John1 Posted November 10, 2018 Share Posted November 10, 2018 (edited) I'm building the Tamiya -1D Corsair with a full compliment of HVAR rockets. The Tamiya rockets are truly wonderful but one thing that will be on me will be the firing leads that ran from somewhere in the wing / rear pylon into the HVAR. Does anyone have detailed info on what these looked like and where they were located? On a related note - the Fundekals instructions for my particular Corsair show the warheads to be an off/creamy white color instead of the regular OD. Anyone have any info on what that was about? Just curious, never seen that before. Wondering if they were some sort of WP or smoke warhead instead of the standard HE? Any info on all this is greatly appreciated. Edited November 10, 2018 by John1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LSP_K2 Posted November 10, 2018 Share Posted November 10, 2018 Here's an image from this Detail & Scale book on the Corsair. I can't say with absolute certainty that all earlier Corsairs were so fitted, but I believe they were. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John1 Posted November 11, 2018 Author Share Posted November 11, 2018 Perfect, thanks very much! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1to1scale Posted November 11, 2018 Share Posted November 11, 2018 Yes, that’s the picture. If I remember right, the green tips were high explosive, and white were either timed air-burst or white phosphorus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finn Posted November 11, 2018 Share Posted November 11, 2018 Warheads with faded colours: Jari LSP_K2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John1 Posted November 11, 2018 Author Share Posted November 11, 2018 11 hours ago, 1to1scale said: Yes, that’s the picture. If I remember right, the green tips were high explosive, and white were either timed air-burst or white phosphorus. Sounds plausible, I know that the US Army typically color-codes it's warheads and white usually meant smoke or WP. Never knew they had a WP warhead for the HVAR. Given how obsessed the USN was (is) about fire on ships, you would think this would be verbotten. I'm leaning towards the timed air-burst. Just funny that with all the googling I've done on the subject, nothing ever came up except the standard HE warhead. Anyone have a pic of the rear of the HVAR that shows exactly how the firing lead was connected to the motor? Almost looks like they had some coiled up slack in the cable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1to1scale Posted November 12, 2018 Share Posted November 12, 2018 There were many versions of different warhead, what i dont know myself, is when they were introduced. They had several by Korea, but its not my expertise as to what came out during WW2. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finn Posted November 12, 2018 Share Posted November 12, 2018 On 11/11/2018 at 4:38 AM, John1 said: Anyone have a pic of the rear of the HVAR that shows exactly how the firing lead was connected to the motor? Almost looks like they had some coiled up slack in the cable. Here is a drawing of one: Jari Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John1 Posted November 12, 2018 Author Share Posted November 12, 2018 1 hour ago, Finn said: Here is a drawing of one: Jari You are the man! That answered all my questions. LSP_K2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John1 Posted November 12, 2018 Author Share Posted November 12, 2018 38 minutes ago, Jennings Heilig said: Sometimes Wikipedia comes to the rescue: "Two different versions of the HVAR were built during World War II. The warheads were either 1) Mk 4 general purpose warheads with 7.5 pounds (3.4 kg) of TNT and both nose and base fuses or Mk. 2 AP warheads with 2.2 pounds (1.00 kg) of Explosive D." I saw that Wiki. Just didn’t think the white warheads would be AP. Figured the AP ones would be different shaped (thought I saw pics of ones used in Korea, they were much longer and pointier) and not very common in the pacific theater. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finn Posted November 13, 2018 Share Posted November 13, 2018 Found this one as well: Jari LSP_K2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thierry laurent Posted November 13, 2018 Share Posted November 13, 2018 Hi, I did a lot of searches about the same topic some years ago. So you're lucky! This may help regarding the colors and markings: 5 inches HVAR rockets. USN HVAR color: flat grey motor tube and olive drab warhead. USAF was Oxidized aluminum tubes and olive drab warhead. Steel-colored fuze. Some examples of stencils: On the side of the rocket motor (Horizontal black letters) or on the warhead (Horizontal white letters without the first line: 5.0 IN. ROCKET BODY MKI): 5.0 IN. ROCKET BODY MKI BU. ORD. DR. No. 394567 CONTR NO. 5172 LOT 95 CDV INSP DMR On left side of the rocket motor (Horizontal black letters): 5.0 IN. MOTOR MK10 MOD.6 BUORD. DR. NO 656724 CONT. NO. 11098 LOT 147 H.B. On right side of the rocket motor (Horizontal black letters) or on the warhead (Horizontal white letters): GR MK.16 MOD 0 BLJ LOT 1952 AMM LOT NO. RMDA 1517-54 CODE 5.00 710-0600-J USE UP TO 120F ONLY or another one seen on the body right side: ROCKET MOTOR, MK 32 MOD 1 LOT: RA-H-1044 SAFE TEMPERATURE LIMITS -40 TO + 120 F On the warhead (Vertical white letters): WARHEAD, MK 6 MOD 1 TNT LOT:PA-E-1366 Note: Vertical means that the text is written perpendiculalry (to the rocket axis). And some other pictures: I hope this helps! LSP_K2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhilB Posted November 13, 2018 Share Posted November 13, 2018 Plus three different shaped warheads too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John1 Posted November 13, 2018 Author Share Posted November 13, 2018 1 hour ago, PhilB said: Plus three different shaped warheads too. One photo shows the earlier 3” rockets, a predecessor to the HVAR. The other one shows some of the shaped-charge AP/anti-tank HVAR’s being loaded on an F4U in Korea. These were hurriedly deployed to counter NK T-34’s. Pretty much disappeared later in the war. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John1 Posted November 25, 2018 Author Share Posted November 25, 2018 On 11/13/2018 at 1:05 AM, Finn said: Found this one as well: Jari This is probably a stretch but does anyone know if this (the red sealant over the rocket exhaust openings) was accurate for an actual rocket? I've seen a lot of warbirds with replica ordinance and often times, they take "artistic license" with details like these. Given the quality of this picture, I'm guessing this is a replica HVAR and not the real deal. Just trying to get all the small details correct. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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