Heavy fighting took place between
the Royal Hungarian Forces and the Slovakian Army near the town of Szobránc on
the 24th of March in 1939 A Hungarian panzer column got attacked by a formation
of Slovakian Letov light bombers escorted by Avia B.534 fighters. However the
Hungarians were ready and the Fiat CR-32-s of the Royal Hungarian Airforce (RHA)
encountered the attackers.
A heavy air battle took place between
the opposing forces, having shoot down at least 8 enemy aircraft by the
Hungarians, using the superior climbing of the Fiat!
Several other Slovakian planes were damaged including the Avia B.534 of Jozef
Zachar, who made a crash landing into Hungarian territory. The pilot was
captured and the plane was repairable, soon after repair it was sent to Ungvár
and then to Budapest.
The plane got the standard, brown-green-grey camo of the RHA and the register
letters G.192. This is how this unique airplane got into the RHA, although only
for a short period. The aircraft was soon given to civil use, with the letters
HA-VAB and with a new camo resembling to the one used on the Héja fighters.
The last time the aircraft was seen it was in this state in Győr during
1944.
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images below to see larger images
I first saw this airplane
in a magazine got on the Kecskemét Air Show in the early '90. It's nice
camo, the the unique type got my attention. Then I got the plastic scale
form of this plane during the following Mosonmagyaróvár Model Show. Back
then the only available copy of this aircraft in 1/72 was made by the
Czech (ex-Czechslovakian) company KP (now it's called Kopro).
The kit is a typical
Kovozavody Prostejov (KP) kit moulded in light grey with very basic
detailing. The cockpit was empty, the panel lines were raised, and the
decals were yellow. I planed a huge upgrade on the kit, so I stared
collecting resources. Great help to me were the book of the Czech
Aeroarchiv, and the book of Jirí Vrany on this type. I got these books
from my friend István Vadász, to whom I am very grateful for his help!
After careful study of
these books I started with the representing the fabric cover of the
airplane. Then I cut off the moving parts of the wings and the stabilizer.
I made their moving mechanism using different wires. I opened two little
service holes on the wings, and then I made the air intakes on the nose,
the radiator under the fuselage and all the edges of the wings thinner.
The cockpit was scratch
remade using various materials. Then followed the new machine guns using a
needle. Then I cut off the air intake gills and made new ones using metal
foil. After joining the fuselage parts I rescribed the panel lines. The
followed the canopy, for which I had to make a new one, because the old
was soo thick and scratched. The cockpit was painted according to those
two books mentioned earlier.
After carefully masking it, followed the joining of the wings with the
fuselage. The correction of the upper wing's holders was very challenging
just as the correct placing of the holders of the main gear. New exhaust
was made using metal foil, just like the cover of the two little service
holes. After correcting the shape of the airscrew, I made the small jewel
ready for painting.
I used acrylic
paints for this. Unfortunately coloured pictures of this plane didn't survived
the war, so I studied colour pic of other Hungarian aircrafts painted with the
same camo. These colours were Hungarian production in the war, but they
resembled very much to the RLM 61,62,63,64 colours of the Luftwaffe, so who
paints his model using RML colours can't make a big mistake. However I used my
own colour mixed from various colours.
First I gave a
grey coat to the plane, which showed the small mistakes before painting. Then
the white followed of the tricolor markings. After the white the red and the
green came. Then after very careful masking followed the painting of the camo.
First the green and the brown. Then a cote of gloss followed, just to make good
surface for the decal letter, which I made from 'left-over' decals.
After a cote
of flat I used pastel to make the little bird a bit used, although I didn't
wanted to make it too dirty, since it was in this colours only for a short time.
After it followed a satin cote before removing the masking. After the placing of
all the wheels and all the small parts, like pitot tube, radio wire, service hole
covers then the canopy and the airscrew followed.
I placed a
little canvas in front of the canopy, to simulate the ground crew just wanted
prepare the plane for a flight.
After almost a
half year of work, the little bird was finally ready! Only after the finish have
I heard that a new resin Avia is available now. To sum up I was very pleased to
work on this ancient KP kit, and to upgrade it, and I think this plane is one of
my favourite in my glass-case!
Greetings,
Robert
Serfozo
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images below to see larger images
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