To be working on something in between burn out sessions on the Wespe, I decided to dive into the Hasegawa 129. I picked the kit up last year at a show for 23 clams and it even had the CMK interior set inside the box. Not a bad deal considering these boxings are going for 50 plus on eBay right now!! I think this was one of the coolest planes in the war. Had a very unique look was loaded to the gills with guns!! The armored cockpit was a marvel as well. Can you say precursor to the A-10?? Anyways, the CMK kit came with the 50 gallon fuselage tank that sits directly behind the pilot and I wanted to show it but didn’t want to leave the panel off. Think I will finish it all out and scratch some fuel filler caps and have them open. Wont see much but there is some pretty neat detail right underneat them. Cut of the rudder and elevators using some polyester thread (thanks fermis, you da man!!) and repositioned them slightly.
I also picked up a Superscale decal sheet and will be using it on this bird. Typical splinter scheme with blue spirals on the spinners and blue letters. Hopefully more to come soon!!
Hey, its really shaping up. I love the look of this plane, especially the one with the big cannon sticking out. I picked up a Hasegawa 129 kit also a few months back in a show. Shame to cover up that interior work behind the cockpit though.
What a find on that kit. I love the looks of that bird and I agree it is one of the cooler planes of the era. The tank is looking good. Keep us posted.
Ahhhh, the flying tank! I have no idea why I haven’t picked up one of these yet but I need to. Cockpit looks great, and I agree it’s a shame to cover up the fuel cell. Would you dare have a removable portion of fuselage? (Or is that glued in place now?)
Thanks everyone for the responses!! Unfortunately the fairing over the fuel cell is glued down as of right now. Good news is that there is actually quite a bit of detail to be seen through the refueling caps on top of it so hopefully scratching them and leaving them open will work . I’ve also thought about opening one of the side sliding windows in the canopy so the interior can be seen a bit easier also. I have the Squadron vac formed canopies so maybe its a good thing these come in 2 packs!!![:D]
That would be the one Hans. And this thing had a wide array of weapon arrangements. Came with two 7.92’s and two 20mm cannons in the fuse with the option of having bombs or 2 versions of the 30mm cannon, and they even tried fitting modified Pak40 to this bad boy! There was even a prototype of one that had something like 6 anti-tank mortars mounted throught the fuse pointing down. I think had they fit it with better engines as it was very underpowered, it wouldve been much more well known. Those crazy Germans would try anything!!
That’s exactly right; the damn thing was notoriously underpowered. The poor Germans never did find a suitable engine for it otherwise it would have really given the IL2 some serious competition. But then again, good old Hans Rudel did that with his Ju87 “kanonenvogel”!
I dug through my magazines and in an issue of Planes of Fame I found a 15-page article chock-full of photos and some color profiles of the Hs 129… Now I gotta get one in 1/48th somewhere (for 20-25.00)… The Freijagd is on…
Ok, dammitall… Against all my 1/48th scale price principles, I bought it… Cost over 25.00 though, just wanted you to know that… But I found some cash I didn’t know I had stashed today…