Airfix A19004 Grumman F6-F5 Hellcat

Product Information

Only issue I faced was when I joined the fuse and wings together and found the fuse was slightly larger than the gap in the wings! Separate, robust wing spar stubs support straight or folded wings; Airfix correctly suggests trimming them for a smooth fit after assembling the wing internals.

Subsequent images represent this gradual building up of fuselage information and how the various components relate to the overall shape of the Hellcat and connecting areas of its internal construction.

Obviously, the Hellcat’s naval aviation heritage allowed for some distinctive build options to be included in the new kit, as well as having wide international appeal for an aircraft type which saw service with the US Navy, US Marine Corps, Fleet Air Arm and French Navy. The last photo is at an angle showing the oil lines into the firewall just left of the air intake I had such difficulty in locating earlier. A very nice touch is a complete page dedicated to adding ignition leads to each engine cylinder, if the modeler so chooses.

Astonishingly, during this fighting, five VF-27 pilots achieved the status of ‘Ace in a day’, with five aerial victories to their name, one of which was Lt. That date, as confirmed by the exclusive graphic displayed above, will be June 21st June 2019 – even though this is just fifteen days after the world will have marked the 75th Anniversary of D-Day, it might be a little fanciful to describe the Hellcat’s launch as H-Day. I gradually trimmed the structure where the center section and wing meet until they matched correctly. I thought I'd take a few shots of the underside and a few of the first time everything's been on together.So, the build of the cockpit itself was quite straightforward, HGW Seatbelts and I like to drill a little hole in the seat side and pass a small pinhead through to act as a fixing point. The box will contain multiples of each and every component frame of the new kit and as we have already seen, several members of the team will be presented with a complete set of parts, not just the lead designer on the project. A fighter aircraft is only doing its job when it is in the air fighting and is of little use if prone to excessive hangar maintenance time. Continuing the Hellcat exclusives theme of this latest blog and courtesy of Paramjit’s modelling talents, we are pleased to bring you a selection of these fantastic build images now. After joining the two tire halves together and dealing with the seam, I used my razor saw to reinstate the lost or soft tread pattern.

I have no shelf space left, but I’m sure I will find somewhere to place it until I start my next project, likely next October or so when the weather becomes cold again. Modest to a tee, Chris failed to tell us that at this stage, he had already spent months perfecting the shape of the Hellcat, then breaking it down into kit component parts, ensuring that all the manufacturing formers, ribs and stringers were in their correct positions. We feel sure that this Hellcat development issue of Workbench will leave many modellers hoping to add this new kit to their 2019 build schedule, but for one lucky reader, they will definitely be ahead of the Hellcat game. The phographs contained herein have been taken at the 2018 Scale Modelworld and show a full set of 9 greay plastic sprues, sans the clear sprue which will be added as the 10th item in the box. This is the fantastic Airfix Grumman F6F-5 Hellcat - the obligatory box art shot (Airfix currently has the best box art IMHO).So these are some pics with most parts in place but not glued and some bits of tweaking to paintwork needed. Yes a 1/24 Corsair would be great - naturally a "clipped-wing" FAA version (for fitting in smaller RN carriers) for me, but I'm biased! This must be quite frustrating for the designers working on these larger scale models, as much of this detail may never be seen once the model has been constructed, if the modeller has chosen to finish his kit in flight configuration, with all the engine panels in place.

Painting the inside of the undercarriage bays was easy: use the same colour as underside of aircraft.Here it is (along with the edges of the booth in the background), next to my 1/32 Tamiya Spitfire, which appears tiny in comparison. The separate control surfaces fit well but be aware that the cockpit controls are fixed and can’t be posed to match control surface deflections. The exhaust pipes go on very easily as long as you mark them up when they come off the sprues, otherwise it's a happy half hour mixing and matching. Using the LIDAR scan data as a hollow outline, the designer, Chris, needed to create a 3D CAD version of the information, which served as a base model shell, from which all the individual components of the kit can be produced and allowing every aspect of their design to be assessed and perfected. It just gives a hint of something lighter over the ribs and you can then play around with mist coats to get it right.