What made me model a
KA-6D and not a regular bomb truck you ask?
Well I like Intruders and have many pics of aircraft which I have seen and
"touched" at Fremantle Western Australia over the years.
I have an aversion to low vis toned down schemes so I was gonna model a Light
Gull grey and White example of VA-52. Going through my photo collection I
realised that EVERY white and grey pic was of a Tanker version. This started me
on the research trail which revealed a number of interesting facts:
-
Tankers retained
a visual bombing capability (rarely if ever used)
-
To aid
visibility for pilots of thirsty planes they retained the "high vis"
scheme
-
as a further
recognition aid, the rear fuselage featured either a red or blue stripe, for
night ops the anti collision light lens were blue filtered and set to flash
in sequences of 5.
A lot of this stuff
I gleaned from regular ARC forum contributors.
So looking at my photos I found that none of my "high vis" KA-6 pics
had the knight rider motif on the fin! (paradoxically a low vis example did!
About this time I found some pics of VA-52 Intruders veritably pin cushioned
with lances ..hmm I thought well I never actually "saw and touched"
these but it was a neat scheme!
So I ditched my "personal aeroplane" angle and went for this.. I
scratched built the refuelling drogue unit with bomb casings and other bits from
the spares box.
A US modeller (Ryan F) provided me with an excellent reference pic which became
my subject. Another US modeller (Peter Fey) sent me the extra two tanks I
required to finish the KA-9.
Click on
images below to see larger images
Now whilst
there are decals available for VA-52 jets, the ones I have seen has a
Knight's Head design very different to my reference material and even the
Lances were quite different, so once again I bit the bullet and set out to
make my own decals. The Lances were surprisingly easy to draw.. I used
Microsoft Powerpoint and had them done in 20 minutes! Unbelievable in
comparison to the knights head. For this I had to crop the photo, enhance
the image and use photoshop to create a drawing. With my inept photoshop
skills this took many evenings work but very happy with the result! The
rudder pennant thingie took a while as well, it was perfect but I forgot
to save it and had to re-do it and I couldn't get it as good as before..I
was fed up at this stage and left it.. it was good enough (for my build
quality anyway).
Once again not
perfect, but I do like this jet, making a unique subject of a rarely modelled
version with home made decals makes it a bit special.
Wally Civitico
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