ITALERI 1/72 F4U-5/5N CORSAIR "NIGHT INTRUDER"
'INBOX Review'

 

Reviewer: Myself  (rec.models.scale)

Kit:  Italeri 1/72 Kit No. 044 - Corsair F4U/5N "Night Intruder" 

Aircraft:  The Corsair with its distinctive Gull Wings is one of the most famous fighters of World War II, first seeing service in 1943 with the US Marines.  It served with distinction in all Pacific war battles and was superior to anything the Japanese were able to throw up against it.  The Corsair seemed to start fading out of existence with the emergence of jet fighters after the war ended, but when the Korean War commenced in 1950 there was quickly discovered a need for the Corsairs to participate in battle again.  Here further models were improved and the F4U-5N served as a Night Intruder aircraft against Korean targets.  It had a length of 10.5 m, span of 12.5 m and a maximum speed a fraction under 600 km/h.

Parts: There are two sprues that float loosely in the box featuring dark blue injection molded plastic.  There are about 45 or so pieces in the kit plus a two piece clear canopy on a separate sprue, which is a bit on the thick side and slightly distorted in spite of its rather crisp looking appearance.  Detail is very good on the kit with panel lines all engraved and featured well.  The wheel well details are quite shallow (barely a millimetre in depth!) but do feature ribbing and structure detail with the interior of the gear doors also displaying some detail.  The cockpit is adequate for a mainstream kit of this type with nicely rendered seat, stick and tub containing feet mats and rudder pedals already molded.  Side panels and main instrument panel are also provided and both receive raised console detail.  The engine is simply a "block" with the front row of cylinders exposed.

Instructions: Fold out Italeri style sheet with brief history on front, sprue diagram, paint identifier labels from the Modelmaster range with generic names and FS numbers provided where possible for the painting of the model, both individual components and external scheme.  This is followed by a very easy to follow 9 step assembly process and four view diagrams for markings and decal placement.

Versions:  Two US Korean War examples are provided for in the kit, both of course in overall Midnight Blue FS15050, which is quoted by the instructions as being "Blue Angel Blue" - is this correct?  The first is an F4U-5N US Marines Corps, VMF(N)-513, Wonsan, Korea, 1950; and the second an F4U-5N US Navy, VC-3, USS Princeton, Korea, 1953.

Decals:  The sheet is not very big and mainly consists only of the unit badges, fuselage codes, insignia and force (eg: "Navy") designations.  The Marines corps example includes white decals whereas the Navy example has all the white parts (eg: the star in the insignia) in a light blue colour, I assume to cut down on visibility.  There are also a series of small stars (kill markings?) for this version.  The decals are in excellent register and given there is an Italeri F4U-7 review on this site, a kit released at the same time as this one, then one expects the same result with the decals as in that kit, which sounds very promising as they went on well.

Accuracy:  The F4U-7 version reviewed separately suggests that the accuracy of the kit will be quite acceptable, capturing the unique lines of the aircraft very well.  The main difference or distinctive change to this version is the wing housing for the radar and this matches reference material quite accurately based on what I can assess on the sprue. 

Options:  There is very few options available in the kit with only a two piece canopy suggesting an open cockpit as the main option.  There are no weapons for underwing attachment points although you can affix small pylons under the wings as shown on the boxart.  You will need to open up holes in the underwing piece if you wish to do this (and the instruction sheet shows which holes to open).  Only the centreline fuel tank is the only stores of any kind supplied in the kit.

Impressions:  This kit was released at the same time as the Italeri F4U-7 kit which has been reviewed separately on this site.  As both kits share a lot of common components you can expect the build to match that of the F4U-7 which sounds like it will go together easily and hassle free with only the canopy and centreline wing to fuselage roots providing any problems that needed some sort of attention.  The kit displays a lot of essential detail in 1/72 scale and is very acceptable on the sprue in all these facets.  The breakdown on the kit is identical the F4U-7 and the number of parts sounds very similar.  The wings are split into three pieces being a single underwing section and two upper halves.  I would say that this is yet another good Italeri offering and highly recommended to all modelling skills. A quick browse of the F4U-7 review should give you some insight into how this kit can be expected to fair at its conclusion.

 

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