1/48 Tamiya F4U-1D Corsair – No Guns? No Problem!

By the time the USN and the Marines sailed up to and flew over Okinawa, they had pretty much solved everything there was to be solved in terms of aviation in the Second World War. The Marianas, the Philippines… all that was behind them. By this point in the war, carriers carried fewer Dauntlesses and Helldivers because there were less ships to sink. Instead, they loaded the decks and hangars with Hellcats and Corsairs and hundreds of fully trained and battle-tested pilots ready to annihilate anything that moved.

And then there was Okinawa.

This was the final campaign of the Pacific War. But those fliers didn’t know that yet. Nope, to them, this was only a prelude to some pretty awful months to come. Now, it might be a combination of Iwo Jima happening right before it and the big bang that came two months after, but the battle of Okinawa is almost forgotten. Many see it as a footnote and know few details about it. I’m just as guilty.

But I know there was one thing that happened in the skies above Okinawa. One event that completely changed my scale modeling ‘career’ as it were. And surprise of all surprises, it involved a Corsair.

The Kamikaze Threat

The air battle over Okinawa is known for the effectiveness of the Kamikaze attacks. 34 ships were sunk and over 360 were damaged by Kamikaze pilots who were barely trained to fly. Because of the inexperience of these pilots, there was an entire infrastructure built to escort and guide the hordes of suicide planes to the right place to begin their attacks.

They just had to know where to find the ships.

The Navy and Marines were well aware of the daily high-altitude, high-speed recon flights. A single Ki-45 “Nick” dual-engine aircraft was used to carry out photoreconnaissance over Okinawa and the surrounding waters. These Nicks took pictures of the ships, noted their locations, and flew at an altitude that made interception extremely difficult.

But not impossible.

On May 10, 1945, a flight of Marine Corsairs was on patrol over Okinawa with the sole intent to intercept and destroy one of these Nick reconnaissance planes. When alerted to the heading and altitude of their target, the planes dropped their external tanks and began a climb toward the reconnaissance plane. Once they reached 20,000 feet the Marines began firing to lighten the load and inch even higher. Two of the four Corsairs had to turn back home due to engine trouble but the flight leader and his wingman remained determined to down this Nick

The flight leader got in range first and emptied the rest of his ammunition into the right wing and engine. With his .50 Cals empty he slipped aside to allow his wingman to deliver the coup de grace. His wingman was happy to do it and lined up for a beautiful shot. Once the Nick filled up his reflective sight, he pulled the trigger with authority.

Except, nothing happened.

All six of his guns froze due to the altitude. Now, most pilots would swear at the enemy plane and curse their luck. But Bob Klingman was not like most pilots. No, he was not going to let this Nick live another day and endanger the lives of his fellow Marines and Sailors. Instead, Bob Klingman was going to slice up the Nick’s rudder with his Corsair’s propeller.

You know, the only thing keeping him in the air.

Not only that, he chopped at the Nick’s tail several times before it broke loose, sending the Nick diving into the ocean. With his prey destroyed and his Corsair shaking violently, Klingman shut off the engine and dead sticked it back to base. Landing safely, of course.

I first read about this encounter when I was about 12 or 13 years old. At the time I had a lot of familiarity with the Battle of Britain and a lot of the air war over the European theater. But I was discovering the Pacific War for the first time. This story left quite the impression. I remember thinking this Marine was either the bravest aviator who ever flew. Or the craziest.

Now, I think he was probably a little of both.

No matter what, it was this story that got me interested in all things Corsair and got me hooked on the Pacific theatre. Something that I am still learning about to this day.

Building the Tamiya 1/48 F4U Corsair

Since its introduction in 1994, there have been roughly 143,645 articles extolling the virtues of Tamiya’s nice little family of F4U Corsairs. And they still are nice kits. Oh sure, they have some build issues and they are a bit long in the tooth. But if you are looking for an accurate, inexpensive, and relatively straightforward build of a Corsair, look no further. I have built several of them and I know their features and quirks rather well.

A previous post detailed some of my build strategies that I use on the Tamiya Corsair. For very little effort or money, one can do a lot to improve the look of this model and place something really special in the display case.

While the Tamiya cockpit is a gem, especially for its time, today’s 3d decal technology is simply a generation better. And the Quinta set is far better than any resin or photoetch cockpit set. If you then consider the absolute brainless ease in installation, then there really is no competition. I highly recommend these sets no matter who makes them.

The kit engine is similar to the cockpit – a marvel for its time but maybe showing its age a little. Instead of aftermarket, I used some led wire and strategic painting to get the most out of it. Same with adding brake lines to the landing gear.

The scratch building came into play with three areas: the gun barrels, wingtip lights, and the armored glass in the cockpit. These were incredibly easy to do with the most basic of tools and supplies.

I you are interested in a video showing how I did all that, just click below:

Painting and Finishing the Corsair

It took me a while to get this thing painted. And then when I was just about finished, disaster stuck and left me with paint peeling from the fuselage and messed up markings from paint bleed.

But all was not lost. This major oops, though definitely not welcome, was an opportunity to start over and improve some areas that I was not happy with. I wanted to mimic a finish of one of those ‘newish’ and well-maintained Corsairs that were based on Okinawa near the end of the war. Sure, this is an exercise in Gloss Sea Blue but these planes did have character:

These Corsairs were not the chipped, sun-bleached planes that were commonplace earlier in the war. They were stained, scuffed, and scratched but otherwise in very good shape. And this look was what I was trying to capture with my -1D the second time around.

Starting with Tamiya spray aluminum I used masking liquid and then I covered everything with Mr Color Lacquer Gloss Sea Blue. Some of these made chips were too big and where that happened, I used a 000 brush and more gloss sea blue to make them into scratches. Overall I was ok with the finish but I still have a lot more to learn.

Once again, if you are interested in how I painted this Corsair, I put together a video showing some painting and weathering techniques – just click down below:

Last thing

If anything, this project left me with a couple of thoughts about finishing these late-war Corsairs: getting the right finish on a Gloss Sea Blue plane is not as easy as it might seem, and scratching and scuffing paint is very hard to replicate in scale.

But I am not done trying!