Warbird Information Exchange

This is a beautiful and almost never modeled very advanced Japanese floatplane. The story of the build was unique in how it all started. Here is the link on the build and how it all went together with many photos, videos, and info I gathered on this aircraft to help me assemble the plane.

Build Log here
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1417974
This was totally finished in 3 months time.

Nice work....

Phil

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A man's got to know his limitations.

Thank You Phil,
A very interesting model. I only have seen 4 others modeled and flown. Flew very easily also.

If the build log is quite long you can look at theses pictures.. If you see an interesting on click it to zoom. The videos are still in the build log though.
Here's a link to that story.
http://s1190.photobucket.com/user/neons1/story

image

Why'd they paint the leading edges yellow? Been wondering about that lately.

Oh ... and wonderful model, just beautiful! A bonus to hear she's nice to fly.

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Cheers,
Kurt Maurer
League City, Texas

PIC, Ford 6600 pulling Rhino batwing up and down the runway

I always wondered myself about the bright red or yellow leading edges myself. The British used them also. The best I found was on another forum and it seems logical. So this is what I read:
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The official regulation was dated 12 September 1942 but the bands may have appeared before this and the bands first introduced in the homeland, possibly following the Doolittle raid, may have been red.On 18 April 1942, the Japanese HQ discovered that the US insignia with the red dot confused Japanese AA gunners. They began to place large white squares and 'bandages' behind/around the Japanese national insignia for "Homeland Defense" aircraft. Some of these "Homeland Defense" white markings found their way to the South Pacific.

Head on tests revealed they needed some other quick identification of who was who...and both the Japanese Army and Navy tested RED leading edge stripes on aircraft.

On 11 Sept 1942 the official order came from Imperial Headquarters for the IJA-IJN to have YELLOW leading edge stripes. The order was sent out on 12 Sept 1942 according to the date stamp below. Japanese researcher "Summer" located this order recently, in the Japanese equivalent to the US NARA.

Applications of yellow stripes were noted in the 'field' in October 1942.
The yellow bands were 20cm wide and indeed spanned from the wingroot to exactly half the wingspan.
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Also thank you for your comments. Glad you enjoyed looking her over. I posted some pic links. By the time you read this it may be posted , I hope. Same on the Mars.