Building the Academy P-36A Hawk

Manufacture: Academy
Scale: 1/48th
Kit: # 12238
Build Series: Ben Builds Season Three: The P-36 Hawk (Completed) 

Background

I have always liked the look of the P-36! There was just something "interesting" about the plane, with it's mismatched nose gun calibers and big radial engine. It always peaked my interests and to this day, I have only ever built two P-36s: a 1/72nd scale, Monogram kit from 1989 and this 1/48th scale Academy boxing. So, let's talk a little about this one.

The Kit

I had a blast building this kit. The parts went together very well, with minimal fit issues. The parts were flash free and crisply molded. The decals were clearly printed and went down without any issues. The cockpit looked OK, but it wasn't as busy as I would have liked. I did end up adding some homemade seat belts and closing the canopy. There just isn't a lot of detail to show off, so I figured it would be fine to close everything up.

Since this kit allows you to make a few different versions of the P-36, there are a few areas where you might need to remove some molded in details. If you are building the Hawk 75 version, the kit is pretty much ready to go, but if you want to build the Pearl Harbor version as I did, you have to remove some details. If I remember correctly, you have to sand down some louvers around the fuselage nose, some dive breaks under the wings, the wing guns and a few panels here and there. Not too bad, but a bit tedious.

Even though I did enjoy the build, I did have a few issues with the kit. Nothing that should dissuade you from picking this one up, but first off, the cockpit wasn't as accurate as I was hoping it would have been. I found some issues with the floor and the instrument panel, so I did my best to rectify that by adding basic styrene details.

My other real issue was the wheel bays. The kit parts were molded with a canvas covering detail that did not match any of my references. Now, as I understand it, these covers were sometimes carried, but none of my references showed them installed. And when I did find images of these covers, they did not look anything like the kit parts. So, I decided to take advantage of this, remove them and just try my hand at scratch building the bay interiors.

I tried to represent the interior details with strips of styrene, cut down and shaped to look like internal ribbing. I wanted to get the look close enough to my references, but since this was my first attempt at this sort of thing, I gave myself some leeway. I ended up going for more of an artistic representation, rather than a 100% accurate recreation. It was fun process! The finished product was not exactly perfect, but I am happy with the end results, so if nothing else, it was a good learning experience for me. I really wanted to just try it out and to see if I could actually build those types of details. I did my best and that is all one can hope for. 

Conclusion

Despite the kit's few issues like the cockpit and the wheel wells, I think that overall, this was a very nice project. There is a lot of potential with this model. A more experienced builder could include resin add-ons and updates and have a great basic kit to build off of, or a beginner builder could take their time and practice their modeling skills. Either way, I would recommend that fans of early WWII aircraft check this kit out. Build it and have fun with it. I know I did!

Feel free to checkout my completed P-36A Hawk build over on my YouTube channel!

Thanks for joining me today, stay safe and happy modeling.

Sci-Fi Wednesdays - Moebius Models Viper Mk. VII

Manufacture: Moebius Models
Scale: 1/32nd
Kit: # 916
Build Series: Sci-Fi Wednesdays - Viper Mk.7 (Completed) 

Background

Battlestar Galactica was such an awesome show! Based on the 1970s television series, the 2004 sci-fi show was a masterpiece of storytelling and I binged that entire series in a matter of weeks. Great characters, intriguing plot lines and of course, sweet looking ships.  Anyone who knows me, knows that I'm a big ship guy. That is one of the reasons why I liked Babylon 5 and most of the Star Trek shows. I just love a good ship and BSG had some nice looking ships! 

Watching the show, I immediately fell in love with the designs of the Vipers, the Cylon raiders, the Battlestars and the Bay ships. They looked great on the screen and I couldn't wait to see those epic space combat scenes.

It wasn't until 2014 that I actually found out that Moebius had released some of the ships as model kits. I saw them in a Squadron mail order catalog and I just couldn't resist. I immediately pick up both the Mk. II and the Mk. VII Vipers and couldn't wait to get started. 

To be honest, I actually wanted to build the Mk. II first, since it was my favorite of the Viper designs, but since I hadn't built a sci-fi kit in ages and the Mk. II was going to require some very careful painting with the color white (a difficult color to paint on any day), I decided to start with the Mk. VII. 

The Kit

This was my first experience with a Moebius kit and I have to admit, I was pleased! The parts were nicely molded, flash free and clean. It does have some heavily scribed recessed panel lines, but it didn't bother me as much.

Moebius supplies a very high quality, glossy instruction manual, printed in color, which is a really nice change of pace. Their line drawings were easy to understand and I didn't have any real issues with assembly.

There decal sheet was well printed, nice and glossy, with all the images in registry.  Moebius gives the builder options for either Galactica or Pegasus versions of the Mk. VII and options for a number of different pilots. Nice touch Moebius!

This kit was well engineered, with very nice fit in most areas. I did have a large seam between the upper and lower fuselage, but some filling and sanding minimized it enough for my liking. This kit comes with both landing gears and an in-flight display stand, so depending on how you wish to show the finished product you have two options. I decided to cover the gear bays and use the stand, but the doors were a little finicky to fit. They seemed to be a bit undersized, so I had to take my time installing them.

One of my main complaints for this kit was the cockpit assembly. The detail was extremely sparse and not very accurate to the t.v. show. I ended up doing a ton of scratch building and after it was all done, I was able to get something that looked closer to the actual design. Honestly, I think a resin replacement would have been a better choice, but I got it to work.

I also printed my own gauges and glued them to my scratch built instrument panels. If I ever build another one, I might go with a lighting kit and replace the entire cockpit with a much nicer part.

I also had some issues with the wings. The overall shape were more or less correct, but the details were not as accurate as I would have liked. The guns were not angled correctly, the wing intakes were not molded in the correct shape and the gun housings were very different then what appeared on the show. Even so, the kit still built up into a nice looking bird, even though it isn't as screen accurate as one might think.

I ended up drilling and adding some additional thruster ports around the nose intake. There were several missing and it was a super simple job to add them in. I also deepened the remaining ports, to give them a bit more impact.

I used a mixture of Tamiya and Gunze Aqueous paints for the basic color. It is probably too dark, but I like how it looks. Decals settled nicely into the panel lines, I just used a bit of Micro Set and Micro Sol for good measure. It all worked well.

I ended up tinting the canopy with some Tamiya Smoke, not only to obscure the cockpit's lack of accurate detail, but to help hide my paint work on the pilot figure. I am just not that good at painting figures, so the tint helped to keep that hidden. 

Conclusion

Overall, I had a lot of fun with this build. The fit was good, the decals went on nicely and aside form a bit of seam issues here and there, it was a really enjoyable build. Like I said, I wished Moebius had spent a bit more time on the cockpit, but if it is a deal breaker for you, it can be replaced with a lighting kit or just doctored up with time and better references.

Despite the few misgivings that I had regarding some of the points of accuracy, I still would highly recommend this kit to any sci-fi enthusiasts. It was a great project of a really cool ship.

Feel free to checkout my completed Viper Mk. VII build over on my YouTube channel! This was my first entry into my Sci-Fi Wednesdays build series, so it was a little rough.

Until next we meet, stay safe and happy modeling.

Building the Eduard Hawker Typhoon

Manufacture: Eduard
Scale: 1/48th
Kit: # 1131
Build Series: Ben Builds Season Four: The "Spiffy" Tiffy (Completed) 

Background

I have to be honest, I don't know much about RAF aircraft. Sure, I can usually recognize a Spitfire or a Hurricane, but when it comes to the later war aircraft like the Typhoon or Tempest, I am mostly in the dark. I probably wouldn't have even looked at this kit, if it weren't for a group build called "The Spiffy Tiffy" group build, being hosted by the International British Modeler. This build was focusing on Typhoons in any scale, and by any manufacturer, which intrigued me as I had never build one before. Typhoons were one of those aircraft that looked mean and impressive and I thought that the group build would give me a good reason to try my luck at building one. So, I grabbed the 1/48th scale Eduard kit and boy am I glad I did!

The Kit

First off, this was a great model and I thoroughly enjoyed branching out into RAF aircraft. It really gave me some appreciation for the Tiffy. I enjoyed myself so much, that I ended up building and purchasing several additional British planes and I have plans to pick up a few more in the coming months.

As I mentioned before, the group build only focused on the Typhoon, any make, model or version. Some builders built in 1/72nd, others went with the larger 1/24th scale kits, I stuck with my favorite scale and selected the early "car door" version in 1/48th. For some odd reason, I typically enjoy building the early versions of subjects, so this was a perfect kit to continue on with that trend. 

During the kit selection process, I found out that this Eduard kit is actually a reboxing of the 1/48th scale Hasegawa Typhoon. That means that it has the typical Hasegawa habit of adding inserts into certain areas of the model, in order to give the molds more flexibility. All of these types of kits share typical sprues of common parts, but for each unique version, Hasegawa gives you inserts, so you can make a particular mark. In this Typhoon's case, the canopy and cockpit areas were different, so I had the inserts for those sections. 

On a personal note, I am not really against the idea of inserts and I understand why some manufacturers choose to do this practice, but most of the time, inserts can tend to be a bit fidgety. Hasegawa's line of P-40s come to mind, where you have to replace the entire tail section depending on the version you're building.  This leaves a nasty seam and step to contend with, but that comes with the territory.

For the actual Tiffy build, the kit was a real pleasure to work on. Not only was the box loaded full of extras like decals, resin parts, masks, and photo etched pieces, but the part fit was really solid. The only issues that I had, focused around the P.E. parts and some of the kit's plastic inserts. They gave me a bit of a pause, but that isn't really surprising and I was able to pull it off. 

Truth be told, I am not a huge fan of P.E. parts, mostly because of their size and their innate ability to fly off of the sprue and be swallowed up by the carpet. In the Tiffy's case, most of the PE levers and switches were super tiny and very difficult to work with, and once the cockpit was closed up, almost impossible to see. Due to this fact, I ended up leaving a few of the smaller, hidden parts off the kit. 

Building the kit was relatively painless and most of the steps were a joy to work through. As I had mentioned before, the plastic inserts around the canopy and spine of the aircraft did leave a bit of a seam and step that had to be dealt with, but with some fitting, sanding and filling we got it done.

Paint was typical late war British Dark Green, Ocean Grey and Medium Grey. I used a mixture of Vallejo, Mr. Hobby, and Tamiya paints to get this all squared away. I used a top coat of Future to seal it all together and to get it ready for decals. The decals went on nicely, with just a little bit of Micro Set and Sol to help them along the way. After that we sealed it all up with another gloss coat and tried my hand at weathering. 

Weathering is still a very difficult concept for me and I am sorely lacking in a lot of the necessary techniques, but it is a work in progress and I'll figure it out one of these days....I hope lol. I actually do not have any store-bought washes, so I ended up making my own sludge wash with some pastel chalk and weathering powder by AIM. I used a few drops of dishwashing liquid to breakup the surface tension and then applied it all around the kit. The results were alright, so I added some color pencil chipping and some oil stains and streaks with Testors Rubber. I finished it all off with some semi flat coat and called it a day.

Conclusion

Overall, this was a great project and an awesome kit to work on. Not only do you get Hasegawa molds and Eduard detail parts, you also get resin upgrades pieces, and a beautiful decal sheet. All of those additions really made this build a great time on the bench and I would recommend the kit to anyone, who is a fan of RAF aircraft or Eduard kits. Truth be told, I was a little bit skeptical at first, about the PE and all of the added resin parts, but they weren't too bad and really spiced things up. As I mentioned before, I ended up leaving off a few of the PE levers, as they were absolutely lost in the cockpit detail. I just didn't feel they were all warranted, so I kept them in the spares box. I think the cockpit looked sufficiently detailed, so I was happy with the end result. Feel free to checkout the completed Hawker Typhoon build over on my YouTube channel!

Thanks for joining me today, stay safe and happy modeling.

Building the Hobby Boss F-105D Thunderchief

Manufacture: Hobby Boss
Scale: 1/48th
Kit: # 80332
Build Series: The F-105D Thunderchief (Completed) 

Background

The Thundercheif and I have always had a rough relationship, a sordid history of failures and regrets. In fact, up until this Hobby Boss kit, I had tried on two separate occasions to build a F-105, but each time something would happen and the kit would either end up in the spares box or "crashed" in the backyard.

My first attempt was the venerable 1/48th scale Monogram, F-105D. That one failed. I then tried the Monogram F-105G Wild Weasel in the same scale. I got the kit into a basic airplane shape, but it didn't make it out of my backyard combat zone.

Despite my initial failures, the F-105 has the distinction of not only being one of my favorite aircraft from the Vietnam era, but it was also my very first jet model kit that I ever attempted! Still, a completed 105 eluded me, until now.

The Kit

Upon opening the box, we are reminded of just how big this kit really is. This thing is monstrous, which is awesome for anyone who likes a large plastic canvas. The surface details are nice and crisp with some beautiful rivet work and numerous, fully detailed areas. We have a fully detailed engine, radar, refueling probe, nosecone and Gatling gun bay, which can all be posed open or closed. Of course these areas could all be doctored up with even more details, P.E. parts and scratch building, but they get the job done.

The cockpit isn't anything to get that excited about, but it builds up well enough out-of-the-box. I really think a resin cockpit set would be a great investment, especially if you intend on having the canopy open, but like I said, it isn't too bad for out-of-the-box. If nothing else, a new seat would add a nice level of detail.

Construction was fairly straightforward. Nothing really jumped out at me during the initial construction phase and the fit was very nice. Areas such as the mid-air refueling probe doors and the radar dish nose cone were geared to be displayed open, but since I decided to close them up, I had some minor issues getting them all aligned and installed.

I also had some small gaps that showed around the wing joints and a slight step at the rear tail cone/fuselage joint. They weren't too bad and after a few swipes with my sanding sticks and some putty, they basically disappeared.

Like I mentioned before, this kit had a lot of detailed sections that would get completely covered and lost within the fuselage. I didn't want to waste much time on those sections, so I just closed up areas and left out a lot of the unneeded parts. Instead, I used the open spaces in the nose and gun bay for ballast. I figured that this kit might be a tail sitter, so I took ever opportunity to add weight, forward of the nose wheel.

With regards to the ordinance, I didn't really like the assortment of weapons that came with this kit. I wanted to see a really bomb laden F-105, like you do in a lot of the Vietnam era photos. Unfortunately, the kit came with some rarer load outs, so I opted to purchase a weapons pack from Hasegawa. I wanted that iconic cluster of 750lbs. bombs that you always see on period photos! I did have to scratch build the center pylon, but that wasn't too bad and the weapons pack took care of the center ejector rack. I think that the finished product turned out looking the part and I am happy.

I finished the kit in a mixture of Vallejo and Tamiya acrylic paints, with a Future gloss coat and a Gunze rattle-can flat coat. Decals were kit supplied and Micro Set and Micro Sol were used to get the decals to settle down. They all preformed perfectly and I didn't have any issues with tearing.

Seeing as I have never been very adept at weathering, I kept this finish rather clean. I tried my hand at a dot filter, but I didn't have much luck with that. I also preshaded panel lines and tried to keep the top colors thin so the preshade would show through. I need a lot more practice. Despite my best efforts, I didn't achieve the exact results that I was trying for. If I had been a bit more comfortable with painting, I would have loved to so some additional sun bleaching, chips and color variations. Maybe next time!

Conclusion

Overall this kit was a really fun build. I have always loved the F-105 and I think that this one turned out far better then I had expected. I think that it looks great on my shelf and since I had such a blast with this version, I have even considered picking up the Wild Weasel version!

Yes, the kit was a bit over engineered, but the fit was excellent and I think that any detail fanatic would have a field day with this setup. Well done Hobby Boss!

One of the biggest areas of concern for this kit, were the landing gears. They are very delicate and flimsy, so I would recommend that you invest in a set of white metal replacements. I think that they would hold up better under the kits heavier weight.

Feel free to checkout my complete F-105 build over on YouTube!

Until next time, stay safe and happy modeling.