At the end of WWII the Japanese, instead of using existing fighters as kamikazes, started purpose-building planes to throw at ships. One of them was the Nakajima Ki-115 Tsurugi (Sword). Made out of wood and steel, capable of using any old engine they had laying around, with jettisonable landing gear (they weren't gonna land normally!) and an 800kg BFB on the belly.

In the end, although over 100 were built, they never got to use them in action.

This is the Eduard 1/48 kit of the little beast.

http://www.inpayne.com/temp/ki115-003.jpg
http://www.inpayne.com/temp/ki115-002.jpg
http://www.inpayne.com/temp/ki115-004.jpg
http://www.inpayne.com/temp/ki115-007.jpg

I wasn't sure if I should bother weathering the damn thing- the real plane would have come right out of the factory, to a front-line unit, and flown one and only one mission. But I figured the pilots HAD to have a training flight or two, no? And Japanese paint in the Pacific tended to come off like a prom dress. In the end, I couldn't help myself.

Well, unfinished patches on the craft would show how badly they were short on materials, particularly metals, the propeller, even the bomb itself.

And Japanese paint in the Pacific tended to come off like a prom dress

Never heard it put quite that way before John. I like the mental image though. I agree about the test flights, and it wouldn't look right without weathering, accurate or not. You can always claim it was extensively tested by the US after V-J Day.

And now that I look at the pictures myself, I notice the left wheel is loose! Crap!
Back to the photo table it goes!!

Apparently, I'm the only guy who didn't get lucky at the prom!

Whenever I have a wheel problem on a model, I tell people that one wheel was toed in to offset engine torque on takeoff.

Hell, I didn't even GO to my prom! :lol: