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hi everybody.

after searching accurately the web, i must turn to arc knowlwdge to answer my question.

when i was a child i did build an hawk 1/48 f2-h2 banshee. it was a/c no 136 of an -in the box art picture- undecipherable vf.

i loved that model, among the others, and i would like to build today a banshee in the all-white livery and red markings as it was in the hawk model.

i bought the 1/72 academy brand new f2-h3 as in the pics it looked to be white.

disillusion: it was just a lighter f.s. 36440 that looked white. by the way, it's a beautiful kit, and i will build it grey/white or, why not, in the warlike glossy sea blue of korean war.

now. time to go to the question: i have done the usual net searching, but i found no image of a white banshee.

so, did the all-white banshee come from hawk's fantasy, or there's a gap in the f2-h imagery?

actually there's only another navy a/c i saw all white. the f-4d skyray. and of this i have the very good 1/72 tamiya kit plus a lot of imagery.

in the end, friends: do you think that an all-white banshee ever existed or not? and if yes, from which squadron/unit should i search the decals for? (the holy grail...)

sorry to be so talkative tonight...

thanks in advance and happy modeling!

best ciaos. bobo.

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Overall White aicraft with International Orange trim (described Red a lot of the time) would be a station aircraft at MCAS El Toro (124955) , NAS Oakland Reserve unit with 133 on the nose (125008), and the 4G coded 125036 from NAS Glynco.

 

That should give you some key words to search for the same photos online.

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13 hours ago, MoFo said:

 

Seriously?  The 30 year old Hobbycraft kit?  

hi mofo.

sorry, but we're misunderstood.

as for vintage kits i was mentioning HAWK 1/48 of 1957.

as for beautiful kits, i was referring to the latest academy 1/72 f2-h3...

never mentioned hobbycraft in my post.

ciao. bobo.

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14 hours ago, Bobo1953 said:

hi everybody.

after searching accurately the web, i must turn to arc knowlwdge to answer my question.

when i was a child i did build an hawk 1/48 f2-h2 banshee. it was a/c no 136 of an -in the box art picture- undecipherable vf.

i loved that model, among the others, and i would like to build today a banshee in the all-white livery and red markings as it was in the hawk model.

i bought the 1/72 academy brand new f2-h3 as in the pics it looked to be white.

disillusion: it was just a lighter f.s. 36440 that looked white. by the way, it's a beautiful kit, and i will build it grey/white or, why not, in the warlike glossy sea blue of korean war.

now. time to go to the question: i have done the usual net searching, but i found no image of a white banshee.

so, did the all-white banshee come from hawk's fantasy, or there's a gap in the f2-h imagery?

actually there's only another navy a/c i saw all white. the f-4d skyray. and of this i have the very good 1/72 tamiya kit plus a lot of imagery.

in the end, friends: do you think that an all-white banshee ever existed or not? and if yes, from which squadron/unit should i search the decals for? (the holy grail...)

sorry to be so talkative tonight...

thanks in advance and happy modeling!

best ciaos. bobo.

I believe the old HAWK kit of the overall white F2H-2 Banshee had markings that never existed. At least in all the photos I've ever seen. They may have been a reserve squadron but I have never seen that scheme applied to either an active fleet or reserve squadron.

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1 minute ago, jpk said:

I believe the old HAWK kit of the overall white F2H-2 Banshee had markings that never existed. At least in all the photos I've ever seen. They may have been a reserve squadron but I have never seen that scheme applied to either an active fleet or reserve squadron.

well, jpk. thanks.

but what about the "real" all-white banshees i can't find an image of?

thank you for your interest.

ciao. bobo.

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13 hours ago, Rex said:

Overall White aicraft with International Orange trim (described Red a lot of the time) would be a station aircraft at MCAS El Toro (124955) , NAS Oakland Reserve unit with 133 on the nose (125008), and the 4G coded 125036 from NAS Glynco.

 

That should give you some key words to search for the same photos online.

thank you very much rex.

the info about the trim color is important.

unfortunately till now the only reference to your suggestion i have found is a note about the mcas el toro 124955: http://www.millionmonkeytheater.com/F2H.html

and there is a testors kit from kawk molds that is issued in the livery of a Factory Flight Test Aircraft St. Louis MO 1949.

may i ask where did you get your references from?

thanks a lot and...happy modeling!

ciao. bobo.

Edited by Bobo1953
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I'm pretty sure the color scheme on the original box of the Hawk Banshee was just an artist's fantasy. If you are hung up on having a white Banshee with "red" markings and want to be accurate, you may want to consider an F2H-2 from the Navy/Marine Reserve unit in Oakland in the mid 1950s. There's an artist's rendering of it in the centerfold of Squadron/Signal's  "FH/F2H Banshee in Action"  and a photo of the same airplane in Steve Ginter's original "Naval Fighters No. Two McDonnell Banshee" on page 26. The photo is black & white, but it's clear that the airplane is overall white with the international orange areas on the nose, tail, underside of the rear fuselage, tip tanks and probably also on the outer wing panels. The Squadron book mis-identifies the color as fluorescent orange, but fluorescent orange would look much lighter in black & white.  Here's a shot of another from the same unit:

 

4806264462_f8f99b2fb2_o_zps9qfmxz9p.jpg

 

Also, to clarify, the "brand new" 1/72 Academy F2H-3 Banshee is not brand new, just a new boxing of the kit Academy has had available for a decade or so. Before that, the same kit was issued several times by Hobbycraft Canada.

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22 minutes ago, Paul Boyer said:

I'm pretty sure the color scheme on the original box of the Hawk Banshee was just an artist's fantasy. If you are hung up on having a white Banshee with "red" markings and want to be accurate, you may want to consider an F2H-2 from the Navy/Marine Reserve unit in Oakland in the mid 1950s. There's an artist's rendering of it in the centerfold of Squadron/Signal's  "FH/F2H Banshee in Action"  and a photo of the same airplane in Steve Ginter's original "Naval Fighters No. Two McDonnell Banshee" on page 26. The photo is black & white, but it's clear that the airplane is overall white with the international orange areas on the nose, tail, underside of the rear fuselage, tip tanks and probably also on the outer wing panels. The Squadron book mis-identifies the color as fluorescent orange, but fluorescent orange would look much lighter in black & white.  Here's a shot of another from the same unit:

 

4806264462_f8f99b2fb2_o_zps9qfmxz9p.jpg

 

Also, to clarify, the "brand new" 1/72 Academy F2H-3 Banshee is not brand new, just a new boxing of the kit Academy has had available for a decade or so. Before that, the same kit was issued several times by Hobbycraft Canada.

 

Good advice, Paul.

 

Just to add my two cents. During the flourescent red-orange period (1959-64, off the top of my head, don't quote me) they switched the layout and painted the FRONT half of the wings in the day-glo. So that's one easy way to tell on a b&w photo, as least on smaller fighter/attack and trainer aircraft. Larger aircraft are more difficult to ascertain. After this period (too lazy to get up and look at my Sq Signal Navy colors book) they reverted back to using Int'l Orange on the BACK half of the wings. 

 

So, if the color is on the FRONT half of the wings, it's always flourescent red-orange. (Never say "always," of course, but I love this period and have given it some study.)

 

Bob in Louisville

Edited by sierrascale
Spelling, correct dates for day-glo.
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And, of course, comparing the orange areas to the red in the national insignia - they're about the same value in the shot above.

 

And here's some from the same unit, but this time the F2H-4:

 

4816974441_633d82f564_b_zps4szbwdly.jpg

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The Academy/Hobbycraft kit seems to be adapted from the Airfix F2H-2, many of the parts are similar. I used to have both kits in the stash and it was easy to see the family resemblance.

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43 minutes ago, Paul Boyer said:

I'm pretty sure the color scheme on the original box of the Hawk Banshee was just an artist's fantasy. If you are hung up on having a white Banshee with "red" markings and want to be accurate, you may want to consider an F2H-2 from the Navy/Marine Reserve unit in Oakland in the mid 1950s. There's an artist's rendering of it in the centerfold of Squadron/Signal's  "FH/F2H Banshee in Action"  and a photo of the same airplane in Steve Ginter's original "Naval Fighters No. Two McDonnell Banshee" on page 26. The photo is black & white, but it's clear that the airplane is overall white with the international orange areas on the nose, tail, underside of the rear fuselage, tip tanks and probably also on the outer wing panels. The Squadron book mis-identifies the color as fluorescent orange, but fluorescent orange would look much lighter in black & white.  Here's a shot of another from the same unit:

 

4806264462_f8f99b2fb2_o_zps9qfmxz9p.jpg

 

Also, to clarify, the "brand new" 1/72 Academy F2H-3 Banshee is not brand new, just a new boxing of the kit Academy has had available for a decade or so. Before that, the same kit was issued several times by Hobbycraft Canada.

 

thank you again paul, thanks a lot indeed: this is definitive. here is my white banshee!

by the way, a beautiful aircraft.

i don't think that there are decals for this plane in the aftermarket, but the project really attracts me.

thanks also for the info about the misdoings of the cute koreans, who recycled the same molds for the...third time?

actually i had a look at the sprues and they seemed nice, but for the virtual absence of wheel wells. but i just packed away again as when the kit arrived i was in the heat of the f-101b project.

well one should always know better...i think i looked quite naive...

many thanks also to bob the river-counter and to don for the specification on the academy kit.

arc is a whole bunch of wonderful people!

happy modeling to all!

ciao. bobo.

 

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The three aircraft I listed are from the "Big Banjo" book by Steve Ginter. One is the same photo as the one Paul posted from the older Banshee book in the same series.

 

As for the boxart, it was indeed fictional, here are two of the White Banshee boxtops from Hawk.

 

170592-12155-pristine.jpg

 

138187-11104-pristine.jpg

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wow, rex!

yes, it's my childhood banshee i had seen recently on oldmodelkits by my friend alan bussie.

well, if it was released in 1957 in the u.s., say that it arrived in italy a year later or so, i was five and would have not started building but a year later.

i don't know how, i have sharp memory of both the issues, but i see from scalemates that the second was from the early sixties, so it is probable that it's the one i have built.

actually, looking at the box art, i would have said that the sequence was the opposite: the bomb run and built model photo look more "modern" than the landing one.

on scalemates there is also a testors 2003 reboxing and new decals for a " Factory Flight Test Aircraft, St. Louis, MO | 1949" and a " Naval Reserve Aircraft, Oakland, CA | 1957"

in facts you were suggested that one could find white banshees in the naval reserve, oakland.:thumbsup:

again, thank you rex.

best ciaos. bobo.

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You could very well be correct about the release order.

 

On Scalemates, when someone types in a date such as "196x" that means that he is guessing as to what the date of the release was. So, it could actually have been released before the other one. My old instructions are of no use, they came in a different release of the kit, with a Natural Metal scheme, and different decals.

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Bobo...Mofo understood you perfectly. The Academy release is indeed the about 30 year old kit previously released by Hobbycraft and is certainly not a beautiful kit but is certaily OK and as Paul says the only game in town. All Academy have done is add their name to the sprues and added what looks like (in photos) a much nicer decal sheet. By the way for you Canadian fans as well as 4-5 US schemes the kit has at least 3 Canadian schemes and now includes the red stripes and blue triangle rudder markings of two Cdn. squadrons....... 

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thank you for the clarification, rcaffan.

i'm somewhat embarassed by the naivety of my enthusiasm.

there are often strange and vicious stories behind our beloved kits...

maybe those koreans do really deserve one of the mr. kim jong-un's candies?

ciao. bobo

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11 hours ago, Rex said:

You could very well be correct about the release order.

 

On Scalemates, when someone types in a date such as "196x" that means that he is guessing as to what the date of the release was. So, it could actually have been released before the other one. My old instructions are of no use, they came in a different release of the kit, with a Natural Metal scheme, and different decals.

once more, thank you rex, for your kind dedication.

have a great day, and happy modeling!

ciao. bobo.

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On ‎7‎/‎3‎/‎2017 at 7:59 AM, Bobo1953 said:

well, jpk. thanks.

but what about the "real" all-white banshees i can't find an image of?

thank you for your interest.

ciao. bobo.

I wrote my reply before reading all the replies so I deleted it. Rex and Paul have the subject covered.

Edited by jpk
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14 hours ago, Rex said:

You could very well be correct about the release order.

 

On Scalemates, when someone types in a date such as "196x" that means that he is guessing as to what the date of the release was. So, it could actually have been released before the other one. My old instructions are of no use, they came in a different release of the kit, with a Natural Metal scheme, and different decals.

The upper box top image is the earlier one. I remember the second box cover, the bombing one, from the mid to late 1960's. The other is more than likely very late 50's to early 60's.

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