Does anyone know if this is the same kit as the Italeri or Airfix one in 1/72 scale? Thank you!
I would lean towards it being the Airfix kit rather than the Italeri. If it’s an MPC boxing, that would have put it somewhere in the late 70’s/early 80’s? I don’t recall Italeri having a '130 out at that time.
If it helps to identify it, the Airfix kit had movable control surfaces, and movable ramp (if you didn’t glue the struts on)
MPC kit is the Airfix kit. Their Profile Series were all Airfix kits molded in white (at least all of the ones I purchased were) and some of the first to have multiple marking choices–I loved them for the box art if nothing else! In the early 80s/late 70s, MPC kits were released in the same colored plastic as the Airfix issue, for the most part. I still have an HH-53 Super Jolly molded in green, a Falklands series Sea King in dark blue, Westland Lynx in dark blue, Puma and GR3 in grey; the C-130 was molded in green, box art was of an aircraft running on the ground (I purchased one years ago when it first came out in 82 or 83 but had to take it back due to the cockpit not being properly molded). I believe the instruction sheets made mention of Airfix. Another give away to Airfix is the use of the same pilot figures in all of their modern era kits–helos and fixed wing all had the same crew figures–flight helmets, right arms on sticks,etc…
YES. This is one dead give-away. For this era kit it would have had their “mid” jet-era fids. Right upper arm moulded tight against the side, but extended straight out at the elbow, left hand against the outside of the left thigh, head turned slightly to the left and legs tight together, but the right leg slightly forward from the knee down, about half a boot forward at the feet.
Later kits (from about '75 onwards) had a different pattern pilot figure, “big” helmet with arms and legs laterally symmetrical.
When the Airfix C-130 came out it was in the late60s, early 70s with the boxart showing a C-130, usually British, Taking off from a dirt strip. In the mid 70s, about 75-77, MPC came out with the kit. The fit of the windows below the flight deck windows was not too good, but neither was the flight deck windows. For the smaller windows I ended up filling in the gaps with plastic and putty, sanding the entire area smooth and polishing it out with Brasso. I had to do a similar job on the main windows because they didn’t fit all the way around aand the frames stuck out too far. Before I sanded the flight deck windows I cut around the inside of the frames so I would have a guide as I sanded and polished. I had no rescribe an occasional line once in a while in the process but it looked better when it blended in with the rest of the fuselage.
One of these kits I turned into a AC-130H, using a couple 1-32 miniguns from a OH-6 for the forward Vulcans, and a 105 from the Revell Skycrane as the basis for the Spectre modified 105. The observation domes I took from a Airfix/MPC B-29.
Okay, good. Thanks for the info!