WWII Japanese Ground Maintenance Dio

1/72 Academy A6M5c with Hasegawa vehicles

by Jerry Hawhee (Old Blind Dog)

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This is a revised and slightly re-worked version of the diorama I built for the Ground Vehicles GB here on ARC several years ago. I’ve literally sawed the old dio base in half, concentrating the action of the scene and improving the composition. 

 

The A6M5c Zero being refueled here is the Academy kit enhanced with parts from the Aires resin cockpit and the Eduard Zoom photo-etch set. It was entirely hand-brush painted with Polly Scale IJN Green over IJN Sky Gray; sub-standard kit-supplied decals were used and the model was heavily weathered using Tamiya Flat Aluminum applied with a Microbrush to simulate chipping.

The Isuzu fuel truck and Toyota aircraft-starter truck come from the excellent Hasegawa kits, which also include generous helpings of figures and accessories; oil drums and carts from the fuel truck, and the “bomb dolly” from the starter. I used Polly Scale Br (RAF) Middlestone and Khaki for the trucks, highlighting with Tamiya Flat Aluminum, Gunze Steel and Gunze Wood Brown. Tires and underframes were hand-brushed with Polly Scale Grimy Black. I took the opportunity to do some touching up while revising the dio.

The “concrete” base was made from Evergreen .040 plastic sheet, scribed with my Bare Metal Foil Scribing Tool and hand-brushed with a prime coat of Polly Scale Grimy Black and one or two not-especially even coats of PS Concrete. This, in turn, was mounted on a plywood sub-base. Some interesting discoloration occurred here and there when I used acetone-based fingernail polish remover to de-bond the CA that held some of the figures and vehicles in place. After halving the plywood sub-base with my table saw and reattaching the removed pieces, I thought the bleached areas looked right in character and elected to leave them as they were.

Click on images below to see larger images

  

Sticklers for detail or those who get a thrill out of identifying continuity errors in movies will immediately notice that the trucks are in the wrong colors! As the Zero was an IJN plane, the trucks ought to have been painted Navy Blue, and, in fact, I’d originally intended to use two A6M5s for the scene with accompanying naval personnel and colors, but as one of the Zeke’s accidentally “crash landed” on my workshop floor, I had to substitute a Hasegawa IJA Oscar at the last minute, and the trucks ended up in army livery. A close look at the driver figure in the starter-truck cab reveals a white naval uniform shirt; all other figures are in the Middlestone and Khaki army uniforms. Admittedly, figure painting is not my strong suit!

 

Cheers

 

Jerry (Old Blind Dog)

Photos and text © by Jerry Hawhee