1/48 ESCI A-4N Skyhawk II  

by Rick Reinbott

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  Start of the Jewish New Year 

 

This is my ESCI 1/48 A-4N Skyhawk II.  

Construction  

Although this kit is boxed as an N version, the canopy and windscreen represent an “H” version, as they have the flatter shape of the earlier version and the intakes seem to have the narrower shape of the “H” as well.  Due to the age of the kit, some of the engineering is not up to today’s standards.  Since there were no locating pins or holes for the bombs on the centerline multiple ejector rack, on the bombs themselves, or for the 30mm DEFA cannons, I had to do some scratchbuilding in those areas using brass wire for the pins and drilling the holes using my mini-drill.  The IsraDecal book on the IAF A-4 Skyhawk (an outstanding book) was an indispensable reference when aligning the cannons on the undersides of the wings.  I also drilled out the cannon barrels.  Sheet plastic was used to simulate the chaff dispensers on the underside of the rear fuselage, with the holes being drilled out again using my mini-drill.  Due to the small size of the chaff dispensers, it was difficult to get all the holes to line up evenly with one another, but I hope I created the look satisfactorily.  There was quite a gap where the horizontal tail planes met the vertical plane so I used some plastic strip and putty to fill in the area.  Also, the actuators for the slats and corresponding holes were not engineered well and I had to open up the holes quite a bit to insert the actuators.  The actuators for the outer edge of the slats were molded with way too high of an angle and, as a result, were a real pain to fit into the holes.  The starboard slat still bows a little on the outer edge because of this.

The only aftermarket parts I used was a cockpit set from Cutting Edge (# CEC48279) which consisted of an ejection seat, instrument panel, and mechanism behind the seat, as the kit seat was not very good and the instrument panel just consisted of a decal.  I used the kit decals for the side consoles since the Cutting Edge set didn’t include consoles.  The set is designed for the Hasegawa kit but fit the ESCI kit perfectly.  To simulate the hydraulic lines on the nose landing gear lift/retract cylinder and main gear struts and rear area of the wells, I used copper wire for the lines and lead foil for the retaining straps.  To keep the model on its nose, I inserted weights in front of the nose gear wheel well and in the tips of the underwing fuel tanks, as this model is a real “tail-sitter”.  

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Painting  

Model Master Enamels were used for the three-tone upper camouflage and underside color.  Using the IsraDecal book, I expanded the drawings to 1/48 scale and cut out a paper mask for the upper surface colors.   For a mask I first sprayed the tan color freehand and then masked and sprayed the brown and green tones respectively.  Each color was lightened with some flat white after spraying the base coat to give a faded look to the finish.  Since I lifted the mask slightly off the surface to achieve a soft edge to the colors, some of the brown and green got underneath the mask (I call this “underspray”), which I touched-up by with some drybrushing.  The red areas for the leading edge wing slats and intakes and the black cannon blast areas and nose tip were masked and sprayed prior to spraying the camouflage and lower surface areas.  The red outlines on the landing gear well doors were done using a red Sharpie marker.

In painting the wheels, I first sprayed them flat black.  I then cut a piece of drafting tape and laid it over the wheel so that it covered the hub.  Using a scribing tool, I kept outlining the hub gently until the tape separated so that I had a mask that covered the wheel and exposed the hub.  I then drybrushed the hub using Testors flat white until the desired look was achieved.  The windscreen and canopy were painted with a brush, dipped in Future and allowed to dry overnight.  The canopy was glued on using super glue, and the windscreen was glued on using Elmer’s glue.

 

Weathering & Decaling  

I chose not to highlight the upper surface panel lines as the panel lines on the kit’s fuselage are very deep and most of the photographs in the IsraDecal book show the upper surfaces as being quite clean.  For the cockpit, undersurfaces, multiple ejector rack, pylons, landing gear, wheel wells, and landing gear well doors, I used an oil wash of ivory black.  The cockpit also received some drybrushing using the base colors mixed with flat white while the Mk. 82/500 lb. bombs received an acrylic wash of Model Master flat black followed by some light drybrushing.  The wheel treads were drybrushed using Humbrol panzer gray and Testors flat white.

I used the kit decals which worked out okay.  The decals include a ficticous squadron badge for the tail so I had to turn to my favorite local hobby shop for an inexpensive aftermarket sheet.  Well, as luck would have it, they found an old Microscale sheet (#48-70) that included squadron badges in 1/48 scale for a host of Israeli aircraft including the Skyhawk, Phantom, Mirage, C-47, Kfir and F-15 for the huge sum of…$6.00.  I’m not sure how old this sheet is, but it recommended my ESCI kit and the Monogram kit for the A-4 model and, for the Mirage kit, it noted that the Heller kit would be on the market in a few months!  The decals included yellow stripes for the bombs but I decided to paint those on instead.  Red stripes were also included for the LAU-3/19 rocket pods but they didn’t settle on the pods very well so I discarded them.  Testors Micro Set and Champ Setting Solution were used to apply the decals.

The model represents an A-4N Skyawk II as flown by the Dragon Squadron of the Israeli Air Force during the Yom Kippur War in October 1973.

Happy Modeling!

Rick

References:

· McDonnell Douglas A-4 Skyhawk (Aircraft of the Israeli Air Force Vol. 3) Ra’anan Weiss and Yoav Efrati , IsraDecal Publications 2001

·A-4 Skyhawk, Combat Aircraft Series, Osprey Publishing 1987

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Photos and text © by Rick Reinbott