1/72 Italeri
Vought F4U-4B

by Orlando Sucre
Rosales

--------------------

Steve Bamford will insert full sized
version of photo 01.jpg here

Hello again, fellow modelers and readers.

This time I’ll share with you some of my
experience building a 1/72 Italeri Vought Corsair F4U-4B, along with some
pictures of the finished model. The Corsair needs no introduction, it has been
one of modelers’ favorite aircraft. Korean War Corsairs have received
less attention by both modelers and kit manufacturers than their WWII
counterparts, even though they made an enormous contribution, mainly in the
ground attack role.

Italeri is almost surely the only mainstream
manufacturer that has offered Korean War Corsairs in 1/72 scale, namely the
F4U-4B and the F4U-5. According to some reviews I’ve read on the
Internet, the F4U-4B kit is very inaccurate, with wrong wings, propeller and
rocket pylons, among other issues. Unfortunately, as one of the Murphy’s
laws surely would state, you’ll read a serious review of a kit more
likely after you’ve started building it, and this was my case!

Apart from its inaccuracies, the kit has an overall
good fit and a sufficient level of exterior detail. Regarding the fit, the more
problematic area is the joint between the lower wing half – which
includes a section of the lower fuselage – and the remainder of the
fuselage. Another problematic area was the main wing. Surely the manufacturer
molded the lower wing together with a section of the fuselage in order to get
the correct complex dihedral of the wing. However, despite all the care I put
while assembling the main wing and the tail, I ended with a bit asymmetrical
dihedral, and I wasn’t capable to fix it later.

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 03.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 03.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 04.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 04.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 05.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 05.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 06.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 06.jpg

Italeri’s kits painting directions almost always
have mistakes, and this kit’s painting directions were not an exemption.
Zinc chromate was indicated instead of Interior Green for the interior,
regrettably I knew about the mistake after the fuselage was closed. For the
fuselage Blue Angel Blue FS15050 instead of Dark Sea Blue FS15042 was
suggested. This time I didn’t follow the directions, so I painted the
airframe with Humbrol 181 Dark Sea Blue lightened a bit with Hu 47 to get a
scale effect. Italeri also suggested Zinc chromate for the inner undercarriage
doors and for the undercarriage legs, but after some research on the colors of
these parts, I decided to paint these also with Dark Sea Blue. The tip of the
rudder and the propeller hub were painted with a mix of Hu 14 and Hu 47.

There is currently a strong trend among modelers of
highlighting the panel lines of dark painted models with white. Panel lines are
visible in real objects because there’s a shadow inside each joint, sometimes
there’s also grime in the joint. As both shadows and grime are dark, I
prefer, for the sake of realism, highlighting panel lines with a dark wash,
even if the remainder of the model is also dark. I applied the wash after all
the decals were applied and sealed, in this way the panel lines that run under
the decals were also highlighted. As I wanted a not so shiny finish on my
Corsair, I sealed the weathering (which also included some paint chipping) with
a coat of satin clear.

At this point it’s good to remark that another
issue were the manufacturer made mistakes in this kit were the decals.
Italeri’s decals are often regarded as very good. That’s true when
it comes to quality of materials and register, but it’s questionable when
it regards to accuracy of size, colors and design. In the case of this Corsair,
it seems to me that the national insignias for the fuselage sides were undersized,
and their blue was wrong (it would have been better to provide just the white
star and the white and red stripes, as often other kit manufacturers do for
U.S. insignias of aircraft painted Dark Sea Blue overall.)

I chose to model my Corsair as “302” of Navy
squadron VF-53 Blue Knights, because I like the big “S” on both
sides of the tail and over the right wing (“S” is the first letter
of Sucre, after
all…) and I also like the medium blue accents. Well, when I went to apply
the decals I found that the “302” numerals intended for both sides of
the cowling were oversized (in fact, they were the same size that of the
numerals that go over the right wing,) so I had to use the numerals originally
intended for the main undercarriage doors, which in turn were too big for these
doors. Another annoying mistake, and one I could notice only after the decals
were applied, was that the serial number that go beneath the horizontal
stabilizers displayed the word “Marines” instead of the word
“Navy” (!) I overpainted the word with dark sea blue to partially
amend the mistake.

Steve Bamford will insert full sized version of photo 02.jpg here

After sealing the weathering, the model was ready for
final assembly. First I assembled the main undercarriage legs (a tricky
assembly, by the way) and glued these and the tail leg into their locating
holes. Next I glued the undercarriage doors, and it was time to attach the drop
tank and the ordnance. The kit provides ten rockets with their pylons (which
are wrongly shaped, as I previously mentioned.) However, the F4U-4B only
carried eight rockets, so I didn’t used the inner pair. The kit’s
instructions also suggest to attach the underbelly drop tank and two bombs, but
the references I read on the Internet indicate that this combination was never
used, so I used just the drop tank and left the bombs for a Skyraider I’m
planning to build later. Nevertheless, the aircraft is “bomb ready”
because it has the bomb supports already attached. I replaced the kit’s
cannons with tiny sections of hypodermic needles, and I also deepened and
widened the recesses for the cannons, using photos of the real aircraft as a
guide.

When the ordnance assembly was completed, I glued a
length of black hair to simulate the antenna, and then I began to struggle with
one of the more difficult stages of the project: painting the exhaust stains.
It was only after the third attempt that I was satisfied (although not
completely) with the result. After the stains were painted, I painted and glued
the exhaust stacks and then brushed a mix of brown and black pastel powder over
the area of the stains just behind the stacks, and the model was finally
finished.

I’m quite satisfied with my F4U-4B, my only Korean
War aircraft model so far. I hope you’ve enjoyed both the story and the
model. I also hope some day seeing a good and accurate Korean War Corsair kit
with folding wings being released in 1/72 scale.

Greetings from Caracas,
Venezuela.

Orlando Sucre
Rosales

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 07.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 07.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 08.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 08.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 09.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 09.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 10.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 10.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 11.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 11.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 12.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 12.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 13.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 13.jpg

Steve Bamford will insert a click-able smaller version of photo 14.jpg here.  Clicking on that
photo will bring up the full sized version of photo 14.jpg

Photos and text ©
by Orlando Sucre Rosales