CAC CA-14B Sea Wallaby

[PR19_Kit]

When the RAF had Lightnings and Phantoms based in Germany some of the stencils were posted in  German and English. I guess the Harriers may have been the same too.

On a Phantom that makes for a LOT of extra paint!

[Old Wombat]

Almost there!

Actually, I would be, if it wasn't for the myriad of small stuff-ups that have occurred during these final stages. Still, only one left to fix, although it may take a couple of days to do so properly.

I must say that, even though she'll never be a "show" model, she's looking pretty good.

Some of you may have noticed that the model has changed from a CA-14A to a CA-14B, I figured the changes, especially the bigger engine & subsequently longer nose, made this sufficiently different from apophenia's original design to warrant the new designation.


Thanks for your patience!

[TheChronicOne]

Starting to have a coniption fit over here over the lack of new pictures so I'm stoked.   

[Old Wombat]

In late-1941 Australian aero-engineers from the Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation (CAC) obtained access to two captured Fw.190 fighters of the A-1 & A-2 variants. The engineers were impressed with many of Kurt Tank's innovative ideas, taking copious notes & measurements for future use.

Returning to Australia they immediately set about designing an aircraft to incorporate many of these features. In a feat of design & production wizardry on par with, or better than the development of the CA-12/13 Boomerang the first prototypes were flying in mid-1942.

The result of this work was the CA-14 Wallaby which was initially offered to & rejected by the RAAF. The biggest issue was the Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp engine which was under-powered for the airframe, but tooling up for a copy of the BMW 801 was impossible at this time.

Next was the RAN, with a "navalised" version, the CA-14A Sea Wallaby. The Chief of Naval Air Operations looked at the rugged aircraft & said "Sure, we'll take a batch, but we want a more powerful engine & 20mm cannon. Immediately!"

CAC began building CA-14A's but had no idea what to do about the engine until Pratt & Whitney representatives chimed in with "We can you get copies of the tooling for the R-2800 Double Wasp, if you like."

Some quick calculations were undertaken & CAC "liked". In addition they used a newly developed belt-fed 20mm cannon based on the Oerlikon & incorporating improvements found in the MG 151/20.

The new variant differed enough to be given a new sub-variant designation, the CA-14B but not a new registration code, so all CA-14s are N56-??? registered.

Official records show that  57 x CA-14As, 193 x CA-14Bs (including 24 x CA-14B*s with 4 x 20mm cannon) & 84 x CA-14Cs (fitted with super-turbochargers) were built, with the CA-14As all being relegated to the advanced trainer role & the CA-14Cs being primarily allocated to high-altitude escort & interception duties.







The aircraft depicted here, NA-? (N56-93), was flown by Lt. Commander Tomas Joseph "Tojo" Wong (RAN) (Commanding Officer of 850Sqn RAN between September, 1944, & August, 1945) during the, overall, disastrous series of running battles called the 1st Battle of Leyte Gulf, fought from the 23rd of October through to the 26th of October, 1944, when the unexpectedly strong Imperial Japanese Navy had come out to play in earnest. It is depicted as it looked after the Allied fleet had withdrawn to regroup.

During this period 850Sqn engaged in between 4 & 8 sorties per day, being heavily engaged with enemy forces every mission. Wong was credited with 16 kills, 9 probable kills & 18 damaged over this period & the subsequent 2nd Battle of Leyte Gulf.

Meanwhile their ship, HMAS Jervis Bay, a heavily modified Essex-class fleet escort carrier, was hit by 3 bombs of 500lb or greater, one torpedo &, apparently accidentally, a Japanese aircraft. Despite fires & taking on water she was still able to operate her aircraft for the duration of the battle.

As a result the US Army operations on Leyte stalled & 4Div RAM & 7Div 2AIF were called in from reserve on November 1, 1944. The landing operations for these units led to the 2nd Battle of Leyte Gulf which, although just as intense, was more successful for the Allies.











NA-? bears the motto "Strike Hard" (which became the post-war motto of 850Sqn) in Chinese (嚴打), with the small, super-texted Chinese character 四 meaning the number 4 (this being the 4th aircraft flown by Wong to bear that name), underscored by a leaping white tiger.

Tomas Joseph Wong was born at 8:02am on the 5th of August, 1914, at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, the second son of parents of predominantly Chinese ancestry, however his paternal grandmother was a Russian Jew & his maternal great-grandmother was Irish Catholic. His parents were members of the Church of England according to his birth certificate. Tomas Joseph was of the 3rd generation born in Australia on both sides of the family.

Both his parent's families were quite successful in various forms of retail. His father owned a small chain of middle-class department stores, which his elder son was expected to inherit & Tomas was expected to be a part of.

However, as his mother is reported to have said, Tomas Wong was born to be a military leader. He was born in the Year of the Tiger at the outbreak of a war. Even before he finished his secondary education at Geelong College, he had divorced himself from the retail world & embraced the world of aviation. Wong, jokingly, "blamed" his father, who had tried to show him the power of wealth by taking him on an expensive flight to Adelaide, to witness the opening of a new store in that city, when he was 15 years old. Wong's father had been airsick the entire journey but Wong, himself, had been enraptured by the experience of flying & had vowed to make it his life.

In 1935, at the age of 21, Wong had completed a Graduate Degree in Engineering at the University of Melbourne & had earned his civilian pilots licence. He applied to the Royal Australian Air Force & the Royal Australian Navy for a job. The RAAF rejected his application, the RAN accepted.

At the outbreak of World War 2 Wong  was a Sub-Lieutenant in the RAN FAA with experience flying several types of aircraft, including Bristol F.2b Fighters & Fairey Flycatchers, & was eagerly awaiting the delivery of the first batch of Gloster Sea Gladiators to what had just become 851 Sqn RAN FAA (formerly 4 Sqn RAN FAA, formerly 4 Sqn RANAS).

Tomas Joseph Wong would survive the war, going on to command HMAS Jervis Bay during the Korean War & attain the rank of Admiral, Chief of Naval Staff (Australia) & be appointed the Chief of the Defence Force (1965-1969). He became only the second officer to be awarded the (honorary) rank of Admiral of the Fleet (Australia) upon his retirement in 1970.


The Build

Firstly, I'd like to apologise to the RCAF & RAAF for using the NA code, it was meant to be NB but I lost the list of free codes I had researched & NA seemed logical for the ex- 1 Sqn RAN  (as it must have to the RAAF who used it for their 1 Sqn).

The build involved incorporating the wings, lower rear fuselage & rear tail surfaces (planes & vertical) of a Hasegawa FW.190 A-3 into the CA-12 Boomerang structure. The rear fuselage was stretched by about 1cm which counter-weighted my eventual decision to fit the more powerful P&W R-2800 Double Wasp engine (increasing available power from 1,200 hp (895 kW) at 2,700 rpm to 2,100 hp (1,567 kW) at 2,700 rpm). The Hasegawa FW.190 parts went together very well but the Special Hobby CA-12  Boomerang parts were a struggle due, mostly, to the lack if any form of positive alignment or positioning structures & less than clear instructions (If, like me, you're going to build this kit into an actual  Boomerang,  get lots of reference photo's & plan the build before even thinking about glue. Some parts you would be better off scrapping & fabricating more accurate pieces from styrene stock (the cockpit framework comes to mind, here)) & there are far too many small, fiddly parts that are ... less than essential.

If I had thought about it, I probably would have done some more cut-&-shunt work on the inner wings to allow use of the longer FW.190 undercarriage but resulting in a shorter folding outer wing (the current fold is just outboard of the ridge separating the inner Boomerang wings from the outer FW.190 wings).

Camouflage colours are;  Tamiya XF-23 (Light Blue), XF-54 (Dark Sea Grey), XF-18 (Medium Blue) & LifeColor UA-044 (Non-Specular Sea Blue). Top coats were SMS Premium Super Clear Gloss & Flat Clear.

Honestly, I'm never putting LifeColor paints through my airbrush again, they're too much of a mongrel to spray & clean out of the workings.

The entire build was plagued by various problems, the worst all coming toward the end of the build, & this isn't going to be a build I'll try to repeat. However, having said that, it was a mostly enjoyable build & I'm fairly happy with the result.

[Old Wombat]

I haven't fully considered the spec's of the CA-14B but roughly;

Speed: some 25mph faster than a F6F Hellcat
Armament: 2 x synchronised .50cal machine guns mounted in the upper cowl; 2 x free-firing .50cal machine guns in the outer wings & 2 x 20mm cannon inboard of the .50cal's
Range: slightly less than the F6F Hellcat

Someone can play with that if they want.










Hellcat comparison:









WW2 RAN FAA & RAM AA Family photo:





Again: Thanks for your patience! I hope the wait was worth it.


Cheers!


Guy

[NARSES2]

The wait certainly was worth it, excellent build sir 

Those 3/4 frontal shots remind me of something ? Possibly some of the latter Curtis proposals/prototypes ? I need to go and look at the Anigrand part of the stash.

[Old Wombat]

Thanks, Chris!


By the way, forgot to mention that the gun barrels are all from a Polish company called Master Models (Master: Reality in Miniature) & the prop is a QuickBoost item, one of their P-61A/B Blackwidow set.

[The Rat]

I think that's what we refer to as a 'show stopper'! 

[Dizzyfugu]

That's looking very good, and the best thing IMHO is that neither the Fw 190 nor the Boomerang ancestry is obvious.

Just the legs are a little short...? 

[Old Wombat]

I think that's what we refer to as a 'show stopper'! 

Oh, I wish! Rattus but there are far too many faults for that!

Still, as I said earlier, I'm reasonably happy with the finished product, I just don't think it's my best work.

That's looking very good, and the best thing IMHO is that neither the Fw 190 nor the Boomerang ancestry is obvious.

Just the legs are a little short...? 

Thank you, Dizzy!

Yeah, I kinda made mention of that in the small "Build" segment.

[PR19_Kit]

Oh YEAH! That's something else, Womby. 

REALLY looks the part, most impressive, and well worth the Whiffy nomination too.

[chrisonord]

Absolutely marvellous  build  O.W. and your  patience with  it has certainly  paid off. I can see a wiffy award for this too
Chris

[Old Wombat]

Thank you, both! Greatly appreciated, Kit & Chris!

[TheChronicOne]

DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMN!    Wow, that turned out even better than I was thinking......  looks so good with the others with similar paint scheme which I have to say are outstanding......    I'm going to have to try something with these colors myself because this right up my alley. The whole thing is killer.....  It looks like a completely natural thing.... natural as in....   it could be real and will confuse the hell out of people at shows I'd suspect. 

[Rheged]

This is a remarkably good, highly imaginative build.  I am impressed