More on Mottle - 'Kato Hayabusa Sentotai' 1944

One of the best resources for a close look at the various mottle patterns as applied to Japanese Army aircraft is the 1944 Toho film 'Kato Hayabusa Sentotai' ("The Kato Peregrine Falcon Fighter Unit') directed by Kijiro Yamamoto, which tells the story of the charismatic 64th Sentai leader Tateo Kato using real aircraft from the Akeno Flying School. Whilst the use of some Ki-43-II aircraft - and their camouflage - is anachronistic for the time period depicted by the film it nevertheless provides an exceptionally useful reference for "typical" mid-war camouflage patterns, not least because the aircraft are seen "in the round" rather than in the single "flat" image of a photograph. The film quality is also of a very high standard, allowing details to be clearly seen and studied.

In these views of the aircraft painted to represent Kato's aircraft the mottle application on the fuselage is distinct and different from the more densely applied coverage on the wing upper surfaces. The yellow wing IFF stripes on the aircraft are also anachronistic, not being introduced until September 1942 (Kato was killed in May 1942), but still appear surprisingly often on art and models depicting Kato's Ki-43-I Hayabusa.

Notice the way that the mottle thins out to nothing on the fuselage spine and its appearance at the wing roots where it terminates abruptly at panel lines. Also apparent is the near pristine condition of the anti-glare panel and the "silver" band where the fuselage recesses behind the cowling. This particular aircraft is also carrying a wing-mounted gun camera. When was the last time you saw that on a Hayabusa model?

Here is the opposite side view of the same aircraft for comparison. Note the way that the mottle does not extend onto the cowling ring.

As the aircraft banks towards the camera the pattern on the wings can be seen. The "silver" band behind the cowling is again very apparent as is the glossy lustre of the spinner (probably not matt brick red).

Here the close-up image of an earlier Ki-43-I reveals evidence of an overall colour applied beneath the mottle. Its colour is speculative but could be grey or brown as there is hard evidence for both. Is the canopy frame painted to match the mottle or the anti-glare panel? An intriguing question. On the Ki-43-II the canopy frame appears to be natural metal finish so there is no standard being applied here (delivery photos also show the Ki-43-I with a natural metal finish canopy frame). The light coloured rubber eyepiece of the telescopic gunsight shows up well.

In this sequence of a 12th Sentai Ki-21 trundling out we get a good view of the mottle application to the tail and the very worn condition of the tail stripe markings. The "tail stinger" gun is also apparent. The camouflage pattern on the starboard elevator becomes solid to the centre rear and also appears to be a different colour, suggesting perhaps a repair.

On top of the Ki-21 fuselage thin, sprayed "smoke rings" provide a sharp contrast to the heavily applied blotches on the sides. Added later perhaps? On a model this might look odd and tempt the modeller to apply a more consistent pattern overall. Note the formation stripes which the Hinomaru has been partially applied over.

As an interesting aside the film includes air-to-air footage of genuine captured Curtiss P-40 and Brewster Buffalo aircraft but in the lengthy scene showing air combat over Rangoon Akeno Ki-44 aircraft marked with roundels stand in for the Buffalos in distant dogfight shots, their distinctive planform being one of the curiosities to look out for. I can only speculate that the film was made this way to serve a logistical convenience for the dogfighting sequences around the bombers.

'Kato Hayabusa Sentotai' is still available to buy in Region 2 DVD format from YesAsia (who can be recommended as an efficient and reliable source for other vintage Japanese films too) slightly reduced from the listed price of ¥4,500. There is much of interest for Japanese aviation enthusiasts in the film, including a memorable scene where Kato lands in and climbs from a Ki-27, extensive air-to-air footage of Hayabusa and Ki-21 aircraft, a paratroop sequence with embarkation, dropping and consolidation (meant to be Palembang but probably an exercise) and even a captured Hudson. 

Image credits: All © 1944 Toho Co. Ltd.  

JASIG Extra ~ Special Hobby's Big Nate (Updated)

Gary Wenko, the IPMS (UK) Japanese Aviation Special Interest Group (JASIG) Leader has kindly provided sprue-shots of the new Special Hobby 1/32nd scale Nakajima Ki-27 Ko "Nomonhan Aces" kit which is now available.

The rear canopy section appears to have the correctly curved top cross-section profile which has been missed on previous kits. The aircraft was often flown with the sliding portion of the canopy removed on both variants - the Ki-27 Ko and Otsu. The kit includes a set of resin detail parts which includes the pilot's seat and a small photo-etch sheet mainly for the interior and seat-belt. Suggested colour call-outs are interesting. Gunze (GSI/Creos) C14/H57 (Aircraft Grey) for the interior referred to as "Cockpit Colour" and a mix of 90% C128 (IJA Grey-green) with 10% C1/H1 (White) for the exterior*.

One detail that appears to be missing from the kit fuselage parts (and the box art) are the small rectangular windows above the gun breeches on the cockpit floor, just above the wing roots and to the rear of the engine flaps. These should really be included on a model in this scale but I guess would be easy enough to drill out and create. The only separate flying surface is the rudder, the ailerons and elevators being molded integrally to wings and tailplanes.

The engine detail looks a little soft but anyone planning a model with cowling removed will want to replace or upgrade it anyway (and will have to cut the fuselage parts as the cowling is not separate).

The kit looks pretty good on the sprues but we can probably now kiss the chances of a Ki-27 in this scale from Hasegawa or Tamiya goodbye! External fuel tanks are included and seem to be complete with their tops for the potential of separate display.

The undercarriage fairings are molded in sections like the original but although recessed circles are shown on the upper surface of the wings I'm not sure the oleos can be depicted projecting above the wings (as they did when the aircraft stood on the ground) without modification 

*Colour call-outs corrected from original post - see Mario's comment below.

Images credit: © Special Hobby 2010 courtesy of and via Gary Wenko

JAAF Mitsubishi Ki-15-II "Babs" in Mottled Camouflage

Further to the photograph of the JAAF Ki-15 in unusual mottled camouflage shown here in March 2008, correspondent Jacob Terlouw has kindly provided another photograph of what appears to be the same aircraft. Rather than Malaya, the original owner believes that the location may in fact be Indonesia. This photograph reveals that the aircraft is a Ki-15-II type. Colours are conjectural but note the differences to the previous image which may be due to the type of film used.

Another "Babs", this time a Ki-15-1, photographed on Ambon (Amboina) in 1946 in a single overall colour perhaps badly sun bleached. There appears to be two "ghosted" horizontal stripes just visible on the tail fin, either painted over or bleached out. Note also the bordered fuselage band.

For anyone who wants to try their hand at replicating the challenging mottled camouflage scheme in 1/72nd scale, the respectable LS kit of the Ki-15-11 dating from the mid 1960's, shown above, may still be found and is also available from time to time in the guise of the Arii re-issue shown below (for less than £5 if ordered direct from Japan).

Image credit: Photographs courtesy of Gerben Tornij via Jacob Terlouw; Box art © Arii

Medal Winning Ohka from Russia

One of the best things about managing this blog is receiving emails from Japanese aircraft enthusiasts and modellers from all over the world, not just across the Anglosphere, with news of their own interesting projects.

From regular correspondent Dmitri Korolkov come these photos  of his 11-years old son's first kit, a 1/72nd scale Hasegawa Ohka. This beautiful and accomplished model was submitted to DiSHow-2009 (a Moscow online model contest) and was awarded the 2nd Place Silver medal in the Junior grade by the judging panel and also the 1st Place Gold Medal in internet voting. A short feature on building the model (in Russian) is here and some more pictures from the model contest are here. The attention to detail, presentation and observation of colour of this tiny model would put many an experienced and older modeller to shame. Very well done!

Recently I also received a lovely email and photos of some Japanese aircraft models from a model show in Guatamala and news of a small but dedicated group of Japanese aircraft enthusiasts in Guatamala and El Salvador (I'm waiting for permission to show those photos too).

Sometimes when we are bemoaning the lack of English language references on this subject we might spare a thought for those enthusiasts in countries across the globe where neither Japanese nor English is the first language and it is sometimes much more difficult to obtain relevant kits and books with which to pursue this interest. 

Image credits: All via and courtesy of Dmitri Korolkov © 2010

Jose Luis Fauste 1/72 Collection ~ Special Hobby Ki-43-III Ko

It is with great pleasure that I am able to share images from the Jose Luis Fauste collection of 1/72nd scale Japanese aircraft models. First up, and further to blogging about the release of the Special Hobby Ki-43-III Ko here, are images of Jose's model from this kit, together with his comprehensive build report:-

"These comments are also applicable to the Nakajima Ki-43-II variant also available from Special Hobby, as both kits have a lot of common parts, and problems……

The appearance of the sprue frames in the box is really nice but the assembly of the model brings noticeable problems, mainly in the fit of the cowling parts. The cowling is composed of three pieces, the upper area and frontal ring plus two additional lateral covers which include the thrust exhausts. The fit of these together is very bad as the curvature of the two lateral pieces does not follow the same curvature as the frontal piece; and even worse, as the edges of the parts are not very well defined and are too thick, it is quite easy to remove part of the covers, which means there is a lack of adjustment on the lower side of the cowling. I had to include a plastic shim at the 6 o’clock position to adjust both parts. All this area needed a lot of putty and sanding.

The wing to fuselage fit is also problematic, again due to very thick plastic parts. The fit is bad mainly at the lower rear part and heavy sanding of the thickness of this part of the wing is necessary.

The locations of the wing pylons are not indicated on the kit parts, only a dimension for reference being included in the instructions. Another problem with the attachments of the external tanks is that they appear too large when compared with pictures of the real thing. The difference between the curvature of the tanks and the attachments also impedes their proper installation, so again additional work is necessary to get them to fit.

In the Ki-43-II variant kit the lower oil radiator scoop beneath the cowling is formed by two parts and the assembly of these parts against the cowling and wing is bad, very bad; on the Ki-43-III kit this detail has been improved with only one part for the intake.

The fuselage assembly is good but with the typical problems of Special Hobby models in locating the engine or the complete cowling onto the fuselage. The fit of the canopy is fair mainly between the two sections.

Otherwise the kit and assembly is as for other Special Hobby kits; a good interior (good enough for this scale and aircraft size), very good surface detail, excellent decals (on the model I built I used Aeromaster decals to represent a Kamikaze aircraft - not included in the kit) and a very clear injection molded canopy.  With this kit Special Hobby has introduced location pins for the main parts, but in any case I removed these as the fit is better without the pins - especially at the tail area.

I painted the model with Gunze IJA gray and IJA green, the latter with a lot of variation of hues by adding small quantities of brown, yellow or off white variously in each area. The chipped areas were accomplished by airbrushing Alclad (before painting the green) and by applying Humbrol H11 Silver  with a brush, adding small touches over the green. The propeller was painted with Gunze H302 (FS 43092). The yellow wing IFF strips were painted with White Ensign models ACJ19 .

After the completing the painting and decals I airbrushed dirty thinner to reproduce the oil stains and degrading effects around the engine, oil scoop and radiator mainly on the lower part of the aircraft. Finally I applied an overall coat of Marabu matt varnish."

Thank you, Jose, for providing the photos and this useful commentary. Prior to the release of this kit the only available 1/72nd scale kits of the Ki-43-III Ko were the very hard to find (and expensive) Gartex release which included the standard Hasegawa kit with additional resin and white metal parts (we'll take a closer look at that one in due course) or the limited run AML kits which are plastic and resin hybrids. There was also a resin conversion set designed for the Hasegawa kit available from no other than yours truly*, marketed under the short-lived Zhong Kui label. This was an excellent and reasonably priced set consisting of very finely molded resin replacement fuselage (including sidewall detail) and cowling parts which were custom made by an established and expert East European resin manufacturer. It was available with a comprehensive data sheet on the type, including colour information (even actual paint chips) and detail drawings. Unfortunately, the interest and uptake were disappointingly small, precluding any further 1/72 conversion/enhancement kit projects for Japanese subjects. I may still have a few mouldering in the attic if anyone is desperate to obtain one . . .

Looking again at the Special Hobby kit in conjunction with Jose's review and images and comparing it directly with the Hasegawa kit I now notice that the rear section of the canopy is significantly under-sized and not to the correct profile.  It is suspiciously similar in appearance to the rear canopy section on the old LS 1/75th scale Ki-43 kits. It also has a prominent hole in the plate for access to the water-methanol tank spout behind the headrest whereas on the real aircraft this was a spring-loaded flap. A practical suggestion would be to use instead one of the excellent quality and inexpensive vacform replacement canopies by Rob Taurus (who have a good range of canopies for other Japanese types too) which are available from HLJ .

* Straggler, Ochi-Musha, 脱走兵 . . .

Image credits: Box art © Special Hobby 2010; Model photos © Jose Luis Fauste 2010

Update ~ Berna Decals and On The Subject of Mottles

When I saw the new Berna Decals for the Hayabusa I thought the 47th Sentai insignia on the 1/72nd sheet looked a bit large - in fact the same size as the one on the 1/48th sheet !  Have no fear, having examined an actual set there is an addendum sheet included in the 1/72nd set with the 47th Insignia to the correct size. That's good, because this option is an interesting one, an early Hayabusa in much worn dark green paint with Home Defence bands and colourful fuselage stripes.

Please note though that there are not sufficient Hinomaru in the set to do all the options, in fact there are not enough wing Hinomaru to do even two options.  My example sheet has thin, glossy decals with good colour saturation but as with all such decals it remains to be seen how they hold up when applied over dark paint. The variegation on the Hinomaru apparent in the image shown here is not present on the actual decals which have consistent and rich colour.

The instructions suggests either FS 34102 or 34036 for the green paint on all the options, presumably meant to represent # 21 "midori iro" and # 27 "ao midori iro" respectively. This is somewhat at odds with the artifact evidence presented here and here but I don't know how these FS values were arrived at. Recent evidence suggests that these two paint colours were used haphazardly on the early Hayabusa and even together on some airframes to emulate the Luftwaffe-type camouflage. (More on Hayabusa colour and camouflage in my forthcoming guide which has had to be split into separate Ki-43-I, II and III volumes because of the amount of data to be included therein).

One of the minor mysteries of the JAAF and one which continues to confuse modellers is the factory vs "field" finish. Whilst Kawasaki's Ki-45 Toryu (a fighter) and Ki-48 (a bomber) left the factory in overall camouflage finishes with a painted base coat on all surfaces, the Ki-61 Hien was (predominantly) shipped in bare metal. Most of Nakajima's products left the factory in bare metal, whilst Mitsubishi's were mostly fully painted. Why? As far as I know, no satisfactory explanation for these inconsistencies has emerged.  Recently I was sent photos of a Ki-48 model finished in green mottle over bare metal, a typical depot-style "field" finish. Of course it is impossible to rule out the possibility that some Ki-48 appeared this way but it just looked odd. We are used to seeing this aircraft with the camouflage mottles applied over a painted base colour and the available photographs support this. But bearing in mind the typical mid-war finish of the Ki-43 and Ki-61 the choice is perhaps understandable, especially by someone confronted with the subject for the first time.

I think the origin of this confusion lies in the fact that it is sometimes very difficult to discern a badly oxidised natural metal surface from a grey-painted surface in old photographs and also that some types - the Ki-43 for example - sported both variants with mottles applied over the bare metal (usually) but also over a painted base coat (sometimes). In the latter case a further complexity arises as to whether the painted base coat was applied overall or only on the upper surfaces, leaving the underside in bare metal (or a different colour paint). In some cases the mottles were sprayed so densely as to give the impression of a base coat and/or of two separate colours. It is a brave man who can resolve these questions definitively just by examining photographs.

The Revell Ki-45 Toryu instructions (from 1972) suggested painting a dark green mottle over "silver" and one still sometimes sees Ki-45 models finished that way - but again it looks odd. The subject of these green mottles over natural metal (or base colours) warrants further exploration and, as with so much to do with Japanese aircraft, the devil is in the detail. The patterns and application methods were incredibly varied (even on the same aircraft) but this seems to be rarely represented on models. Some of the patterns depicted on models (and in artwork which modellers then copy) are just too regular, too stylised and too contrived. They reflect more the airbrush skill of the builder or painter rather than any connection to the real Japanese aircraft. Sometimes it seems that the modellers have got as far as "airbrush + dark green paint + "mottle"" without going further than that. I suspect that often as they paint the "pattern" is in their mind's eye rather than referenced closely to any photograph. The result of this is usually an impression rather than a replication of the real thing. And the airbrush is not always the best method to replicate all the styles and applications to be seen in photographs.

Another aspect is wear and tear. JAAF finishes especially could deteriorate to the degree that an originally overall colour was reduced to a quasi-mottle appearance and some such worn finishes were then touched up with applications of mottle (and vice versa), very often on selected parts of the airframe rather than all of it. Airframes often give the appearance of being partially painted by different people at different times - as indeed they probably were. On single engined fighters particularly the mottle finish was often densest on the wing upper surfaces and sparse at the wing roots and sides of the cockpit. Whether this was just the result of wear, deliberate or an application dictated by circumstance is sometimes difficult to determine. Again, one seldom sees these finishes replicated on models. This is all the more surprising since the motivation of so many modellers in the face of so much internet image overload is to build and create something different! But one of the hardest things to achieve in modelling is to deliberately paint in a way that appears random or improvised.

Image credits: Decal sheet © 2010 Berna Decals; Ki-43 photo 1 © Lt Richard "Rip" Collins, 35th FG; Ki-43 photos 2 & 3 © author's collection