1/72 Sunderland MR5 - Italeri

[Bruce]

I have just completed my RNZAF Sunderland MR5 which is based on the new Italeri Mk III (I brought mine from Hannants in the UK as soon as I heard of its release!) This is a superb kit - especially compared to the old Airfix offering, with really high quality moldings and even Etched brass details. I modded this with Beam gun windows in the rear fuse, modified the gun turrets using some ex- Wellington Turret bits from my bits box, and most importantly some cast resin Pratt and Whitneys. I made these up myself as a learning exercise, using a modified Airfix Catalina engine as the master. My resin cast props were not sucessful, so I brought some "Quick Build" Resin Catalina props instead.
The example I have modelled is NZ4107 of 5 sqn Lauthala bay, at the end of her service life. this aircraft was one of the few Sunderlands recorded as carrying personalised artwork - "Tiny's Tropic Tours" above the nose door. I used Ventura Roundels and Fin Flashes and inkjet printed the serials and nose art (pretty small in 1/72!)











With my older MkIII Transport (the Airfix Kit)



and with my Postwar Boeing PB2B1...

[Dave Homewood]

Great work Bruce.

[harrysone]

Fantastic effort Bruce ...been tempted to do one of these myself

[dewobz]

Nice work Bruce. I love the exhaust stains.

[flyjoe180]

Nice work Bruce.

[ZacYates]

Very nice! I'll have to get one for my stash and build it as NZ4115 once MOTAT's done with it. Any issues wih the kit, or things to look out for when building a kiwi one?

Also, way cool camo and roundels on the Mk.III!

[Bruce]

The base kit absolutely superb and comes with a really detailed instruction booklet. Some of the brass details were a bit fiddly, and a lot of the interior detail is never seen, but definitely the way to go. For the NZ version there were lots of little detail changes in addition to the obvious engines, turrets and beam gun windows - for example the Yagi antenna on the nose, Dual ADF fairings and dual pitot masts. The kit comes with the under wing radomes - a close inspection of the moulded parts shows sections that have been have been given provision for a Mark 5 in the future, but like the Italeri Hudson Mk II variant, dont hold your breath! I have the moulds for the engines if you do want to mod a MR5!

[ZacYates]

I may have to take you up on that! Thanks for getting back to me. So it has PE parts OOB? I had no idea.

[falcon124]

Nice work on the model. According to my father's logbook, he crewed 4107 through-out his entire time in NZ & Fiji (1959 to 1964).

The only other one that spanned the lot was 4116.