1/48 Hasegawa Kyushu J7W1 Shinden

Gallery Article by Randy Lutz

 

The model represents: The prototype aircraft used for flight tests at Mushiroda Airfield, Fukuoka Japan during August of 1945.

 

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Modifications to the kit consist of the following:

Cockpit

  • photo-etched seatbelts installed

  • seat back modified to correct shape and seat frame added

  • throttle and mixture controls added

  • gunsight removed, as it was not fitted on prototype

Fuselage

  • nose gun port covers made from sheet styrene

  • all raised panel lines were re-scribed

  • engine cooling fan made from sheet styrene

  • sliding portion of canopy replaced with vacuform piece

  • antenna wire made from stretched sprue

Wings

  • pitot tube drilled out

  • all raised panel lines were re-scribed

Paint and Decals

  • airframe painted with Xtracolor X353 Navy Green, X364 Navy Grey,  X11 Trainer Yellow and X103 Insignia Red FS11136

  • all markings are painted

References

  • Famous Airplanes of the World,  No. 129 Kyushu J7W1 Shinden

This kit, while of older vintage, has fit that rivals the new Tamiya kits on the market.  It is built basically out of the box aside from rescribng the model and adding seatbelts and gun port covers.  No decals were harmed in the making of this model as all markings are painted on.

 A full length building article appeared in the October 2002 issue of SAMI.

Randy Lutz

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Photos and text © by Randy Lutz