The
Aircraft
The
only aircraft that was completely designed built and operated exclusively in
Australia
during WWII. The Boomerang was not an exceptional fighter; it spent most of its
career as a ground support aircraft and a feared one at that. Boomerangs were
the only plane available to the RAAF at the beginning of the war, but were
quickly replaced with Spitfires from
Britain
and the P-40 from the USA.
After
Japan
's attack on Pearl Harbor,
Australia
found itself ill prepared.
The only real fighters the RAAF had were a small number of the Brewster Buffalo,
which were later found to be no match for the Japanese Zero fighter when flown
by the RAF defending
Singapore. To overcome this shortfall and the possibility that
Australia
could not get fighters from overseas, design work was started on the CA-12
Boomerang. Using parts from the CA Wirraway, the
Boomerang was designed and built in only three months. 105 airframes were built
during 1942-3.
In 1943 a second batch of 95 improved CA-13 Boomerang mk
II's were built. The most obvious change was the
addition of two 20mm cannon. Later versions like the CA-14 had a turbocharger to
improve high altitude performance and the CA-14A had square tail feathers.
Neither were produced in quantity because of the
availability of the Spitfire mk VIII. The final
version was the CA-19 Boomerang mk II with minor
modifications over the CA-13. Only 49 CA-19's were built.
Preamble
I
picked this elderly Airfix kit up at a local hobby shop sale for under $10 and
after seeing the terrible decals, promptly picked up Red Roo’s
most excellent sheet depicting a white tailed Boomerang. In the end I never used
this particular sheet. More on that later!
The
Kit
The
plastic parts are moulded in light grey plastic and
are typical Airfix quality. Both fuselage halves, tail planes and the three wing
parts are festooned in raised detail and rivets, which was going to make
replacement of the raised detail difficult. There were numerous sink holes
present on all the larger parts which would need to be filled.
The
cockpit canopy and rear armoured glass were packaged loose as per Airfix
standard practice.
The
instructions were typical Airfix, simple and well illustrated, but the decals
were terrible with images being vague, ill defined and in the main out of
register. Aftermarket is a must here.
Click on
images below to see larger images
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Construction
Construction
(as always) started in the cockpit. Research indicated that the cockpit of the
Boomerang was a tubular steel frame with no floor as such but as per the age of
the kit only a rather simplified seat was supplied along with a pilot that
looked a refugee out of a Frog kit. I decided to go the cheat’s way out and
painted the cockpit interior flat black to hide the vast emptiness. I painted
the seat Pollyscale Interior Green and added Tamiya tape harnesses, just to busy
the seat up a little more.
The
engine moulding included the engine firewall and
when cleaned up and painted looked quite convincing for the scale. I painted the
engine assembly flat black and dry brushed various shades of Testors
metallisers. I sprayed the cowling interior with
Tamiya AS-12 Natural Metal.
I
then cemented the fuselage halves together, which went together very well, with
some filling, and sanding required to smooth over the joins. The cowling was a
particularly bad fit requiring a good deal of filling and sanding to smooth out
the join to the fuselage.
The
lower wing half was offered up to the completed fuselage and a moderate amount
of filler was needed to smooth over the joins fore and aft. Fit of the wing at
the wing roots was average with a fair amount of remedial work needed to remove
small steps and problems along each side. One area was so bad; I had to add plasticard
shims to plug the gap. At the same time I added the horizontal stabilisers,
cleaning up the resultant joints as well. This was a frustrating time as it
seemed to take for ever to get all looking ready for primer. A subsequent primer
coat revealed several flaws, particularly around the 20mm cannon roots, which
were cleaned up quickly.
The
undercarriage legs cleaned up well and look adequate when painted and washed.
The undercarriage legs were painted Tamiya AS12 Natural Metal and Citadel Mithril
Silver. Tyres were painted Aeromaster Tyre Black and
weathered with a little Citadel Shadow Grey.
The
undercarriage bay was painted with Pollyscale Interior Green and when cured,
washed with a burnt umber sludge wash weathering mix, and then dry brushed with
Interior Green lightened with a little white.
I
then carefully cut the transparencies from the sprues, cleaned them up and
attached them to the fuselage. Small amounts of PVA glue watered down with a
little water were used to fill any glaring gaps with excess glue wiped away with
a mark one moistened finger. The rear panels were then cleaned up and added to
the fuselage. This proved to very frustrating with minute amounts of model glue
added by toothpick to “tack” the transparency in place with gaps carefully
filled using PVA glue. All transparencies were then masked with interior framing
pre-painted in interior green. Now the kit was ready for painting.
Painting
and Decaling
Kit
decal options are provided for three aircraft – two, overall foliage green and
one disruptive green/brown/sky blue. Although I had a new Red Roo decal sheet in
my decal locker, I opted for “Phooey” which was included on the kit sheet.
However, as mentioned earlier, the Airfix decals were only worth binning. So
where could I source “Phooey” from? A quick Google search revealed that Esci
released a Boomerang sheet many years ago and another question on ARC resulted
in a sheet arriving at my doorstep a couple of weeks later. Thanks Hal!
Both
the Esci and the Airfix instructions indicated that
“Phooey” was Foliage Green with sky undersides. Yet another question on the
Aussie Modellers Forum linked me to a profile done by Noel Barnes indicating
that “Phooey” was actually overall Foliage Green.
Here
is the description as provided with colour profile.
“CA-13
Boomerang, QE-A - "Phooey" of No 4 Squadron, RAAF.
Flown by Flight Officer Ian Pedersen, Labaun,
North Borneo
, 1945. The aircraft made a forced landing at the Awar
airstrip, Hansa Bay,
New Guinea
in February of 1945. It eventually crash landed on the 29th of July 1945.”
This
is the profile I based my Boomerang on and as such an overall coat of Pollyscale
Foliage Green was applied. Many thanks to Noel for
contacting me and pointing me in the right direction.
At
this stage I also sprayed the spinner cover green as well.
Once
all the paint had cured, I applied several coats of Johnsons
Future with a wide flat brush, kept especially for this purpose, to seal
everything in and preparing the surface for the decals.
I
then added the “hedgehog” exhaust, which had been cleaned up and pre-painted
Modelmaster Burnt Iron into the exhaust recess on
the starboard fuselage side.
Now
the fun began. Pre-warned is pre-prepared!
Stage
1
I
brush painted Microscale Decal Film on the Esci
decals to prevent shattering.
Stage
2
Decals
were soaked in very hot water whereby they promptly curled. I brush painted a
puddle of Future onto the decal final location. The decal was placed and excess
Future wicked away with a tissue.
Stage
3
Each
decal was massaged with a cotton bud into conforming to the model surface
carefully and with lashings of Future. After a while each decals annoying
necessity to curl was overcome. Future was brushed over the top to lock down the
decal.
Stage
4
After
drying overnight an application of decal sol was used to snuggle each decal down
further. When dry all looked great with only a little silvering corrected by
careful brushwork.
In
contrast, the Aussie Decals black dots I used to represent the machine gun wing
openings and the Aeromaster solid silver decal stock used for the wing landing
lights performed flawlessly with no decal sol needed. (The landing lights were
circles punched out by a sharpened 3mm dia brass
tube).
Total
time for 18 decals was around 8 hours!
My
favourite part of building a model kit would have to
be weathering! I then used a raw umber
Vallejo
acrylic sludge wash to enhance the recessed lines defining the control surfaces
and cowling gills.
As
these aircraft served in the hot tropical sun, I “bleached” the high points
of the upper surface paintwork with a lightened shade of the overall green. I
the dry brushed Humbrol matt aluminium over the “wear” areas of the fuselage
side under the cockpit and the wing roots.
Once
again the model was put aside to cure and finally sprayed with Aeromaster flat,
to give a matt appearance.
Finishing
Touches
The
undercarriage attachment was essentially trouble free, although I needed to use
a 5mm length of brass tubing to install the tail wheel into the oversized hole
under the tail. Finally I added the assembled propeller and the Pitot tube.
Careful
applications of powdered pastel around the engine exhaust and gun barrels were
then applied. I then lightened various panel lines to add a degree of sun
bleaching. All masking was then removed and my Boomerang was complete!!
Overall
Well,
I happen to like this stubby little Aussie aircraft! BUT the frustration and
angst generated whilst constructing it almost outweighed my liking of the
Boomerang.
Unfortunately
the Airfix release is the only game in town if you want a 1:72 Boomerang for
your display shelf. This is changing soon though, with Special Hobby supposedly
releasing a new Boomerang kit this year.
I
would recommend this kit to any experienced modeller mainly due to its age. That
said and done, a junior modeller could still get a great result straight OOB.
There is also an alternative scheme available from Red Roo which is a massive
improvement over the poorly printed kit decals. I chose to use very old Esci
decals, which needed a great deal of work to perform well.
References
World
Aircraft Files
The
Internet
Mr
Noel barnes
http://www.aussiemodeller.com/Images/4%20March%202005/Phooey.jpg
Michael
Click on
images below to see larger images
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