps one of the other Thorpe identified interior colours N5 'light olive green' (similar to FS 34151) or N6 'buff green' (similar to FS 14255). 

Image credits: Heading painting ©2010 Shigeo Koike; Rendered colour chips ©2010 Straggler; Kariki 117 chips Summer via Fuku BBS; Aichi "Jake" Photographs ©2010 Owen Veal via Bob Alford.

Tamiya 1/48th A6M5 - An Appraisal

From correspondent Dan Salamone comes this informative "warts and all" appraisal of the much lauded Tamiya 1/48th Mitsubishi A6M5 Zero, kit # 61103:-

"When first released in the summer of 2008, the Tamiya A6M5 kit was hailed as the ultimate Model 52 kit in this scale. I would like to weigh the pros and cons of this kit as someone who has actually built it, and by comparison to the kit of the same variant from Hasegawa (originally kit # Jt 70).

The quality of the moldings is without question spectacular. At first blush in the box, the kit looks superb, and is indeed superior to the older Hasegawa kit in the amount of detail found in the cockpit. This is where the superiority to the Hasegawa kit ends.

This kit suffers from a Jekyll & Hyde syndrome. Some aspects of the engineering and fit are amazing, others leave much to be desired. For instance, the tolerance of the finished cockpit mating to the fuselage is so minute that you will need to scrape paint off of the edges of the cockpit to allow it to fit into the tabs inside the fuselage. Likewise, the main gear doors literally fall into place on the finished and installed main landing gear legs.

However, these instances of great engineering are balanced by the very poor fitting vertical fin to the rear fuselage, made even more difficult by the insert (part B5) that seats beneath the fin on the left side. The cowl panels (parts C3, D7/D8) need an excessive amount of dry fitting, trimming, and finally careful application of liquid cement to avoid very obvious gaps. Nearly every copy of the kit I have seen built online suffers from gaps in this area. Additionally, the wing leading edge inserts for the guns (parts E 15/16 and B3/4) do not fit well at all.

Then there are the “cute” aspects of the engineering that defy common sense. The placement of the cowl guns prior to assembly means the need to paint them after they are nested in their channels. Tamiya chose to mold the lowermost cowl flaps integral to the oil cooler fairing (part D5) - meaning extra masking and painting. But even worse, the need to add this assembly after painting and after the cowl proper has been installed…..made the very poor fit an exercise in frustration. I needed to shave off some of the exhaust parts (part D10) to even achieve a mediocre fit.

Tamiya also chose to include detail one will never see once the fuselage has been closed up- such as the oil tank near the firewall. Yet, they omitted easily seen detail, such as on the main landing gear wheel hubs. Even more puzzling, Tamiya included this wheel hub detail on their original 1/48 Model 21 kit, back in the late 1960’s!

I also feel that the kit prop has an odd shape about it….not the pitch of the blades in reference to the “hub”, but rather there is a twist to the blades that draws one’s eyes to it.

The laundry list goes on….the windshield has a poor fit to the fuselage which again is a major nuisance in that these parts will have already been painted by the time you discover the fact. Would you believe that the sliding portion of the canopy does not fully fit over the rear portion without cajoling? Needing to install the auxiliary gear doors (part A14) before the main gear legs risks breakage. Every good idea or feature has been countered by two poor ones.

One major improvement in Tamiya kits are the kit supplied decals. I applied the kit hinomarus using the Gunze system of decal liquids and they performed wonderfully. This is countered by Tamiya’s insistence on calling for their own line of paints which ignore differences found on Mitsubishi and Nakajima built aircraft….which have been well documented on this very website.

If this had been a kit that was not so highly touted on its release, I would not view it so harshly. When the 1/48 Tamiya P-47 family was released, it was at the time the pinnacle of plastic airplane model engineering and fit. My subjective view of this Zero kit is as follows . . . people have been blinded by the quality of the molding and the level of detail found in the box. I have studied pictures of various examples of this model both online, and in a recent Model Art volume, and now that I know what to look for, nearly every single example reveals that it suffers from poor fit in the areas mentioned above. Yet, I have never seen any review of this kit that was anything short of glowing.

You may be wondering where the pictures are of my finished Tamiya A6M5. To be honest, I reached such a level of frustration after having spent so much time wrestling the kit that when I discovered my (painted) clear parts fitted so poorly that I would need to perform surgery, I gently tossed it into my garbage can and called it a day. The only other kit I have ever done that with as an adult was the 1/48 Hasegawa Ki-43-I . . . which is another story.

I recommend that if you would like to build an accurate, well engineered model of an early to mid A6M5 in 1/48, you buy one of the many decal variants of the Hasegawa kit. The fit may not be perfect, but it is less expensive and common sense was used in the engineering aspect of kit design.

Dan Salamone"

So many superlatives were promised by this kit when it was first announced that I bought one, even though I model almost exclusively in 1/72nd scale! The last 1/48th Zero model I actually built was Monogram's veteran when it was first released and new!

Looks like Dan's appraisal is going to kick off a short season of all things Zero as we get to grips with a number of recently released books and kits. It remains a popular subject across the modelling and research community, even with modellers whose collections are not limited to Japanese subjects.

Image credits: © 2008 Tamiya Inc