America's first manned space program was best summed up by Deputy Administrator, Hugh L. Dryden in the foreword to the book, Project Mercury: A Chronology (NASA SP-4001) where he wrote “ Project Mercury is now history In its short span of four years, eight months, and one week as the Nation's first manned space flight program, Mercury earned a unique place in the annals of science and technology. The culmination of decades of investigation and application of aerodynamics, rocket propulsion, celestial mechanics, aerospace medicine, and electronics, Project Mercury took man beyond the atmosphere into space orbit and confirmed the potential for man's mobility in his universe. It remains for Projects Gemini and Apollo to demonstrate that potential.” There are many fine books on Project Mercury, you can use your computer's search function to find them or go to your local library.

A perfect addition to your diorama is this Aires Aerobonus US Army Load set. Aires Aerobonus provides you with two resin pieces, perfect for a load in the back of a 1/48 scale 2-1/2 ton truck or a 1/48 cargo aircraft. The first piece consists of 12 sacks strapped to a wooden skid with the second piece consisting of four crates strapped to a wooden skid. Of note is the re-sealable packaging that Quickboost uses that makes the parts easy to review and then stuff back into the package securely.

Aires Aerobonus has molded the parts in light grey resin with no discernable bubbles. There are no mold seams to sand off and the resin plug is easily removed from the bottom with a razor saw or Dremel.

Although most paints will adhere to resin alone, I would recommend that you wash the parts to remove any remaining mold release and prime them first. I painted the sacks and the crates with Vallejo acrylic paints.

Highly recommended.

Background

The Polikarpov I-16 was a Soviet fighter aircraft of revolutionary design; it was the world's first low-wing cantilever monoplane fighter with retractable landing gear to have attained operational status, and as such "introduced a new vogue in fighter design." The I-16 was introduced in the mid-1930s and formed the backbone of the Soviet Air Force at the beginning of World War II. The diminutive fighter, nicknamed "Ishak" or "Ishachok" ("Donkey" or "Burro") by Soviet pilots, prominently featured in the Second Sino-Japanese War, the Battle of Khalkhin Gol, and the Spanish Civil War. The Type 24 replaced the skid with a tailwheel, and featured the much more powerful 670 kW (900 hp) Shvetsov M-63 engine. The Type 24 also featured four ShKAS guns, proper landing flaps replaced the drooping ailerons, and a second cockpit door was added on the starboard side.

This is another of SAC’s marvelous landing gear replacements for 1/144 scale aircraft. One of the worst things to fix on a finished aircraft is the broken landing gear which occurs from either a move or less than careful handling, usually by a friend of spouse. I was at a display when a spectator started to pick up one of Brian Baker’s planes. I tried to stop him, but he said “I know what I’m doing!!” and then proceeded to remove the antenna, landing gear and rigging in one grab.

The Kit

You get two sets of nicely cast metal gear legs. This is cool, because Eduard has two Spitfires in their 1/144 kits. Well, there IS a single kit, but I haven’t seen that one yet.

I show in the photos below that the SAC parts match the Eduard parts pretty closely. In 1/144, it’d be hard to say exactly. Even with a magnifier, I’m not that good.

The Aircraft

The F4U-5 Corsair was a 1945 design modification first flown in mid-December 1945. It was intended to increase the overall performance, incorporate pilots' suggestions, and featured a more powerful Pratt and Whitney R-2800-32(E) engine with a two-stage supercharger rated at a maximum of 2,850 hp. Other improvements included automatic blower controls, cowl flaps, intercooler doors and oil cooler for the engine, spring tabs for the elevators and rudder, a completely modernized cockpit, a completely retractable tail wheel, and heated cannon bays and pitot head. The cowling was lowered two degrees to help with forward visibility, but perhaps most striking, it was the first variant to feature all-metal wings

The Resin Parts

Injected-molded plastic kits do have some limitations when forming small details. Often times these details may not replicate the parts exactly, have difficult to remove mold lines, or may be fragile.