Japanese Carrier Akagi (赤城) Flight Deck, 07 December 1941

 

 This is the culmination of those three Pearl Harbor aircraft projects I've completed over this last year; a B5N Kate, a D3A Val and an A6M2 Zero.  A series of trips to Hawaii last year got the idea running and here it is finally done.  This diorama represents the flight deck of the Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier Akagi during the early morning hours of 07 December just prior to engine start.   I discussed the builds of the individual aircraft in previous posts so I will just cover the diorama here.

Artistic License

The configuration of the aircraft and even the figures are actually quite inaccurate. It would have been unlikely for the three different types of aircraft (fighter, torpedo bomber and dive bomber) to have been cued on the flight deck together like this. The fighters took off together first, followed by the dive bombers and then the torpedo bombers.

The crew of the airplane maintenance crews doing last minute checks is somewhat unlikely, since most maintenance would have been done below on the sheltered hangar deck.  The pilots and aircrew would also have likely completed their last minute briefings in their ready rooms, not in the pre-dawn darkness on a pitching flight deck. 

And finally, while the aircraft represented here all flew from the Akagi during the Pearl Harbor attack, they flew in different waves.  Goto’s Kate was in the first wave but Utsugi’s Val and Itaya’s Zero were in the Second Wave.  They would definitely have been below decks when the first wave was preparing to take off.  All this was done simply in the name of artistic license.  I wanted to portray interesting subjects in their natural environment. 

The Deck

This was one of the more simple diorama bases I’ve done but definitely not the easiest. The base is an 18 x 24 picture frame from a discount store which cost less than $10. The deck is made from basswood strips glued to the base with Deluxe brand "Super 'Phatic" aliphatic glue. I replicated the caulking between the planks with three to four strips of simple black construction paper like we used in elementary school. After cutting the basswood strips to scale length I pulled random piles aside and stained them varying shades of brown with heavily diluted Tamiya acrylics. I then randomly placed them in the base to give a nice variant look to the deck.

As I glued the individual planks into place I had to constantly monitor their alignment.  If I found myself going off true I had to pull up what I had done and rest them in place.  It was simple, but also time consuming and tedious.  I was well through watching several seasons of Magnum PI on Netflix before I was finished.  Once everything was in place I lightly sanded the whole piece to blend everything together.   This also served to distress the construction paper “caulk” nicely.  An added bonus was that the black dust from the paper filled previously unseen cracks and marks in the basswood strips which added to the worn look of the deck nicely.

The tie downs are from the White Ensign photo etch set.  I honestly don’t know what I would have done if these hadn’t been available.  They were a huge time saver over fabricating my own.  The white stripes are hand painted as were the originals. 

I’m sure Shep Paine would grumble in disapproval, but I broke a cardinal rule of diorama building on this project by having the scene run parallel to the base.  There was no way around this however due to the amount of space the aircraft took occupied.  I tried every conceivable way to position them on the base and this was the only way to get them to all fit without having them hang over the edge, which I couldn’t do because there is an acrylic cover that fits over the frame.

Once everything was placed I had a dead spot which I didn’t quite know how to fill.  Hasegawa came to the rescue however with their  Isuzu TX40 Fuel Truck kit.  It had a terrific little fire extinguisher included.  I’m dubious as to whether this was standard flight deck equipment in the Imperial Japanese Navy, but with a couple of wheel chocks to keep it from rolling off a pitching carrier deck it looked right at home.

The Figures

Figures are the main reason I shy away from dioramas. I held my nose and drove on with this project though. The air crew are mostly from the Tamiya sets which come with the new A6M kits. They are hands down the best 1/48 Japanese aircrew figures out there.

The poses are all pretty boring though. I had to reposition a few pretty drastically, like the fighter pilot demonstrating an attack angle with his hands and the aircraft commander briefing his crew with the map (which is a shrunk down copy of an actual map taken from a downed Japanese pilot during the attack by the way – a nice little touch that no one will likely notice).

The two hardest conversions were the pilot being helped with his parachute and the ground crewman on the wing of the Val.  They were both conversions using the Tamiya aircrew parts and a set of Luftwaffe aircrew by Italeri.  Pretty challenging but they are ok as long as you don’t look too closely!

The rest of the ground crew are all Luftwaffe figures from Italeri that I reconfigured with putty, scratch built respirators and lead foil belts and straps.  I painted them with Valejo acrylics and oils.

The Final Touch

One of the things that made me want to build this diorama in the first place was a particular photo of the Akagi taken a few weeks after the Pearl Harbor attack. It’s a very dramatic photo showing a large portion of the flight deck with the rest of the fleet in line ahead formation in the background. I enlarged it and mounted it on foam board and set it as a background for a photograph. I was pretty pleased with the results.

Vehicles of the 640th Part 4

In this fourth installment of the Vehicles of the 640th Tank Destroyer Battalion we look at the M3A1 Halftrack:

Halftracks in the 640th were originally intended to function as a prime mover for the unit’s towed M5 Anti-tank guns.  After the towed guns were replaced with M10 GMCs however many of the halftracks were retained and put to use by the battalion’s

reconnaissance company.  In the official history of the 640th it was particularly noted that halftracks gave the battalion an unprecedented degree of mobility during its lightning advance against Japanese forces on Luzon.

The Kit:

Dragon began releasing its series of US halftracks in 2006. They are light years ahead of the only other game in town, the venerable Tamiya kit. The M3A1 Smart Kit is no exception. As one would come to expect from Dragon, the molding is superb and devoid of flash or unworkable ejector pin marks.

There are some excellent value-added features to the kit.  The mines for the side racks can be built with photo-etch handles and pressure plates that are striking compared to the injection molded alternative.  There are also numerous extra parts such as machine guns and other weapons which are welcome additions to the spares bin.

There are options to build an M3, M3A1 and M3A2 in the kit.  I opted for the M3A1 as shown in photos of the 640th on either Guadalcanal or New Britain in 1943.  The halftracks in the photos appear to be early M3A1s missing the pulpit mount for the M2 machine gun.

The halftracks in the photos also sport the unditching roller on the front bumper.  Subsequent account of the 640th in action on Luzon notes that their halftracks (at least some of them) were equipped with winches on the front bumper instead of the roller and that it was a critical piece of equipment which allowed the reconnaissance company to ford many rivers and creeks they would not otherwise have been able to.  Never the less, I modeled this kit with the roller to make it more in line with the photo.

The Build:

I built the kit almost completely stock box. About the only exception I made was to use resin tie downs from Tiger Models. These little resin beauties are inexpensive and give eye popping detail way out of proportion to their cost an effort.

As with any open top vehicle, it pays to plan ahead when painting.  There are a number of areas which if left until after the final assembly is done, are very problematic to paint.  So, I painted the interior of the cab, cargo bed and chassis before they were joined. 

I painted the base color using Tamiya XF-62 Olive Drab lightened to scale with XF-60 Dark Yellow.  I then post shaded with straight Dark Yellow diluted to almost water consistency with isopropyl alcohol. 

I used the Archer Fine Transfers set of halftrack instruments and placards for the dash board.  They went on like a charm and added a lot to the look of the cab.

I decided to make the weathering understated.  I started the weathering with a wash of black artist oils mixed with a touch of burn umber.  I went heavy on the wash and mixed it heavier on the undercarriage and wheel wells to replicate areas which would be shaded from normal light.  I used a lighter wash on the upper areas and made special use of the many vertical spaces.  I dabbed small dots of heavier oil paint on the sides and dragged a brush laden with mineral spirits in an top to bottom motion.  This left vertical streaks on the sides that suggested water and grime draining down the sides of the vehicle.  I left this to dry for a day or so then gave the vehicle a light dry brush with light brown pastel chalk.  I accentuated the vertical pattern on the sides with the pastels which gave a nice three dimensional feeling to the whole work.

The markings were simple and easy.  I made a positive mask of all the stars and placed them on areas I had painted white before painting the main color and shading.  The only decals were the bumper codes (which came with the kit) and the registration numbers.

It was tempting to go hog wile with the stowage.  Photographs of halftracks in combat invariably show them loaded down heavily with packs, ammo, tents, camo netting… you name it, and I have to admit they look very, very cool.  I wanted to keep this kit as stock as possible however so the only stowage I placed on the exterior of the vehicle were some rolled tarpaulins made from rolled tech wiped stiffened with diluted white glue.  The tie downs are lead foil.  On the interior I placed another tarp, some ammo boxes, a box of K Rations and some tripods for the M1919 30 cal machine guns.  I also paid more homage to my kindred spirit souvenir hunters with a trophy flag and Japanese bayonet sitting on a passenger seat.

For the flag I used the decals that came with a set of Master Box Japanese infantry figures.  The decals were very old and crackly and required heavy coats of Microscale liquid decal film to keep from coming apart when they hit the water.  I rolled out a thin piece of Apoxie Sculpt and trimmed it to the size of the flag.  After draping it naturally on the seat and letting it dry I applied the decal.

I’ve been criticized before about how I place soldiers’ war trophies and souvenirs on models I build.  Let me just say that yes, I know they wouldn’t be left out in the open for fear of being stolen.  My grandfather told me of his time on Okinawa during the battle, “You could leave your wedding ring, wristwatch and a huge roll of cash sitting out on your pack and no one would touch it.  But if you left even the smallest Japanese trophy, souvenir or trinket out where it could be seen, it would be gone before you could blink.”  (he brought back some very cool stuff by the way) So, before anyone sends me an email reminding me that a battle flag like that would never be left sitting out, let me just state for the record, yes I know.  It’s called artistic license.  It just wouldn’t display as well stashed under the driver’s seat.

Yet Another Pearl Harbor Aircraft: A6M2b Zero

Four of the major combatants in WW2 came out of the conflict with absolutely iconic military aircraft.  I know someone out there is going to have issues, but after conducting a completely unscientific survey (I asked about a dozen guys at work one day) I’ve come up with a predictable list of THE aircraft associated with each major belligerent; the United States gets the P-51 Mustang, the Brits get the Spitfire, the Germans get the Me109 and Japan gets the legendary A6M Type 0 Carrier Fighter, more commonly known to us in the West as the Zero.  (Yes, I know the Soviets had aircraft too but no one I surveyed could name even one.  There you go.)

Lieutennant Commander Shigeru Itaya in China in 1940.

I modeled this kit to represent the A6M2b Model 21 flown by LtCdr Shigeru Itaya from the First Air Fleet on the carrier Akagi.  Itaya was the commander of the fighter escort on the first wave of the Pearl Harbor attack and was in all probability the first Japanese pilot airborne at 0610 on the morning of 7 December. 

Aircraft number AI-158 on the Akagi.  AI-158 flew with the second wave on 7 December but was configured in all respects identically to Itaya's AI-159 (or 155).

Itaya had served in China with the 15h Kokutai prior to the Hawaii operation and  had become an ace serving on the carrier Ryujo.  He was killed in the Kurile Islands in July of 1944, shot down by friendly anti-aircraft gunners who mistook his plane for an enemy.

The Kit:

Hasegawa aircraft models have a deserved reputation for excellence and their Zero kits are no exception. Hasegawa has produced the Type 21 Zero in several re-boxings over the years. The original kit was released in the 1990s. As with the other Pearl Harbor Hasegawa projects, this was a joy to build. The kit is well thought out and engineered very well. While there are a very few minor fit issues there was nothing a small amount of putty would not easily fix.

The cockpit is well done.  There are many aftermarket sets for the Hasegawa Zero cockpit but when using them the Law of Diminishing Return quickly takes over. 

In my mind, on this kit at least the amount of benefit you get from a resin upgrade set doesn’t warrant the added time and cost.  Others may disagree but that’s how I see it.  

The Build:

For the most part I built the kit stock out of the box. In keeping with my “folding wing” theme however, I decided to cut the wingtips and pose them folded. It was a fairly simple operation as the recessed panel lines gave me an excellent guide. Surprisingly, my research turned up few photos of the details of the interior workings of the Type 21 wing folding mechanism.  As luck would have it however, Tamiya obligingly came out with their A6M5 kit in 1/72 which had an excellent drawing of the feature in the instructions.  I was also lucky to come across the Aero Detail #7 book on the Zero which shows the angle at which the wingtips sit when they are folded.

The Zero's wintips did not just fold straight up.  They folded up and over to overlap the main wing slightly as seen in this head on view.  Many kits miss this detail.

I mixed my own “aotake”, the metallic blue colour used on Japanese aircraft, by mixing X-23 Clear Blue, X-25 Clear Green and a touch of X-24 Clear Yellow. I painted the interior wing surfaces with XF-16 Aluminium first, then the “aotake” mix.

I used Tamiya acrylics almost exclusively to paint the model.  I began by painting and masking the red national insignia and unit markings with Tamiya XF-X Flat Red, darkened just slightly with XF-1 Flat Black.  The base color is Tamiya XF-76 IJN Grey Green.  I post shaded this with the base color thinned and lightened with XF-2 Flat White. I then masked and painted the black cowling.

Aside from a few "no step" markings, the only decals I used on this kit were the tail numbers.  I used the excellent aftermarket set by Aviaeology for these.  The only complaint I had with them is that once in place they are a little too light for my taste.  If I had it to do over again I would touch them up a little with a brush while they are still on the decal paper, seal them and then apply.  Overall though I think they worked nicely.

Researchers disagree on what the tail number of Itaya’s Zero was, though it has been narrowed down to either AI-155 or AI-159.  We may never know.  I flipped a coin and chose AI-159.

After removing the positive masks for the Hi no Marus, wheels and tail stripe I began the weathering process.  Japanese aircraft used in the Hawaii Operation were very well maintained but had been used during rigorous training during the summer of 1941 so some fading was called for.  I used a very light wash of burnt umber and black artists oils for this.  Once this had dried fully I gave the aircraft a light coat of Future to give it the very light semi-gloss look IJN aircraft had during this time period.