In spite of promises, RAZBAM has yet to produce a paint kit for their A-6 series of AI Carriers-capable aircraft, so, I kinda made one.
This is a KA-6D (tanker equipped) version from VA-75 "Sunday Punchers" circa 1974- 1976 in Airwing 3 aboard CV-60. A photo of a real one is included.
A-6s normally carried a MODEX in the 500 series. KA-6Ds were rebuilt A-6As and had no radar or inertial nav systems. The old non-functional fuselage "swiss cheese" speed brake panels were bolted shut as opposed to production later models with the wells paneled over. They also used a green anti collision light system when aboard ship to readily find them at night.
Tankers typically were painted with a "belly band" in squadron color(s) and were numbered in the 520s. I recall we had 10 attack A-6Es (500 - 509) an 4 KA-6Ds(520 - 523)
I was a pilot in VA-75 in this period and flew tankers many times; night ops got interesting since we had two F-4J squadrons and anyone having problems in an F-4 ran low on gas in a big hurry. The KA-6D had lots of gas "give away" and was a great asset.
Tankers usually carried a "buddy store" on the centerline vice a standard 300 gal / 2000 lb centerline tank; this was a good backup in case the main fuselage mounted package went down.
I like the RAZBAM model very much for carrier ops. It is very smooth and predictable. It has a good AoA indexer and the cockpit is very realistic. I don't care for the heavy bump texturing but overall it is very accurate.
I could not figure out how to find the lips of the intakes in order to paint them a tan/ocre color, which A-6s had - a kind of rain erosion coating that was kind of rubbery in texture.
I used MODEX 521 vice 520 even though the Bureau Number does not match the photo. These numbers moved around during their time in a squadron anyway.
I am getting pretty good with Photoshop, but need to learn how to feather the grey/white intersection along the fuselage. I have studied numerous online tutorials but they don't help much.
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