My building of Hasegawa´s 1/48 Kawasaki Ki-61-I Tei-Hien (55th Flight Regiment)

Theme: Shogun (© to Apple Inc.?)
Despite some minor problems with the decals (I had to paint the yellow bands on the front edge of the wings as well as the red rectangle warning on the flaps area, plus the damned transparent film of the decals for the flaps area letters), it was a quite straightforward model that even a beginner could do.

I have to confess nonetheless that I committed the mistake of not painting the cockpit and fuselage interior the same colour -olive drab- as the fuselage, as instructions had it. Just overlooked it... And talking about fuselage colour, I found it curious that, unlike the majority of imperial WWII planes, this was not painted dark green, but olive drab like some US Army warbirds.

It seems that there were at least three or four tones for the Japanese WWII green camouflage: I still have to do a 1/48 N1K2-J Shinden (also by Hasegawa) and his colour (as set by the instructions) is a bluish-green one...

For those who don´t know about the Ki-61 Hien ("swallow" in Japanese, but called "Tony" by the allies), it was the only WWII Jap fighter motorized by an in-line, liquid-cooled engine built under licence in Japan and inspired by the German Daimler-Benz DB601 of the Messerschmitt Bf-109 (there was, however, another in-line powered Jap aircraft, the Aichi D4Y1 Suisei, for reconnaissance and dive bombing). The engine was precisely the Hien´s only handicap: Japan lacked the experience to produce, maintain and repair that kind of engines because almost all Japanese aircraft engines during WWII were radial and air-cooled (similar problems that the veteran Curtiss P-40 had to face in the US, since it was the first important WWII US fighter powered by an in-line liquid-cooled engine).
The "life expectancy" of the Hien in the battlefield would not last for too long because of all those engine problems, but its direct descendant, the Ki-100 Goshiki, went back to the radial air-cooled engine and became, together with the Nakajima Ki-84 Hayate (Frank) one of the best Japanese fighters at the end of the war.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• modelismo
• aviación
• escala
• plástico
• 1/48
• Hasegawa
• Ki-61

[CapLAGOS]

congratulation ....good work!! greetings

[AlanMartinNala]

@CapLAGOS Thank you! ;D

[eggjj2001]

@AlanMartinNala so......what marking did u choose?

[BasicModelling]

@AlanMartinNala I have another resin kit in my stash, it is of a Saab B18 bomber, the version with radial engines.. buit it cost me an absolute fortune, so I won't start building it until my skills are good enough.. It's too much money to waste if I have a misshap.. :) It comes with vac-form canopies as well.. sigh.. :)

[BasicModelling]

I find etched brass is best cut with a sharp blade against a hard surface, such as a flat piece of glass or a mirror.. where the thin metal can't bend under the pressure of the knife. You will have to use cyanoacrylate glue, which is dodgy.. I find the metal parts tend to stick to my fingers more than to the model! Other than that it's no different to plastic, you paint it the same as you would any other model part.. unless you get it prepainted, which saves a lot of work.. :)

[BasicModelling]

@AlanMartinNala Yes, that is the main reason.. and the fact that I'm useless at weathering and chipping.. and Japanese aircraft tend to be both heavily weathered and chipped.. :) But I have a Hasegawa 'Zero', and a couple of other Japanese planes in 1/72 to build, incl. a torpedo bomber and a small Submarine based floatplane.. The latter have been in my plans for quite a while, I may well get round to building that quite soon.

[AlanMartinNala]

@BasicModelling He! That´s something in which we diverge a little bit :) I always loved the Pacific theatre, which I always found rather varied geographically (islands, sea). Is that why lately you haven´t done any Jap warbird at any scale? :) I´ve seen Trumpeter has made a large 1/24 or 1/32 A6M2-N Rufe that seems to be as amazing as expensive...

Do you know how to handle (paint, cut and glue) photo-etched parts? I´ve got some models (even tiny 1/72 WWI warbirds!) with such pieces.

[AlanMartinNala]

@BasicModelling Though obviously everyone has his own techniques and style, I can´t honestly see neither anything special about my videos, nor any peculiar difference with yours or any other´s :) After all, it seems that the only way to do videos on this kind of stuff is this one; step-by-step. Even more, I´d say that your videos are more varied than mine, since for instance I´ve never done resine models till the date. Nonetheless, thanks for saying that you find my videos inspiring ;)

[BasicModelling]

@AlanMartinNala Well, the war in the Pacific in general, and Japanese aircraft in particular, is not an area I have spent much time looking into, as my main WWII interest lies with the types used by the allies in the European Theatre of Operations, especially by the Americans and RAF. I knew that the Japanese used some German engines to a degree, just not how and where and on what types.. Still, that's what so great about this hobby, you never stop learning new stuff! :)

[BasicModelling]

@AlanMartinNala Well.. ha ha.. in this case I was referring to the interesting video editing technique.. I feel now I need to vary my videos a bit more, even if the format I use works from a strict informative point.. but I want to add an element of fun and surprise as well, as and when I can.. That's why your editing inspired me.. :)

[AlanMartinNala]

@bakabomb45 Thank you. Despite some minor problems during its building, in general I´m happy with it...