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The second kit of my summer '16 start with hopes to finish by 7 Dec for 75 anniversary. Pearl Harbor P36, P40B, A6M2b. Life hit the fan and bench time kept to minimum. My wrecked knee kept me from working at bench as it's 36" (91cm) high and I stand to do my work. Tamiya's very nice A6M2b will be base kit for my Pearl Harbor subject. IJNAF pilot Shigenori Nishikaichi's A6M2b "B11-120" will be the subject. I've always been fascinated about the story of the "Niihau Incident". Nishikaichi crash landed his aircraft after receiving damage during the second wave attack at Pearl Harbor. The events that followed for the next 6 days is nothing short of epic. Moral of the story, "Don't mess with the Big Kahuna". Nishikaichi was based on the carrier Hiryu. After crash landing on the island of Niihau Nishikaichi set his aircraft afire. This photo was taken 17 December, 1941. Fire damage is visible and well as some parts already scavenged. This aircraft is now on display at The Pacific Aviation Museum at Ford Island, Pearl Harbor. Ejector sink marks removed with putty and sanding pen. Following primer of Gunze 1500 Black I applied Gunze 127 Interior for cockpit area and tub assembly. Moving forward to detail paint and Aotake finish applied with mix of Tamiya clears (11 parts X19 Smoke, 10 parts X23 Blue, 1 part X25 Green). Heavily thinned then a few passes on a silver base of Alclad Aluminum. IP complete using kit decals and clear lenses.

I have started work on the Tamiya A6m2b Zero. It is a superb kit and I have been spending the last several weeks studying resources and gathering materials. I purchased a copy of Aero Detail's Zero book. I have been spending a lot of time studying j-aircraft.com and a couple other parties have helped me out with some details. Particularly George from Arawasi provided me a few key photos of Zero's at Tainan airbase. Also Pat D a regular on Hyperscale sent me a ton of photos to help me out with radio details, or should I say non details. As I have found out the plane I am building was sans radio equipment. According to j-aircraft.com the radio equipment had not been fully integrated with the airframe to obtain good working reliability. As a result on land based planes the equipment was frequently deleted. The plane I am building in particular was recovered on Guadalcanal some years ago and it was determined it did not have radio equipment. Saburo Sakai also has stated this plane was not radio equipped. To help out with my build I purchased the Big Ed Pe set, masterbarers machine guns, and the Burna decal sheet. I started on the cockpit this weekend. I feel one area where the Tamiya Zero is a little plain is in the cockpit. The resources I have found show lots of raised rivets. So I have added some in areas likely to be visible especially in light of radio deletion. Also there are very prominent lightening holes in the double bulkhead behind the pilot. My plan was to reproduce the double bulkhead idea however I found the kit part had a wide enough flange to carefully drill relief holes. Now for a couple images. I am using archer resin rivet decals. If you slice close to the rivet line and use decal solvent they will form to any shape you want.