Howdy y’all,
I just finished building this kit.
It was a fun little helicopter to build. It went together really well. Because I had read that this was a relatively easy kit, I wanted to use it to improve some of my basic modeling skills.
- Avoid any seam lines.
After staring at a model for days or weeks, it’s easy for me to start overlooking some obvious flaws. So my goal here was to not overlook any seam work.
- Become more comfortable with weathering techniques, specifically chipping along panel edges.
I will reiterate this kit goes together great…however, as they say, the devil is in the details. I quickly discovered that virtually every detail was wrong…
The box claims it’s an F model but after comparison to pics and descriptions of the variants, it’s definitely an S model. Just one example is the infrared jammer mounted above the engine exhaust on the F, but is absent on this kit.
Also, the only chin turret option in the kit is for the shrouded turret that’s mostly seen on later Cobras.
The paint guide and decals for the desert schemes were for F models, which this model is definitely not.
Finally, the entire body is hollow, meaning you could look clean thru from the air intake out the back of the exhaust.
So as a bonus, I got to use some resin and brass aftermarket parts, come up with a new paint scheme, and scratch build “something” to replicate the turbine and engine exhaust.
This is the something:
Because you only see about 1/16” of the front of the turbine, I used styrene tube set in the body vertically, with small squares of card stock to secure it. Attached to the tube is about 1/4” of the top of an old super glue bottle turned horizontally and attached to another styrene rod to simulate the drive shaft. It isn’t perfect, but worlds better than a hollow body.
I blocked off the exhaust with 3/8” styrene tube and a round plug cut from card stock. I also had to block off several small air scoops from the inside with card stock.
For the turret mods I was very pleased that Werner Wings provides a beautiful resin replacement and a Master Model brass barrel set made a much more accurate cannon.
As far as an appropriate paint scheme, I found inspiration in some awesome pics from the BRIGHT STAR '85 Exercise. The helicopters were well worn, with lots of chipped paint. Perfect subjects to base this build on. So a little US Helo Green, and the application of the kit stencils, and a whole lot of panel line accents, enamel washes, chipping effects using aluminum paint and a fine brush, and here we are.
Thanks for taking a look.
. And not a seam line to be seen!!