1:72 TBM-3 Avenger

A torpedo aircraft of the close of the war

The Avenger was the largest single-engine carrier machine the US Navy deployed during the Second World War. The TBM-3 version was produced under license at the automaker General Motors and represented the performance peak of the type: a more powerful power unit and a strengthened wing made it possible to carry rocket weapons under the surfaces. It was in precisely this form that the aircraft served during the closing operations in the Pacific, and a number of them went on flying after the capitulation of Japan. The roomy bomb bay space under the fuselage set the Avenger apart from the smaller carrier bombers and allowed it to carry, besides a torpedo, an ordinary bomb load or depth charges when patrolling against submarines.

Three decks, one year

All three subjects fall into the year 1945 and each belongs to a different vessel. The machine with the number 84 flew with a composite squadron on the escort carrier Saginaw Bay, the aircraft marked D-87 belonged to a torpedo squadron on the deck of the Suwanee, and the third with the number 309 served with a torpedo squadron of the large aircraft carrier Essex. The difference between escort and strike carriers showed in the size and placement of the identification markings, so the individual variants differ from one another distinctly. The smaller escort carriers also operated closer to the coast and their aircraft carried out different tasks from the squadrons of the large strike formations.

The color scheme of the subjects

The machines given carried the three-color combination of dark blue, intermediate blue and white, that is the standard of naval camouflage of the second half of the war. The light areas of the underside helped against observation from below, the dark upper surface against observation from above over the water. The sheet reckons with this base and it is advisable to have its shades applied and cured before you set about the markings.