The kit
The kit comes in a sturdy lid and tray box with superb artwork of the Mohawk doing what it does best in the jungles of Vietnam.
Opening the box reveals two cellophane bags. One contains five sprues of the main kit parts, two of which are identical sprues.
The plastic is fairly hard and carries some superb sharp detail. The panel lines are recessed and are fine enough to be appropriate for the scale. There is some flash on some parts but generally, it is fairly flash free and will clean up easily. Annoyingly, there are some ejector pin marks where I would prefer them not to be. There is quite a large one affecting the moulded rib detail inside the wheel wells and in the small spaces between the ribs inside the air brakes, certainly not easy to remove.
Some parts of the kit have a few scuff marks from all being in the same bag but no damage. However, in places there is an odd surface texture to the plastic. The small domed nose for example has a ripple effect which will polish out but shouldn’t be there. The wings and fuselage will also benefit from a polish. I am not talking heavy sanding here, it just that the surface is not quite as clean looking as I am used to.
Clear sprues
The second bag contains the very important clear parts. This is a very distinctive canopy made up of four parts, the windscreen, top and two gull wing style doors.
There are a few parts on the clear sprue not used in this version, a different instrument panel and screens for the SLAR unit. There is also a frosted clear nose cone which is only used, painted, on the third of the four schemes depicted.
The clear parts are frosted where they are painted but, thankfully, stunningly clear and distortion free where they need to be. The big problem will be joining the parts together without risking fogging and what the final fit will be like. I will let you know when I build it.
The decals
The decals are nicely printed, in register and clear. Mainly common stencils, of which there are loads of tiny ones, with minimal carrier film. The only ones that look like potential silvering problems are the thin black lines that will outline the grey/black walkways on the wings. It may be better to mask and paint these as the walkways have to be masked and painted anyway.
Other than stencils, there are minimal markings to depict four aircraft
- OV-1A sn 59-2617 23 Special Warfare Aviation Detachment Vietnam 1963
- JOV-1A sn 60-3736 225 Aviation Company, “Phantom Hawks” flown by Cpt Mike Langer, Vietnam December 1964
- JOV-1A sn 60-3729 23 SpecialWarfare Aviation Detachment Vietnam 1964
- OV-1A sn 63-13125 73 Avn Co (AS), An Xugen Province, flown by Lt. Johnson Vietnam Sept 1964
Remember, the JOV is the armed type. I will probably do the version III which has the different nose cone and armed for added interest. The paint schemes are pretty simple for these variants as two are Olive Drab all over and two are Faded Olive Drab. Later variants were in grey. One of the nicest builds I have seen of one of these not in grey was painted Field Drab which is a more brown olive than Green and should fit in with the faded olive drab nicely even if not 100% accurate.