I
have always been a big fan of the wide body Skyraider and in my scale of
choice, there is only one choice available in 1/48 and it is from
Matchbox. The Matchbox kit has basically toy like features such as
moveable flaps, rudder and wing folds and kit detail is lacking. On the
other end of the spectrum is the Skyraider from Tamiya which is a real gem
however they only offer the single seat version. I am not sure who the
first person mated a Matchbox Skyraider with another manufacturer’s kit
(I think this was done with Monogram/Matchbox kit-bash) but there are a
few articles covering both conversions (Tamiya or Monogram kits) and with
those in hand and a saw, it was off to kit-bashing at it best.
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images below to see larger images
There
is a lot of scratch building involved in this kit but for added detail, I
purchased some aftermarket update sets. This build I added a cockpit set from
Cobra Company, Ejection seats, landing gear doors and some small accessories
from C& H aero, Wheel well set from Aires, wheels from True details, Vacuum
form canopy from Squadron, KMC Skyraider weapons & pylons set, Cutting edge
prop and Engines & Things R-3350.
The
Cobra company cockpit is a great offering however it represents the non
ejection seat. I tried installing the Cutting edge “Yankee seats” but
they were too wide to fit into the Cobra cockpit. After a desperate, I
located a few spare parts from the C&H aero conversion including their
“Yankee” Ejection system (seats) and a few other details. I had to
scratch build the ejection rockets and to fit them in the cockpit, I
needed to cut down the bulkhead behind the pilot seats which I believe is
done on the actual aircraft. For the instrument faces, I punched out some
instrument dial face decals. One big mystery is what is in the “blue
room” and the Cobra set takes care of that mystery. Now to show that
area off, I opened the aft canopy and scratch built all the canopy frames
and structures. I ruined one Vacu-formed canopy so I am glad Squadron
still makes the item but once cut, it was time to tint the aft canopy.
First, I dipped the canopy in Future to aide the blue tint which is Tamiya
blue clear.
The
wheel wells and landing gear needed some cleaning up so I started of by adding
the Aires wheel well set. I was beginning to wonder if this set was made for the
Tamiya kit but after grinding the wing and resin set, they finally fit. Material
was getting very thin but what a remarkable set. I cleaned up the main gear by
adding wire for brake lines and other details but the tail wheel was almost
totally rebuilt. I saved just a small section of the lower link and as you can
see in the pictures, the Tamiya part is about a solid chunk of plastic. The mod
I did also allowed me to rotate the tail wheel in any position I wanted. The
main wheel doors needed to be modified by removing the aft gear doors. The A-1e
and earlier Skyraiders just had a fwd gear door and the wheel went into a round
hole in the wing. Later Skyraiders had fully enclosed main gear doors.
One
area Tamiya lacks is a fully detailed R-3350 radial engine. All they offer is an
engine face so I picked up a R-3350 from Engines & Things but detail was
still needed. I developed a method of bending plastic rod and made all eighteen
exhaust pipes and intake tubes. Next was to add the 36 spark plug wires to
finally give the engine a real busy look. I wanted to show the engine so I had
to scratch build the engine cowling bu laminating a .010” thk outer skin with
a .015” thk inner panel showing the pocked areas. I also thinned out the cowl
flaps and added the pockets similar to the cowling doors.
Weapons
seemed to take a long time to complete, especially when the Skyraider has 15
hard points!
The
first step is to cut the fuselage and I wanted to leave as much Tamiya as I
could. Pictures show where I cut but I forgot to include a foot step and had to
splice that area later. The only Matchbox parts left in this build is 80% of the
fuselage and rudder, I did have to add some A-1E specific details such as the
air scoop in the tail and two landing lights, one retractable on the LH wing tip
and one on LH gear door (USAF specific). The aircraft I depicted did not have
the strange red rotating beacon so that was not added. I did have to add the oil
cooler vents located on both sides of the fuselage below the windshield.
Matchbox has these but again detail is poor. I filled nearly all the panel lines
and re-scribed all the panel lines. Finally I had to remove all the armor
plating that Tamiya included since the A-1E did not have this installed. Cutting
Edge does make a wing set with the armor removed but I decided to remove it
myself.
Painting
the kit I used Xtracrylix paints with Mr. Detailer for the panel line washes and
Tamiya weathering set along with chalks to get the colors Tamiya did not offer.
Decals are from AeroMaster decals (Air War over Vietnam part III).
This
has been a challenging build to say the least but very rewarding. I have been
waiting ten years to do this and I can finally say it is done. I probably did
not list everything in the conversion but hopefully it will give you an idea on
what is needed to do this kit-bash.
The
last picture shows the Matchbox kit built OOB for a comparison.
David
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