1/72 Hasegawa EKA-3B Skywarrior

Gallery Article by Burt Gustafson on Oct 20 2009

 

For your viewing pleasure, here are some photos of my 1/72 scale Hasegawa EKA-3B Skywarrior. Nicknamed "The Whale", the Douglas A-3 Skywarrior was originally designed as a strategic  bomber for the U.S Navy, and was the heaviest aircraft ever to be flown from an aircraft carrier. A-3s were in service from the mid-1950s to 1991. In its later service life it was converted to an ECM platform and an air refueling tanker, and was re-designated the EKA-3B. 

About the kit: Assembly of this kit was a straight OOB build and relatively easy. The parts fit was quite good. External detail was also quite good, but cockpit detail was a bit lacking. However, with a closed up cockpit, it doesn't matter. The parts fit was good enough to allow me to build, paint, and decal the engines separately. The finished engines were then installed after model painting was finished. Note that saving the refueling probe installation to the very last might be a wise thing to do. I didn't, and it broke off 5 minutes after I installed it.

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Painting the model was a bit challenging because of all the masking involved. All painting was done with enamel paints. White areas were airbrushed with MM Flat White. Black surfaces were airbrushed with MM Gloss Black while the main body of the model was airbrushed with MM Flat Gull Gray. Bare metal surfaces of the engines were primed with gloss black, and then airbrushed with Alclad II Pale Burnt Metal.

The kit provided decals for two aircraft. I chose to go with decals for the VAQ-130 "Zappers", U.S. Navy, June 1972. The decals were excellent; they snuggled down nicely with a touch of Micro Sol. Note that the engine decals are incorrect for this model. I messed up one of the engine decals so I substituted the engine decals with engine decals from an S-3 Viking. I finished the model with a coat of MM Semi Gloss Lacquer Finish. 

I am pleased with the finished model, an enjoyable project.

Burt Gustafson

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Photos and text © by Burt Gustafson