Kayaba Katsuodori

[MichelC]

Just before buttoning up the fuse I realized I'd forgotten an O2 hose so I made one from fine copper wire wound around a thicker gauge wire.



Well, there!



The canpoy was attached with liquid cement, a good, airtight joint. You can see on the pic how well you can see the cockpit detail.



Now it was time to turn to the exterior details and stuff, starting with the rocket boosters.



The exhaust lips were thinned to scale and we're good to go!



BTW, the Japanese RATOGs weren't very reliable. They had plenty of trouble fine-tuning them. One can only imagine what would have happened if the placement was slightly off-axis or if there was a lag in ignition time...

Next the FOD covers: simple styrene discs with copper wire grab handles. I glued some supports on the inside of the intake and exhaust so that when the covers are put in place at the end of the build they don't fall into the fuse with no way of retrieving them...



The trolley was detailed somewhat with rubber cushions, a lunette ring and weld seams (made from stretched sprue softened with liquid cement and shaped with a sharp blade) where there were unsightly gaps.





This being a prototype the gun ports were removed by filling them.





For those who like this kind of stuff, here's an excerpt from the Konpeki no Kantai animation showing how the Katsuodori could have been put to use. The a/c depicted looks more like an Okha but the concept is pretty much the same.

https://youtu.be/X5vIGnk3XJ8

[MichelC]

The primer coat is on: Mr. Surfacer 1200 polished with micromesh 3600 to remove any lint stuck to the paint and give it a smooth finish for the base coat.

[MichelC]

Base coat is on. It went on straight, no pre-shading. The reason for that is because of the base coverage ability of yellow, which results in too harsh a contrast. I'll use post-shading instead.

After doing some research on the WWII Japanese yellow/orange color for trainer and experimental a/c (there's a quite thorough essay by Nick Millman on the subject) I settled for a 95% Gunze H4 Yellow and 5% Gunze H3 Red mix. I'm quite happy with the result. Hope you like it too.

[Fermis]

Loving this project!

Base coat is on. It went on straight, no pre-shading. The reason for that is because of the base coverage ability of yellow, which results in too harsh a contrast. I'll use post-shading instead.

Friendly tip...
Any time I do colors that don't cover well...ie...yellow, red, etc. I do the normal preshade routine, then paint those areas in white...to the point where I'd want them, if they were to end in white (preshade showing through a little)...then spray over the white with thin coats of the color. This way, you get the subtle preshading effects, without having to go through 4 gallons of yellow paint!

[MichelC]

Cool tip, thanks, Fermis! I thought of using white as an undercoat for the yellow but couldn't think of how to combine it with the pre-shading. I'll have that in mind next time.

M

[MichelC]

Next after painting came post-shading: base color lightened with white and darkened with orange and brown.



Elevons and rudders were masked off and painted in a lighter shade of the base color.



Hinomarus were painted with Gunze H3 Red, using masks made from Tamiya tape.



To make the masks a hole was punched into a piece of tape using a hollow punch.



The punched out disc was not discarded but used as a guide by placing it on the model where the hinomaru would go and then positioning the mask around it.



A small section was cut off from the disc to make it easier to lift off once the mask is in place.





The numbers on the fins were airbrushed using leftovers from an earlier set of Miracle Masks.



The paint is Gunze Flat Black lightened with a little Tire Black to break the harshness of absolute black.



No decals were used at all for this build.



The nozzle was painted with Model Master metalizers.



More to come...

M

[LyleW]

impressive. Very sleek.

[MichelC]

Thanks, Lyle!

M

[MichelC]

That one's finally done after some unexpected delays. The weathering of the a/c was kept to a minimum, an oil wash in the panel lines and some very light chipping on the leading edges. The trolley was given a little heavier treatment but only so much.

I Hope you like it!

[BlackSheep214]

Outstanding job!