Sunday 22 March 2020

Japanese Aircraft Online Model Contest 014 - DANILO RENZULLI #2

This subject is the well known "Zero that looks like an Army fighter" and it is still debated whether its livery is in "trainer orange" or in "amber grey" finish. I clearly decided to go for the orange finish. At this regard observing the pictures I noticed the inner face of the u/c covers were of the same airframe shade and then I painted them in orange as well.
The model is a 1/72 Hasegawa kit with a few addition in the cockpit (instrument panel, safety belts, ect.) by Eduard. I riveted all the surfaces and added the position lights in the wings using a small drop of Crystal Clear. Added some details to the u/c legs. Tail codes are from different decal sheets while the Hinomaru have been masked and sprayed. The colours are (matt) Humbrol slightly rubbed with white spirit to obtain a semi-gloss finish. The model was built in 2015.

- Danilo Renzulli -

6 comments:

Baronvonrob said...

Simply amazingly good looking ! I really like the bold color choice and you pulled it all off to perfection ..Well Done !

9.6 please !

Toryu said...

A very neat build and a courageous choice of colours. 9.5

Arawasi said...

This is a really beautiful model and Danilo has put a lot of work in it to improve the kit. But I'm afraid the overall color is wrong. Japanese planes left the factories painted according to the role they were designed for, not the role they would be assigned to at the units. ALL Zero fighters left the factories either in hairyokushoku overall or the green/gray combo. (I said fighters, not trainers, ok?). It would have been A LOT of work to strip the plane off its paint (remember the red brown primer) and repaint it in trainer orange. Adding a hand of orange paint over the hairyokushoku would add a lot of extra kgs of weight. And what would happen if the plane was assigned to the fighter role again? Strip the paint again or add another layer?
This particular Zero (and her sister(s?)) is indeed an enigma because of the cowling paint job. Maybe we should do a special on the "KA-" Zeros...
But great job overall Danilo!
So, I would have given the model 9.8 for overall work but I have to shave off a point for accuracy. So, it's 8.8 from me.

D. Chouinard said...

An interesting model, and one that is very well done! I sort of look at this one as a "what if" because of the color. 9.0

Honza78 said...

Very good job. But I'm very torn. So I give 8 points.

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I've been thinking about this Zero for a few days. He searched all the books available to me. I think the problem is in misinterpreting/translating information. As far as I understand this is a verification/test series, delivered to the combat unit in China. Where the traffic testing took place. Not for flying instruction. And the aforementioned note about the same shade of color on the inside of the chassis cover shows just the use of a gray shade. Which was used in the first Zeros. These are purely my personal conclusions. I would very much like to hear more detailed information from the experts in this field.

Unknown said...

Your color choice brought back memories of the Aurora model of the Zero...completely yellow plastic. Stunning and my personal favorite version without regard to historical accuracy