The Little World

Wobbling through Google the other day I discovered a colour scheme for the Focke Wulf 190 fighter plane that looked quite interesting. It has little to do with any boxed kit, but I can get other decals and paints readily. All you need is reference material and the inspiration.

But what kit to get? There is a plethora of them – from the A models through to the longer-nosed D and F models with bigger engines. Some makers box different decal sheets and call them different planes – and in one case I counted at least 6 variants from the same mould. I was also able to find kits from at least 5 makers. You could be forgiven for being confused as to which to buy.

I was more focused – I wanted a radial-engined A model, and wasn’t at all fussed what decal or colour scheme was offered in the box. I could choose from simple Hobby Boss or Mister Craft – the latter would have been a more doubtful proposition. Both of these were under $ 15 per kit in a local shop. But I have had an experience with Mister Craft recently that makes me regard it as a last resort choice.

Further along the shelf was an Airfix kit that has had a good write-up – $ 26 with a brush and four pots of acrylic paint. No need for the pots of paint – and the brush looked distinctly amateurish.

And finally, a sealed Hasegawa kit purporting to be the plane of Adolf Galland. I hold neither brief for nor grudge against Galland and will not be spraying Luftwaffe colours anyway…but I do respect Hasegawa kits. Never had a bad one, either in original supplied form or in later re-issues from Academy. It was only $ 4 more, so I went the extra expense.

The result was all I wanted. Clean sprue trees and crisp detail – no flash. Enough detail to satisfy without overwhelming the builder. Clear canopy.

The instructions are clear enough and the call-out keyed to Creos GSI paints.

I am intrigued with the decal sheet’s inclusion of swastika markings for the tail of the aircraft. These do not appear on the box art nor the colour call-out, but they are there on the actual decals. This would seem to be paying outside service to the European ruling against swastika display, while hiding them inside. I’d bet that it would still get an EU refusal once this was pointed out.