1:72 Vought SB2U Vindicator

The Vindicator in prewar finery

The Vought SB2U was the first monoplane scout bomber of the US Navy. It entered service in 1937, had folding wings for the sake of the hangar below deck and the rear fuselage still covered with fabric. At the time it came about it represented a clear step forward; five years later it was hopelessly obsolete and its crews paid hard for that in the fighting of 1942.

Five machines of the years 1938 to 1941

The sheet aims at the period when American carrier aircraft wore the most colorful markings in their history: richly yellow upper wing surfaces, colored bands on the cowlings and large fuselage numbers. Three subjects belong to squadrons from two aircraft carriers, one to a Marine Corps scouting unit from the Caribbean and one to a machine from a naval station in California in 1939. Anyone who wants to build an aircraft that really shines in a display case starts right here. Most of these schemes disappeared within a single year, when the navy went over to muted gray-blue finishes, so it is a short and easily datable episode.

The richest package of the whole series

Besides the markings the set holds masks for spraying the color scheme, masks for the canopy and a photo-etched part with the cartridge-case ejection chutes under the wing. The large yellow areas and bands in particular are more sensibly sprayed than stuck on, because a continuous colored film of that size lays down badly and breaks at the seams. Fix the photo-etched accessory on with cyanoacrylate only onto a finished clear coat, otherwise a visible step will form beneath it.