1:32 A-4E/F Skyhawk Air Intake FODs #C with Jet Exhaust Plug, AOE Cover for Trumpeter kit

A small attacker from the deck of an aircraft carrier

The A-4E version entered service in 1962 and brought a more economical engine with higher thrust and a fifth pylon under the wing. It was precisely this form that bore the main weight of combat use over Southeast Asia, when the aircraft took off from decks in the Gulf of Tonkin often several times a day. The machine weighed roughly half of what contemporary naval fighters did, and even so it carried a load comparable with the bombers of the Second World War.

Life on deck is cruel to equipment. Salt moisture, jetting water and the endless small dirt flying around the runway made it necessary for every machine to be blanked off once the engine was shut down. Intake covers, a plug for the nozzle and a cover for the measuring probe therefore belong among the kit the ground crew carries with them as naturally as wheel chocks.

What it means for the build

In a large scale an open air intake is a problem: the duct behind it can be done faithfully only with great effort, and otherwise a black hole remains. Blanking it off elegantly gets around this whole part and at the same time lends the model a story, because an aircraft like that unambiguously stands parked on the display.

The parts are fitted dry and their seating is worth trying before the surroundings are painted; the paint adds a layer by which the cover stops fitting. The rendition carries the designation by the letter C and is built for the Trumpeter kit. It is usually painted in saturated shades, because real covers deliberately tend to have garish tones so that nobody overlooks them on the walk-around before takeoff.